Certainty : a Religious Interlude

Religion has, from one perspective, been the biggest scourge on humanity we’ve ever managed to think of. If you lump the quasi-religion of Communism (and other political ‘religious’ ideologies) in there too, religion has probably been the biggest killer of human beings since Ugg bashed Thugg over the head because Mrs Ugg was making eyes at him.

Fundamentally I would suggest it’s about man’s desire to impose his will on others - which seems to be something of an innate feature in the never-ending struggle for status on the hierarchy. Priests can lord it over the unwashed plebs, bishops can lord it over the priests, and the Pope can trump the lot of them.

Paradoxically, religion has from another perspective also brought about some of the greatest good.

I’m not averse to the idea of a God - although it’s more wishful than rational thinking on my part - but organized religions kinda suck.

I remember being told (plenty of times) that I would be consigned to eternal damnation and torture for the crime of disbelief.

Like this was supposed to make me believe? No, it made me think God was an absolute fucking psychopath.

In the name of religion people can believe all sorts of weird shit. I was brought up as a Catholic and the “ever virgin” Mother of God was somewhat venerated. When I later learned that Jesus (or the more accurate anglicized Joshua) had brothers and sisters and that Jesus’ brother, James, not Peter, was the head of the Jerusalem Church, I began to think that Mary had a bit of a side-line from the day job of popping out a divine being.

The historical record doesn’t tell us whether Joseph and Mary were going at it like rabbits, or whether it was just on birthdays and festivals, but go at it they almost certainly did. It’s only the Catholic Church that has this somewhat peculiar love/hate relationship with sex so that they need to turn Mary into something that matches their peculiar view of “purity”.

Let’s face it, if you give a bunch of celibate men control over what non-celibate people get up to, you’re going to get something a bit odd out of the other end of that process.

And just in case you think I’m taking a cheap shot at Mary here, I have a profound respect for her. She nurtured and brought up someone I view to be one of the most remarkable and insightful human beings to ever have lived. But I’d rather view her as a fully-fledged woman than as some weird sexless receptacle for God’s seed.

In some respects I think we crave certainty; some anchor, however irrational, in the face of an uncertain world. We’re much more comfortable with certainty than uncertainty. Religious certainty is one way of meeting that, probably fundamental, human need.

The problem is that this certainty leads us into some strange places. In Islam, for example, there is an instruction that when relieving oneself you must enter the bathroom left foot first. I don’t think it’s mandatory, but recommended and pleasing to God.

So, here you have the Great Author of the Universe who created the ineffable dance of atoms and the subtle interplay of energies and patterns, who painted the Cosmos with galaxies and supernovae, and He’s bothered by which foot you decide to enter a bathroom with?

Is He feeling OK? Has he taken His dried frog pills today, I wonder?

Now a religious person might think I’m attacking God Himself here. Far from it - I’m attacking an idea of God. An idea of God that exists in a human mind. The human mind has constructed for itself, in this instance, a kind of certainty about what God wants and thinks.

I’m doing it too. I’m expressing a kind of certainty by suggesting I know what God isn’t like. I hope to God I’m right, because if He really is some kind of cosmic psychopath, then we’re well and truly fucked.

Forget your Gates’s and your Schwabs, your Bidens and your Trumps - we’re talking GOD here. Let’s just keep our fingers crossed and hope He’s actually sane.

In some respects Islam has a much bigger problem with certainty than the Christian faith. Whilst some Christians do take the Bible to be the literal Word of God, this is not a majority view. Christians tend to be accepting that there are contradictions and imperfections and that, although inspired by God, it was written down by humans - and so there’s a margin of error.

For a Muslim, however, it is a central article of faith that the Qur’an is the actual Word of God, that it is perfect, and the final Word of God for all time.

These are quite some claims to live up to - and it builds in a fragility.

If we take Allah’s allowance of slavery and the practice of having your way with the surviving women of the town you’ve just conquered - then it’s hard to see what the fuck is “perfect” here.

Sure, it may be that Islam instructs Muslims to be better than the cultural mores that existed at the time - maybe conquered women had a worse time of it from other conquerors. So, in this regard, Islam was an improvement. But it’s a bit like losing only one leg instead of two.

I’ve had many conversations where this slavery and concubinage was defended on the grounds that the women were treated well, it was only in times of war, and that it was a way of providing for women found destitute as a result of conquest.

Hmmmm. You telling me that God couldn’t think up something better than this?

Maybe don’t start a fucking war in the first place? How’s about that one?

It is a strange understanding of the word “perfect” you’ve got there.

The other argument that is often made is that no one was forced to have sex with their new masters, that the women were willing. Sort of Weinstein-willing, one supposes.

Oh you’ve just killed my husband, my brothers and my sons and my friends. You’ve taken me from my home and destroyed my way of life - but, hot damn, you’re just soooooo sexy. Come here big fella.

This rape apologia exists purely because there’s this notion that God said it’s OK, it’s perfect, and that no one else will come up with anything better for all time.

It has to be said that God has a peculiarly 7th century notion of perfection here.

We know this kind of thing happened because there’s an episode in the Hadith in which the Muslims out on conquest have just conquered a place. The men, feeling a bit randy being away from their wives, want to have their way with the women they’ve just captured. Muhammad says go ahead, but if any children result you have to take care of them as your own family.

One of the ideas that seems implicit in todays “multicultural” world is that, barring a few non-consequential doctrinal quibbles, all religions are broadly speaking the same. I don’t think this is the case.

The vast majority of the Muslims I’ve met and spoken to are just like everyone else. They want peace. They want a safe world in which to raise their families who they love very much. They have the same kinds of hopes and dreams and goodness that we all do. They’re kind and generous and help those in need.

But fundamentally at the heart of their faith is a kind of dread totalitarianism that cannot be compromised on. Because the Qur’an is said to be the perfect Word of God, for all time, this is a problem. Islam is not like Christianity. It is in a lot of respects a lot more practical and prescriptive than Christianity. It deals not just with your relationship with God, but with how to structure society and the laws that govern that society. Secularism is very hard to defend in Islam.

The certainty in Islam is unchangeable and for all time.

The only possible way out is in the interpretation of the texts. Even the actual, literal, Word of God has to be filtered through a human interpretative mechanism. The more extreme interpretations of Islam give everyone, including other Muslims, a headache.

I’ve been told, many times, that in Arabic the Qur’an is beautiful and the greatest poetic language ever written. Unfortunately, something gets very lost in translation when reading it in English. I’ve read a couple of different translations, cover to cover, and it’s hard going, to say the least. It’s really quite tedious, in English.

You can get an idea of the seemingly endless litany of exhortations to believe in Allah from the Cow surah (chapter) which can be read here. It’s ultra-repetitive and dull in English. I really wish I could read Arabic so that I could find some sense of the claimed beauty and perfection.

You can also get a sense of the religious appropriation that’s going on from this chapter. Just as the Christians (not the first Christians who considered themselves to be following Judaism) appropriated Judaism, Islam appropriated them both. Islam adopts all the prophets of Judaism, and Jesus, but claims that previous writings and scripture were incorrect (the prophets were correct but they were recorded wrongly or misinterpreted) and the Qur’an has (finally) got it right.

So, you read a surah like this - and there’s some good bits that make a lot of sense - but you’re really struggling to see it as perfect. I think I could do better (but not in Arabic, obviously). You can also see the more prescriptive nature of Islamic scripture, as opposed to Christian scripture (the Gospels, for example), in this surah. From around 2:275 you get some detailed instructions surrounding debt and interest.

Muslims view this as an improvement - that Islam encompasses both the religious and secular (practical) aspects of life and combines the two. I think it’s a weakness - particularly when you’re going to claim perfection, for all time.

The difficulty with certainty, and particularly religious certainty, is that it creates unbreachable walls.

When Martin Luther nailed his articles to the church door (sounds painful) he ushered in a few centuries of more death and destruction over the assumed certainty of a particular interpretation of a religious scripture. That probably wasn’t what he had in mind, but that’s what happened.

It’s the same problem we’re seeing in the Israel/Gaza conflict right now. The issue for the Israelis is the question of how does one negotiate with people that are not willing to compromise or to countenance a peaceful co-existence? The problem with many in the pro-Palestine lobby is that they find it hard to accept that Hamas are operating under this rigid certainty; they seem to think they’re willing to work with Israel to negotiate a peace. Meanwhile, the rest of the Palestinians are suffering from this brutal clash of ideologies.

When it comes to religion we have to accept that we’re not God and don’t really have any fucking clue what He really thinks.