The Age Of Reason

Paine analyzes the Old Testament book-by-book in what is Age of Reason’s lengthiest chapter by far. To believe the Bible (and he always means the Old Testament specifically when he refers to "the Bible”), Paine writes that he would have to believe in a God who sanctioned all manner of cruelty, and this alone would prevent him from accepting the Bible as God’s word.

The Bible, however, contains many other problems. One of these is authenticity, for the Bible’s own internal evidence shows that Moses could not have authored the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Bible: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. Paine spends several paragraphs examining inconsistencies in the Book of Deuteronomy before proceeding to chronological and historical evidence, which forms a substantial part of his overall critique. One passage in Genesis, for instance, refers to the city of Dan, which did not exist under that name until more than three centuries after Moses’s death.

Next Paine identifies a passage from Genesis that he believes was actually taken from the Book of Chronicles. Another geographical reference from Deuteronomy dates to 400 years after Moses died. Based on the Biblical text, which is the only evidence he employs, Paine describes Moses and his successor Joshua as villainous characters and the Old Testament, which neither Moses nor Joshua wrote, as a blasphemy against God. Chronological evidence shows that not even the Book of Joshua was written by Joshua. Likewise, textual evidence suggests that Samuel was not the author of the two books of Samuel.

Paine pauses several times to chastise the priests for imposing this fraudulent Bible before resuming his chronological, historical, and textual analysis. On this basis, he debunks the two books of Kings. He notes that several parts of the Bible offer conflicting accounts of those it deems prophets. A comparison of Chronicles with the Book of Ezra reveals “several broken and senseless passages” consistent with “the disorder and ignorance in which the Bible has been put together” (95). The Book of Job, which Paine praises in an earlier chapter, contains internal evidence suggesting both that its author was not Jewish and that it is not an authentic part of the Bible. The Book of Job, for instance, does not contain anything like the historical narrative that characterizes the rest of the Old Testament. Paine dismisses the books of Psalms, Proverbs, and Ecclesiastes on familiar grounds related to chronology, authenticity, and immorality, respectively.

In the final third of Part 2, Chapter 1, Paine focuses on those whom the Biblical authors identify as prophets, beginning with Isaiah. Like most of the Old Testament, the Book of Isaiah strikes Paine as disorderly, anonymous, and filled with chronological impossibilities. The Book of Isaiah also features a prediction of a virgin birth, which New-Testament authors later identify as a prophecy of Jesus Christ but which Paine explains as a reference to contemporaneous events. Two consecutive chapters in the Book of Jeremiah, another purported prophet, give contradictory accounts of Jeremiah’s arrest and imprisonment. Furthermore, several of Jeremiah’s most important predictions proved demonstrably false. On the whole, Paine dismisses the Book of Jeremiah as “a medley of detached unauthenticated anecdotes, put together by some stupid book-maker, under the name of Jeremiah” (113). Paine reiterates his claim, advanced in Part 1, that the Biblical “prophets” were closer to poets or musicians than to the modern interpretation of that word that signifies an ability to see the future.

The Biblical prophets also served particular factions and almost invariably gave predictions designed to soothe their master or employer. Paine does identify Ezekiel and Daniel as the likely authors of the books bearing their names, but, as in the case of Isaiah and the prophesized virgin birth, Paine connects Ezekiel and Daniel’s dreams and visions to contemporaneous circumstances. Paine closes the chapter by mocking the story of Jonah and the whale, which Paine regards as a fitting way to conclude his analysis of a fraudulent book.

Part 2, Chapter 2 occupies fewer than half as many pages as the previous chapter, and Paine devotes the majority of these to an analysis of the Gospels: the books of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. The Gospels tell the story of Jesus Christ, whom Christians believe to have been the Son of God, conceived by the Almighty, born to a virgin mother, executed by crucifixion, resurrected, and ascended into Heaven.

Here Paine also identifies textual contradictions that, in his view, invalidate the whole. Christ’s genealogy, for instance, differs in Matthew and Luke. Matthew and Luke also differ on the story of the angel who proclaimed the Immaculate Conception, which Mark and John do not mention. All four books differ on crucial details of the crucifixion. Matthew, for instance, describes darkness, an earthquake, and a resurrection of all the saints, but none of these events appear in the other three books. On Christ’s resurrection, all four books mention Mary Magdalene appearing at the tomb, but they agree on little else (Paine even insinuates that Mary Magdalene was a prostitute). As for Christ’s reappearance after the resurrection, all four books agree that it took place in private, but they disagree as to time, location, and circumstances. Finally, Matthew and John are silent on Christ’s ascension into Heaven, while Mark and Luke mention it only in passing. Paine concludes his examination of the Gospel by declaring that it would be “impossible to find in any story upon record so many and such glaring absurdities, contradictions, and falsehoods, as are in those books” (138).

For the remainder of Chapter 2, Paine speculates as to how the New Testament came together and why it was imposed on the world. He believes that the four Gospel authors were not eyewitnesses to the events they describe, nor did they act in concert. Otherwise they would have coordinated their stories. He notes that the New Testament did not exist until more than three centuries after Christ’s death, at which point, he claims, it was cobbled together by early church leaders and then, by vote, declared the word of God. Paine quotes a late-fourth or early-fifth-century letter from Bishop Faustus, who denies the Gospel’s authenticity. Paine briefly analyzes the letters of Paul, which constitute the bulk of the New Testament after the Gospel, and which Paine regards as mediocre ruminations on the prospects of resurrection and immortality. Paine concludes that those who believe the New Testament “put man in the place of God, and have no foundation for future happiness” (151).

Paine admits the possibility of divine revelation but denies that God has revealed His word through the Old and New Testaments. He repeats his assertion that Quakers are true Deists.

Addressing a subject he did not cover in Part 1 or earlier in Part 2, Paine also rejects the Christian doctrine of loving one’s enemy, which Paine insists is impossible, and which he regards as additional evidence of revealed religion’s false morality. He denies the Trinity and accuses Christianity of producing “only atheists and fanatics” (158). He contrasts this with Deism, which does not serve the church-state union and its nefarious purposes. He closes with another appeal for Deistic science and philosophy, again urging readers to reject all revealed religion.