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Of Religion II
Posted on: Sunday, December 26, 2004
Roger. So, last time I dealt with the existence of a generic, unidentified and undefined "god." Now I will move on to the veracity of specific religion(s). First though, I will narrow the scope somewhat: I have to define RELIGION. What is a religion, then? Well, one dictionary says it is: "[a] collection of beliefs concerning the origin of man and the universe, faith." That's mediocre at best. If I wanted to be really anal, I'd look at the etymology of the word: "from Latin religion-, religio supernatural constraint, sanction, religious practice, perhaps from religare to restrain, tie back." Gee, how very helpful. Not. (See, digressing here for a minute, the dry scholarly approach to things most of the time sucks. Empiricism beats authority hands down in cases like this and, indeed, in most cases. Hm, that could be why I absolutely abhor books with a million references and more text in footnotes than in the actual core matter.
) I would say that religion is any belief concerning the origin of the human race and universe, which relies on faith as corroboration and which, CRUCIALLY, is actively advertized by the holder thereof. This last proviso is extremely important. A belief as such, regarding ANYTHING, is inconsequential. People can believe that YHWH made the universe and humans; people can believe that aliens brought us here; people can believe the universe is but the innards of a huge dragon; people can believe that they must get up on the left side of the bed in order to have a successful day; people can ultimately believe that George W. is actually a woman. We all believe a helluva lot of things, sometimes without even realizing it. Some of the things we believe are easily provable (eg. gravity), others are as abstruse as hardcore religion itself (eg. that the color yellow REALLY IS yellow). Belief in itself makes no difference to anyone except its holder. It is hence necessary for the holder to endeavor to promulgate that belief for it to have a meaning to others and for it to provide a cause for others to critically evaluate that belief. Also, that promulgation has to be done in an active manner. Passive, ie. subconscious, "living out" a belief is not enough of a stimulus for us to have cause of appraise it. If someone believes that walking around with egg on their face (literally!) enhances the quality of their life and/or earns them rewards in the "hereafter", good for them. If, however, they start giving out leaflets urging us to break eggs on our heads, seeks to legislate to that effect, or takes to throwing eggs at us, then we have legitimate cause to subject the merits and demerits of that their belief to scrutiny. And this doesn't hold just for religion in the conventional sense of the meaning but ANY kind of abstract postulate--philosophical, political, sociological, architectural, etc. dogma--is encompassed. Of course, we COULD, if we took the "egg on the face" example, evaluate passive beliefs. We COULD look into the rationale for walking around with egg on one's face and denounce it as insalutary. We could even castigate the person as being utterly foolish, to put it mildly, for behaving in such an asinine manner. But WE would be the ones at fault, primarily because of Mill's Harm Principle. (Digression: this is incidentally why ad hominem arguments are so wrong: attacking the person is pointless; it's the substance of what they are proselytizing that has to be examined.)
OK, so which religions do we look into here? Of course, my "favorite": Xianity. And Islam. And all religions mandating a missionary aspect. That excludes Judaism.
It also excludes Hinduism (notwithstanding Bhajap, RSS and similar.) And Buddhism (despite the comportment of the Sinhalese regime in Sri Lanka.) Animism, Sikhism, Taoism, Confucianism... - all out. So, really, Xianity and Islam with all their many offshots. But let's not make this quite as simple as a bit of Christer-bashing! Let us first see what these, and other man-made religions, have actually done.
Let's survey "god." "God" is meant to exceed EVERYTHING else in existence, real or imagined. Think about it carefully. Think of the universe. Think of time. Think of infinity. Can the human mind fathom infinity? Can we fathom that no matter how big a number we think of, it will be literally next to nothing compared to the infinity? And the space: the vast expanse which SHOULD be...infinite! It should be stretching in all directions without an end. How "without an end"? Exactly. Incomprehensible. And if it has an end, what is beyond it? Does that which is beyond it have an end? And so on. Think of human beings. How intricate we are. In spite of all the multifarious contraptions and scanners and probes, we still know practically nothing about our physical bodies. Think of our souls, the concept and reality of consciousness. What makes our sack of flesh, bones and water TRULY alive as opposed to clinically animate. Think of our personalities... - sets of unique spiritual/mental characteristics which cannot be measured or quantified or held or physically manipulated. Think of the complexities of human feelings, emotions, sentiments as well as relations with one another. Think of love, hatred and sorrow: such strong feelings which overwhelm us and cause us to be able and willing to modify our state of consciousness (ie. kill, even massacre, or do "crazy" things out of love for another)... "God" is bigger than all of it, to and beyond the point of actually "inventing" all the foregoing.
And then... - then we have puny human minds seeking to understand such an incomprehensible entity. Not merely understand but even intercede for it, advocate at its behest! Humans give that "god" a name. They ascribe it a CV. They create a personality for it. They spend money on it. They presume to be able to expound on that "god's" wishes, designs, intentions. They exalt individuals and even manufacture a whole hierarchy of people who supposedly are ordained to do the antecedent. They intertwine the notion of divine protection with the most odious of human machinations: nationalism, racism, discrimination, murder (including the capital punishment), genocide... They are certain that the most important thing to the "god" who putatively created the universe, the time, the infinity and all else is whether the border of a country runs a hundred meters to the west or to the east. Or whether a man thinks of some cunnilingus
when he sees an attractive lady walk by. Could people BE any more risibly pathetic? Or is that, pathetically risible? Or is it, pathetic AND risible? 
It's probably all of it.
Now, for a religion to be "true", what conditions should it satisfy? Well, we know that religions which stipulate proselytizing also operate a reward-punishment system. In other words, you have to do something or else. It is, put differently, a kind of law. And what better place to see if a religion is just, but in jurisprudence! One of my favorite legal philosophers is Lon Fuller. And Fuller propounded these criteria as necessary to determine the validity of a law--and indeed, they are the bases accepted in most countries today of the rule of law--: the generality of the law (ie. of a legal provision), the clarity of phrasing, public promulgation, the time at which it is enacted, the manner in which it is applied. Sensible enough, I should think! These criteria ensure that a law is fair (and hence justifiable as morally burdening those within its jurisdiction to abide by it). Let's traverse these now in the context of religion. GENERALITY. This means that religious dogma should be general: referring to concepts, circumstances, things and persons; not to particular actions or defined individuals. Do Xianity or Islam (to name the two most prevalent missionizing religions) conform to this? Probably yes although a whole philosophy could be made out of demands that Xians or Muslims should conduct themselves in a particular way, separately from the "non-believers." CLARITY. Religious dogma should be devoid of all ambiguity, room for manipulation, contradiction, inconsistency, etc. (Indeed, until relatively recently laws in England and Wales were written without any interpunction whatsoever; the rationale being that if text needed punctuation to be comprehensible, then it was not lucid enough to begin with.) Again, do our major religions fulfill this prerequisite? I think the answer is clear: absolutely not. Xianity alone has its tens of thousands of denominations, cults and sects, all of which understand their (version of the) Bible differently and almost all of which insist that any interpretation other than theirs leads to eternal damnation. PROMULGATION. For a law to be just, it has to be KNOWN to all. To a nation it is announced via the written, aural or visual media or by a version of town crier. And this is where every single world religion fails abysmally--more on which in the next paragraph. TIME AND MANNER OF APPLICATION. It cannot be retrospective. Therefore, such religion as starts offering "salvation" (never mind the arrant illogic of the NECESSITY for any "salvation") two thousand or 1600 years ago has one HUGE problem which ties in with the promulgation issue. So, religions seem to fail Fuller criteria. Does it matter? Can we not just say: "Oh, 'god' knows better than man"? It does matter and we cannot say that. Why: because the very LEAST one would expect from the "master of the universe" is that he/she/it/they should be equitable and transparent. Otherwise one is led to the conclusion that all things are rather subject to "god's" whim; that "god" is arbitrary and capricious. And in that case we're all potentially screwed, whether we're doing what we think our "god" wants or not.
OK, enough for today. Or, aaj ke liye bahut hai.
The last (I think) installment tomorrow. I hope you all have a shavua tov. 
Posted on: Sunday, December 26, 2004
ב''ה
Roger. So, last time I dealt with the existence of a generic, unidentified and undefined "god." Now I will move on to the veracity of specific religion(s). First though, I will narrow the scope somewhat: I have to define RELIGION. What is a religion, then? Well, one dictionary says it is: "[a] collection of beliefs concerning the origin of man and the universe, faith." That's mediocre at best. If I wanted to be really anal, I'd look at the etymology of the word: "from Latin religion-, religio supernatural constraint, sanction, religious practice, perhaps from religare to restrain, tie back." Gee, how very helpful. Not. (See, digressing here for a minute, the dry scholarly approach to things most of the time sucks. Empiricism beats authority hands down in cases like this and, indeed, in most cases. Hm, that could be why I absolutely abhor books with a million references and more text in footnotes than in the actual core matter.
) I would say that religion is any belief concerning the origin of the human race and universe, which relies on faith as corroboration and which, CRUCIALLY, is actively advertized by the holder thereof. This last proviso is extremely important. A belief as such, regarding ANYTHING, is inconsequential. People can believe that YHWH made the universe and humans; people can believe that aliens brought us here; people can believe the universe is but the innards of a huge dragon; people can believe that they must get up on the left side of the bed in order to have a successful day; people can ultimately believe that George W. is actually a woman. We all believe a helluva lot of things, sometimes without even realizing it. Some of the things we believe are easily provable (eg. gravity), others are as abstruse as hardcore religion itself (eg. that the color yellow REALLY IS yellow). Belief in itself makes no difference to anyone except its holder. It is hence necessary for the holder to endeavor to promulgate that belief for it to have a meaning to others and for it to provide a cause for others to critically evaluate that belief. Also, that promulgation has to be done in an active manner. Passive, ie. subconscious, "living out" a belief is not enough of a stimulus for us to have cause of appraise it. If someone believes that walking around with egg on their face (literally!) enhances the quality of their life and/or earns them rewards in the "hereafter", good for them. If, however, they start giving out leaflets urging us to break eggs on our heads, seeks to legislate to that effect, or takes to throwing eggs at us, then we have legitimate cause to subject the merits and demerits of that their belief to scrutiny. And this doesn't hold just for religion in the conventional sense of the meaning but ANY kind of abstract postulate--philosophical, political, sociological, architectural, etc. dogma--is encompassed. Of course, we COULD, if we took the "egg on the face" example, evaluate passive beliefs. We COULD look into the rationale for walking around with egg on one's face and denounce it as insalutary. We could even castigate the person as being utterly foolish, to put it mildly, for behaving in such an asinine manner. But WE would be the ones at fault, primarily because of Mill's Harm Principle. (Digression: this is incidentally why ad hominem arguments are so wrong: attacking the person is pointless; it's the substance of what they are proselytizing that has to be examined.)
OK, so which religions do we look into here? Of course, my "favorite": Xianity. And Islam. And all religions mandating a missionary aspect. That excludes Judaism.
It also excludes Hinduism (notwithstanding Bhajap, RSS and similar.) And Buddhism (despite the comportment of the Sinhalese regime in Sri Lanka.) Animism, Sikhism, Taoism, Confucianism... - all out. So, really, Xianity and Islam with all their many offshots. But let's not make this quite as simple as a bit of Christer-bashing! Let us first see what these, and other man-made religions, have actually done.
Let's survey "god." "God" is meant to exceed EVERYTHING else in existence, real or imagined. Think about it carefully. Think of the universe. Think of time. Think of infinity. Can the human mind fathom infinity? Can we fathom that no matter how big a number we think of, it will be literally next to nothing compared to the infinity? And the space: the vast expanse which SHOULD be...infinite! It should be stretching in all directions without an end. How "without an end"? Exactly. Incomprehensible. And if it has an end, what is beyond it? Does that which is beyond it have an end? And so on. Think of human beings. How intricate we are. In spite of all the multifarious contraptions and scanners and probes, we still know practically nothing about our physical bodies. Think of our souls, the concept and reality of consciousness. What makes our sack of flesh, bones and water TRULY alive as opposed to clinically animate. Think of our personalities... - sets of unique spiritual/mental characteristics which cannot be measured or quantified or held or physically manipulated. Think of the complexities of human feelings, emotions, sentiments as well as relations with one another. Think of love, hatred and sorrow: such strong feelings which overwhelm us and cause us to be able and willing to modify our state of consciousness (ie. kill, even massacre, or do "crazy" things out of love for another)... "God" is bigger than all of it, to and beyond the point of actually "inventing" all the foregoing.
And then... - then we have puny human minds seeking to understand such an incomprehensible entity. Not merely understand but even intercede for it, advocate at its behest! Humans give that "god" a name. They ascribe it a CV. They create a personality for it. They spend money on it. They presume to be able to expound on that "god's" wishes, designs, intentions. They exalt individuals and even manufacture a whole hierarchy of people who supposedly are ordained to do the antecedent. They intertwine the notion of divine protection with the most odious of human machinations: nationalism, racism, discrimination, murder (including the capital punishment), genocide... They are certain that the most important thing to the "god" who putatively created the universe, the time, the infinity and all else is whether the border of a country runs a hundred meters to the west or to the east. Or whether a man thinks of some cunnilingus
when he sees an attractive lady walk by. Could people BE any more risibly pathetic? Or is that, pathetically risible? Or is it, pathetic AND risible? It's probably all of it.
Now, for a religion to be "true", what conditions should it satisfy? Well, we know that religions which stipulate proselytizing also operate a reward-punishment system. In other words, you have to do something or else. It is, put differently, a kind of law. And what better place to see if a religion is just, but in jurisprudence! One of my favorite legal philosophers is Lon Fuller. And Fuller propounded these criteria as necessary to determine the validity of a law--and indeed, they are the bases accepted in most countries today of the rule of law--: the generality of the law (ie. of a legal provision), the clarity of phrasing, public promulgation, the time at which it is enacted, the manner in which it is applied. Sensible enough, I should think! These criteria ensure that a law is fair (and hence justifiable as morally burdening those within its jurisdiction to abide by it). Let's traverse these now in the context of religion. GENERALITY. This means that religious dogma should be general: referring to concepts, circumstances, things and persons; not to particular actions or defined individuals. Do Xianity or Islam (to name the two most prevalent missionizing religions) conform to this? Probably yes although a whole philosophy could be made out of demands that Xians or Muslims should conduct themselves in a particular way, separately from the "non-believers." CLARITY. Religious dogma should be devoid of all ambiguity, room for manipulation, contradiction, inconsistency, etc. (Indeed, until relatively recently laws in England and Wales were written without any interpunction whatsoever; the rationale being that if text needed punctuation to be comprehensible, then it was not lucid enough to begin with.) Again, do our major religions fulfill this prerequisite? I think the answer is clear: absolutely not. Xianity alone has its tens of thousands of denominations, cults and sects, all of which understand their (version of the) Bible differently and almost all of which insist that any interpretation other than theirs leads to eternal damnation. PROMULGATION. For a law to be just, it has to be KNOWN to all. To a nation it is announced via the written, aural or visual media or by a version of town crier. And this is where every single world religion fails abysmally--more on which in the next paragraph. TIME AND MANNER OF APPLICATION. It cannot be retrospective. Therefore, such religion as starts offering "salvation" (never mind the arrant illogic of the NECESSITY for any "salvation") two thousand or 1600 years ago has one HUGE problem which ties in with the promulgation issue. So, religions seem to fail Fuller criteria. Does it matter? Can we not just say: "Oh, 'god' knows better than man"? It does matter and we cannot say that. Why: because the very LEAST one would expect from the "master of the universe" is that he/she/it/they should be equitable and transparent. Otherwise one is led to the conclusion that all things are rather subject to "god's" whim; that "god" is arbitrary and capricious. And in that case we're all potentially screwed, whether we're doing what we think our "god" wants or not.
OK, enough for today. Or, aaj ke liye bahut hai.
The last (I think) installment tomorrow. I hope you all have a shavua tov.
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