Religion and Contention

06 Jan Religion and Contention

While human beings through time have found plenty to disagree about—politics, financial matters, family and neighborly feuds—perhaps there is no more contentious subject than religion. Though human beings through time have found plenty to disagree about—politics, financial matters, family and neighborly feuds—perhaps there is no more contentious subject than religion. Religion, understood broadly as a set of beliefs and practices meant to venerate the supernatural, is at once deeply personal and generally enacted in conjunction with a large community of fellow worshippers. Given that today the religions of Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism and Confucianism account for the faiths of a vast majority of the world’s population, it might seem that there are several main ways and worldviews from which to approach God. But religion is always more complicated than it seems. Within each major faith, there are dozens, in the case if Islam, or many hundreds, in the case of Christianity of denominations—each with what appears to be a “different” set of beliefs, dogmas and daily living practices and prohibitions.

When one winds the history clock back even further, to the times when monotheism was not the majority view amongst religious institutions, the picture of “what is religion” gets even more complicated. In addition to the faith and worship practices of monotheism—the belief in one, true God—polytheism—the belief in an entire pantheon of gods—and pantheism—the sublime as supernatural expressed in nature—there are all kinds of Eastern religious traditions, including Hinduism, Buddhism and Confucianism, that place the transcendence of the self and the working off of karma at the center of their religious praxis.

So, given the emotional, conflicting and often hostile camps or religion in the world—and the prevalence of religious wars—what is the purpose of religion? One way to consider religion is as a “script” or “way” to approach an experience with, understanding of, and veneration for the preternatural. In this generalized way, we can discuss the “script” or the “way” one must follow within a certain religious tradition in order to reach a state of virtuous piety appropriate for an encounter with the divine. For instance, there is prayer and supplication, worship and adoration, sacraments, fasting and almsgiving, purification rites, and ethical codes for avoiding profanations and sacrileges of all kinds. It might, then, be most appropriate to look at religion, in a broad sense, as a community of seekers who follow a tradition in order to have both a communal and a deeply personal relationship with the divine. For instance, there is prayer and supplication, worship and adoration, sacraments, fasting and almsgiving, purification rites, and ethical codes for avoiding profanations and sacrileges of all kinds. It might, then, be most appropriate to look at religion, in a broad sense, as a community of seekers who follow a tradition in order to have both a communal and a deeply personal relationship with the divine.

On the other hand, there is also a perennial debate on what is “not” religion. Most of the main religious faiths today were, at one time, small minority groups, even considered cults. And so, in addition to all of the debate about religious belief, “scripts,” “ways” of worship, paths to purification and methods for encountering God, there is a conversation to be had about that which is not “religion” but “magic, idolatry, witchcraft, sorcery and superstition.” Finally, we will also be exploring the general influences of major religions of the West—Judaism, Christianity and Islam—on the cultural production of the Western world over the last several thousand years.

Principle Questions Relating to the Great Idea

1) What are the chief attributes of a religious tradition or community? How is a religion different from (and how is a religion similar to) magic, idolatry, witchcraft, sorcery and superstition.

2) What are the overall effects of religion on the development of human civilizations and cultures? How can we observe and analyze the influence religion plays in cultural production?

3) What is the proper relationship between religion and politics? What is the proper amount of religious freedom? What is the difference between tolerance and acceptance of the beliefs of others? Why do we seek out others of similar religious faith? Why do we often fear those of other faiths? What role does a religious community play in forming one’s personal and group identity?

4) What is the efficacy of prayer and supplication, worship and adoration, sacraments, fasting and almsgiving, purification rites, and ethical codes for avoiding profanations and sacrileges?

Excerpt From: Dr. Chad Redwing. “Introduction to Western Monotheism: Syntopical Course Guide.”

Photo: J. M. W. Turner [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons