Well....in the third book they did kill "God". Granted "God" was just
the first angel.
I could see how people can interpret that as "promoting atheism"
On May 1, 2008, at 9:00 AM, Jim Davis wrote:
> Here be Spoilers (come to think of to both "The Golden Compass" and
> "The
> Bible").
>
> I finally got around to finishing the trilogy. I knew from the
> religious
> right that these books "promoted atheism" but, of course the first
> book had
> nothing of the kind in it. The second book began to poke nastily at
> the
> church and the third book opened things up hugely in that
> direction... but
> never, ever did these books even come close to presenting an
> atheistic point
> of view.
>
> Anybody care to share some light on this?
>
> In the books:
>
> 1) God ("The Authority") ABSOLUTELY EXISTS. Yes, he's not immortal or
> omnipotent, but he is (or was) immensely powerful and easily fits the
> classic view of God.
>
> 2) Angels exist. Lots of them - especially many of them names
> explicitly in
> the bible. The angelic rebellion exists. Granted the books make it
> clear
> that "angels" were probably men once but still...
>
> 3) Ghosts and the land of the dead (very "Hell-like") exist. When
> you die
> you continue on in spirit form.
>
> 4) We have "souls" (the Daemons) and it's made clear that even if
> you can't
> see your Daemon, it's there.
>
> 5) "Dust" is portrayed as unifying, intelligent force of elementary
> particles absolutely necessary for life and completely responsible for
> intelligent life. While Pullman never presents directly as such it's
> clearly analogous to the new-age babble-speak about "The Intelligent
> Universe" and the "something out there".
>
> So where's the atheism? I realize that these books are profoundly
> anti-religious but it seems like blaming atheism for that is just
> plain
> wrong. Pullman never claims an absence of God. He only slantways
> claims a
> materialistic viewpoint (in that "Dust" is described as a physical -
> but
> intelligent and sentient - partical).
>
> I'm just not seeing any atheism at all in this. If anything the
> books end
> up as a soft sell (a "stealth campaign", to use the words of the
> anti-atheism crowd) for informal religion than for atheism. Am I just
> missing the point here?
>
> Jim Davis
>
>
>
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