From: sdoe@nmsu.edu (Stephen Doe)
Subject: Re: THE MIND OF THE BIBLE BELIEVER
Keywords: Bible--psychology--fundamentalism
Organization: New Mexico State University
Distribution: world,public
Date: Wed, 16 Dec 1992 04:14:35 GMT

In article <1992Dec14.192145.18552@en.ecn.purdue.edu> muehlhau@en.ecn.purdue.edu (John Muehlhausen) writes:
>I really enjoy these posts!  Keep 'em coming.  I don't know much about
>'academic' psychology, but everything presented seems to make pretty good
>sense.

Thanks.  It's been quite a challenge to "condense" Dr. Cohen's ideas
into a few posts.  Glad to hear I haven't totally botched it. :)

>Of course, the Bible clearly states that God's wisdom will appear as
>foolishness to "the world", which you would explain as a "cushion" against
>such a work as this.  

Yeah, that's Device 2 in action--discrediting the world.  Of course,
just shielding people from competing ideas will be enough to keep most
people from straying.

>I would like to present, for your analysis, the reaction of such a mind to
>what you have written:
>
>1: What alternative state of mind should I have, and why would it be any better
>   than what I have now?  (What is the state of mind of the author?)

The whole point of the work is that the Bible subtly encourages and
stabilizes a state of dissociation.  (If you recall, to Jung
dissociation was roughly analogous to Freud's notion of repression,
but covered a wider range of issues.  Basically, anything that was a
matter of bad conscience could be dissociated.)  The Bible encourages
the believer to project his better qualities onto a God-complex; this
means he can only see himself as a "sinner."  The Bible aggravates the
state of feeling "wrong, inferior and unhappy" that most of us have.

Now this God-complex cannot be apprehended by any of the four Jungian
functions.  Hence it needs to be constantly propped up through prayer,
Bible reading, church attendance and even religious radio/TV programs.
Complete saturation is the idea.  

In my next post I will discuss dissociation.  Let's just say for now
that imposing an artificially inflexible boundary between conscious
and unconscious is a bad idea.  If you recall our analogy of the
psyche to a parliament, then remember that in a neurotic person, the
complexes are disruptive because the ego-complex hasn't allowed them
to participate in the "government."  In a healthy person, the
complexes act more like a loyal opposition.

Having been through both Jungian analysis and fundamentalist
Christianity, Dr. Cohen has come away with the opinion that the best
state we can presently aspire to is a state of informed self-reliance,
rather than reliance on any of the ideologies that have plagued our
history.

>2: Where is the supposed harm that this is doing?  I don't see it anywhere in my
>   life - in fact, God has changed my life for the better!

Yes, I would have said the same during my Christian phase.  Yet
looking back, I can see only a state of chronic misery.  My biggest
fear was that those I cared most about--parents, siblings,
friends--would be sent to Hell for not accepting Christ.  My other
preoccupation was that I had not sufficiently conquered my sinful
nature.  Remember what Paul said:  "The good I would do, I do not do;
but the evil I would not do, that I do."  This does not sound like the
"peace that passeth all understanding" I had been led to expect.
(Though the Bible also says, "You shall have tribulation in this
world," which is usually not stressed to newcomers.)  Also I felt
guilty for any "this-worldly" activity--doing well in school,
activities that detracted from Bible study, even reading secular
fiction or listening to secular music.  Eventually, bewildered,
thinking I was one of those in whom the Word could not take root, I
dropped it.  I found the whole thing to be traumatizing.

Now anecdotal evidence doesn't count for much.  Dr. Cohen, however,
describes substantially the same experience when he speaks of his time
in Christianity, and has spoken to many with similar experiences.
Furthermore, his model of Christianity *predicts* that this can occur,
and that the believer will blame his own sinful, fleshly nature,
rather than the doctrine itself.  In my mind, this weighs heavily in
favor of his model.

>3: Given that God does in fact exist, re-write the analysis.

Dr. Cohen's model does not presuppose the non-existence of God per se.
However, he does not think that the God of the Bible is the true God,
if there is a true God.  He notes that Christ's failure of a speedy
return calls the supernatural premises of the Bible into question;
Christians get around this by "spiritualizing" the promise.  

>4: Why is presupposing that He does not exist any more credible than
>   presupposing that He does?

When one proposes a scientific model of something (some might say that
psychology doesn't really count as a science :) one does not include
God as part of the hypothesis--because science involves patterns we
see in nature.  Invoking a supernatural entity is akin to saying, "For
all we know, the world came into existence last Tuesday, with all our
memories in place."  There's no way to test this statement, so it's
useless.  (This at least presupposes non-interference from God, though
not necessarily non-existence.)  

If Christian's can't provide satisfactory evidence for their
assertions, it's fair for us to try out alternate explanations for the
phenomenon of Christianity.  If one of these explanations works better
(which I think Dr. Cohen's does) we ought to at least seriously
consider that explanation.  


>5: How could Biblical authors write such a cohesive and psychologically
>   influential book, separated in time and space as they were?  For that
>   matter, given the Old Testament, could -YOU- construct such a masterpiece
>   in your life-time, given the education of any one of the Biblical
>   authors?  Would -YOU- suffer and die for your careful lie?  What possible
>   gain is there?  I think "THE MIND OF THE BIBLE WRITER" is in order...

Part of the explanation for this is the unique historical conditions
of the time--ie, in Christianity we can see a synthesis of Hebrew and
Hellenistic ideas.  In particular Paul was little short of brilliant
in his formulation of Christianity--picking up the themes of death and
original sin from Genesis 2 & 3 that had been lying dormant for so
long.  The Bible authors were not trained psychologists, but they knew
their people well.  

Also there is no need to assume that the Bible authors were lying.
That is, I have no doubt they believed in what they were doing--even
as they were inventing the doctrine.  We can think of this as "double
orientation"--that is, part of you knows what you are doing, but only
in a peripheral sort of way.

Dr. Cohen uses the example of the "hysterical soldier" to illustrate
this.  That is, consider the case of a soldier who has seen his friend
die in combat.  He begins to doubt whether or not he did all he could
to save his friend.  Eventually the hysteria manifests itself in a
hysterical symptom--let's say blindness.  Though the soldier honestly
believes he cannot see, there is no organic impairment.  Dr. Cohen
once witnessed a demonstration with such a patient.  The patient was
led into the room, and in his path was a stool.  He was guided in such
a way that if he were truly blind, he could not avoid stumbling over
the stool.  Yet he did avoid stumbling over the stool.  At some level
the patient was aware that he was pretending, but he wasn't ready to
consciously admit that.  

So it is perfectly consistent that the Bible authors were willing to
suffer and die for their beliefs.  In effect, they "brainwashed"
themselves as well as their flocks.

>I think all of these are pertinent and need to be answered...
>
>Expounding on 4:  The human mind seems to exist in a greater state of
>"comfort" when there are no loose ends - when questions are answered.
>Credibility aside, why should someone choose to reject such a powerful 
>"answer" given (2)?

Because ultimately we cannot take comfort in spurious answers.  On one
level, the Bible believer knows he has no real knowledge of God--he
has not apprehended God with any of the four Jungian functions.  But
he represses this knowledge, perhaps by preaching all the more
vigorously.  (We can see this attitude in the advice once given to
Martin Luther by one of his mentors.  Luther wanted to stop preaching
because of his doubts over Christianity.  His mentor's advice: "Preach
faith until you have it; and when you have faith, you'll preach it!")

Confronted fairly, my ignorance should not impel me to take refuge in
a comforting fantasy.  Also, in my answer to question 2, we see an
example of the price that can be paid by those who indulge in such
mind-games.  I am profoundly grateful to be one of those who made
their way out of the "labyrinth," if you will.


I plan to get posts 4 and 5 in the series--the final ones, I hope--out
this weekend.  It is gratifying to see that some people have found
them to be of interest.

SD


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