“God, No!: Signs You May Already Be an Atheist and Other Magical Tales” By Penn Jillette. Simon & Schuster. 231 pages. $24.99.
Penn Jillette serves as the louder and much larger (6-foot-7, 280 pounds) half of the world-famous magic duo Penn & Teller who have the longest-running show ever (Penn & Teller: Bulls–t!) on Showtime (8 years) nominated for an amazing 16 Emmy awards.
They have performed blockbuster shows on the Las Vegas Strip as well as on Broadway, and they have appeared as frequent guests on most major television talk shows. Teller, also an ardent but not as outspoken nonbeliever, was busily occupied with other projects so his performing partner had to go solo on this literary outing.
Anticipating that his atheist manifesto will be interpreted as an attack on Christians, the author declares: “I haven't found Christ. I'm not even looking for him. I don't need or want salvation.”
The entertainer self-identifies as a hard-core atheist, which he defines as not even believing that other people believe in God. He calls agnostics “just cowardly and manipulative atheists.” It should come as no surprise that he departs radically from other anti-God advocates who eschew any form of proselytizing.
Instead, he aggressively exhorts all atheists to take full advantage of every opportunity to preach and promote their unbelief and feel impelled to share their scientific, rational stance with anyone who will listen. Unlike many critics of religion who emphasize only the harmful and negative effects of belief, this spokesman acknowledges the bountiful contributions of writers, artists and musicians inspired by religion (he cites Bach in particular) and how culturally deprived we would be without their monumental and invaluable artistic treasures.
Raised in the Congregational Church, his road to unbelief began when he attended Sunday night youth group meetings. His non-stop questions and challenges became so threatening that the pastoral leader genuinely feared that Jillette's burgeoning skepticism might convert other members to atheism.
The real coup-de-grace to any lingering doubts about God came after one cover-to-cover read-through of the Bible, an experience the author insists serves as the best, most sure-fire way for anyone exposed to Judeo-Christian programming and indoctrination to quickly abandon their gullible and naive beliefs.
The structure of the work consists of ten chapters with the Ten Commandments as headings, and each title followed by the Penn Commandments.
For example, the Fifth Commandment (honoring parents) comes out as: “Be there for your family. Love your parents, your partner and your children. (Love is deeper than honor, and parents matter, but so do spouse and children.)”
The Seventh Commandment (re: adultery) reads: “Keep your promises. (If you can't be sexually exclusive, don't make that deal.)”
The author himself admits that he does a great deal of rambling in this treatise. He veers off in many directions, on many tangents such as: The Tea Party; a visit to a gay bathhouse in San Francisco strictly as an “observer”; his determination to experience weightlessness on a flight on the so-called “vomit comet”; his many woes with the TSA when flying and atheist parenting.
It might come as a real surprise to most readers to learn that as daring and intrepid as many of his exploits have been, the prestidigitator never once has tasted even a drop of alcohol or used any recreational drugs in his whole life.
In his literary pasture, there are no sacred cows. Anyone, everything become fair game as a target for his scathing, irreverent humor. He freely, continuously employs most of the taboo items on George Carlin's infamous FCC-censored list of Seven Dirty Words throughout the narrative, but his hilarious approach, particularly in describing memorable sexcapades, provides very entertaining reading.
He forcefully reminds us that since 9/11, we must conjoin the two terms “religious terrorism” to describe what blind faith can lead to and that the enemy is not Islam, or God, but rather faith. He soberly ends his fanciful diatribe with this stern admonition: “We must stop glorifying faith.”
Mr. Akerley may be contacted at benakerley@aol.com
