Upstreaming

For many, many years I have known what I believed and why. And I often think I "get" where other people are coming from, but every so often I find out I do not. Through various paths I discover that though they and I might use the same words we have completely different meanings, largely based on the context of our lives. Recently I have been discovering a serious flaw in the reasoning of some religious figures. I already knew I had serious disagreements with them, and now I am figuring out why.

It relates to a concept historians have called "upstreaming". A quick, down and dirty explanation is perhaps in order. When a historian upstreams, they start at the end and work back to the beginning. Conversely, if you downstream then you start at the beginning and work forward, examining things as they happen. Let's look at an example.

A historian who works downstream might look at the events leading to the Declaration of Independence as a flow where many things could have turned out differently. Had the policies of the Howes been followed, for example, then the colonies would have happily returned to the fold and remained British subjects just as Canada would later do. Had King George III responded differently even after the battle was joined it would have been just a hiccup and the colonies would have remained colonies.

Remember, as late as July 5th, 1775...AFTER the Battle of Concord, during the battle for Boston...Congress adopted the Olive Branch Petition, trying to make peace. It was nearly a year later, July 4th 1776 that the Declaration of Independence was signed. Thus there were clearly opportunities for a resolution long before the Declaration of Independence was formed. Great Britain could have altered their methods of taxation. Firebrands such as Thomas Paine, Nathan Hale, etc. could have been slain and their inspirational rhetoric might not have inflamed the patriotism of the farmers who would provide the backbone of the army. Washington could have been drawn into a conflict the Continental Army was ill-equipped to fight and the Revolution lost almost before it started. Remember, his military career was checkered at best with few successes prior to being named Commander in Chief. Had the Congress named the able Benedict Arnold, for example, he might have impetuously joined battle and lost.

In other words, when you downstream there are numerous places where alternatives occur. It was by no means a foregone conclusion the colonies would turn an attempt to reform taxation and governance principles into a rebellion designed to form their own nation.

However, a historian upstreaming might start with the Declaration and see it as the natural next step for the colonies after the writing of documents such as Common Sense or the various Circular Letters that so agitated people. By seeing where events ended, working backward they see how each step logically led to the next one and thus declare it was inevitable.

Who is right? That is very debatable. I would argue both are correct...and neither is. Sometimes great events of history are altered by the smallest details. History abounds with huge changes that are the result of inconsequential desires or needs.

With that said, what of the historian who downstreams and writes about the things he finds important? For example, if a historian wishes to tell the history of the development of democracy, he might start with the early development of Greece. He could discuss how various philosophers, reformers, and politicians shifted the view and practice of Democracy. He could discuss the way various battles and wars altered the practice of democracy and how the overthrow of Greece actually spread democratic principles to the Romans as Greeks became the teachers of the children of their conquerors.

The decline into the Dark Ages, the wars of religion, the Magna Carta, the colonizing of the world...all these things and many, many more could be discussed by said author. He could show how the development of the long bow by the English led to the development of the Church of England...and how that accentuated the advance towards today's version of democracy (okay, republican government) by allowing them to throw off the French chains. Finally he might arrive at the American Revolution and end his work there with the development of democracy in the "modern world".

Hundreds of years from now, someone might discover this work and study it. Then, because he knows the goal of this book...namely, to feature democracy as the desired goal of history and his version of events leading to it...this critic could accuse the writer of making up or changing the meaning of events to suit his own goals.

Don't laugh...I have seen it argued that the Magna Carta was not important to the British.

But the main point is that someone who has a different goal might argue against the nature of writing of such a historian because he believes the historian was upstreaming...starting with the result, going back and picking and choosing what to write about, changing the meaning and significance of events, ignoring things that seem to controvert his belief in the onward march of a political system.

That is how a lot of people view the writing of the Bible. Let me explain.

When I view the Bible, I view it as being what it claims to be...an account of the history of man as planned, produced, guided, and intended by God. The various writers...over 40 of them...were guided by the Holy Spirit, as related in Peter ("men moved by the Holy Spirit") to write what God wanted written. History occurred as He wished it to. When Israel broke his laws He used other nations to punish them. When Jesus came He had specific teachings to impart, both through His own teachings and through the things His followers would then relate.

Many, many religious people, however, look at the Bible as upstreaming...they claim the teachings were RESPONSES to prior events, not independent of them. They claim, implicitly at best and explicitly at their worst, that the Old Testament prophets were not independently proclaiming the will of God but instead were seeing things they personally disagreed with and their responses were what LATER became CONSIDERED to be the teaching of God.

I cannot express how extremely flawed this reasoning is. Perhaps this statement will do it: The "God" they believe in is a god that is created by man and manipulated by man for his own purposes and plans. The God I believe in created man and gives man choice, though the better choice is to follow the plan God laid out for man for His purposes. There can hardly be a larger divide.

My verbiage is hardly proficient in expressing the ideas percolating in my head. I wish I could express it better because this is a concept that is fundamental to explaining why bumper stickers such as "coexist" and groups such as Promise Keepers, the Purpose Driven Life, the Catholic Church, and, for that matter, any other denomination must be fought against.

People are often critical of the religious world for combating one another in the arena of who is teaching correctly. Ironically, it is those critics who are themselves wrong. It does not matter if someone is "close" but misses on key commands of God or if they are far away. If the Bible is indeed, as I believe, accurate, the Word of God, and the one path to heaven, then the person who disbelieves part of it is in the same boat as the person who believes it is "just a work of fiction" as many people who disbelieve proclaim it to be...even though it has been demonstrated time and again to be the most accurate, reliable work historically speaking in all the ancient world. People scoff at the numbers Herodotus gave for his battles...yet a Biblical account of a battle was used to win a battle in World War I! Interesting...

And the person who changes the Bible from being a true relation of God's plan into a series of reactions to contemporary problems, as the upstreamers interpret it to be, is a person who changes the meaning of the Bible from a book relating the path to salvation, as the internal claims relate it to be, into just a group of individuals striving to alter the morality of their people. And that is a sad, sad thing indeed.

Yet when I read many religious