Religion rationally

[Mohan]

Anyone out there who wants to discuss religion and its applicability today. I want to have a cool, composed and a rational discussion. I do not use expletives and I beg that you do not too.

[Mohan]

I know that this is a controversial topic and has the capacity to send tempers surging. But all I am asking is to take out the faith element for a moment and discuss religion on its own merits.

[pringles]

It\'s good you started a topic on religion. I think it\'s time people discuss the merits and demerits of practice, and consequences it has on our social and political behaviors. I think it is important for us to understand what we believe in and how it affects our perspective. We come from a long history of relegious beliefs, traditions, and customs. The question here is how much of it do we need now. Can\'t we live and work under the the principles of democracy and morals without consciously or sub-consciously tying it with relegion? If we look at all the conflicts going on in the world today, each and every one of them has a relegious or racial overtone. there\'s something to learn from....

[Mohan]

Very well said, Mr. Pringles. I think religion should be like any other social enterprise that should evolve with the changing situations and scenarios. There probably was a time, that the caste system, in its original spirit made sense. It was never intended to become heriditary. It got hijacked by people who would benefit from it and what we see today is the diabolical monster. It simply beats me, as to how even educated people cannot see thru the sheer stupidity of this practice and still engage in it, even if not actively.
The problem arises, if we stop to trust in our individual ability to grasp things and believe in the prescriptions passed down by our forefathers. The implicit requirement of all religion is that you do not ask questions but accept things with faith. For if you start asking questions, things fall apart.
How can Islam justify killing \"infidels\" and treating them as inferiors, levying special taxes on them etc. It is tough to conceive that God would be so vengeful.

[Nick]

and religion... the tale continues.....

[Seayen]

Religion I feel is like a club membership. Pardon me for my frivolous comparision, but I am serious. I feel \'religion\' has been conceptualized to take care of the hierarchy of needs (Maslow\'s theory). Simply put the functions it intended to take care of are: security, social belonging, support, entertainment and pride. Religion need not necessarily have God, it may have an ideal/ideology too. What do you say?

[Mohan]

I agree with you Seayen. That is what religion started out as. But when a person instead of passing thru the hierarchy of needs, i.e. experiencing the stages, is given a cheat sheet of dos and donts, becomes irrational religion. Most of the so called religious minded people do not know jack about most of the practices they indulge in but they do em anyway cuz, it is the prescription from some great mind/prophet/elders/GOD. One curious thing I find in all the religions is \"Do not ask questions. Have Faith\". Hinduism does not say so in so many words but the Hindu mindset is as rigid when it comes to religious practices, rites, superstitions etc. But for Muslims and Christian, of course there is the word of God that cannot be questioned. So in any case questions are not encouraged.

[summer spray]

Religion was originally created so that people will have a vent to let out their anxiety and frustrations and have a feeling that someone superior is protecting them all the time. The concept of religion has undergone many transformations but of late it becoming atavistic. The British had taken advantage of religion and were highly successful in their \"divide and rule\" policy. Even after 53 years of independence...nothing has changed! In fact we have become worse! It is sickening to know that people are ready to stoop to any level to stick to their fanatic beliefs and their religious frenzy. I feel that if one follows one’s own religion and tries not meddle with others, the world will be a better place to live in.

[fareed]

VICTIM OF PREJUDICE
\"The trouble with Muslims is that they have ceased to be the DOMINANT POWER and have become the Subjugated Community. The result is that every action of a Muslim is criticised, every move condemned; every reaction misinterpreted, and the whole community is blamed for either the fault of a few or the indifference of the many.\"
Even after 50 years of partition, Indian Muslims suffer from a feeling of insecurity.
Indian Muslims suffer from two traumas today: One, the religious prejudice against them which has historical roots and has been whipped up by the protagonists of Hindutva and two, their campaign against so-called pseudo-secularism, targeting Indian Muslims as the favoured lot, receiving preferential treatment at the hands of the country’s rulers. Arising out of these two developments, there is a widespread misconception about Islam, which is presented by its detractors as a backward-looking faith refusing to allow its followers to move with the times.
This is a hangover of the calumny against Islam started by the Christian clergy within 50 years of the passing away of Prophet Muhammad (pbuh); it was mounted with a virulence and hate that is unparalleled in human annals. The reason was simple. Islam spread in the lands which were under Christian domination and it uprooted the hold of Christianity on the people.
No one has put the case about the phenomenon better than H G Wells, one of it’s bitterest critics, who in his Outline of History wrote, \"Islam prevailed because it was the best social and political order the times could offer. It prevailed because everywhere it found politically apathetic peoples robbed, oppressed, bullied, uneducated and unorganised and it found selfish and unsound governments out of touch with any people at all. It was the broadest, freshest and cleanest political idea that has come into actual activity in the world and it offered better terms than any other to the masses of mankind.\"
However, to the Christians the shock was too great to bear, both for the rulers and the clerics, as they retreated from the lands they had ruled. They consoled themselves by painting Muhammad (pbuh) as Manhound or the devil and Islam as a false religion. Many eminent Orientalists have now \"exposed the distorted reports of fanatical Christians,\" to quote Edward Dennis Ross, \"which led to the dissemination of a multitude of gross calumnies\". He pointed out that what was good in Islam \"was entirely ignored\" and \"what was not good in the eyes of Europe was exaggerated and misinterpreted.\"
Until the advent of the British in India, Islam, despite being the dominant power, was free from such distortions or misinterpretations, but during their rule the same propaganda against it was unleashed among Hindus by both British civilians and clerics. Little has happened even after their departure to change this atmosphere of prejudice against Islam. Indian Muslims continue to be viewed as a drag on India’s progress, an alien community, intolerant, aggressive and uncompromising, ready to break but unwilling to bend, prepared to rot in their ghettos but refusing to adjust to the changing requirements. Is it not strange that a religion, which brought about the greatest revolution in the history of the world and changed the shape of mankind, should be condemned as the most retrograde, outlandish and regressive of all religions? Some condescendingly explain that the fault might not lie with Islam but with Muslims. Neither proposition is true.
The attack against Islam takes a subtle form; it is said that Islam needs reforms. Better still, that unless Muslims give up their unqualified adherence to the Quran, neither reform nor renewal of their faith is possible. And without these, it is stressed, they are doomed. This, in effect, amounts to asking Muslims to give up Islam.
For the Quran is really the basis of Islam: no Muslim can modify or alter it. Those who doubt its divinity cannot remain in the fold. The Quran is the pivot around which everything revolves for Muslims. Though revealed in Arabic and addressed to the Arabs, it has a universal message.
Islam is fundamentally as progressive or perhaps more than any other religion and Muslims are as good or bad in following its precepts and practices as the followers of other religions. The trouble with Muslims is that they have ceased to be the DOMINANT POWER and have become the subjugated community; their erstwhile subjects have become the rulers who have no sympathy or consideration for them. The result is that every action of a Muslim is criticised, every move condemned; every reaction misinterpreted, and the whole community is blamed for either the fault of a few or the indifference of the many.
Note: I have taken these excerpts from the award-winning book ‘Victim of Prejudice’ by Dr. Rafiq Zakaria. He was also featured on ‘Movers & Shakers’. I was guessing why he received an award for this book by a Hindu Fundamentalist Government. Upon reaching the end of the book, he has very meticulously driven the point that Islam needs basic reforms, which of course, is unacceptable to any Muslim. So I have only selected paragraphs which are informative.