The resurgence of fundamentalism in our modern age is giving rise to narrow beliefs that once turned the western world into the “dark age.” But, this resurgence is only temporary and I believe that it will lose its momentum in light of the fact that the “information age” will ultimately show the hypocrisy and intolerance caused by fundamentalism.
My wife Anita and I had the good fortune of endowing a chaired professorship to the University of Illinois Program In Jewish Culture and Society. As the name implies, the program is not religious in nature. It is a historical review of Jewish culture and its impact on our society. Judaism is the foundation for three major religions all following what is described in the Hebrew Bible as the God of Abraham. As a person of Jewish heritage, I have deep concerns about the interpretation of the God of Abraham as applied to modern Judaism and the sister religions of Christianity and the Muslim faiths. More importantly, the concern should be about treating scripture as true history. Scripture is not history even though historical events are described in scripture.
The archeological evidence is clear that the Hebrew Bible was written in the 6th century B.C.E after the Babylonian exile of Judeans. When the Persians conquered the Babylonians, King Cyrus of Persia allowed the Judeans to return to Jerusalem and rebuild the Temple of Solomon. The writings of those early biblical authors were based upon stories that had been handed down to them through many generations. Those stories also reflected the perception of the world at that time; before science and civilization had changed the understanding of the physical world. The Hebrew Bible in Genesis describes a creation process that in our modern era has long since been disproved. Yet many still believe that humanity has descended from Cain, a murderer and a person who committed incest. I would prefer to believe that we descended from other forms of life. Furthermore, there is no evidence that many of the people described in the Hebrew Bible ever existed. This would include, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, King David, and even King Solomon. Furthermore, the stories described in the Hebrew Bible seem to justify genocidal incidents such as the story of Noah, the binding of Isaac, and the slaying of innocent first born.
For four hundred years during the early Rabbinic period, the Talmud records debates between the rabbis about the interpretation of the literal words of the Hebrew Bible. Essentially, the rabbis argued that God could not have meant what was written in scripture. The rabbis argued for the metaphorical interpretation of literal scripture. During this same period Christianity was evolving and ultimately became the formal religion of the Roman Empire. The God of Abraham now had the power of the Roman Empire behind it. Many thoughtful Christian theologists have written about the Roman influence in the writings of the New Testament. One of the consequences of the Roman conversion was to absolve the Roman authority from the crucifixion of Jesus. Writing into the Passion stories of the New Testament that it was the Jews and not the Romans who caused the death of Jesus is understandable in light of the Roman conversion. But what was written into the New Testament for obvious political reasons should not be taken as literal anymore than the Hebrew Bible. Yet the stories about the Jewish betrayal as described in the Passion stories and especially that of John, were the precursors of anti-Judaism and the more racially inspired anti-Semitism of Nazi Germany. Furthermore, the fall of the Roman Empire and the establishment of a Papal authority in Rome put the world into a period called the “dark age” in which the laity was prohibited from any study of the physical world that was contradictory to the writings in testament. Even Galileo was excommunicated for his belief in the solar system.
Unfortunately, scientific advancement and knowledge of the physical world has evolved much faster than human capability to reject long instilled religious beliefs. Whatever faith or culture one follows, it is necessary to reject untruths and hypocrisy. Miracles can always explain what is not provable in scientific observation. However, in the three dimensional world we live in, miracles cannot be proven nor can they be attributed to any faith or god of a faith. Einstein did not deny the existence of a forth physical dimension nor can we who are trapped in a three dimensional world prove or disprove its existence. What we all have to understand is that there is much that humans do not know and that religion cannot teach us. Religion is pure faith. The danger is when religious beliefs become a basis for bigotry and intolerance.
I personally am a very spiritual person who believes in a universal creator. I am culturally Jewish and I am proud of my heritage. However, I do not believe in the God of Abraham or a god of any one faith. To that end, I would like to recommend a book called God Without Religion, by Sankara Saranam. It is a wonderful book about what I believe is the most positive view of human creation. I have copied below the forward from that book by Arun Gandhi, the grandson of Ghandi. I hope you enjoy it.
“The question "What is God?" has baffled humankind for eons and will continue to defy logical understanding as long as we live with the concept that there is a heaven up above, where God sits judging all of humanity and punishing those who misbehave. Eminent thinkers throughout history have tried to find a logical answer to this vexing question, with little success. On the other hand His Holiness Gautama, the Buddha, did tapasya (Sanskrit for asceticism) under a banyan tree and, like some others, found that God exists within every human heart in the form of love, compassion, understanding, and other positive attributes humankind is capable of but often chooses to suppress. It seems that instead of trying to assert strict logic or put a solid image to our concept of God, we ought to follow their example and devote greater energy to intuitively understanding the meaning of God.
This book, God Without Religion: Questioning Centuries of Accepted Truths by Sankara Saranam, helps us do just that. It offers a refreshing attempt to provide humankind with a modernized spiritual road-map for use in our eternal quest to comprehend God.
Since the identity of God is so inscrutable (if not the best-kept secret in the world) and the philosophy surrounding this power so impenetrable, religious leaders of various faiths have defined God in ways that raise more questions than they answer. The easiest and most accepted explanation is to see God in the shape of those who are considered God's messengers-among Jews, Moses and the Hebrew Prophets; among Christians, Jesus; among Muslims, Muhammad; among Hindus, Krishna; and among Buddhists, Gautama.
The common thread running through the lives of God's many messengers is love, compassion, understanding, commitment, and respect for all living creatures. It might therefore be assumed that by exhibiting these qualities they were demonstrating to the rest of humanity the way our Creator expects us to live. Although I do not attribute saintly qualities to my grandfather, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, what he said about a week before his assassination on January 30, 1948, is pertinent in this regard: "They [the Indian people] will follow me in life, worship me in death, but not make my cause their cause." These prophetic words could have been said by Moses, Jesus, Muhammad, Krishna, or the Buddha-beings whose life stories and lessons were enshrined into scriptures we generally read with little intention of making them a part of our lives. Bypassing divine go-betweens, Sankara Saranam's book attempts to give us a more direct and immediate perspective of God. Like Sankara, I hesitate to say its perspective is absolutely right, because as mere mortals, irrespective of our profound scholarship, experience, knowledge, training, or vision, we cannot fathom the depths of spirituality enough to presume we have the right way.
I recall the wisdom my grandfather imparted to our family when I was living with him as a young teenager. He said human beings can only hope to understand God and aspire to reach "salvation," which he defined as living a life of service, sacrifice, and satisfaction. He believed the greatest religion was to ensure that we wipe the tears from every eye and bring hope and decency to every life. If performed with utmost humility, he said, this service would grant us the magnanimity to recognize and accept the many ways we are called to see God in humanity.
I am convinced that at the root of the spiritual problem we face today is the intense competitiveness we have injected into religion. Each of us believes our religion is the best and it is incumbent upon us to save the world by converting everyone else to our mode of worship.
I recall a painfully sad episode that took place a few years ago when I was invited to explain the Hindu way of life to Christian students of comparative religion. Also invited were Muslim and Jewish clergymen. After my talk one of the clergymen prefaced his presentation with remarks that were obviously addressed to me, stating: "We Christians, Muslims, and Jews have a few things in common. We not only have a common source but we are a 'book religion,' unlike you who are pagan." The implication was clear. He believed that the Muslim, Christian, and Jewish word of God came in the form of a book whereas the Hindu scriptures were transmitted orally and therefore inferior. He concluded that Hindus believe in 50,000 Gods while followers of the Western family of religions believe in only one.
The perceived superiority of book-based religions, I explained, is a common misconception in the West. In fact, an ancient philosopher once said the easiest way to kill a philosophy is by writing a book, for then it becomes a dogma and ceases to be a vibrant, living philosophy. As for believing in 50,000 or more Gods, I added, the Hindu belief is not that there are so many Gods (or, according to some, as many Gods as human beings) but that there are many possible images of God.
The admission that no one really knows the true God behind all these images leads to an understanding that human beings can only pursue the truth and not "possess" it, as many religious zealots claim to do. Pursuit implies humility, acceptance, openness, and appreciation, while possession suggests arrogance, close mindedness, and lack of appreciation. Herein lies the rub: if we persist in competing to possess the truth instead of working in unity to pursue it, we are going to face untold grief-and worse, violence.
When asked what he thought of the meaning of God, Grandfather said: "There is an indefinable mysterious power that pervades everything. I feel it, though I do not see it. It is this unseen power which makes itself felt and yet defies all proof, because it is so unlike all that I perceive through my senses. It transcends the senses. But it is possible to reason out the existence of God to a limited extent.
"I do dimly perceive that whilst everything around me is ever-changing, ever-dying, there is underlying all that change a living power that is changeless, that holds all together, that creates, dissolves, and re-creates. That informing power or spirit is God. . . . For I can see that in the midst of death, life persists; in the midst of untruth, truth persists; in the midst of darkness, light persists. Hence I gather that God is life, truth, light."
Sometimes Grandfather referred to God as love, or the supreme good, or other attributes reflecting his belief that God lives within us as well as outside of us. He also implied we have a hotline to God, an instant connection enabling us to invoke God when necessary. In humankind's eternal quest for a tangible answer to the elusive meaning of God, God Without Religion adds an ancient dimension-the idea of self-in a radically new way that I hope will bring the reader a few steps closer to unraveling this divine mystery.”
-Arun Gandhi
Cofounder of The M. K. Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence
Memphis, Tennessee
http://www.godwithoutreligion.com/