It is blasphemy to deny that man was created with woman, in the likeness of god (Gen. i., 27, and v., 1,2), and came into a world replete with life, with fowl and every living thing, over which god gave him dominion (Gen. i., 28). It is also blasphemy to deny that man was created without woman, and came into a world where there was no life, and that god, pitying his loneliness, formed all living things in the attempt to make a help meet for the man, and that failing in this attempt he lastly made a woman, not with man but long afterwards (the making and naming of all animals and birds intervening), out of one of the man's ribs which he detached for that purpose from his skeleton while the man was asleep (Gen. ii., 7, 18, 19-22).
It is blasphemy to deny that god gave man for food "every tree in the which is the fruit of a tree" (Gen. i., 29), while it is equally blasphemy to deny that the "Lord God" withheld from him as food one of the trees (Gen. ii., 17.)
It is blasphemy to deny that god, who is "the truth," said that Adam should die "in the day that" he eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge (Gen. ii., 7), and it is blasphemy to deny that so far from dying in that day, "all the days that Adam lived were 930 years," and that "he begat sons and daughters" (Gen. iv., 5, 4) long after the day on which, unless we blaspheme and make god a liar (1 John v., 10), we must believe that he died.
It is blasphemy to deny the fable of the Fall. It is of divine authority that a talking snake persuaded Eve to eat the fruit of the forbidden tree, and that by eating this fruit man and woman found out that they were naked, a sufficiently obvious fact of which they appear to have been ignorant. The first result of eating the forbidden fruit was a regard for decency, and they made some somewhat inadequate clothes out of fig leaves, sewing them together. There is no divine authority as to the implements used, nor as to the discovery of the needles and thread which seem necessary for the sewing. God who is "a spirit" (John iv., 24) and who is "without body" and "parts" (1 Art of the Church established by law) "walked in the garden" (Gen. iii., 8) soon afterwards; it is blasphemy to deny that god walked, and blasphemy to assert that he has legs. The method of walking without legs is not revealed to us on divine authority, so we must believe (literally) without understanding.
It is blasphemy to deny that "the eyes of the Lord are in every place;" it is also blasphemy to assert that the eyes of the Lord were in the special place wherein Adam and his wife "hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God amongst the trees" (Gen. iii., 8). The only way to reconcile these contradictions is to believe that Adam and his wife and the trees behind which they hid themselves were nowhere, and to believe this comes perilously near the blasphemy of denying the whole story.
It is blasphemy to deny that god cursed the serpent- who had unfortunately lost the power of speech just at the time at which he most required it-for being the helpless tool of Satan, and condemned him to go on his belly and to eat dust. Divine authority does not say how snakes went about before this literal fall, whether on their heads or their tails, so that the method of their locomotion is not of faith.
It is blasphemy to deny that god made coats of skins for Adam and Eve, although coat-making seems rather a curious employment for a deity, and scarcely as dignified as world-making. We are not told what became of the animals whom god deprived of their skins for this purpose; nor whether he killed them first. If he did, then death first entered into the world by god's immediate act. As it is blasphemy to deny that death entered into the world by sin (Rom. v., 12), it is difficult to avoid identifying god with sin, and this, again, is, I fear me, blasphemy.
If in any other old eastern book we read about trees the eating of the fruit of which gave knowledge, serpents which talked, gods who walked in gardens and who made coats, we should at once understand that we were reading old myths, and should never dream of regarding them as a record of historical facts. If we apply the same reasoning to the Bible, Justice North will send us to pick oakum here, and we shall be burned for ever hereafter.
It is blasphemy not to believe that "Cain went out from the presence of the Lord" (Gen. iv., 16) – whom it is blasphemy to deny is everywhere present-and that god put a mark on him lest any one-there being only in existence his own family-"finding him should kill him" (Gen. iv., 15). It is blasphemy not to believe that having a wife, who was also his sister, and who bare him a son, he "builded a city" (Gen. iv., 17) for himself, his wife and child. How many houses there were in the city, and whether each of the three inhabitants lived in a separate house, or the trio moved from house to house, so as to inhabit "the city," these things are not revealed by divine authority.
It is blasphemy not to believe that Adam lived 930 years, Cain 910 years, Methuselah 969 years; and that the rest of the antediluvian patriarchs lived to approximate ages. It is useless to allege that such preposterous terms of life are contrary to all experience. "He that believeth not shall be damned."
It is blasphemy to deny that all the human race are descended from one man, Adam, created 5,887 years ago. It is true that there was existing in Egypt a settled government more than 11,000 years ago, and as a settled government implies centuries upon centuries of political evolution, it is hard to reconcile this fact with the declaration made on divine authority that man has only existed for about half this period. Egyptian antiquities are not safe subjects of study for the true believer, and a nation which has blasphemy laws on its statute books should shut up its museums and burn its collections of Egyptian treasures, for each room stored with these objects is a training school for blasphemers and a standing menace to the faith of the young. Justice North should also ask that the delta of the Mississipi should be blown up with dynamite to the depth of at least a thousand feet, for that blasphemous ground has given up human bones, says the blasphemer Gliddon, which formed parts of living men 57,000 years ago.
It is of divine authority that "the strength of Israel will not lie nor repent, for he is not a man that he should repent" (1 Sam. xv., 29). It is of equally divine authority that "it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart" (Gen. vi., 6). It is blasphemy to deny that god knows all things before they take place; that before he created man he knew what man would do, and slew a lamb from the foundation of the world (Rev. xiii., 8) to atone for the sins not then committed, but which man would commit in due time; that at this same period the book of life was written containing the names of all those who were to be saved (Rev. xvii., 8); that no sin occurs that god does not himself do, (Is. xlv., 7; Amos iii., 6), so that he need not have any difficulty in avoiding sin if he objects to it. Since it is blasphemy to deny any of these propositions, it is a great trial to faith to believe that god repented when he saw happen the facts he fore-ordained, and grieved over the wickedness which he caused; yet hard as this is, you will be damned if you do not believe it, so you had better try to do so.
It is blasphemy to deny that god, "whose tender mercy is over all his works" (Prayer-book), said that he would destroy "both man and beast, and the creeping things and the fowls of the air" (Gen. vi., 7). We are not told what sins had been committed by the beasts and fowls and creeping things, so that god exclaimed: "it repenteth me that I have made them." If the Bible were a mere human book, and "the Lord" were a mere ordinary man, I should say that he was behaving like a naughty, passionate child, who has lost his temper because the paper animals he has cut out very badly will not stand properly, and who tears them up in a rage. But as it is blasphemy to say this, and blasphemy to deny that god did act exactly in the fashion that would be naughty if he were a child, I can only suppose that the conduct for which a child would be put in the corner is admirable when displayed by a god.
Out of all the wicked men there was one man, Noah, who found "grace in the eyes of the Lord" (Gen. vi., 8). Noah was not what Atheists would regard as a very good man, so far as his conduct is recorded in Holy Scripture. In fact, we are not told of any one good action that he committed. He was a very selfish man, for he saved himself and his family in the ark, and left all his poor fellow-creatures to drown; he drank so much