C. K. Shreve sounds as if he is very well versed in the Bible (“Answers to a letter writer’s religious questions”, published July 20).

I will readily admit I am not.

Now that we have gotten that out of the way, the questions that I posed might be taken up in Bible studies did not involve the basic rules for a society to exist such as the Ten Commandments, of which any large group of people hoping to live in close proximity to each other would have to declare, and it certainly would not take a supreme being to figure out. That is the reason these rules are codified into our laws, not because some “supreme being” handed them down to us.

What I was questioning in regards to this “Holy Scripture” is all of the inanities, inconsistencies and absolute absurdities that make up this book: God is a kind and benevolent God; no wait, God is a vain and jealous God; He loves His creations; no wait, He destroys all of humanity; He encourages genocide, He encourages adultery, He condones slavery, He seems to enjoy all of the frailties of human beings — one could wonder how that might be if they took the time.

Mr. Shreve informs me that my questions might be answered by citing me passages from the Bible so it seems apparent to me that he just wants me to find the answers myself in this book of fables and folklore which has, most likely, been misinterpreted by people in the past without a clear knowledge of ancient Hebrew, Greek and Aramaic who tried to translate it to English. Since he is so well read of the Bible he could have, perhaps, explained to me himself the answers that there are no answers for, tower of Babel; no room for nearly three million animals on the ark. Sure, I did get one answer from a true believer a couple of weeks ago, a couple of answers actually: “The predators weren’t predators until after the flood” and “They weren’t trying to build a tower, it was a ‘portal’” (he didn’t make it clear how this portal might have been constructed).

Now to recap, a civilized society knows they need rules to exist, not edicts handed down by some “Supreme Being.” The religious views I want kept out of our governance are the ones involving such things as abortion, LGBTQ people and many of the other opinions that have nothing to do with us living together in a civilized society but just religions antiquated rules which they feel should rule us all, both believers and non-believers. Just sayin’.

Larry Benson

Enumclaw