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What Do YOU Think?Your Visit to the Hsi Lai Temple in Southern California

I magine that you’re walking up the broad fl ight of stone steps to the Hsi Lai (shee lai) Buddhist temple in Hacienda Heights, California, just east of Los Angeles. Hsi Lai claims the distinction of being the largest Buddhist temple in North

America, and it certainly looks like it from where you stand! When you get inside, you look around and realize that this is a religious building complex like none other you have ever seen. There seem to be no large-group ceremonies going on, at least right now. Instead, small groups of wor- shipers and tourists come and go, doing their own thing. Some off er incense, a few are carrying fl owers to leave in the temple, others are praying and meditating in front of statues, and out in the courtyard there are people doing meditative exercise routines.

Most of the neatly dressed families coming to this tem- ple do not seem to refl ect deeply here on their faith. You see nobody reading Buddhist religious texts, nor does any monk teach or preach to a group. Rather, most worshipers come here just to sense something of the sacred and be in its presence. Their minds are calmed by the familiar architecture, by the many statues of the Buddha, by the soft smell of incense. They engage in quiet, low- key activities.

You notice people who aren’t doing tradi- tional Buddhist worship. You wonder if this means that they might come

from other religious traditions. Some people you see are just tourists, a few of them mostly interested in the tasty vegetarian buffet lunch served every day. But per- haps they too have come to absorb the beauty of this place, and at least some of its religious meaning. This temple was founded not only to bridge the differences between different groups of Buddhists, but also to be a bridge between Eastern and Western religions and ways of life.

As you are introduced to the academic study of religion, you may fi nd yourself bewildered— by the varieties of religion, by

distinguishing religions from other move- ments, by the different academic

methods used to study religions, and by hot topics such

as religion and gen- der, ecology, and vio- lence. You may have questions about matters of fact and value: is one religion true, are dif- ferent religions true, or are none of them true? What might it all mean for you?

“Religion starts with the perception that something is wrong.” —Karen Armstrong

Religion is mostly about fi nding one’s way to eternal life, however that is understood.

Strongly Disagree Strongly Agree 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

h hh kWhat Do YOU Think?

< As sunlight moves over the Eastern Hemisphere, one can see the regions where most world religions were born. The new perspec- tive of Earth from space has helped to stimulate global thinking in religions.

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4 C H A P T E R 1 B E G I N N I N G YO U R S T U DY O F W O R L D R E L I G I O N S

These issues may occur to you as well:

● Formal “separation of church and state” is strong in the United States and Canada, but religion and poli- tics are mixed in powerful ways here and around the world. The government of China’s continuous pressure on Buddhism in Tibet and on the Falun Gong movement is just one example.

● Most people in North America affi rm the importance of religion for their lives, but fewer actually practice it. For example, almost 90 percent of all North Americans believe in the existence of God or gods, but only about half regularly participate in religious services or in other religious practices such as prayer, meditation, or giving to those in need.

● Despite a high level of religious belief in the United States, most Americans have surprisingly little knowl- edge of their faith. Stephen Prothero (PROTH-er-oh), a professor of religion at Boston University who has appeared on The Colbert Report and The Daily Show, has shown that many Americans—even many who attend services often— are “religious illiterates.” As Laurie Goodstein of the New York Times wrote in summarizing a 2010 study of religious knowledge in the United States, “Americans are by all measures a deeply religious people, but they are also deeply ignorant about religion.”1 In Western Europe, most people don’t hold formally to a religion, but they know a good deal about religion, because it is a required academic subject in the schools.

● Is religion in the world shrinking, or is it growing? Actually, both. Although some parts of Christianity and Judaism are shrinking, other parts of these religions are growing, and Islam and Buddhism are also growing. The number of people in North America who formally adhere to

1 Laurie Goodstein, “Basic Religion Test Stumps Many Americans,” New York Times (city edition), September 28, 2010, page A17.

no religion at all is growing, but certain religious practices such as prayer are stronger than ever.

● Most of the major religions of the world come from ancient times. However, every decade of the last two hundred years has seen new religious movements born around the world, some of them now powerful, some controversial. You might wonder why we still get new religions—don’t we have enough already?

● Religion has evoked some of both the best and the worst in human life. Great acts of love, service, and even self-sacrifi ce have arisen from religious conviction. Religion has inspired some of the world’s great- est music, art, and architecture, and has lifted the human spirit in count- less ways. Ironically, it has also been the source of much destruction.

LO1 What Is Religion? Religion is found across all cultures and throughout the entire span of human history. Evidence of early human remains shows signs of religion, including veneration of animal spirits in art and human burials that suggest belief in a life beyond death. Most anthropologists today have concluded that Neanderthal humans who lived around 200,000 years ago may have had religious beliefs and practices, but that Cro-Magnon humans (around 35,000 years ago) defi nitely had religion. From the dawn of human civilizations until modern times, religion has shaped the beliefs and values of all human cultures.

Defining RELIGION But this talk of the prevalence of religion leads us to ask: What exactly is religion? Defi ning academic subjects can be a boring business, but on the subject of religion, most people have something interesting to say. Grappling with this question involves both careful, objective academic thinking and personal engagement. The University of Cambridge scholar John Bowker remarks, “We all know what [religion] is until someone asks us to tell them.”2 If pressed for an answer, most people in the Western world would say fi rst that religion is based on belief in God and obedience to God. However, do

2 John Bowker, ed., Oxford Dictionary of World Religions (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997), xv.

“Americans are by all

measures a deeply religious

people, but they are also

deeply ignorant about

religion.” —Laurie Goodstein

W H AT I S R E L I G I O N ? 5

they mean the God followed in a particular religion or something more general, such as “gods”? Some major religions—certain branches of Hinduism and Buddhism, for example—have relatively little teaching about gods. A few religions such as Jainism have no gods at all.

Some people around the world would give a sec- ond answer to “What is religion?”—that it is a system of morality. On fi rst refl ection, this might seem to be a more all-encompassing defi nition than the previous one. Karen Armstrong, a former Roman Catholic nun and now a popular writer on world religions, recently wrote that “Religion starts with the perception that something is wrong,” and that the value systems in reli- gions set out to deal with that wrong.3 The three main Western religions—Judaism, Christianity, and Islam— have strong moral teachings. Confucianism is so cen- tered on morality that the issue of whether it is a social philosophy or a religion is often debated. However, a few religions, such as Shinto, have little or no devel- oped teaching about a way of life. All this shows how our prior perceptions color our answer to the ques- tion “What is religion?” Despite the diffi culties of this question, many scholars from various academic fi elds have attempted to answer it in as objective a manner as possible.

Notable Definitions of RELIGION Another way of studying the issue of what religion means is by looking at defi nitions that have been offered in the past and have had some infl uence on the discussion. Here is a sampling of how religion has been defi ned in the Western world, by scholars and others. Religion is …

“The feeling of absolute dependence” —Friedrich Schleiermacher, Christian theologian (1799)

3 Karen Armstrong, A History of God (New York: Ballantine, 1994), 1.

“The opiate of the people” —Karl Marx, nineteenth-century founder of communism (1843)

“A set of things which the average man thinks he believes and wishes he was certain of”

—Mark Twain, American writer (1879)

“The daughter of Hope and Fear, explaining to Ignorance the nature of the Unknowable”

—Ambrose Bierce, American social critic and humorist (1911)

“A unifi ed system of beliefs and practices … which unite into one single moral community”

—Émile Durkheim, French sociologist of religion (1915)

“What grows out of, and gives expression to, experience of the holy in its various aspects”

—Rudolf Otto, German scholar of religion (1917)

“All bunk” —Thomas Edison, American inventor (ca. 1925)

“Something left over from the infancy of our intelligence; it will fade away as we adopt reason and science as our guidelines”

—Bertrand Russell, British philosopher (1928)

“An illusion deriving its strength from the fact that it falls in with our instinctual desires”

—Sigmund Freud, Austrian psychiatrist (1932)

“The state of being grasped by an ultimate concern, a concern … which itself contains the answer to the question of the meaning of our life”

—Paul Tillich, Christian theologian (1957)

“What the individual does with his own solitariness” —A. N. Whitehead, British philosopher (1960)

“A set of symbolic forms and acts which relate man to the ultimate conditions of his existence”

—Robert Bellah, contemporary American sociologist

“Feeling warmer in our hearts, more connected to others, more connected to something greater, and having a sense of peace”

—Goldie Hawn, contemporary American fi lm actress

The Definition Used in This Book Each student will have to wrestle personally with defi n- ing religion, because scholarship isn’t settled on any one defi nition and because defi ning it involves some subjectivity. Here’s the defi - nition used in this book: Religion is a pattern of beliefs and practices that expresses and enacts what a community regards as

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religion Pattern of beliefs and practices that expresses and enacts what a community regards as sacred and/or ultimate about life

6 C H A P T E R 1 B E G I N N I N G YO U R S T U DY O F W O R L D R E L I G I O N S

sacred and/or ultimate about life.

Let’s “unpack” this defi nition. First, religion is a pattern of beliefs and prac- tices. All religions believe certain things about ultimate reality in or beyond the world. They answer existential ques- tions most humans have:

● Why am I here?

● What does it mean to be human?

● How can what is wrong in the world—and in me—be corrected?

● Where am I—and the world—going?

They answer these questions in different ways. The dif- ferent religions believe in one God (monotheism) or many gods (polytheism). They believe, with or without belief in a god, in a world soul in Hinduism, in Nirvana in Buddhism, and in the Dao (also spelled Tao, with both pronounced “dow”) in both Daoism (Taoism) and Confucianism. They practice these beliefs in certain ways: in worship, rituals of passage at various points of the individual life cycle, meditation, and ordinary actions in daily life. Each religion has its own way of arranging these beliefs and practices into a distinctive pattern. Second, this pattern expresses and enacts what is sacred. Sacred refers to what is considered most holy and important, whether in this world, in a supernatural world that transcends this one, or both. Religions draw on their experience of the sacred, both ancient and contempo rary; express the sacred in all of its aspects; and enact it by continuing to make it real for believers.

Because common West ern notions of the “sacred” or “holy” often entail belief in a holy God, we add this further phrase to our defi nition: ultimate about life. This “ultimate” may be a principle, an impersonal force, or a spiritual power, hidden in the world or beyond it. Sacredness or “the ultimate” in world religions is wider than a divine being. Third, note that it is a community of like-minded people that forms a religion. Religions sometimes begin with an individual (Buddha, Confucius, Jesus), but they become social communities of shared belief and practice even during the lifetime or in the sec- ond generation following the life of these founders. They persist through history as communities of religion. Not all religions try to grow throughout the world, but all of them are concerned with passing themselves from gen- eration to generation, thus becoming “traditions.”

The meaning of religion is typically traced to the ancient Latin world religio (ree-LIG-ee-oh), derived

from the verb religere, “to bind/tie fast.” This verb is itself derived from the word ligere, “to bind” (compare our words ligament and ligature). Of course, the mean- ing of a word today can’t be limited to what it meant thousands of years ago, but this ancient meaning shows how religion began and still illustrates nicely the different parts of our defi nition. Ancient Romans used religio in several senses. First, it means a supernatural constraint on behavior, doing what is good, and especially avoiding evil. It “binds” people to what is right. Second, it entails a holy awe for the gods and sacred power in general. Third, religio means a system of life that binds people together in a group and orients them to the gods. Finally, it entails the practices of rites and ceremonies by which the Roman people expressed and enacted their religion.4

Although the Romans and some other peoples used the term religion for their system of belief and prac- tice, different religions of the world call themselves by different names, most of them not using the word reli- gion at all. For example, Daoism is “the Way” to most Daoists; they don’t refer to it as “the Daoist religion.” Many Hindus call their religion “the Eternal Teaching”; Buddhists sometimes call theirs a “school”; and many Jews, Christians, and Muslims prefer the term faith instead of religion. But no matter what they call them- selves, they are in fact religions as that term is used in scholarship and teaching. However, the defi nition given above doesn’t rule out the necessity for world religions students to wrestle with this question on their own.

A good defi nition will carefully identify the subject being defi ned, but it can also be used to exclude other things from the defi nition. How does the defi nition given above exclude things that aren’t religion? Here are two examples. First, the defi nition speaks of religion as a system based on the sacred or on ultimate value; other systems that do not view themselves as religions do not usually speak about the “sacred” or “ultimate.” This is true of most political ideologies and parties such as Democrats and Republicans, academic philosophies, systems of popular psychology like that of “Dr. Phil” McGraw, and so on. (This isn’t meant to demean these other groups; many people fi nd a great deal of meaning and inspiration in them.) Therefore, people who belong to nonreligious groups can also practice a variety of religion or no religion at all. Second, a pattern of belief held by only one person can’t be a religion as we defi ne it here. Such do-it-yourself religion may be popular in Europe and North America, and it is usually sincere and important to the person who holds it, but it doesn’t bring with it a social bond. Some scholars sometimes refer to this as private religion, but

4 P. G. W. Glare, Oxford Latin Dictionary (New York: Oxford University Press, 1983), 1605–06.

monotheism Belief in one God

polytheism Belief in many gods

private religion Pattern of belief held by only one person

W H Y S T U DY R E L I G I O N ? 7

others question whether “private religion” is really religion at all.

LO2 Why Study Religion? At fi rst, the question “Why Study Religion?” may seem pointless to you. You might say, “I’m taking the course, aren’t I?” You may go on to give your reasons for taking this course: to get course credit, to fulfi ll a cul- tural studies requirement at your school and maybe pick up some knowledge and skills along the way, and ultimately to get an academic degree. But let’s explore a bit further why students today should study religion.

Studying the Persistence of Religion in the Modern World Religion should be studied—among other reasons—to understand its persistence in the modern world, which in many ways is not hospitable to religious belief and practice. The rise of secularism, or life without religion, has challenged most religions for the past two hundred years. Today, the secular approach to life rejects religion

for the perceived evils of fundamentalism (“Look what happened on 9/11!” is commonly heard); the inappro- priateness of religious training for children (“Children should be allowed to decide for themselves when they are older”); and the better view on life offered by science (“Religion is false, because we know about evolution”). Secularism has led to a lessening of religious belief and practice, and in North America to widespread illiteracy about religion. Many people, including about half of all Europeans and a growing number of North Americans, are neither especially religious nor completely irreligious; they are “in the middle” between them. They com- bine aspects of secular life with aspects of religious life.

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In Avatar, indigenous peoples prepare to defend their world—especially the “Tree of Souls” connection with the spirit world—from colonizers.

secularism Life without religion

Is Religion a Dirty Word?

To some religious people, religion is, if not a dirty word, at least a derogatory one. Some Christians, Jews, and Muslims think that “religion” is a bad thing. Many religious people want to have a strong connection with God/ ultimate reality/cosmic power, but not a “religion.” They call their own beliefs a “faith,” “teaching,” “school,” or something similar, but they often call other people’s belief systems, somewhat pejoratively, “religion.” In his best-selling book written for Christians, The Shack, William Young even has Jesus say, “I’m not too big on religion.”

People who don’t like any religion at all also use religion in a negative way. An increasing number of people in North America and Europe say, “I’m spiritual, but I’m not religious.” A 2008 documentary fi lm featuring comic and social critic Bill Maher was titled not Religious, but Religulous, Maher’s unfl attering combination of religion and ridiculous.

“I’m not too big on religion.” —Jesus, in

The Shack

To study world religions well, you have to put aside prejudice, whether pro or con, if you have it. All scholars of religion use religion as an academic, neutral, descriptive term, and you should, too, regardless of your own personal stance on religious belief and practice. To use an analogy, many people today, including students, often use the word politics prejudicially. But to study well in the academic fi eld called “political science,” one must put aside prejudice about the term politics. The same is true for the study of religion.

A Closer Look:

8 C H A P T E R 1 B E G I N N I N G YO U R S T U DY O F W O R L D R E L I G I O N S

This means that reports of the death of reli- gion are mistaken. Religion persists today and is often on the rise, even as secularism has become more widespread. More than three-quarters of the world’s people identify with one or more religions. We still fi nd religion everywhere: in high culture, in popular culture (for example, the 2009 fi lm Avatar and the rock band U2), and in everyday life in North America and around the world. The religions of the world are now present in North America, and almost every religion is as close as one’s keyboard, on the Internet. In the Soviet Union and China—which tried with Communist fervor in the twentieth century to suppress and even extinguish all religion—it has come back with vigor. The government of China is now bringing back Confucian texts and teachings to counteract the “money-fi rst” mentality among so many young people there. At the beginning of the twenty-fi rst century, religion is at or near the center of global issues and cultural confl ict. Religion has an increas- ingly visible role in national and even interna- tional politics. One simply can’t understand many of the confl icts in our world with- out a basic knowledge of religion. What’s more, new religious movements are aris- ing every decade, so that the number of religions in the world is increasing, not decreasing. Religion is emerging as one of

the main markers of human identity in the twenty-fi rst century, along with gen- der, class, and ethnicity.5

Why does religion keep on thriving? First, despite the challenges to religion, it continues to be a powerful resource for everyday life all around the world. Religion still provides meaning, strength, and joy to many. Another reason is that most religious traditions have proven them- selves adaptable to the ever-changing situations of human

5 Stephen Prothero, Religious Literacy (San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 2007), 5.

life. They’ve changed over the thousands of years that many of them have existed, and

the study of these changes forms a large part of the study of religion. (If religions can’t or don’t change, they usually die

out.) Many religions even have some room for skepticism and for the secular, which gives them strength in our rapidly changing world. In many places, especially in central and south-

ern Africa, indigenous religions tied to local cultures

are fading, but universal religions

such as Christianity and Islam have taken their place.

Overall, religion is powerful and persistent, and it shows no signs of disappearing. For everyone who wants to be informed about the world, religion is an important part of understanding it.

The study of religion is also a persis- tent part of the academic scene. Around

750,000 undergraduates take a reli- gion course each year in the United

States. Enrollment in world religion courses in the United States has grown rapidly after the religiously connected attacks on this country on September 11, 2001. Some of the students decide to make the

study of religion their major or minor. Religions are taught in most

liberal arts colleges, as well as in private and state universities. Leading universities

that didn’t have a religious studies program in the past because of a more secular orientation estab- lished one in the twentieth century, among them Harvard, Princeton, Cornell, and Stanford. In 2009 the American Historical Association reported that more historians in the U.S. now specialize in religious issues than in any others. Even the government of China, which is offi cially atheistic, is setting up undergraduate and graduate degree programs in religious studies in several of its most selective universi- ties. What’s more, the study of religion in U.S. K–12 public schools is growing, with new guidelines from the American Academy of Religion, an association of religion professors.6

In sum, the academic study of religion is alive and well.

6 “American Academy of Religion Guidelines for Teaching about Religion in K–12 Public Schools in the United States,” http:// www.aarweb.org/Publications/Online_Publications/Curriculum_ Guidelines/AARK-12CurriculumGuidelines.pdf.

The rise of

secularism has

challenged most

religions for the

past two hundred

years.

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Religion is powerful and persistent,

and it shows no signs

of disappearing.

D I M E N S I O N S O F R E L I G I O N 9

What the Academic Study of Religion Can Offer You Intellectual exploration to shape one’s knowledge and values is one of the joys of being a student, but most students today also have valid concerns about how studying religion will help them to earn a living in today’s economy. A small proportion of students in religion courses choose to make religion the center of a professional career, either as the leader of a religious community (such as a rabbi, priest, or minister) or as an academic specialist in higher education. Some students take a world religion course to clarify or strengthen their own religious knowledge and values. They real- ize the truth in the proverb fi rst said by Max Müller, “Those who know only one religion know none.”

Most students take a world religion course to learn more about an important aspect of the world today. This study offers students training in a unique combina- tion of academic and everyday skills such as these:

● The ability to understand how religious thought and practice are related to particular social and cultural contexts

● The ability to understand the religious dimensions of confl icts within and between nations

● An appreciation of the complexities of religious language and values

● An ability to understand and explain important texts both critically and empathetically

● Cross-cultural understanding, or what is now becoming known academically as “cultural intel- ligence” or “cross-cultural competence”

Few academic fi elds bring together so many different forms of analysis as religion does. With this broad lib- eral arts background, many religion majors or minors go on to study law, business, education, and medicine in graduate school. In short, the study of religion offers a foundation for a successful and fulfi lling career, in addi- tion to growth in personal knowledge and satisfaction.

LO3 Dimensions of Religion As we examine the varieties of religious experience, all sorts of human beliefs and practices come into view. Religion seems to be as wide as human life itself.

This was illustrated in one American publishing com- pany’s poster, which read: “Books about religion are also about love, sex, politics, AIDS, war, peace, jus- tice, ecology, philosophy, addiction, recovery, ethics, race, gender, dissent, technology, old age, New Age, faith, heavy metal, morality, beauty, God, psychology, money, dogma, freedom, history, death, and life.” To get a grip on this complexity, various scholars have organized the dimensions of religion in various ways. These patterns are somewhat artifi cial, but they’re helpful in grasping the mass of information avail- able about religions, for both beginning students and experienced scholars alike. The prominent scholar of comparative religion Ninian Smart fi rst laid out fi ve dimensions in the 1960s, but by the 1990s he had come to think there were nine. Following Smart, Rodney Stark and Charles Glock have systematized the various interlocking aspects of religion in six dimensions.7

The Cognitive Dimension Religions have cognitive (thinking) dimensions that teach their followers what it is necessary to know. Most religions teach deep knowledge about their gods and founders, often in stories. They teach about the creation of the world, the meaning of life, and ways to overcome death. They teach about human identity, both individ- ual and social: gender, class, ethnicity, and others. They provide ways of understanding what the world is and what it should be. Often the history of religion itself is explained so that followers can know that they stand in a great tradition. The cognitive dimension of religion entails analyzing and systematizing knowledge, as well as learning it and passing it on. Its teachings are framed in stories, short statements that summarize beliefs (for example, the Four Noble Truths of Buddhism), songs, proverbs, laws, and many other forms. The cognitive dimensions of religion typically grow so comprehen- sive and important that religions can contain an entire worldview. However, we must keep in mind that there is often a signifi cant gap between the offi cial levels of religious teachings and what is believed and practiced by most people.

The Ethical Dimension Ethics are important in almost all religions, because, as we saw above, religions seek to correct what they perceive to be wrong in the world. Personal ethics are

7 Rodney Stark and Charles Glock, Patterns of Religious Commitment (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1968).

“Those who know only one religion

know none.” —Max Müller

10 C H A P T E R 1 B E G I N N I N G YO U R S T U DY O F W O R L D R E L I G I O N S

found in most religions, but the emphasis is strongly on social ethics. All religions have moral expectations for marriage, families, religious societies or congrega- tions, social classes, and even whole nations. We may think of religious ethics as “rules” more negative than positive, but most religions have a balance of both “do this” and “don’t do that.” These systems of social ethics sometimes become the law of the nation where religion is not separated from the state, as in Shari’a, religion-based law in some offi cially Muslim countries. Values, norms, and patterns of behavior in religions are internalized with the help of moral rules. Different people and activities serve to shape religious behavior: living models such as professional religious specialists (clergy, monks, gurus, and the like); legendary models such as saviors, saints, and immortals; and behavior in the overall group. When social morality based on religion is

constantly, care- fully practiced, religion becomes a way of life.

The Ritual Dimension Ritual is symbolic action in worship, meditation, or other religious ceremonies. It’s symbolic and sometimes abstract, but meant to achieve very practical goals. When most people in North America today think of religion, they think of the ritual ceremonies of worship. But ritual also includes formal and informal prayer, sac- rifi ce, chanting of scriptures, public processions, and even pilgrimage. Pilgrimage—travel to a special des- tination to increase one’s devotion or improve one’s religious status—doesn’t often come to the minds of modern North Americans as a religious ritual, but in 2009 millions of people worldwide went on a pilgrim- age and spent the equivalent of 18 billion U.S. dollars on it. Ritual can be long, elaborate ceremonies performed by religious specialists or simple daily acts like such as a short prayer before eating a meal or going to sleep. Rituals are directed to one God, many gods, or to spir- its or deceased ancestors. Ritual is not only symbolic, but also effective; it helps to reenact and reapply the deep truths of a religion to people in the present. Mircea Eliade (MUHR-chuh eh-lee-AH-deh), who died in 1986, advanced his infl uential theory of “eternal return” about myths. This theory holds that myths and rituals do not simply commemorate past acts of the gods, but actually participate in them and bring worshipers to the gods. In some religions, sacrifi ce of food or drink is thought to “feed” the gods or deceased ancestors and make them happy with those who offer sacrifi ce to them.

Within religions there is often a mixed attachment to ritual. For example, in Christianity some Protestants minimize formal rituals, whereas most Roman Catholics and the Eastern Orthodox have many elaborate ritu- als. Sufi Muslims emphasize pilgrimage to God “in the heart,” in part to contrast with other Muslims who view

ritual Symbolic action in worship, meditation, or other religious ceremonies

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Ethical and ritual dimensions come together in a Hindu wedding in Ahmedabad, India.

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D I M E N S I O N S O F R E L I G I O N 11

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the pilgrimage to Mecca as the highlight of their life. Some Hindus have given up the rituals of the home and temple to seek salvation in purely solitary meditation. Although ritual may be downplayed in favor of other dimensions of religion, it never completely disappears.

The Institutional Dimension Because religions are social more than personal, they give an organizational structure to their religious com- munity and (usually) the wider society. Moreover, many religions are internally diverse, with different institu- tional structures for each internal group. Most religions come from ancient, traditional societies, so they aren’t “democratic” organizations; power in religious institu- tions tends to fl ow from the top down. This is also true of new religious movements (NRMs), religious groups that have arisen since the nineteenth century and now have suffi cient size and longevity to merit academic study. They are typically founded by a charismatic leader, such as L. Ron Hubbard of the Scientology movement, who wields great power. Religions typically make

a valid distinc- tion between specialists (reli- gious healers, priests, monks) and others, typically called “laity.” This ins t i tu t iona l dimension is so important that people often speak of “organized religion.”

The Aesthetic Dimension The aesthetic (beauty) dimension is the sensory element of religion. Beauty appeals to the ratio- nal mind, but has a special appeal to human

emotions. This dimension encompasses religion’s sounds and smells, spaces, holy places, and landscapes. It also includes its main symbols (Judaism’s six-pointed Star of David, Buddhism’s wheel), devotional images and statu- ary, and all the religious items of material culture. Islamic religious art tends to be abstract, because of strong pro- hibitions of anything that could enable the worship of other gods. Most Hindu art, on the other hand, is fully representational, some of it even explicitly sexual. The aesthetic dimension encompasses the architecture and decoration of religious buildings, as well as works of music, poetry, and hymns. It also includes ritual gestures: hand gestures in yoga, kneeling bodies in prayer, hands pressed together in Hindu greet- ing and Christian prayer, and many others.

Beauty adorns a wall and the dome of a mosque in Isfahan, Iraq, to the glory of Allah and inspiration of those who worship.

new religious movements (NRMs) Religious groups that have arisen since the nineteenth century and now have sufficient size and longevity to merit academic study

Dimensions of Religion

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Participating in initiation rituals, as these ten-year-old males of the Yao tribe in Malawi, binds the initiates

closer to their gods and their tribe.

12 C H A P T E R 1 B E G I N N I N G YO U R S T U DY O F W O R L D R E L I G I O N S

The Emotional Dimension This dimension includes the particular emotions and wider “moods” experienced in religion. They include senses of awe, fear, and love. They also include some religions’ hope for life after death or other religions’ hope for no more life after death. The emotional dimension includes confi dence received to cope with death, suffering, and evil. The emotional self-confi dence and sense of purpose that religion brings are so notable that “losing my religion” or “getting religion” about something are common expressions. The emotional dimension includes the emo- tions that come with belonging and per- sonal identity, as well as with concern for others. It also includes extraordinary feel- ings and experiences such as isolation, feelings of union

with an ultimate reality or God, and hallucinations. The emotional dimension of religion looms large today in the Western world, where belief for many is primarily a matter of emotion. In the words of the 1981 hit song

by the rock group Journey, put to more recent use by such tele- vision shows as Family Guy and Glee, “Don’t stop believ- ing, hold on to that feeling.”

To conclude this sec- tion, sometimes people reduce religion to one or two of these dimensions. For example, they may suppose that religion is primarily an ethical system, a system of teaching about the divine, an institution, or even a feel- good emotion. This reduction is to be expected, but it’s wrong. Almost all religions are multidimensional. That the many dimensions of religion are closely related to one another was suggested by the British philosopher Alfred North Whitehead, who once wrote that the power of religion lies in its grasp of this truth: “The order of the world, the depth of reality of the world, the value of the world in its whole and in its parts, the beauty of the world, the zest for life, the peace of life, and the mastery of evil, are all bound together.”8

LO4 Ways of Studying Religion The study of religion is pursued today with a wide vari- ety of methods. These center largely on six different

academic disciplines, some of which you may be studying. We’ll consider the methods and the work of promi- nent scholars who have contributed to them, and along the way we’ll encounter different theories of the ori- gin and purpose of religion. Before we discuss these methods, however, we should deal with the important mat- ter of the difference between theology and religious studies.

Theology and Religious Studies The study of religion in America today is pursued in two main ways. Theology is the study of a religion, based on a religious commitment to that religion,

8 Alfred North Whitehead, Religion in the Making (New York: World, 1960), 115.

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The sense of purpose that

religion brings is so notable

that we speak informally of

“losing my religion” or “gett ing

religion” about something.

Sensual Hindu art put to spiritual use: a goddess in a temple sculpture

theology Study of a religion, based on a religious commitment to that religion, in order to promote it

WAY S O F S T U DY I N G R E L I G I O N 13

in order to promote it. It is study from the “inside.” Christian theology has been an important part of the Western university since the oldest universities were founded in thirteenth-century Europe. Theology is pursued today at many American schools, especially those with religious affi liations. To use the words of the eleventh-century Christian theologian Anselm (AHN-sehlm) of Canterbury, England, theology is “faith seeking understanding.” This statement is true of theological study in other religions as well, in both Eastern and Western religions. The university thought to be oldest in the world still existing today–– at the Al-Azhar (al-ah- ZAHR) mosque in Cairo, Egypt––was founded for theological study. Theology is older in Buddhism and Hinduism than it is in Christianity or Islam. Theology in these religions has typically relied closely on philosophy and tex- tual studies to carry out its intellectual work.

The second branch is called religious studies, a relatively new fi eld of academic study of religion that aims to understand all religious traditions, not just Christianity and Judaism, and to do so objectively, in a religiously neutral way, from the “outside.” It doesn’t ask students to make religious commitments or even require students to refl ect on those they have. In the Enlightenment (ca. 1650–1800), the independence and separation of human reason from religion had developed to the extent that a schol- arly treatment of religion independent from theol- ogy could begin. Reason, not faith, was now seeking understanding of religion. By about 1875, religious studies was emerging as an academic fi eld. Now uti- lizing the tools from many other academic fi elds in the humanities and sciences, religious studies arises out of a broad intellectual interest in the nature of religion and the different world religions. It offers a unique, nonthreatening opportunity for students to ask important questions about religion, different world religions, and life itself.

History History is the scholarly study of the past, whether that past is remote (the beginnings of human civi- lization, for example) or recent (the events of last year). It seeks to fi nd out what really happened and why. This task is important because, as the historian Philip Jenkins has written about religion, “Virtually everybody uses the past in everyday discourse, but the historical record on which they draw is littered with myths, half-truths, and

folk-history.”9 When history is applied to religion, rich and important knowl- edge emerges, because religions come from the past, both remote and recent. History studies the process of a religion’s beginnings, growth, diversity, decline, and so on. An example is a recent vol- ume of essays entitled Sacred Schisms: How Religions Divide, which carefully studies internal splits in a dozen reli- gions and draws conclusions about the different factors and events involved in religious splits.10 History has almost

always been a main method in the study of religion. The Oxford historian of Indian culture F. Max

Müller (1823–1900), whom we already met above, is one of the founders of religious studies—some would say the founder. He edited a fi fty-volume collection of ancient sacred scriptures from the main Asian religions,

9 Philip Jenkins, “Ancient and Modern: What the History of Religion Teaches Us about Contemporary Global Trends,” ARDA Guiding Paper, http://www.thearda.com/rrh/papers/guidingpapers/jenkins.asp, accessed 7/17/10.

10 James R. Lewis and Sarah M. Lewis, Sacred Schisms: How Religions Divide (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2009).

After World War I, historians

would become less naïve

about their ability to be

“scientifi cally” objective about

their work.

Al-Azhar University in Cairo, founded in 972 C.E.

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religious studies Academic study of religion that aims to understand all religious traditions objectively, in a religiously neutral way

14 C H A P T E R 1 B E G I N N I N G YO U R S T U DY O F W O R L D R E L I G I O N S

translated for the fi rst time into reliable English edi- tions (the Sacred Books of the East series, 1879–1910), a foundational contribution to research and teach- ing in religious history. He promoted a scholarly dis- cussion on developmental patterns in religious history and on the relation of myth, ritual, and magic to reli- gion in the past. In his Introduction to the Science of Religion (1873), Müller argued that religious scholar- ship can be fully scientifi c in its methods and results. It can collect, classify, and compare religious texts just as scientifi cally as a botanist collects and studies plants. Müller’s investigations led him and others to a supposed “oldest stage” of European and Asian culture and reli- gion that extended from the Indians to the Germanic tribes—what he called the “Indo-Germanic” or “Aryan” stage beginning around 2000 B.C.E. By the end of the 1800s, the notion of near-steady, almost evolutionary progress often assumed in these studies (and in much of European and North American higher learning and cul- ture at that time) started to fade, and the surprising hor- rors of the First World War (1914–1918) ended almost all assumptions of automatic progress in religion and culture. Müller’s work was largely text-based, and based in scriptures as well. This was a necessary fi rst step, and a part of other text-based studies in other specializa- tions in history, but the fi eld of history would widen in the twentieth century to social history, popular history, and even the history of material culture. It would also become less naïve about the ability of historians to be “scientifi cally” objective about their work.

One particular approach taken by some historians of religions is the “History of Religions School.” This school of thought began in Germany in the nineteenth century, lasting with some strength into the middle of the twentieth century, and is still occasionally found today in Europe and North America. It was the fi rst to study reli- gion systematically as a social and cultural phenomenon. It depicted religion as evolving with human culture, from “primitive” polytheism to ethical monotheism. Religions were divided into stages of progression from simple to complex societies, especially from polytheistic to mono- theistic and from informal to organized. Despite the obvi- ous faults of such an approach, the nineteenth century saw a dramatic increase in knowl- edge about other religions, an increase caused by imperial expansion by European pow- ers and the growth of a genuine interest to know about other cultures. For the fi rst time, an

accurate “map” of the different religions of the world emerged (see Map 1.1).

Psychology Psychology deals with the structure and activity of the human mind. It is the scientifi c study of individ- ual behavior, including emotions and other thoughts. Psychology has an interest in religion because of reli- gion’s role in shaping human behavior—for example in coping with the challenges of life-cycle changes and death. Psychology also focuses on how religions under- stand the human self, including gender. It has been particularly concerned with research in conversion, mysticism, and meditation.

Psychology sought at fi rst to explain the origins of religion in terms of the subconscious mind. Sigmund Freud (froyd) and Carl Gustav Jung (yoong), the found- ers of psychoanalysis, sought in opposing ways to trace the origins from the strongest, most basic human needs and drives. Freud (1856–1939) and his school regarded religion as a neurotic condition that needed therapy when it persisted into adulthood. (See his defi nition of religion on page 5.) He held that religion, particularly a belief in God, derives from adults’ need for a father fi g- ure when they achieve independence from their actual fathers. These ideas can be found in his books The Future of an Illusion, in which the “illusion” is religion, and Moses and Monotheism. Freud later admitted that a person could experience an “oceanic feeling” of reli- gion in a positive way, but later Freudians would con- tinue to be mostly negative toward religion until about the 1980s, when some change began.

Freud’s pupil Jung (1875–1961), on the other hand, was appreciative of religion. In his books Modern Man in Search of a Soul and Memories, Dreams, Refl ections, he held that conceptions of the divine, whether of god(s) or some other form of ultimate reality, were related to an ancient archetypal pattern that resides in the sub- conscious of all human minds. Religion enables each developing person to bring out and employ this arche- type as the individual personality grows and achieves what Jung called “individuation,” or personal maturity and wholeness. The notion of “individuation” would become important in the human potential/humanistic branch of American psychology. This positive arche- type is found in all societies, Jung argued, and his theory became important for many researchers in the academic discipline of cultural anthropology.

William James (1842–1910), a professor at Harvard, was an American founder of the fi eld of psychology. In his still-important book The Varieties of Religious

WAY S O F S T U DY I N G R E L I G I O N 15

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16 C H A P T E R 1 B E G I N N I N G YO U R S T U DY O F W O R L D R E L I G I O N S

Experience (1902), James advanced a more prag- matic and positive view of religion than did either Freud or Jung. He main- tained that the religious experience of individuals, not religious institutions,

should be the primary focus of the psy- chology of religion and of religion itself. Intense types of religious experience in particular should be studied by psycholo- gists, because they are the closest thing to a “microscope” into the mind. Individuals must develop certain “over-beliefs” that, while they cannot be proven, help humans live purposefully and in “harmony with the universe.” After James, the psychologi- cal study of religion went into something of a decline, and scientifi c research into religious behavior faded.

Since the 1980s, the psychologi- cal study of religion has been advanced by neuroscience, particularly with regard to research on the human brain. (Here the psychology of religion comes very close to biology, which we will dis- cuss on page 19.) Perhaps the most prominent researcher in this fi eld is Andrew Newberg, a professor of psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania. He has used scan- ning techniques to observe what happens in the brains of sub- jects while they meditate or pray—in a way, providing the “microscope into the mind” that James sought. Newberg’s research used brain imaging to study Tibetan Buddhists in meditation and Roman Catholic nuns in prayer. He found that during intense sessions of these activities, areas of the brain associated with con- centration and emotion are activated and areas associated with the sense of self are deac- tivated. Newberg hypothesizes that this may explain the sense of “otherness” and “oneness with God or ultimate reality” often reported

by people who have had intense religious experiences. Much of this research is summarized in his fascinating book Why God Won’t Go Away: Brain Science and the Biology of Belief (2001). More recently, Newberg argued that the physical and emotional benefi ts of meditational practices grow over years of practice, but even new practitioners get

“healthier brains.” In one study, he tested people who had never medi- tated before, then taught them simple meditative methods. After eight weeks of meditating twelve minutes a day, brain scans and other tests show that most subjects gain signifi cant improve- ment in memory, and their anxiety and anger decrease.

Sociology Sociology, the scientifi c study of groups and group behavior, explains religion’s role in society. Sociologists

studying reli gion are concerned with the mutual rela- tionship between religion and society, how each shapes

the other. They examine, by both qualitative and quantitative research, the practices of religions. Sociologists are interested in beliefs mainly as the backgrounds of social practices and behaviors. They also study the various groups within differ- ent religions.

Current debates in the sociology of religion have centered on issues such as the pace of secular- ization, civil religion (the popular, dominant reli- gion of a nation or culture that typically involves

some religious conviction about that nation

or culture), and the cohesiveness of religions and

religious practice in the challenges

of globalization, multiculturalism, and

pluralism. Sociology of religion based on empirical

research is an infl u- ential tradition in the United States, in which

the fl agship outlet for research is the Journal for the Scientifi c Study of Religion.

Quantitative sociological studies have contributed

Yoga is one popular form of meditation.

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civil religion Popular, dominant religion of a nation or culture that typically involves some religious conviction about that nation or culture

Andrew Newberg has

discovered that the benefi ts

of meditational practices

grow over years of practice,

but even new practitioners

get healthier brains.

WAY S O F S T U DY I N G R E L I G I O N 17

greatly to our knowledge of religion, for example on cur- rent issues such as new religious movements and “fundamental- isms” in world religions.

Émile Durkheim (1858– 1917), a founder of sociology, came from a long line of Jewish rabbis but studied religion from the “religious studies” approach. Many scholars today have concluded that the sociology of religion, and perhaps sociology itself, began with Durkheim’s 1897 book Suicide, which studied among other things the rates of suicide occur- rence among Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish populations in Western Europe. Durkheim theorized, especially in his essay “The Origin of Beliefs,” that reli- gion was a necessary factor in creating and sus- taining a harmonious society. He saw religion as the cement that binds societies and cultures together. Through shared beliefs and practices, religion creates a sense of social identity and rein- forces the moral values of society. This is true even when society is secularizing, and Durkheim argued that secularization would continue. Rites of passage are important as a means of initiat- ing individuals into the wider society and embed- ding a sense of responsibility. Like Karl Marx, Durkheim recognized that religion played a role in social control of the individual, but unlike Marx, he saw this in a positive light. Religion is inevitable, just as society is inevitable when individuals live together as a group. Durkheim argued that the relationship between people and the supernatural in religion was based on the relationship between individuals and

the community. His most mem- orable proverb in this regard is “God is society, writ large.”

Cultural Anthropology Cultural anthropology is the scien- tifi c study of human life focused on various concrete human settings. It arose in the nineteenth century, and soon after its birth it was applied to religions of the world, especially the beliefs and practices of tribal

cultures. Cultural anthropol- ogy uncovers the underly- ing values of cultures, their answer to the question “Why are we here?” It studies such broad cultural dynam- ics as honor and shame, the role of kinship, and so on.

It explores the role of symbols, culture,

and the natural environment; the making of social boundaries; how sex is under- stood and gender roles are constructed; and rituals. A special focus of anthro- pology has been the shaman, a religious

specialist traditionally belonging to an indigenous society who acts as a medium between this visible world and the spirit world, usually for healing and telling the future. Since the 1960s, the formal use

of cultural anthropology has become more prominent in religious studies.

Cultural anthropology can study the past, especially texts, art, and other artifacts. Almost all world reli- gions with sacred writings have had

those writings subjected to some form of anthropological study. For example, in a study of early Christianity, Bruce

Malina of Creighton University in Omaha, an anthropologist and New Testament scholar, has applied this method to several books of the New Testament, especially in

his The New Testament World: Insights from Cultural Anthropology.11 This is often called “historical anthropology.” However, cultural anthropology pre- dominantly deals with living religion. It studies current practices including pilgrimages; life-cycle rituals such as weddings and funerals; belief in mir- acles; festivals; and the functions of guilt, confession, punishment, and for- giveness. History, sociology, and even psychology tend to make broad analy- ses and conclusions, but anthropology tends to study smaller-scale aspects of human life. As Clifford Geertz wrote in his book about Islam in Morocco and

11 Bruce Malina, The New Testament World: Insights from Cultural Anthropology, 3rd ed. (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2001).

shaman [SHAH-muhn] Religious specialist traditionally belonging to an indigenous society who acts as a medium between this visible world and the spirit world

“The anthropologist … fi nds

in the litt le what eludes us

in the large, stumbles upon

general truths while sorting

through special cases.”

—Cliff ord Geertz

Modern shaman, Peru

PHOTOGRAPH BY BARTHOLOMEW DEAN, 1988

18 C H A P T E R 1 B E G I N N I N G YO U R S T U DY O F W O R L D R E L I G I O N S

Indonesia, “The anthropologist is always inclined to turn toward the concrete, the particular, the microscopic . . . . We hope to fi nd in the little what eludes us in the large, to stumble upon general truths while sorting through special cases.”12 For example, while historians made large studies about ancient Hindu sacred texts in the “dead language” of Sanskrit, anthropologists spent long peri- ods of time in fi eldwork in India to study the living use of contemporary oral traditions in other Indian languages.

Victor Turner (1920–1983), an infl uential cul- tural anthropologist of the last four decades, developed a powerful theory of ritual that drew the attention of scholars to religious behaviors. His conception of ritu- als was shaped during his fi eldwork in the 1950s with the Ndembu tribe, in what today is Zambia; his personal background in Roman Catholic Christianity also forms a background for his work on ritual. He was interested in the “social drama” of ritual presentations, especially

rites of passage. Ritual creates the social breaks called “mar- ginality” and thresholds of new kinds of life called “liminality.”

Women’s Studies When the women’s liberation movement came to full bloom in the United States in the 1970s, the academic fi eld of women’s or gender studies quickly developed. It

12 Clifford Geertz, Islam Observed (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1968) 4.

studies the social pressures, expectations, and opportu- nities of both genders but focuses on women with the purpose of promoting their full equality and liberation. Feminism thus has both a descriptive and a prescrip- tive aspect. Gender studies is fl ourishing in North America but is not yet strong in Europe or other parts of the world.

Feminist scholars of reli- gion have pointed to religion as a key factor in the almost worldwide subordination of women to men. They state correctly that practically all religions stem from— and most maintain today to some extent—patriarchal

(male-dominant) societies. In religions that have both male and female gods, the male gods almost always predominate; this is true of both tribal and interna- tional religions. Women’s identifi cation with female gods—for example the new goddess Santoshi Ma in Hinduism—does provide some religious strength, but this is qualifi ed by male dominance among divine beings themselves. Predominantly masculine language is used to describe and address most gods, especially the one God of monotheistic religions.

Women’s roles as professional religious specialists have been limited, even in those relatively few religious organizations that profess women’s equality with men; this limitation is sometimes called in the Western world the “stained-glass ceiling.” Their ambitions have often been constrained by the assertion that their primary religious duty is to obey their husbands and serve their families in the home. Some feminists have argued that a “Mother Goddess” religion centered on the earth and on women is the earliest form of human religion, but the historical basis of this is contested. Women of many religions have made other responses to the pressure of patriarchy. For example, they press for wider roles as religious specialists, trying to break the stained-glass ceiling or at least push it higher. They look for wider opportunities in the world of work, often adapting this to their religious duties in the home. In general, they inter- pret and live their religions in ways more congenial to women.

Cultural anthropology studies life through the generations, such as these young Masai women in east Africa.

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Biology Until recently, biology (the scientifi c study of all life) didn’t contribute much to the study of religion, aside from religious studies scholars’ uncritical application of evolutionary theory to religion. Now, with the ability to study the human gene system, new possibilities are opening for understanding complex human issues in the realm of religion. Many scientists are now seeking to explain religion in genetic terms, or at least to fi nd the genetic connections of religion. Rapidly increasing knowledge of the human genome has made this pos- sible. Some writers have suggested that the pervasive- ness of religious beliefs is due to our genetic makeup.

Supporters of the controversial theory advanced in Dean Hamer’s The God Gene: How Faith is Hardwired into Our Genes (2005) suggest that human religious behavior is the result of, or at least made possible by, a genetic adaptation. Hamer even pointed to one gene, called VMAT2 by the Human Genome Project, as the “God gene.” However, most scientists hypothesize that the genetic background of any complex human behav- ior such as religion probably fl ows from a combina- tion of several genes. More generally accepted is the hypothesis by some biologists and anthropologists that

the development of religious belief in prehistoric peo- ples may have been a key factor in the development of higher-order cognitive skills. Some humans became capable of transcending themselves in thought and action, and this was passed on by natural selection.

Conclusions We’ll conclude our treatment of the methods of reli- gious studies with two observations. First, it’s obvious that the study of religion, like many other branches of scholarship, is multidisciplinary. It has no “reli- gious method” all its own, but draws from many other methods. Second, religious studies is a human, not a divine, way of knowing. Religion itself can bring divine or sacred knowledge, but our academic study of it is method related and time bound. This means that reli- gion scholars, just like other academic experts, are part of the “concrete epistemology” (ways of knowing) of current scholarly and cultural interests and current assumptions that different generations have about life. Religion scholars’ (and beginning students’) personal development, education, and individual religious expe- riences, as well as their generation-specifi c attitudes, all affect how they adopt and use a particular method of studying religion. Religious studies as a fi eld is always conditioned in each generation by time, a fact that is often appreciated only by a later generation, for whom temporal distance allows a better view. As we sometimes say with slight exaggeration, “Hindsight is twenty-twenty.”

This conditioning can be traced through time from the beginning of religious studies until today. Religious studies fi rst went along with nineteenth-century opti- mism about the progressive evolution of human reli- gion. Then, a Protestant bias crept into religious studies from the hidden values of scholars in the fi eld, who were predominantly Protestant Christian: the privileging of sacred texts over oral traditions; the privileging of doc- trine over ritual; and the belief in the primacy of pri- vate religious experience over received traditions—all

Some biologists and anthropologists

hold that the development of religious

belief in prehistoric peoples may have

given humans their higher-order

cognitive skills.

Venus (or Woman) of Willendorf, Austria, the world’s oldest religious statuette (24,000–22,000 B.C.E.)

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crucial elements of the Protestant branch of Christianity. Then, the religious studies “phe- nomenologists” of the 1920s, after the spiritual and intellectual crisis of the First World War, searched for the so-called essence of religion, devaluating differences in the process. Then, the baby-boomer generation of scholars in the 1960s through 1990s was driven by the expe- rience and values of an alternative culture to pose provocative questions that challenged tradi- tional methods in religious studies. The realization that each generation of scholars has characteristic limita- tions, which it cannot see, need not diminish the value of religious studies. Indeed, knowing the limits and biases of knowledge makes our knowledge more certain.

LO5 Special Issues in the Study of Religion Today Tolerance and Intolerance

In Cambridge, Massachusetts, a controversy breaks out in the blogosphere and then in the print media over Harvard College’s decision to reserve six hours a week in the college’s central gymnasium for women only. The Harvard Islamic Society had petitioned for the special hours, arguing that observant female Muslim stu- dents needed these special hours in order to observe Muslim rules about modesty and coverings for women. Although many Muslim women had exercised in the gymnasium dur- ing open hours, dressed in sweatsuits and headscarves, the Harvard Islamic Society says that having hours restricted to women enables them to exercise better, in athletic shirts and shorts, without fear of male students “checking them out.”

Some argue that this is a reasonable toleration of another’s faith; others say that this gives Harvard’s approval to practices that reinforce intolerance toward women.

The British atheist Chris- topher Hitchens is one of a handful of current advocates of atheism— the conviction that there

is no God and that religion is mostly mistaken—who are making sharp public attacks on religion. (Agnosticism, a related term, refers to those who “do not know” if a God or gods exist; this belief is not always antireligious,

and rarely combative against reli- gion.) Hitchens recently wrote that religion is “Violent, irrational, intol- erant, allied to racism and tribalism and bigotry, invested in ignorance and hostile to free inquiry, contemp- tuous of women and coercive toward children.”13 Although this is put in a broad, sharp way that lacks any hint of nuance, Hitchens is articulating a point of view against religion that many people share.

Tolerance means putting up with the views and actions of others that are opposed to your own, usually for the common good. We begin our discus- sion of tolerance and intolerance with

the Western world. The modern Western idea of religious tolerance developed in Europe after brutal wars between Protestant and Catholic Christians in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and has gradually been extended to people of other religions. (The murderous violence between Protestants and Catholics in Northern Ireland from about 1960 to 1998 serves to remind the modern world what was gained at the end of the seventeenth century.) The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution guarantees tolerance in “freedom of religion.” The state cannot interfere with basic religious rights and must actively protect them from restriction in law or policy. In the twentieth century, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights advocates free- dom of religion for all people. Since the Enlightenment, the fostering and maintenance of tolerance, religious or otherwise, has been regarded as a duty of

13 Christopher Hitchens, God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything (Boston: Twelve Publishing Company, 2007), 56.

“Religion is violent, irrational,

intolerant, allied to racism

and tribalism and bigotry,

invested in ignorance…

contemptuous of women and

coercive toward children.”

—Christopher Hitchens

atheism Conviction that there is no God

agnosticism Refers to those who “do not know” if a God or gods exist

tolerance Putting up with views and actions of others opposed to your own, usually for the common good

PHOTO BY JERRY JASPOR. COEXIST DESIGN USED WITH PERMISSION BY PEACEMONGER AT WWW.PEACEMONGER.ORG.

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government. Tolerance and intolerance are public, social things, but they are personal and individual as well. People of one religion can be intoler- ant toward people of other reli-

gions, and people outside religion can be intolerant of all or some religious people and groups.

The history of world religions reveals different ideas of tolerance. In ancient China, native religions were generally tolerated, but non-Chinese religions were admitted only by government consent; this is still true of China today. Ancient Judaism was at times welcoming to other religions in its territory, at other times not. In the ancient Roman Empire, non-Roman religious groups were tolerated, with some exceptions, as long as they did not undermine the reli- gious underpinnings of Roman imperial rule. Christianity, from the thousand years since it became the state religion until at least the Protestant Reformation, tended toward religious intolerance. (Compare the maxim from Roman Catholic his- tory that has parallels in other reli- gions: “Error has no rights.” The Roman Catholic Church did not for- mally accept religious tolerance until the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s.) Islam usually granted tolera- tion of conquered peoples of certain other religions—as a rule, but not always in prac- tice. This toleration did not extend to Arab polytheism, which was extinguished; and over time, even tolerated religions were dramatically reduced in Muslim lands.

Hinduism has been generally tolerant to other religions but has preferred to integrate them into its own system. Hindu relations with Muslims on the Indian subconti- nent have been uneasy for centuries, and mass conversions of Hindus to religions such as Christianity and Buddhism can provoke a violent reac- tion. The regular violence between Hindus and Muslims that has occurred since the division of India and Pakistan in 1947, and occasion- ally Hindu violence against Sikhs, means that the tolerance that some see in Hinduism needs some qualifi cation.

Buddhism, which teaches tolerance, has seen intolerant periods in its history, as recently as the civil war carried on by armed Buddhists in Sri Lanka, in the violently repressive Buddhist government in Myanmar (Burma), and on a much smaller scale in bitter struggles between different Tibetan monastic groups. In sum, achieving and maintaining tolerance is no easy matter.

A diffi cult question involves the limits of tolerance. Few people in the world today would like to be

called “intolerant,” but few people can be equally tolerant of all opposing ideas

and actions. If they try, some diffi cult questions can arise. For example, can

a religious group that is itself intoler- ant be tolerated in the public sector?

In North America, with its legal tradi- tion of granting a maximum of freedom

to intolerant groups, this isn’t so much of an issue. But can a religion be toler-

ated by another if it grows big enough to take over a society and impose its own

intolerance? In general, different religious views are tolerated in Western society, pro-

vided that they do not lead to actions that could challenge a majority consensus on religion. The line between private belief and public action isn’t always easy to see, however. An example of this is the con- troversy in France over the public wearing of Muslim headscarves and full-body veils by women, which the government wants to for- bid as an assault on the secular nature of the French state and its security. The

Church of Scientology is under gov- ernment pressure in Germany, in part because the post–World War II German constitution forbids “totali- tarian movements,” which the gov- ernment suspects that Scientology

is. And in China, the Falun Gong (FAH-luhn GONG)

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People today don’t like to be called

intolerant, but few people can be equally

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Protesters against the Church of Scientology wear masks to shield their identity.

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FABIEN DANY, WWW.FABIENDANY.COM

meditational movement is strongly repressed by the Chinese government as a “dangerous cult” that suppos- edly threatens public order and the health of its follow- ers. These examples show that struggles over tolerance continue today all around the world.

Violence

Faced in April 2010 with a spreading church sexual abuse scandal in Europe, similar to one that took place in the 1990s in the United States, Pope Benedict XVI apologized in an offi cial letter to almost 15,000 victims and their families in Ireland, express- ing “shame and remorse” for what he called “sinful and criminal” acts committed by some priests over the past fi fty years. Most of these acts were sexual assaults against children. “You have suff ered grievously and I am truly sorry,” the pope said. “Your trust has been betrayed and your dignity has been violated.” But the pope didn’t indicate in his letter that church leaders who looked the other way or actively covered up these crimes would be disciplined by the church, or that the whole matter would be turned over to the police, as some victims and their families were hoping. The problem of sexual predators among religious leaders isn’t unique to Roman Catholics, or even to Christianity.

Violence is a diffi cult topic to grapple with, both emo- tionally and intellectually. However, this grappling is necessary. Violence is the intentional use of physical force to injure or kill people, to damage or destroy their property, or both. Violence is motivated by a variety of factors—political, economic, national, and tribal. Religiously motivated violence includes all events in which a follower of a religion is either the perpetrator or the recipient of violent behavior or both. Like most sorts of violence, religious violence can be carried out by indi- viduals or groups. It can be by direct attack, or by indi- rect means such as inducing famine. It includes violence of any kind by members of one religion against people of another religion (the Crusades by medieval Christians against Islam, Muslim holy war, and occasional violence between Sikhs and Hindus), between different groups in a religion (Sunni and Shi'a Muslims, occasional violence between different Hindu castes in India), and crimes by powerful people in a religion against those with less or no power. It includes persecution of one religion by another

or by the state against its people, as in the Holocaust directed at Jews or in current Chinese prosecution of the new Falun Gong religious movement. It also includes

violence against explicitly religious objects, as in attacks on religious buildings or sites or

burning of holy books. Because religions have cultural, political, and other

aspects, different motivations often lie behind what may

appear to be purely religious violence.

Sometimes vio- lence can be infl icted on a public tar- get in order to

induce terror in a populace.

Religious violence commit- ted by groups must be under- stood in its cultural context—not to excuse it, but to understand it. In particular, beginning students of religions should realize that not all religious violence is the same. Some religions tend to be nonviolent, but others approve of violence in certain situations. Some religions began as explicitly nonviolent movements—Christianity and Sikhism, for example— but changed over time. Religious violence often tends to place differing emphases on the symbolic aspects of vio- lence. For example, sometimes violence is understood as a religiously signifi cant act with ritual aspects. In the 1990s Taliban Muslims dynamited ancient statues of the Buddha to remove “idolatry” from Afghanistan, and today they at times attack government schools for girls. Ritual vio- lence may be directed against victims, as in human sacri- fi ce, or it may be more or less voluntarily self-infl icted, as

In 2009, girls attend school in Afghanistan despite religiously motivated threats against them.

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in self-fl agellation with a whip. It may be a part of monastic practice, as for example when head monks in certain sects of Zen Buddhists beat their subor- dinates with sticks and rods to discipline them or try to induce sudden enlighten- ment. So-called “honor killings,” in which fam- ily members kill another member of their family (usually female) in order to “preserve the fam- ily’s honor,” often have some religious motiva- tion today, although other factors are at work there too.

Pluralism

P hil Jackson, the retired head coach of the Los Angeles Lakers, isn’t a typi- cal professional basketball coach. He rarely stands on the sideline and shouts at his players. Instead, he sits so serenely that he has been called “Buddha on the bench” and “Zen master,” terms that apply as well to his religious approach to coaching. His teams don’t play seasons; they go on “sacred quests,” as in Native American religion. Jackson teaches his players short Buddhist medi- tations to use before they shoot free throws. He has called their main strategy on off ense “fi ve-man tai chi,” and their locker room is fi lled with Native American religious objects. His 1995 autobiography is called Sacred Hoops. Raised by devout Christian parents who taught him to value both religious earnest- ness and compassion, he calls himself a “Zen Christian.”

Nonviolent relations between reli- gions, and between cultures and nations with different religions, are based fi rst on toleration. Religious pluralism, the recognition of religious differences and the effort to deal with them constructively, goes beyond toleration. Religious

pluralism owes a great deal to the American and European expe- rience of religious

diversity. Chris Beneke, in

his Beyond Toleration: The Religious Origins of American Pluralism, distinguishes carefully between tol- erance and pluralism. By the 1730s, religious toleration toward minority religions was

practiced in most British colonies in North America.

The policy of toleration relieved religious minorities of physical punish-

ments and fi nancial burdens, but it did not end preju- dice and exclusion. Those “tolerated” could still be barred from holding government and mili-

tary positions and from attending universities. Religious persecution had ended, but reli- gious discrimination had not. However, colonial governments gradually expanded the policy of reli- gious toleration, and between the 1760s and

the 1780s, they replaced it with “religious liberty.”14

This was not primar- ily a compromise with rising Enlightenment secularism in America;

it was an achievement of early American religious

groups. The different Protestant Christian groups—Episcopalians, Methodists, Quakers, Presbyterians, Baptists, Lutherans, and others—saw religious liberty for everyone as in their own best interests, and for the com- mon good. The consensus for religious liberty was so strong that when a new national constitution was adopted at

14 Chris Beneke, Beyond Toleration: The Religious Origins of American Pluralism (New York: Oxford University Press, 2006).

pluralism Recognition of religious differences and the effort to deal with them constructively

Diff erent religions exist

because religions are

diff erent. This makes dialogue

between them both possible

and necessary.

Phil Jackson

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24 C H A P T E R 1 B E G I N N I N G YO U R S T U DY O F W O R L D R E L I G I O N S

the end of the eighteenth century, the Bill of Rights was added almost immediately, with freedom of religion in the fi rst amendment. The strength of religious freedom in the United States has strongly infl uenced the course of religious freedoms in the world.

Religious pluralism demands interfaith dialogue and some signifi cant cooperation. Interfaith dialogue is conversation between members of different religions to reduce confl icts between them and to achieve mutu- ally desirable goals. Dialogue calls for care to be taken with the ideas of others, without necessarily agree- ing with them or assuming (as many people think) that all religions are essentially the same or could be made the same. In the words of the subtitle of Stephen Prothero’s thought-provoking book, the Eight Rival Religions That Run the World have Differences that Matter.16 To put it another way: Different religions exist because religions are different. These differences make dialogue between religions possible, and they make dialogue important if confl ict between religions and between the cultures they shape is to be avoided. Interfaith dialogue is easier if a religion’s adherents have some form of inclusivism, a belief that people in other religions may have a way to salvation or at least some signifi cant but partial knowledge of the truth. At the far extreme, believers with a completely exclusivist

mindset—that only their reli- gion leads to the truth— prefer to proselytize followers of other religions rather than seek an open-ended dialogue with them. In between full inclusiv- ism and full exclusivism is a wide range of attitudes, where most believers today live.

Religion and Ecological Crisis

At Windsor Castle, just outside London, representa-tives of nine of the world’s largest religions gathered in November 2009 to discuss the ecological crisis. They’d been summoned by Prince Philip of the United Kingdom and United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. Called “Many Heavens, One Earth,” the meeting was intended to generate commitments from religious organizations and the countries in which they predominate, agreements that could reduce greenhouse gas emissions or otherwise limit human impact on the environment. In words addressed to the Christians in the delegation, but applicable to many (but not all) of the other delegates, Prince Philip remarked, “If you believe in God … then you should feel a responsibility to care for God’s creation.”

Statement on Pluralism by Harvard University’s Pluralism Project

First, pluralism is not diversity alone, but the energetic engagement with diversity. . . . Today, religious diversity is a given, but pluralism is not a given; it is an achievement. Mere diversity without real encounter and relationship will yield increasing tensions in our societies.

Second, pluralism is not just tolerance, but the active seek- ing of understanding across lines of diff erence. Tolerance is a necessary public virtue, but it does not require Christians and Muslims, Hindus, Jews, and ardent secular- ists to know anything about one another. . . .

Third, pluralism is not relativism, but the encounter of commitments. The new paradigm of pluralism does not require us to leave our identities and our commitments

behind, for pluralism is the encounter of commitments. It means holding our deepest diff erences, even our religious diff erences, not in isolation, but in relationship to one another.

Fourth, pluralism is based on dialogue. Dialogue means both speaking and listening, and that process reveals both common understandings and real diff erences. Dialogue does not mean everyone … will agree with one another.15

A Closer Look:

15 From http://www.pluralism.org/pages/pluralism/what_is_plural- ism, accessed 7/17/10.

16 Stephen Prothero, God Is Not One: The Eight Rival Religions That Run the World—and Why Their Differences Matter (New York: HarperOne, 2010).

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Religion and environmentalism has emerged in the past generation as an important topic in religious stud- ies. This isn’t only because people everywhere realize that worsening pollution, especially of the air, is changing our Earth’s climate rapidly and for the worse. It’s also because, as the Muslim scholar Seyyed Nasr explains, “The environmental cri- sis is fundamentally a crisis of val- ues.”17 Since they shape the values of cultures, religions are deeply involved in how humans treat their environment.

Historian Lynn White, Jr. argued in 1967 that Western Christianity, with its view of nature as under human control and direction, bears a substantial responsibility for the contemporary environmental crisis.18 White’s essay pro- voked a strong reaction, with responses ranging from complete denial of his argument to complete agree- ment with it. Some proposed that Eastern religions, as well as those of indigenous peoples such as Native Americans, offered more environmentally responsible worldviews than did Christianity. By the 1990s, many scholars of religion had entered the debate and begun to analyze how nature is viewed in the world’s various religious systems. A series of ten conferences on reli- gion and ecology was held at the Harvard University Center for the Study of World Religions from 1996 to 1998; the conference papers were published in a World Religions and Ecology series, one book for each of ten religions. An increasing number of courses on religion and the environment are offered in colleges and uni- versities around the world. This topic needs careful study, because the world’s reli- gions sometimes have different views about the origin, nature, and value of the physical world. But it’s probably safe to say that all religions view the world around us as signifi cant and would view the loss of a viable home for humanity as a tragedy.

New Religious Movements

Outside a movie premiere in Utah, crowds gather, waiting for the director, producers, and actors to arrive. Although the scene is similar to that of most premieres, the fi lm is not. It is a feature-fi lm adaptation of the main Mormon scripture, the Book of Mormon, and has been offi cially sanctioned by the Mormon church, formally known as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Along with its general release to theaters and then to video rental outlets, the movie would be used in the missionary activities of the church. From the birth of the Latter-day Saint Church in the 1800s, its use of the Book of Mormon in missionary eff orts has been a key factor in making this church probably the fastest-growing religious organization in the world.

New religious movements (NRMs), as we saw above, are a widely accepted area in the fi eld of religious stud- ies. NRMs are religious groups that arose since the start of the nineteenth century and now have suffi cient size, longevity, and cultural impact to merit academic study. We will deal with NRMs more fully in Chapter 13, but we should consider them initially here.

New religious movements is preferable in some ways to other recent terms such as alternative religious movements and marginal religious movements. It is also clearly preferable to the older terms sects and cults. Although these terms still have some validity—especially in sociology, where scholars use them objectively—they have become so loaded with value judgments that most religion scholars no longer use them for new religious movements. To judge by the dimensions of religion

17 Seyyed Hossein Nasr, Man and Nature: The Spiritual Crisis in Modern Man, rev. ed. (Chicago: Kazi Publishers, 1997).

18 Lynn White, “The Historical Roots of Our Ecologic Crisis,” Science 155, no. 3767 (March 10, 1967).

Religion united to nature: the Eternal Spring Temple in Taroko National Park, Taiwan

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discussed above, there is usually little or no difference between a religion and a sect or a cult. All of them have doctrines and ethics, rituals, social structures, and an aes- thetic dimension, and their members typically describe powerful emotional religious experiences. The term cult has been used to describe many smaller, nontraditional religious groups. These groups often have new or inno- vative beliefs that set them apart from the prevailing reli- gious worldviews, especially those of the religions from which they emerge. In recent times "cult" has become rather derogatory, applied to groups that are deemed to be beyond commonly accepted bounds of social behavior. In many cases, if they do not disappear, sects go on to become recognized groups within the broader context of the “parent” religion. The various Protestant churches are examples of Christian sects that eventually gained mainstream acceptance, and in Hinduism one can cite the example of the Hare Krishna (HAHR-ee KRISH-nah) movement (The International Society for

Krishna Consciousness, or ISKCON). Despite the intensity of its beliefs and actions that can make it look like a “cult” to some in the Western world, it is an authentically Hindu group.

Thousands of groups around the world today are NRMs, and each year sees the

birth of more. Some examples are Falun Gong, the Baha’i tradition, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the Christian Science Church, the Unifi cation Church, and the Church of Scientology. These and other movements called NRMs often don’t see themselves as new religious movements, but instead as the true continu- ing body from an older reli- gion now gone bad. Although scholars use the term “new religious movements” we must note that they usually branch off from older religions. Falun Gong is an adaptation mostly of Mahayana Buddhism and a lesser amount of Daoism. Baha’i arose in the nineteenth century from Shi'a Islam and sees itself as the succes- sor of Islam. The Church of

Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, the Christian Science Church, and the Unifi cation Church see themselves as Christian, and most experts in comparative religions view this labeling as basically correct. That all three accept the Christian Bible is a good indication of their Christian roots. Moreover, outsiders to Christianity, such as Buddhists, would almost certainly recognize them as belonging to the stream of Christian tradition. However, one shouldn’t assume that all organizations that call themselves a church self-identify as Christian. For example, the Church of Scientology does not see itself as Christian and uses church to mean “religious organization”; so does the Buddhist Church in America.

Some of these new religious movements are highly controversial. Many were persecuted or prosecuted in their early years by religious and civil authorities, and some still are today. However, many of the other faiths examined in this book were controversial when they were new. New religious movements can and do change, sometimes dramatically, and often much more quickly than older religions do. This often occurs when their founder dies, but later change is possible as well. Careful students of religion will want to form judgments about new religious movements that take some account of what believ- ers say about themselves in their writings and in life. As

Celebrity Scientology reaches South Park: “I’m a failure in the eyes of the prophet,” Tom Cruise said as he ran into Stan’s closet. Cruise believed Stan was the reincarnation of Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard, so it was shocking to hear him say, “You’re not, like, as good as Leonardo DiCaprio … but you’re OK.”

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always, our learning about a religion should precede any judgment concerning it.

LO6 Coming to Grips with Your Preunderstanding of Religion What Is Preunderstanding? Imagine that a good friend tells you, “I’ve met and talked with an alien visitor from another planet.” You might say to yourself, amid all the thoughts and emo- tions that you usually feel when you hear something strange or upsetting, “I don’t believe in space aliens!” But then you might think, “Are there alien visitors to Earth after all? Maybe they’re real, and maybe he has been talking with them.”

You might think this, but probably not. Instead, your mind automatically begins to sift through your knowledge for an explanation consistent with what you already “know” to be true. Only people who are already convinced, or seriously entertaining the idea, that a set of things are true—there is life somewhat similar to ours on other planets, beings from these places travel to Earth, and they make contact with humans and talk with them—will easily accept your friend’s comment. Given your prior understanding that such things probably aren’t factual, you won’t likely entertain these theories as a serious possibility.

We interpret all of our experience in just this way, because, as psychologists tell us, this is the way the human mind operates. Every understanding of our new experiences is made in light of an understanding that we already had going into the new experiences. Preunderstanding is the state of one’s understanding of reality, in terms of which one makes sense of one’s new experiences. It describes what we already know, whether that knowledge is correct or not. We assume that new experiences will be compatible with our prior understanding. Even if a new experience corrects our old knowledge—let’s say that in this case you actually do meet a space alien with your friend—it is always understood on the basis of old knowledge. This new knowledge is then integrated into old understandings, and the preunderstanding grows. The term preunder- standing, therefore, describes the existing state of our understanding prior to the occurrence of some specifi c

experience in need of interpretation. Our preunder- standing is not static, but dynamic. It changes and constantly gets modifi ed as we alter our beliefs and convictions. Over the course of time, we as individuals reject some of our former beliefs and embrace new ones. With each change, our preunderstanding is altered.

Your Preunderstanding of Religion All this raises the question: What elements of your preunderstanding of religion might infl uence your study of world religions? Each person must examine and answer individually. In all individual encounters with new people and new ideas, our knowledge of ourselves and our knowledge of others are connected and infl u- ence each other. You should fi rst think through your own past encounters with religion and your experiences with it, pro and con. Here are some short but thought- provoking questions to consider as you think of your own preunderstanding of religion and religions:

1. Do I have an unprejudiced view of what “religion” in general is? Or am I biased for or against it?

2. Can I “suspend my disbelief” or “suspend my belief” in order to encounter religion as a whole, or specifi c religions, sympathetically?

3. If I have a religious belief, can I study other reli- gions without feeling threatened in my own?

4. Can I encounter strange, even disturbing practices without getting too upset?

5. Can I be humble and provisional in my conclusions?

6. Can I postpone any pos- sible personal judgment on a religion until I’ve learned more about it?

You are now poised to begin your study of the world’s leading religions. Like the two travelers on the front cover of this book, you are going on a jour- ney. Your journey will encounter the lives and religions of other people. In this process, you will learn more about yourself as well. Enjoy the trip!

preunderstanding State of one’s understanding of reality, in terms of which one makes sense of one’s new experiences