Yup, I am no longer a Christian fundamentalist. I no longer believe the Bible is the inerrant word of God, or for that matter even inspired by God. I wrestled with my faith after 30 years of holding it tight. Too many things made no sense.
In the beginning, questioning triggered night terrors: was I forsaking God, and was he therefore forsaking me? I visited a psychologist to help me get through, and I began researching the historical jesus, and the beginnings of Christianity. As a Christian I only read books to support my faith, and defend it. Now I was curious about the evidence on the other side.
What most set me free from a biblical mindset were the teachings of Bart Ehrman, professor of the New Testament at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Ehrman attended seminary to become a teacher of “God’s word,” but after examining the historical Jesus, the origins of Christianity, and the origins of the Bible, he became un-converted. I wanted to learn what he learned that changed his mind, that caused his paradigm shift.
My questions were answered by reading Misquoting Jesus: The Story of Who Changed the Bible and Why, and listening to The Historical Jesus, a class Ehrman teaches through the Great Courses. Like, do you know the gospels were not written by Jesus’s disciples? They were written 30–70 years after his death. Nobody really knows who wrote them. The names Matthew, Mark, Luke and John were ascribed to them decades after they were written.
Ehrman points out errors in the gospels progression, like how Jesus became the “son of God” after baptism by John the Baptist in the gospel of Mark (scribed about 30 years after death), to “the son of God” in the womb in the gospel of John (scribed about 70 years after his death). And how in Mark Jesus had passover with his disciples before his death, but in John he died during the Passover, signifying that he was the sacrificial lamb of God. Ehrman’s study and writings opened my mind and liberated me from the ancient dogma of the Christian faith, and once again, the fear of hell.
