Mark Twain on Christianity

This will be quite a random post, as I haven’t posted in a while, but wanting to give something to read, in addition to making it on the subject of apologetics, I am posting a paper I wrote my senior year of college for my World Literature class.  Want to know the type of sarcasm that atheism employs when dealing with Christianity?  Read some Mark Twain.

When speaking of literary humor, one cannot help but mention the name of Mark Twain.  Whether discussing his works in children’s literature or his diverse views on life, one recognizes that Twain’s maxims have become classics.  Yet, many people are unaware of the negative religious views and undertones found within his writings.  Unbeknownst to many of his readers is a deep abhorrence for religion – especially Christianity.  The writings of Mark Twain reveal his deepest objections to religion, the Christian God, the Bible, and Christian people, due to a strong skepticism and belief in science and a conservative, Calvinist rearing.

One of the most obvious aspects of Twain’s writing is his objection to religion. Twain once said, “I cannot see how a man of any large degree of humorous perception can ever be religious – except he purposely shut the eyes of his mind and keep them shut by force.” Twain was reared in a conservative, Calvinist home.  After the death of his father John, his mother, Jane, then began to raise the family in Hannibal, Missouri, where she had recently joined the Presbyterian Church.  Twain said of his mother, “On coming to Hannibal, she

joined the Presbyterian Church, and her religion was that clean-cut, strenuous kind which regards as necessary institutions of hell and Satan, though she had been known to express pity for the latter for being obliged to surround himself with such poor society.” The influence from Twain’s mother was apparent later in his life as her strict adherence to church attendance and Bible study seemed to push Twain away from Christianity.  Twain claimed that he often had to attend Sunday evening services at church as punishment from his mother.  As a result, Twain often considered this to be the worst discipline he endured from his mother.

The influence modernism had on Twain is visible in all of his writings.  One such modernist, Charles Darwin, had a great impact on Twain.  Twain was very familiar with the writings of Darwin as he owned thirteen of his books. He also had a deep admiration for Darwin’s work and often referenced it within his own writings.  The majority of these references to Darwin are positive, and become even more favorable as his literary career progressed. It was through Twain’s acceptance of the Darwinian theory of evolution that his skepticism toward Christianity began to grow, leading to his lack of understanding as to why anyone would accept the Bible as literal.

Secondly, Twain had an obvious objection to the idea of the Christian God.  One such example of Twain’s objection is found within his work Letters from the Earth.  Within this writing Twain tells about the creation of man and about Satan being banished to earth as punishment.  While on earth, Satan secretly writes letters to the archangels Michael and Gabriel to inform them of how humans live and act on earth.  It is in this writing that readers are exposed to Twain’s diverse views regarding the thought of a Christian God, mostly presented in a negative tone.  The views expressed by “Satan” in his letters essentially present the thought that man is incorrect in all of his ideas about God and Christianity.  In the letter, Satan relates of how God tells humans, “Thou shalt not kill” and yet, “it is plain that he cannot keep his own commandments.” These same sentiments about the thoughts of God are echoed in other writings of Twain.  He writes in his autobiographical dictations:

In the Old Testament, [God’s] acts expose His vindictive, unjust, ungenerous, pitiless and vengeful nature constantly.  He is always punishing – punishing trifling misdeeds with thousandfold severity; punishing innocent children for the misdeeds of their parents; punishing unoffending populations for the misdeeds of their rulers; even descending to wreak bloody vengeance upon harmless calves and lambs and sheep and bullocks, as punishment for inconsequential trespasses committed by their proprietors.  It is perhaps the most damnatory biography that exists in print anywhere.  It makes Nero an angel of light and leading, by contrast.

In addition to Twain’s objection of God’s unjust punishment of men, he also rejected the concept of Christ being God.  The concept seemed too implausible for him to accept.  He wrote, “If Christ had really been God, He could have proved it, since nothing is impossible with God. . . . When God wants to prove that the sun and the moon may be depended upon to do their work every day and night, he has no difficulty about it. . . . It is only when He apparently wants to prove a future life to us that His invention fails, and He comes up against a problem which is beyond the reach of His alleged omnipotence.” In Little Bessie, one of his short, fictional stories, Twain expresses his views of skepticism through the medium of a three-year old asking her mother religious questions.  Bessie asks her mother if Christ is God.  After her mother explains that Christ is indeed God, Bessie answers, “I understand it, now, mamma, and it is quite simple.  One twin has sexual intercourse with his mother, and begets himself and his brother; and next he has sexual intercourse with his grandmother and begets his mother.  I should think it would be difficult, mamma, though interesting.” Again, Twain’s satirical voice shines through in a way that tries to completely shake the foundations of Christianity in a perverse way.

Further examinations of Twain’s writings reveal his objections to the Bible.  Twain was an extraordinarily knowledgeable person in Biblical literature, as he had read the Bible in its entirety at an early age, thus making him a “sharp critic” of the “Bible’s uncleanliness.” Twain felt that Christians were “credulous people who venerate the Bible but do not examine it carefully, preferring to rely on what preachers or biblical commentators want them to believe.” The same passages which reflect Twain’s objections to Christianity found within Letters From The Earth also reveal his attitude towards the Bible: “[The Bible] is full of interest.  It has noble poetry; and some clever fables; and some blood-drenched history; and some good morals; and a wealth of obscenity; and upwards of a thousand lies.  The Bible is built mainly out of the fragments of older Bibles that had their day and crumbled to ruin.  So it noticeably lacks in originality, necessarily.” Twain, though speaking through Satan, reveals his skepticism of the thought of God speaking to man through the Bible.  In his autobiographical dictations he wrote:

With a message to deliver to men which is of infinitely more importance than all those other messages put together, which [God] has delivered without difficulty, He can think of no better medium than the poorest of all contrivances – a book.  A book written in two languages – to convey a message to a thousand nations – which, in the course of the dragging centuries and eons, must change and change and become finally wholly unintelligible.  And even if they remained fixed, like a dead language, it would never be possible to translate the message with perfect clearness into any one of the thousand tongues, at any time.

A brief look into Twain’s writings reveals his obsession with the Bible.  The majority of Twain’s writing’s concerning the Bible was based on the book of Genesis, and the most famous of his writings on this subject were: The Diary of Adam, The Diary of Eve, and The Diary of Satan.  Twain’s writings on such subjects were often done in a satirical way in which he exaggerates the Biblical accounts to make them sound unbelievable. He laughed at the fact that someone would take the creation story as a literal account, and many people have attributed Twain as “indirectly helping release the Eden story from a literal interpretation.” Twain was also unable to accept the thought that “Adam is forbidden the fruit of a certain tree – and he is gravely informed that if he disobeys he shall die. . . . Adam was merely a man in stature; in knowledge and experience he was in no way the superior of a baby of two years of age; he could have no idea of what the word death meant.” It never resonated with Twain that such a punishment would come from a fair and just God.

Finally, Twain reveals his objections to the Christian people through many of his writings.  It appears his staunch Calvinist upbringing pushed him to be very critical of Christians in general.  Twain once “confessed that he resented adults who made him read, as a child, about the wickedness of David and Solomon in the Bible.” He often commented on the actions of Christians.  One such instance is found in Mark Twain’s Notebook, compiled by Alfred Paine in which Twain writes, “The first thing a missionary teaches a savage is indecency.  He makes him put clothes on.  He is as innocent and clean-minded up to that time as were our first parents when they walked naked before the Lord and were not ashamed.” Twain’s objections to Christian’s actions became more critical as his writings progressed.

Another writing of Twain which reveals his objections to Christians is The War Prayer.  In this book, Twain attacks Christians who pray to God for victory by reminding “all those who prayed for young patriots in battle what victory meant to the lives, lands, and homes of an enemy, or victims of imperialism.” In the writing, Twain uses sickening language to mock Christians prayers by stating, “O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded writhing in pain; . . . stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet!  We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is the ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek aid with humble and contrite hearts.”

In addition to The War Prayer, Twain states in section five of The Damned Human Race in an essay entitled  “The Lowest Animal” how all religious people, especially Christians, have committed horrible atrocities, thus making them lesser than actual animals.  He wrote, “Man is the Religious Animal.  He is the only Religious Animal.  He is the only animal that has the True Religion – several of them.  He is the only animal that loves his neighbor as himself, and cuts his throat if his theology isn’t straight.” Thus, one can easily see that Twain’s attitude towards a Christian’s actions were usually very critical.

A small glimpse at Mark Twain’s writings reveals his sundry views on Christianity.  Whether it is his objection to a sovereign, personal Creator, or his skepticism concerning the Bible, his writings show his opposition to the core components of Christianity.  Though raised in a conservative, Calvinist family, his life would never bear the fruits of a Christian.  With his strong beliefs in science, skepticism of the supernatural comes naturally, thus influencing his negative tones regarding the Christian faith.  Though often merely remembered by many for his writings as a literary humorist, Twain’s anti-Christian writings will forever be recognized as a major part of his contribution to American literature.

Please comment and critique!