Strange…a God who could make good children as easily as bad, yet preferred to make bad ones; who made them prize their bitter life, yet stingily cut it short; mouths Golden Rules and forgiveness multiplied seventy times seven and invented Hell; who mouths morals to other people and has none himself; who frowns upon crimes yet commits them all; who created man without invitation, then tries to shuffle the responsibility for man’s acts upon man, instead of honorably placing it where it belongs, upon himself; and finally with altogether divine obtuseness, invites this poor, abused slave to worship him!
— Mark Twain, The Mysterious Stranger
Exactly! Love Twain.
Accurately stated. I am still amazed so many of us believed in this god for so long, and that so many still do.
I wish they had taught me this quote at school. However that would contradict their message of America being a “christian” nation
Mark Twain: One of the 5 people, living or dead, I would choose to have dinner with.
It makes me wonder why all the churches aren’t preaching against Mark Twain. If anything, he seems to be admired by Christians. I thought of this while watching “It’s a Wonderful Life” for the umpteenth time last week. The irony of Clarence the angel giving George a book of Twain’s writing never gets mentioned in discussions of the movie.
Maybe a lot of people aren’t aware of his other writings
Awesome, bro! Gonna have to steal, lol
Another of Clemens’ bitterly satiric insights.
I still remember reading a number of such anti-Christian commentaries by him when I was a Christian young adult,
but most of them didn’t upset me as a Christian since I agreed with Clemens’ keener ethical insights.
The best one by far was when Huck was wrestling with his conscience about whether or not to do his moral duty and turn in Jim.
Greetings. This quote is an excerpt from fictional work No. 44, Mysterious Stranger. No. 44 set in 1400s Austria is a character portrayed in three different Twain manuscripts as either Satan’s nephew, Satan’s son, or an interdimensional dream being who essentially is like Satan.
Mark Twain was never an atheist, though he serious cast doubt on human organizations and authority claiming religious power.
Lastly, No. 44 in the Dream being version, after engaging in magic and claimed that there was no reality and no God and no Afterlife, and that we were just dreams and thoughts.
These words expose Satan’s ultimate strategy, to turn Man against belief in God so that God condemns him to hell for eternity as He will do to Satan.
As for the quote, there is no pure evil person. And thus, in every child and person, there are God’s mercies, grace, blessings bestowed upon creation, life, humanity, directly and indirectly, explicitly and implicitly. Even the mass murderer finds moments in his life in which he provides mercy and benefits others for their lives and so on. The bleakness depicted by No. 44 or the August character does not fathom the extend of God’s incalculable mercies for all life and how even those who are evil become co suits for mercy and grace.
Twain may have not been an atheist, but he most certainly was not a Christian. Thus, either way, according to your theology, Twain is in Hell.
There is no God; there is no Satan. Thus, “God” gives no mercies, grace, or blessings. The only gods are us. We extend mercy, grace, and blessings to others — no Bible God needed.
And let me add, regardless of who is saying this, it is an accurate description of the Christian deity.
What I would like to ask is why is it us the created who appear to have to be the apologetics and not the creator?
“These words expose Satan’s ultimate strategy, to turn Man against belief in God so that God condemns him to hell for eternity as He will do to Satan.”
^ To add, I am seeing more and more of this from evangelicals. Gone are the days when they would say, ‘God did it’, but now they more often say, ‘the Devil did it’.
It’s almost as if they doubt the power of the God who they worship, perhaps even given up. I don’t remember it this way.