Every time atheists or secularists allow a debate to be framed around “what the Bible really says” or “what the Qur’an truly means,” we lose before we begin. The ground is already tilted. You are not debating reality, but the fine print of a work of fiction.
It’s like arguing over whether Sherlock Holmes lived on Baker Street or Park Lane. The answer might matter to fans of Conan Doyle, but it tells you nothing about truth.
Religious apologists want the fight in the weeds. They want hours spent trading obscure verses, footnotes, and “original meanings.” Why? Because once you accept the scripture as the source, they’ve won. You’re debating inside their invented universe.
The honest position is simpler and more radical: these texts are man-made. They are not evidence. They are not divine revelation. They are collections of myths, stitched together by tribes and councils, edited, translated, and weaponised for power.
Christopher Hitchens put it plainly: “What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence.” Bertrand Russell wrote, “Religion is something left over from the infancy of our intelligence; it will fade away as we adopt reason and science as our guidelines.” And Richard Dawkins reminded us, “We are all atheists about most of the gods humanity has ever believed in. Some of us just go one god further.”
These aren’t just witty lines. They are warnings. Every moment spent trying to win a game of scripture ping-pong is a moment wasted, because the premise itself is false. The texts have no divine authority. Once you grasp that, the endless debates about translation, context, or “what God really meant” fall into irrelevance.
So stop playing by their rules. Refuse the weeds. Keep the discussion where it matters: reality, evidence, ethics, freedom, equality. Ask for proof. Demand reason. Speak for human dignity, not divine dogma.
The world doesn’t need another hour wasted on whether Leviticus 18:22 or Surah 4:34 is being “misread.” The world needs people willing to say: it doesn’t matter. The entire foundation is invented.
If we want progress, we have to stop fighting on their terms. The scriptures are not the battlefield. Reality is.