Bad History and the Bible
Cover via Amazon Oil painting of a young John Calvin. (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) One of the most pressing but invisible threats to Christian thinking at the present time is that of fallacious history. Like carbon monoxide, it can kill; you just do not notice it is happening until it is too late. Fallacious history comes in numerous forms. The most obvious and influential are those pushed by popular culture. Movies are the primary culprits here. So powerful are the aesthetics of modern cinema that the stories the movies tell can be compelling for no other reason than that they seem so real. Thus, if there is a movie in which Americans crack the Enigma code in the Second World War , then the common assumption is, well, the Americans cracked the Enigma Code. (It was actually the British who did so.) Books, too, have an influence, especially those that are combined with a glossy movie. Take The Da Vinci Code , for example. Dan Brown tells us therein that the church only agreed to affi...