Godless: How an Evangelical Preacher Became One of America's Leading Atheists Paperback – September 1, 2008

While I have titled this review "Dan Barker 1, God 0" I must say that with this brilliant book, the score in Dan Barker's favor has to be much better than that; I just didn't know what other number to put down. Points get scored on just about every page, to the effect that religion simply doesn't measure up, any way one looks at it. And Dan Barker has good reason to know--if ever there was an inspiring story of someone's struggling up from being an evangelical Christian to being an atheist, this is it. The gap between fundamentalist minister and eloquently outspoken atheist could scarcely get any wider, and it's an amazing transition for anyone to have made.In fact, the first thing that occurred to me while reading this book was that although Barker is a writer of rare intellectual acumen--with lucid style, clear and crisp logic, and intricate but highly readable arguments--he obviously has had these writing and thinking abilities all his life, even back when he was a victim of evangelical religion. One has to reflect, anew, that religion can get its clutches even into those minds most admirably equipped to resist it, though with such minds the stranglehold of unreason should be only temporary. Unhappily, a lot of people don't ever make the transition, and the story here, of Barker's breaking free of the very worst mind-numbing effects of religious superstition, is truly memorable.He examines the reasons people have given for believing in God, and finds them lacking. He points out that it proves nothing for believers to appeal to the fact that there is a whole long-standing lore about religious belief, as one could make the same argument to justify believing in Santa Claus, there being a vast literature, body of music and ritual, and so on, "proving" the existence of jolly old Saint Nick. Just as in the end it's the fertile imaginations of children keeping all this alive, so with religion and belief in God.Barker rejects the notion (often leveled against writers against religion) that one must be an expert in theology to take religion on; this, as I recall, has been an objection often thrown in Richard Dawkins' way. With characteristically simple yet effective logic, Barker simply replies that if that were the case, most Christians would have to be thrown out of church for not knowing any theology to speak of. (A friend of mine used to say, "I don't have to be an architect to know when a building is falling down around me.") And why, Barker wonders out loud, do ministers who know nothing about science get away with making (pseudo-)scientific pronouncements?Faith and blind belief, Barker argues, are the problem--if what one believes is really true, why would anyone resist its being tested by science and by logical argument? Yet religious believers do often resist this. Barker calls faith "a free lunch"--it's "a way to get there by now doing any work." Touché.Against the notion of "intelligent design" Barker simply points out that the supposed complexity of the universe needs no such hypothesis, as a gradual evolutionary development is quite adequate for explaining the world in which we find ourselves: "Evolution explains how complexity can arise from simplicity." One of my favorite lines in the book: "People who are impressed with the design argument are like the guy who is amazed at all the rivers that were made to flow along state borders." Delectable.Barker goes on to demolish, in his somehow gentle yet uncompromising way, the other bogus arguments for God: mystical "experience" of God (nonexistent outside of the mind), popularity of the belief-system (but a lot of horrible things have been popularly agreed upon throughout history), the specious equating of religious belief with morality, and so on. He takes on the famous Pascal's Wager (the notion that one ought to believe "just in case" there is a God who expects to be believed in) by offering his own Barker's Wager: that one ought not to believe, just in case there is a God (just as probable or improbable as the one most people believe in) who only looks kindly upon those smart enough not to believe in him, so that Christians for example would end up on the wrong side. This is the kind of thing that makes the book so enjoyable, yet Barker manages to do it all without losing sight of the seriousness of his literary purposes.He goes on to examine Biblical religious traditions with an eye to pointing out that anyone who denies that these texts are preposterously contradictory just isn't paying attention. When one looks at these texts perceptively and fairly, one finds it strange that anyone can take them with such owlish seriousness. All in all, Barker makes the case that people who were in his position--essentially sucked in by insupportable belief-systems--can very well climb up and out, as he has done.This is a classic. Read it.

Barker's "Godless" serves as an excellent primer for some basic (and not-so-basic) reasons why a person shouldn't affirmatively believe in a god. It's mainly targeted at Christians, and mostly of the Protestant Evangelical brand, but its broader message (especially the philosophical points it makes) are well applicable to most theism.Other reviews have covered various details of the book's content at length, so instead I'll focus on what I got out of it as a firm and committed agnostic (former Orthodox Christian):The Good:--Engaging and moving account of Barker's journey from fundamentalist theism to rationalist atheism. His enumeration of particular thoughts and mindsets will strike deep chords in most Christians.--Excellent and nuanced discussion of some of the higher philosophical arguments for and against God. Complex and somewhat obtuse, but highly compelling once understood.--Particularly well-reasoned and hard-hitting discussion of the historical-critical method and its implications for the Gospel accounts and the historical Jesus.--Explains in simple language why divinely-ordained morality is unworkable and how men can be good without God.--Generally takes a less rabid and polemical tone than folks like Dawkins and Hitchens; Barker is as sympathetic to Christians as he is unrelenting to Christianity, and this makes it more readable and appealing to the audience that actually needs to hear what he has to say.The Bad:--Rough around the edges when it comes to dogmatics. Barker's Christian background was quite theologically rudimentary, and it shows when he talks about the details of doctrine, especially when it comes to Catholicism; Orthodoxy, unsurprisingly, goes unmentioned. This leads to unfair and inaccurate characterizations and conclusions (such as his bizarre anthropomorphism-filled "letter" from God to a theologian), which are sure to turn the true believer off and cause dismissal of his many more valid and hard-hitting points.--Odd focus with certain arguments. Barker spends pages and pages dissecting the rather easily refuted Kalam Cosmological Argument, while giving far more common arguments (e.g. teleological, argument from morality, argument from beauty, argument from reason) only a cursory treatment. He does a good job covering everything he covers, but his focus seems more tailored to his personal interests than to detailing the fallacies of the most common arguments and the nuances of their superior alternatives.--The significant portion of the book devoted to debunking "Biblical morality" was an huge disappointment. Barker unapologetically uses only the most rabid and fundamentalistic interpretations of quite a few Bible verses to prove that the morality set forth in the Bible is unacceptable. This refusal to accept potential ambiguities and alternative views amounts to basically a straw man thrown at the totality of Christianity. It's a real shame, because his conclusion is sound, and he could have much more persuasively made his case had he extended every interpretative benefit of the doubt to show that no matter how you play with it, Biblical morality contradicts universal ethical norms.--I was bugged by Barker's occasional equivocation. For example, he uses a contemporary definition of "love" and thereby argues that New Testament morality is silly because it advocates warm fuzzies toward one's enemies. "Love" as set forth in the NT is, of course, not an emotion at all, but a mindset, an approach, a commitment to compassionate action (hence its common rendition as "charity" until late in the past century). Such rhetorical tactics are beneath Barker, particularly when he spends so much time taking Christians to task for intellectual disingenuity.--Finally, I was quite annoyed whenever Barker committed the fallacy of composition, i.e., "Christians do immoral things, so therefore Christianity is immoral." Barker often fails to clearly separate what's taught from how it's understood, and equally fails to distinguish that from what people actually do and how it relates back to the teaching and understanding. I imagine he would jump all over any individual who asserted that Stalinism means atheists as a whole teach and are disposed to evil, so it's vexing to see him fall into the same polemical trap, and I could see a Christian totally tuning him out after rhetorical fallacies like this and his occasional equivocation.In sum, the book is largely excellent, an easy and compelling read, both a gripping personal story and a high-minded intellectual endeavor. Barker has generally done his homework extensively, and it shines through. While marred by a few significant flaws that prevent my recommending it without reservation, "Godless" is a great read that is well worth the time of both atheist and open-minded believer alike.