Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Atheist Theologian Extraordinaire

[philosoraptor42]

Okay, so I just heard of her for the first time ever the other night when she appeared on the BBC Radio Comedy show "Museum of Curiosity". I've got lots to say about what I've come across, but for now I'll simply leave you with this transcript of her bits on the show.

Remember that it's a comedy show, so she's being intentionally flippant and her fellow contributors to the "museum" aren't taking it all entirely seriously either:

Host: Dr. Francesca Stavrakopoulou is the senior lecturer of theology at the university of Exeter, a member of the European Association of Biblical Studies and the presenter and writer of the BBC series "The Bible's Buried Secret". She also happens to be an atheist.

What's more, her time on TV has been spent arguing that Moses never existed, and that the Bible was re-written to malign Eve and erase God's wife from memory.

So Francesca, God's wife who was she then?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Well, she's a goddess called Asherah who was responsible for various life-giving functions in the earthly realm along with her consort, her husband, Yahweh. She's kind of fairly well known throughout the ancient Near East and she's pretty cool.

Co-contributor: What was she called again?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Asherah.

Co-contributor: So God was married?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Hmmm.

Co-contributor: Wow. I imagine that was a big spread in Hello wasn't it?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: But he divorced her and she didn't do quite so well in the divorce settlement. The God that's worshipped today by Jews, Christians and Muslims isn't the same as the God that the Bible was written about - and that God actually was the God who was married.
    
Host: That's really remarkable, I mean this has been kept a pretty tight secret then?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Really it's like a testimony to how bad scholars are at just communicating stuff that we talk about, because we've been talking about it for a long time. But a lot of people disagree with me. Anne Widdecombe disagrees with me.

Co-contributor: I think calling her "a lot of people" is a bit cruel.

Host: Have you found out any other weird things in the Bible that we all ought to know? What about the snake? Are you going to reinstate the snake as a sort of...?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Yeah, he's a good guy too.

Host: The snake is a good guy?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: He's been unfairly maligned. He was part of a healing cult in the temple, that was very quickly suppressed when monotheism emerged.    

Host: What was the fruit that he recommended, 'cause it wasn't an apple, was it?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Going on the kind of social/economic conditions of the time it was probably an olive.
    
Co-contributor: What is it with the 666...?

Host: It's 616 to start. There's a translation error, isn't there I think?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Yeah, it's a translation error...

Kind of like the virgin birth, that's a translation error too...

*stunned pause followed by audience laughter*

I'm just hitting you with one after another aren't I? I'm sorry.

Co-contributor: That's a translation error? I've made some excuses to ladies in my time, but..

Co-contributor: So it's 616 is the number of the beast?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: It's just about a magic code primarily. And it's based on how numbers represent alphabet letters and it's...

Host: Isn't it on the Pope's tiara. Did I read that somewhere?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: I couldn't possibly comment on that, I have no idea.

Co-contributor: The fact man's been <inaudible> tells me everything I need to know.

Host: You don't just write about the Bible Francesca I know. What about this um... Here's something that won't get you into trouble, this book you wrote about sacrificing children, how about that?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Yeah, I wrote that as well.

Co-contributor: You wrote a book about sacrificing children?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Yeah, it wasn't a manual. It was um...

I think, as a historian, I see myself as a historian, I look at religious practices and try to work out what was really going on and what people believed and I think this was a very high value, high status sacrifice that was believed to work. Um... so in that sense it was kind of a good thing...?

Co-contributor: Good luck with this one, you're on your own love. Don't look at me. I'm not going to help.

Co-contributor: I don't believe there were, but had they done any kind of random controlled tests?

Host: There were good sides to sacrifices. It says here that before having their chest cut open and their heart pulled out, Aztec human sacrifice victims were given a cup of hot chocolate.

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Yeah, yeah.

Host: Is it a widespread thing? Is that a well known...?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Most ancient cultures...

Host: Most of the them?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: ...have engaged in some kind of human sacrifice at some point and um... I looked at - so going to get me in trouble...- I looked at sacrifice in Biblical cultures and argued that Yahweh, the God who was worshipped in the sort of Iron Age period, - that he accepted child sacrifices. 'Cause it was like a fertility sacrifice. It was a way of saying "If I give you my firstborn child, i'm acknowledging to you that you are the God that made me fertile. And I want more children, so I'm going to give you my firstborn child..." Kind of like a harvest festival, but kind of.... anyway.

Host: Well *as if hurriedly changing the subject*, we must get on so um....

Ladies and gentlemen, the very much alive Francesca Stavrakopoulou.    





Later in the show:

Curator: So we'll start with your donation (to the Museum of Curiosity) Francesca. We've prepared a modest glass case for you, as you requested. What Biblical curio have you brought with you, that we can stick in there?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Um... I've brought God.    

Curator: So, tell us about this "supreme being".

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Okay, so the God I'm thinking about is like the God of western culture.    This kind of very male monotheistic God.

Curator: This is "Yahweh"?    

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: He's known to some as Yahweh, to other as "Lord". He's Allah to others, but it's..

Co-contributor: Some people call him the space cowboy, some call him the gangster o' love. People call me Murray. I'm really sorry.

You're putting God in the museum? He's already there, (whispers) *he's everywhere*.

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Well, that's the thing, I kind of think he's not. I think he's a relic of the past, to a certain degree, and I think for that reason alone he ought to be in a museum. He's past his best. I think to prevent him from kind of getting even more flakey, it's best to preserve him as we have him. He's kinda dangerous. He ought to be behind glass. But he's also really important. I think we ought to have him for future generations to study, so that's why I want to put God in.

Curator: There are lots of other gods, that you could have put in. Other gods from around the world, Centzon Totochtin, Aztec gods: Four hundred drunken immoral rabbits that like to meet up for frequent parties.

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Well that kind of makes sense because one of the neighbouring cultures, next door to ancient Israel; they had a polytheistic system of gods and the main god was Aeol (spelling?). And he used to throw parties all the time and there are lots of mythical texts that tell about him getting so drunk that he vomits and defecates. So it doesn't necessarily disqualify you from being a God to get drunk.

Host: Does it ever strike you as odd that the Old Testament is so different, the character of God, to the one in the New Testament?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: I don't think he really is that different. I think he's more pro-active in Hebrew Bible Old Testament texts.

Host: He didn't do a lot of smiting in the New Testament, did he?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Not much, no. But then the Romans are doing that, so yeah.
    
Host: Ah, they do it for him. Yeah.

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: There are a lot of those passages in the Hebrew Bible where God is more like the kind of fluffy, friendly, approachable God that you find in the New Testament. It's just that they're not talked about as much.

Host: Stephen Fry once told me that if he had to sign up for anything he quite liked Greek gods....

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Yeah, me too! That's what I like!

Host: ...because they are so capricious, which fits better with his idea of the way life is, Which is as a hurly-burly sort of rather chaotic and it sort of has a slight certain appeal. Do you find that?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: I find that much more appealing. They're more exciting and they're more real and they engage more.

Host: Okay, who invented monotheism?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Now, that's a very interesting question.

Host: Oooh okay.

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Do you think there's such thing as monotheism today?

Host: You're going to tell me there isn't?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Nah, not really...

Host: So, it's trinitarianism?

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: Yeah and there's like, most of the monotheistic religions have lots of divine beings and heavens. That doesn't seem that monotheistic to me...

Co-contributor: I was brought up Catholic and there's a million saints and then Mary and you pray to Mary. And then there's Jesus and the Holy Spirit.

Francesca Stavrakopoulou: I mean Christianity's kind of weird in the sense that, I understand theologically and intellectually why you've got different branches of Christianity. But like, Protestantism, to me, is a bit like Diet Coke or decaf coffee, do you know what I mean? If you are gonna do it, just do it.

Co-contributor: Yeah, I'm an atheist, but the Catholic God is the one I don't believe in.

Host: Okay, well we'll very gratefully accept God in the Museum. But just to be sure and just so he doesn't get all Old Testament on us we'll have to put up a sign saying no smiting, cursing, demanding child sacrifices or getting jealous.

Thank you very much Francesca.

Cross-posted to atheism