Mr. J. P. Holding, a librarian whose real name is Robert Turkel, uses much of his space devoted to Mr. C. Dennis McKinsey for personal insults and ad hominem attacks. He characterizes Mr. McKinsey as “having a hatred of all things religious”, of being “extremely irrational, so much so that other atheists and skeptics have rejected him.” This latter assertion is totally unsupported by a scintilla of evidence, and is factually untrue. Of course, Mr. McKinsey may well have atheists who disagree with him, or even hate him, but the same is true for anyone who debates religious issues as openly as Mr. McKinsey. Why, who knows, there may be Christians who do not approve of Mr. Holding.

Mr. Holding finds fault with Mr. McKinsey’s simple statement that pregnant women, and innocent children and animals were drowned in the putative flood, a mere statement of what the Bible says. He asks how Mr. McKinsey knows they were innocent, and opines that the drowned people preferred a quick death as opposed to a long one. Perhaps Holding knows of some animals that have a moral conscience, and were sinners, so deserved to be drowned, and perhaps he knows of some babies that are guilty of anything more terrible than soiling their diapers. Perhaps some drowned babies in New Orleans, Louisiana deserved it, in Holdings absurd moral system, and actually preferred the “quick” drowning.

That personal insults and ad hominem attacks are Holding’s preferred method of debate, one need only look at his treatment of G.B. Singh. He is said to possess a “low understanding”, “limited experience”, and, “has not done a great deal of study”, of various issues he [Singh] raises. Holding/Turkel implies that he is well informed, as contrasted with G.B. Singh, on the Christian doctrine of Trinitarianism, in which the deity is both one person and three persons, or one in substance but existing as three hypostases, or [insert your formulation here]. In reality no one is informed as to how 1= 3, and this includes Holding/Turkel.

Holding’s attempt to defend what the Bible says about slavery is pathetic. When Hebrew fathers sold their daughters into slavery, they were actually helping them, according to Holding, or rather his apologetic sources. Furthermore, according to Holding’s apologetic sources, the slaves in ancient Israel actually wanted to be slaves, for their own good. Where have we heard this kind of drivel before? In the 19th century in America, conservative Christians defended slavery, in part by telling us how much better off the slaves were than as free men. The Reverend Robert Fuller, from slave-owning South Carolina, advised in 1845 that “what God sanctioned in the Old Testament, and permitted in the New, cannot be sin.” And in the 20th century, conservative Christians defended racial segregation, saying it was better for all races.

Holding and his sources desperately try to deny that the Bible says what it does, by word-smithing, redefining, and interpreting. Don’t be fooled; just read the Bible for yourself.