Category: Articles

The season of consumerist indoctrination, dietary excess and Panglossian sentimentality is approaching its peak, so here is a heart-warming little Christmas story. Actually, its roots – literal and metaphorical – go back well before the intrauterine innovations that traditionally attended the conception and birth of Christianity’s founder and it will warm principally and selectively the hearts of cheerful cynics and pessimists like myself (and, I assume, like many readers of B and W) in whom any habits of optimism have long been replaced by a null hypothesis as the default mode. One of the favourite hobbies of People Like Us is saying ‘I told you so’ and we derive additional schadenfreude from noting that even in the current financial crisis, it is a hobby that no government has yet got round to taxing. This is a story about mistletoe and its alleged ability to cure cancers.

Like most doctors, especially those with an interest in medical history, I have never had anything against plants or herbs. They have provided us with many useful therapeutic agents and will doubtless provide quite a few more. However, I reject the notion that just because something is herbal, it must be effective, along with the allied notions that herbs are harmless and that the more exotic the plant, the greater the efficacy. In short, I am all for plant science as opposed to plant magic. I am also a great fan and was sometimes a deliberate employer of the placebo effect in the days when doctors were allowed to use it but I maintain that the function of placebos is primarily – and for entirely benevolent purposes – to deceive patients, not those who are treating them. Deprived of this now-forbidden, politically incorrect experience, even proper doctors who do respect proper evidence usually have little awareness of just how powerful the placebo effect can be and are regularly surprised by it. ‘Alternative’ practitioners, as a rule, simply don’t want to know about it.

Mistletoe is an obvious candidate for plant magic, deeply embedded as it is in our folk history and potentiated by its association with Druidic mysteries on the one hand and Yuletide lechery on the other. Perhaps because it is itself a kind of ‘growth’ on a tree, mistletoe extracts have been used and recommended for the treatment of cancer. As usual, enthusiasm for mistletoe by its advocates is inversely proportional to the amount of evidence for its effectiveness, but it is a characteristic of ‘alternative’ practitioners that they don’t let anything as boring as evidence get in the way of a rattling good bit of myth or symbolism.

Of course, it’s entirely possible – in principle – that mistletoe contains a hitherto unrecognised anti-cancer drug of amazing potency and few side-effects. However, the null hypothesis requires us to start from the presumption that it doesn’t – that it has no beneficial effects at all and requires researchers to disprove that presumption, though I suspect that most alternative practitioners wouldn’t recognise a null hypothesis if they were strangled with one. As always, only a clinical trial fairly comparing like with like can tell us whether the enthusiasm of its advocates is justified. (As one of our better Prime Ministers noted, “Considering that enthusiasm moves the world, it is a pity that so few enthusiasts can be trusted to tell the truth”.)

About ten years ago, I was visiting a medical friend and colleague in Berlin, where we had been organising a conference. Sitting in her office while she dealt with some patients on the wards, I flicked through a few of the mainly German medical journals on her desk. My German is on the rudimentary side (apart from the texts of Schubert lieder¸ which are of limited relevance to medical science), but most foreign-language journals helpfully provide an abstract in English and a lot of medical German is encouragingly similar to medical English. My Berlin friend kindly translated the bits that I couldn’t understand. That is how I became aware of an important randomised multi-centre study[1] of mistletoe extract involving 495 patients that had recently taken place in Germany, where mistletoe seemed to be popular. This popularity may owe something to the fact that in a fee-per-item medical system, as in Germany, treatments requiring frequent injections are nice little earners for the doctors who prescribe them.

The important thing about this particular study, and one that makes it relatively easy to understand and interpret even for non-medical readers, is that all the patients were suffering from squamous cell carcinomas of the head and neck. You don’t need to know in detail what a squamous cell carcinoma is. All you need to know is that it is a type of cancer arising mainly in the skin of the head and neck region or in the mucous membranes lining the mouth, nose and throat. From the researchers’ point of view, this has the advantage that such tumours are much easier to observe and assess than cancers affecting internal organs. They can be seen, measured and often felt directly or with one of those circular, head-mounted mirrors that cartoonists are so fond of depicting. They do not need special techniques like x-rays, CT or MRI scans or investigations that require a mini-camera attached to an endoscopic tube to be swallowed or inserted.

After their cancers had been diagnosed, histologically (ie microscopically) confirmed, and treated with surgery alone or surgery plus radiotherapy as deemed appropriate by conventional treatment standards, the patients were randomised to either twice-weekly subcutaneous injections of mistletoe extract for four three-month cycles separated by four weeks, or to no mistletoe. Understandably, since injections hurt, no placebo injections were given and therefore the study was not ‘blinded’. (That is, both the patients and the doctors knew whether or not mistletoe had been administered and might have been biased by this knowledge.) However, since largely objective outcome criteria were used, this is arguably not crucial. After all, you can hardly get any more objective and less subjective in the assessment of outcomes than death vs survival, and if bias from the placebo effects were important, one would expect it to favour the mistletoe group, especially since injected placebos are usually more effective than oral ones. Patients were followed up for a median period of 40 months and this is what the researchers found: “No statistically significant differences in disease-free survival, overall survival, immune system markers or quality of life could be detected”.

I wrote about his study in ‘HealthWatch’, a newsletter published by and for clinicians, researchers and journalists committed to evidence-based medicine, whether mainstream or ‘alternative’, and it appeared in 2002. I mentioned that one reason for writing the article was that “the ineffectiveness of mistletoe is unlikely to be headline news in the journals of the alternative medicine movement. They remind me of the people who wanted to publish a newspaper which contained only good news. They also remind me of the sort of people – rather numerous, now I come to think of it – who are happy to praise their particular deity when someone recovers from a serious illness or when there is a plentiful harvest but are oddly reluctant to curse him when someone dies or when famine and earthquakes devastate the land. For many people, alternative medicine clearly is a kind of religion but its benevolent deities reside in plants, meridians or homoeopathically diluted molecules, rather than in more theologically conventional abodes. Unfortunately, to paraphrase the Duke of Wellington, if you can believe in a benevolent deity, you can believe in anything. And you may have to, if the delusion is to be preserved intact.”[2]

I was correct in my prediction. Several years later, the saintly Dr Ben Goldacre wrote something along the same lines because mistletoe was still being promoted as an anti-cancer drug. The equally saintly Dr. Edzard Ernst, professor of Complementary Medicine at Exeter University, wrote an equally dismissive editorial for the 2006 Christmas edition (Ho! Ho! Ho!) of the British Medical Journal. Yet, unsurprisingly, mistletoe is still is being promoted. It still lacks a respectable, high-quality evidence base. As a harmless, if over-priced decoration and fine old fertility symbol from pre-Roman Britain and beyond, mistletoe has an honourable place. As a specifically effective treatment for serious and still quite often lethal and treatment-resistant malignant tumours, it has no place at all – except the one we are assured it has by the magicians, witch-doctors, ideologues, perennial optimists, self-deluding fools, money-grubbers and downright charlatans who largely, though not entirely, constitute the ‘Complementary and Alternative Medicine’ movement. Some of them appear to be spiritual descendants of the great Dr Pangloss himself. Voltaire, the creator of Pangloss, had a phrase for people like that who are slaves to ideology. Écrasez l’infame!

December 23 2008

REFERENCES

1. Steuer-Vogt M, Bonkowsky V, Scholz M, Arnold W. Plattenepithelkarzinome des Kopf-Hals-Bereichs. Mistellectin-1-normierte viscumtherapie. [ML-1 standardised misteltoe treatment in patients with head and neck squamous cell carcinoma.] Arzteblatt, 46, 16 Nov, 2585-7, 2001.

2. Brewer C. Mistletoe has failed the cancer test, but you might never have known it. HealthWatch Issue 46, July 2002.

If you’re seeking a Holocaust survivor’s memoir with a profound philosophical or poetic statement on the reasons six million Jews and many millions of other unlucky souls were slaughtered, and why a person like myself survived the Nazi camps, you’ve opened the wrong book. I’d be lying if I said I knew the reason, or if I even believed there is a reason, I’m still alive. As far as I’m concerned it was all shithouse luck, which is to say – inelegantly – that I kept landing on the right side of the randomness of life.

Pierre Berg, from his Foreword, Scheisshaus Luck: Surviving the Unspeakable in Auschwitz and Dora

Scheisshaus Luck is the memoir of Pierre Berg, a teenage member of the French Resistance who was captured and processed through four Nazi concentration camps as well as a protracted death march. He wrote the book shortly after his emigration to America after the war, but trunked it after a couple of rejection letters. Retired but doing voluntary work at a local cinema, he ran into Brian Brock, who persuaded him into a collaboration on his story. The growth of holocaust denial made it imperative that Berg have his say: ‘Those morons couldn’t tell you what continent Germany is on,’ Berg snarls, ‘and they exalt a coward who committed suicide after ordering brainwashed youths to their slaughter on the barricaded streets of Berlin.’

Berg’s description of life in the death camps is vivid and harrowing. The executions. The gassing. The selections. The disease. The dry, terrible pragmatism of survival. The way that inmates end up collaborating with the system; the way that hunger reduces one’s horizons to a pinprick. Berg witnesses two starving inmates eat liver straight from the corpse. He avoids being hanged by virtue of a clerical error. He sees dead women thrown into rivers, their bodies stuffed with eels to weigh them down. It’s brutal and horrific beyond human imagination, and yet it happened. No matter how many testimonials we read, there is no catharsis – the mind reels back every time.

Yet Berg’s story stands out even in survivor literature. One reason for this is Berg’s humour. He says the camp made him subhuman, but it never took Berg’s ferocious wit or his remorseless cynicism. It feels disrespectful and blasphemous to say this, but Scheisshaus Luck reads like Blackadder set in a concentration camp. Berg is disarmingly honest, sexually acute, often self-deprecating, and has an eye for irony and coincidence.

When a Kapo tells Berg that his shirt is filthy, he responds: ‘How observant. I had worked and slept in it for over a month.’ To another official who asks the name of the man who tattooed the number into Berg’s arm, the author replies: ‘He didn’t bother to sign his masterpiece.’ Witnessing a male Kapo rape a young boy, Berg comments: ‘The SS really needed to switch the colour of his triangle.’

All great comedy is deadly serious, and laughter is often a weapon against totalitarianism. In Monowitz Berg sees inmates laughing with the noose around their necks with the guards shouting: ‘Lachen verboten! Lachen verboten!’ It is the very definition of gallows humour.

Berg’s wit and defiance are at their strongest when he deals directly with Nazism. From the SS’s ‘ludicrously stringent regulations’ to ‘the brownish water the Germans had the audacity to call soup’ he writes of Hitler and the Nazis never with fear, but always with a pulsing anger and a deep, lacerating contempt. Drafted as a camp machinist, Berg delights in sabotaging the weapons he is working on. It’s love for his lost Stella that gets him through the camps, but it is also hate, and a steel resolution not to – in Berg’s phrase – let his bones stoke their fires. But defiance can be gentle, too: Berg and Stella manage to make love in Drancy, despite the puritan regime; Stella tells Berg, in a particularly moving scene, that she is happy not to die a virgin.

Another shining quality of the book is Berg’s resounding unbelief. Throughout his endurance, he remains an ‘atheist red triangle’. Having finally escaped, and sheltering with a religious couple, he responds to an invitation to church with: ‘No disrespect, but four horses couldn’t drag me there. The clergy of all religions make a good living selling you a hereafter that they have no proof exists.’ The dialogue is reminiscent of Primo Levi’s maxim: why change the rules of the game just because you are losing? Berg’s interlocutor, Mrs Novak, tells him his soul will burn in hell: Berg might have responded, like Terry Pratchett, that it had already had a lot of practice.

Scheisshaus Luck manages to be both grinding in its bleakness and compulsively readable. As far as it’s possible without having lived through it, Berg lets you see the reality of Europe near the end of the war, with the SS fighting to maintain the camp’s evil symmetry in the midst of a crumbling Nazi infrastructure. Berg often finds himself hiding from Allied bombing raids while cheering on the pilots. The strongest part of the book comes after Berg’s eventual escape, because by this time you’re punching the air for him and also because he describes the carnage of Europe so beautifully: Soviet tanks in tiny villages, Nazi officials scrambling for expropriated goods, the marching refugees, the fragments of human lives.

Gripping and lyrical, Scheisshaus Luck is a powerful corrective to the bullshit and moral equivalence that is beginning to congeal around contemporary discussions of the Holocaust. It is also a paean to the strength of the human spirit and its will, even in the darkest times, to get to a state ‘where we can live again and love.’

Scheisshaus Luck: Surviving the Unspeakable in Auschwitz and Dora, Pierre Berg and Brian Brock, Amacom 2008

Nahla Hussain, a women’s rights activist and the leader of the women’s league of the Kurdish Communist Party and mother of two children, was beheaded at her house in Kirkuk, in north of Iraq. She was alone in the house at the time of her death. According to the police some unidentified men entered her house on Thursday night, but the circumstances that led to the attack are unknown.

However, violence against women who do not observe Islamic laws and dress code has become a common phenomenon in Iraq. Women’s rights activists, secularists and communists are under constant threats by different reactionary factions, including the Islamists.

In the context of Iraqi society, “the circumstances that led to her death” are quite well known. Under the rule of nationalist parties in Kurdistan the violence against women has risen dramatically. Just recently the Sharia law became the governing law in Kurdistan. Moreover, since American led attack on Iraq, which unleashed Islamic and tribal terrorism, women have become victims of brutal violence and terrorism. Nahla Hussain was brutally murdered because of her convictions and political activities; this is a well-known fact. She was the victim of misogyny and reactionary forces.

This brutal murder must be condemned by all women’s rights, freedom loving and progressive organisations. We must vigorously demand the arrest and punishment of these murderers by the government of Iraqi Kurdistan. This reactionary government by creating a de facto Islamic state and co-operating with the Islamic forces and exercising tribal and Islamic laws has created a safe heaven for the Islamists and forces of reaction. Women have become the main targets of these forces. These are the conditions that have led to Nahla Hussain’s brutal murder and murder and maiming of hundreds of other women. We should try to put an end to these bloody and inhuman conditions in Iraq.

20 December, 2008

Azar Majedi is President of Organisation for Women’s Liberation-Iran and
a member of the coordination committee of the European Feminist Initiative.

A new report showing that Muslim women are discriminated against and
encounter gross bias when they subject themselves to Sharia adjudications
was welcomed today by The One Law for
All Campaign, which is supported by a variety of organisations and
individuals.

The campaign’s spokesperson Maryam Namazie said: ‘This research reinforces
our own findings that Sharia Councils and Muslim Arbitration Tribunals are
discriminatory and unfair. However, the solution to the miscarriages of
justice is not the vetting of Imams coming to the UK as the report has
recommended but an end to the use and implementation of Sharia law and
religious-based tribunals.’ She added: ‘At present these Sharia-based bodies
are growing and appear to have some sort of official backing. But they are
leading to gross injustices among women who are often unaware of their
rights under Britain’s legal system.’

This perspective was reiterated in the One Law for All Campaign’s launch on
December 10, 2008 in the House of Lords at which Maryam Namazie and campaign
supporters Gina Khan, Carla Revere, Ibn Warraq and Keith Porteous Wood
spoke; the meeting was chaired by Fariborz Pooya, head of the Iranian
Secular Society.

Gina Khan, a secular Muslim, said: ‘Under British law we are treated as
equal and full human beings. Under the antiquated version of Sharia law that
Islamists peddle, we are discriminated against just because of our gender.
These Islamists use our plight by meddling in issues like forced marriages,
domestic violence and inheritance laws for their own political agenda. To
allow them to have any sort of control over the lives of Muslim women in
British communities will have dire consequences.’ She added: ‘Sharia courts
must be a pressing concern not just for Muslims but for all those living in
Britain. Anyone who believes in universal human rights needs to stand united
against the discrimination and oppression visited upon Muslim women.’

Carla Revere, Chairperson of the Lawyers’ Secular Society, said: ‘Such
self-appointed, unregulated tribunals are gaining in strength; they
increasingly hold themselves up as courts with as much force as the law of
the land, but are not operating with the same controls and safeguards. They
appear to be operating in the area of family law and some even in criminal
matters, where they have no right to make binding decisions as they claim to
do. Even if the decisions were binding, UK courts do not uphold contractual
decisions that are contrary to UK law or public policy. We call on the
Government and legal establishment to stand up for the vulnerable and tackle
this significant and growing problem, rather than ignoring it.’

Writer Ibn Warraq said: ‘Sharia does not accord equal rights to Muslim
women- in regards to marriage- she is not free to marry a non-Muslim, for
instance; in regards to divorce, custody of children, inheritance, the
choice of profession, and freedom to travel, or freedom to change her
religion. In other words, Great Britain in allowing Sharia courts has
contravened the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948, and all the
other more legally binding United Nations’ Covenants on Discrimination and
the Rights of Women… Multiculturalism is turning communities against each
other, it is fundamentally divisive. We need to get back to the principles
of equality before the law, principles that so many people fought so hard to
achieve for so long.’

Keith Porteous Wood, Executive Director of the National Secular Society,
said: ‘Sharia is becoming a growth industry in Britain, putting growing
pressure on vulnerable people in the Muslim community to use Sharia councils
and tribunals to resolve disputes and family matters, when they could use
the civil courts. Sharia law is not arrived at by the democratic process, is
not Human Rights compliant, and there is no right of appeal.’

Writer Joan Smith who was unable to speak at the launch sent the following
message: ‘This campaign is very important because many people in this
country – including politicians – have yet to realise the isolation of many
Muslims, particularly women, from the wider society. Some of them are
already under intolerable pressure from their families, and the principle of
one law for everyone is a protection they desperately need. That’s why I
give this campaign my whole-hearted support.’

To find out more or support the One Law for All Campaign against Sharia Law
in Britain visit One Law for All.

You can also listen to Maryam Namazie’s debates with Sidiqqi, head of the
Muslim Arbitration Tribunal, on BBC 5 Live and with Muslim lawyer Aina Khan
on BBC Radio 4 Women’s Hour here.

To listen to Gina Khan’s speech at the December 10, 2008 One Law for All
Campaign against Sharia law in Britain launch, click here.

To listen to Maryam Namazie’s speech at the December 10, 2008 One Law for
All Campaign against Sharia law in Britain launch, click here.

To listen to Carla Revere’s speech at the December 10, 2008 One Law for All
Campaign against Sharia law in Britain launch, click here.

To listen to Ibn Warraq’s speech at the December 10, 2008 One Law for All
Campaign against Sharia law in Britain launch, click here.

To listen to Keith Porteous Wood’s speech at the December 10, 2008 One Law
for All Campaign against Sharia law in Britain launch, click here.

Some of the signatories to the Campaign

Nazanin Afshin-Jam, Coordinator, Stop Child Executions Campaign, Canada
Mina Ahadi, Spokesperson, Council of Ex-Muslims of Germany; Coordinator,
International Committee against Stoning, Köln, Germany
Sargul Ahmad, Activist, Women’s Liberation in Iraq, Canada
Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Writer, Washington, DC, USA
Mahin Alipour, Coordinator, Equal Rights Now – Organisation against Women’s
Discrimination in Iran, Stockholm, Sweden
Homa Arjomand, Coordinator, International Campaign against Sharia Courts in
Canada, Toronto, Canada
Farideh Arman, Coordinator, International Campaign in Defence of Women’s
Rights in Iran, Malmo, Sweden
Abdullah Asadi, Executive Director, International Federation of Iranian
Refugees, Sweden
Ophelia Benson, Editor, Butterflies and Wheels, USA
Susan Blackmore, Psychologist, UK
Nazanin Borumand, Never Forget Hatun Campaign against Honour Killings,
Germany
Roy Brown, Past President, International Humanist and Ethical Union, Geneva,
Switzerland
Ed Buckner, President, American Atheists, USA
Marino Busdachin, General Secretary, Unrepresented Nations and Peoples
Organization, Netherlands
Center for Inquiry, USA
Council of Ex-Muslims of Britain, UK
Council of Ex-Muslims of Germany, Germany
Council of Ex-Muslims of Scandinavia, Sweden
Caroline Cox, Peer, House of Lords, London, UK
Austin Dacey, Representative to the United Nations, Center for
Inquiry-International, USA
Shahla Daneshfar, Central Committee Member, Equal Rights Now – Organisation
against Women’s Discrimination in Iran, London, UK
Richard Dawkins, Scientist, Oxford, UK
Patty Debonitas, TV Producer, Third Camp against US Militarism and Islamic
Terrorism, London, UK
Deeyah, Singer and composer, USA
Nick Doody, Comedian, UK
Sonja Eggerickx, President, International Humanist and Ethical Union,
Belgium
Afshin Ellian, Professor, Leiden University Faculty of Law, Leiden,
Netherlands
Equal Rights Now – Organisation against Women’s Discrimination in Iran,
Sweden
European Humanist Federation, Belgium
Tarek Fatah, Author, Chasing a Mirage: The Tragic Illusion of an Islamic
State, Toronto, Canada
Caroline Fourest, Writer, France
Tahir Aslam Gora, Writer and journalist, Canada
AC Grayling, Writer and Philosopher, London, UK
Maria Hagberg, Chair, Network against Honour-Related Violence, Gothenburg,
Sweden
Johann Hari, Journalist, London, UK
Christopher Hitchens, Author, USA
Farshad Hoseini, Activist, International Campaign against Executions,
Netherlands
Khayal Ibrahim, Coordinator, Organization of Women’s Liberation in Iraq;
Arabic Anchor for Secular TV, Canada
International Committee against Executions, Netherlands
International Committee against Stoning, Germany
International Humanist and Ethical Union, UK
Iranian Secular Society, UK
Shakeb Isaar, Singer, Sweden
Maryam Jamel, Activist, Women’s Liberation in Iraq, Canada
Keyvan Javid, Director, New Channel TV, London, UK
Alan Johnson, Editor, Democratiya.com, Lancashire, UK
Mehul Kamdar, Former editor of The Modern Rationalist, USA
Naser Khader, Founder, Association of Democratic Muslims, Denmark
Hope Knutsson, Chair, Sidmennt, Icelandic Ethical Humanist Association,
Iceland
Hartmut Krauss, Editor, Hintergrund, Germany
LAIQUES – Région PACA, Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur, France
Stephen Law, Editor, Royal Institute of Philosophy journal, London, UK
Shiva Mahbobi, Producer, Against Discrimination TV Programme, London, UK
Houzan Mahmoud, Abroad Representative, Organisation of Women’s Freedom in
Iraq, London, UK
Doreen Massey, Peer, House of Lords, London, UK
Anthony McIntyre, Writer, Ireland
Caspar Melville, Editor, New Humanist magazine, London, UK
Bahar Milani, Activist, Children First Now, London, UK
Tauriq Moosa, Writer, Capetown, South Africa
Reza Moradi, Producer, Fitna Remade, London, UK
Douglas Murray, Director, Centre for Social Cohesion, London, UK
Taslima Nasrin, Writer and activist
National Secular Society, London, UK
Never Forget Hatun Campaign against Honour Killings, Germany
Samir Noory, Writer; Secular TV Manager, Canada
David Pollock, President, the European Humanist Federation, London, UK
Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan, Pakistan
Fahimeh Sadeghi, Coordinator, International Federation of Iranian
Refugees-Vancouver, Vancouver, Canada
Michael Schmidt-Salomon, Chief Executive Officer, Giordano Bruno Foundation,
Germany
Udo Schuklenk, Philosophy professor, Queen’s University, Canada
Sohaila Sharifi, Editor, Unveiled, London, UK
Issam Shukri, Head, Defense of Secularism and Civil Rights in Iraq; Central
Committee Secretary, Left Worker-communist Party of Iraq, Iraq
Bahram Soroush, Founding member, Council of Ex-Muslims of Britain, London,
UK
Peter Tatchell, Activist, London, UK
Hamid Taqvaee, Central Committee Secretary, Worker-communist Party of Iran
Union des Familles Laïques – section Arles-Istres, France
Union des Familles Laïques – section Marseille-Aix-en-Provence, France
Afsaneh Vahdat, Coordinator, Council of Ex-Muslims of Sweden, Stockholm,
Sweden
Marvin F. Zayed, President, International Committee to Protect Freethinkers,
Ottawa,Canada

For more information, please contact Maryam Namazie, email:
onelawforall@gmail.com, telephone: 07719166731; website:
onelawforall.org.uk.

Amherst, New York (December 08, 2008)-Scholars gathered this past weekend, December 5-7, in Amherst, New York, for the inaugural meeting of The Jesus Project in a renewed quest for the historical Jesus. The project, sponsored by the secular think tank Center for Inquiry and its Committee for the Scientific Examination of Religion (CSER), is an effort by historians, biblical scholars, and theologians to determine what can be reliably recovered about the historical figure of Jesus, his life, his teachings, and his activities, utilizing the highest standards of scientific and scholarly objectivity.

An earlier inquiry, “The Jesus Seminar,” founded by Professor Robert Funk in 1985, concerned itself primarily with the sayings attributed to Jesus in the Gospels and related sources. Dr. R. Joseph Hoffmann, chair of the Project and the Committee for the Scientific Examination of Religion, said that the “The Jesus Seminar had difficulty separating itself from the faith commitments of its members. Its agenda was not exclusively, but in large measure theologically driven. Its conclusions and methods raised more questions than they answered.”

The project has drawn together a diverse and rich group of scholars, including, among others Gerd Lüdemann, Paul Kurtz, Robert Price, James Tabor, Robert Eisenman, David Trobisch, Bruce Chilton, Dennis MacDonald, and R. Joseph Hoffmann.

At the session this past weekend, participants agreed that a rigorous scientific inquiry was needed, and that the Project would be committed to a position of neutrality towards the sources used as “evidence” for the Jesus tradition. Participants represent a wide variety of perspectives, ranging from Tabor’s argument that there is substantial evidence that the tomb of the family of Jesus has been located, to the view that the evidence for the existence of Jesus as an historical figure is not persuasive. “Jesus remains after 2,000 years the most fascinating figure of Western civilization,” said James Tabor, author of The Jesus Dynasty: A New Historical Investigation of Jesus, His Royal Family, and the Birth of Christianity. “Scholars now at the beginning of the twenty-first century are able to take advantage of a plethora of new texts, sources, and methods, including the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, various lost Gospels that are not in our New Testament, and a rich archeological record.” Tabor says that scholars today find themselves uniquely positioned to examine the issue of who Jesus was in new and challenging ways. During the closing conference round-table, Tabor was quick to emphasize that “the Jesus Project repudiates any theological agendas, special pleading, or dogmatic presuppositions.” All members of the project share a common commitment to the importance of applying scientific methodologies to the sources used to construct the Jesus tradition.

The Project has outlined a set of priorities for its next meetings, including a “consistent” translation of the Gospels, an inquiry into the causes of the canonization of the existing New Testament documents, parallels between Islam and early Christianity in delineating its sacred books, and the need to carve a middle path between what Hoffmann describes as “Da Vinci Code sensationalism and the truly fascinating story that underlies the history of Christianity.”

Papers delivered at the conference will be published under the title “Sources of the Jesus Tradition: An Inquiry,” by Prometheus Books in 2009. The Project’s next conference is scheduled tentatively for May 2009 in Chicago.

CSER was founded in 1983 and is now a research committee of the Religion and Science division of the Center for Inquiry in Amherst, New York. It encourages the use of the historical and applied sciences in the study of religion and provides educational programs for the public as part of its religious-literacy initiatives. The Center for Inquiry/Transnational is a nonprofit, educational, advocacy, and scientific-research think tank based in Amherst, New York. Their research and educational projects focus on three broad areas: religion, ethics, and society; paranormal and fringe-science claims; and medicine and health. The Center’s Web site is www.centerforinquiry.net .

The One Law for All campaign against Sharia law in Britain is to be launched at the House of Lords on International Human Rights Day, December 10, 2008 from 4:00 to 5:00pm.

According to campaign organiser, Maryam Namazie, ‘Even in civil matters, Sharia law is discriminatory, unfair and unjust, particularly against women and children. Moreover, its voluntary nature is a sham; many women will be pressured into going to these courts and abiding by their decisions. These courts are a quick and cheap route to injustice and do nothing to promote minority rights and social cohesion. Public interest, particularly with regard to women and children, requires an end to Sharia and all other faith-based courts and tribunals.’

The campaign has already received widespread support including from AC Grayling; Ayaan Hirsi Ali; Bahram Soroush; Baroness Caroline Cox; Caspar Melville; Deeyah; Fariborz Pooya; Gina Khan; Houzan Mahmoud; Homa Arjomand; Ibn Warraq; Joan Smith; Johann Hari; Keith Porteous Wood; Mina Ahadi; Naser Khader; Nick Cohen; Richard Dawkins; Shakeb Isaar; Sonja Eggerickx; Stephen Law; Tarek Fatah; Tauriq Moosa; Taslima Nasrin and others. It has also received the support of organisations such as Children First Now; Council of Ex-Muslims of Britain; Equal Rights Now – Organisation against Women’s Discrimination in Iran; European Humanist Federation; International Committee against Stoning; International Humanist and Ethical Union; Iranian Secular Society; Lawyers Secular Society; the National Secular Society; and the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan.

The campaign calls on the UK government to recognise that Sharia law is arbitrary and discriminatory and for an end to Sharia courts and all religious tribunals on the basis that they work against and not for equality and human rights.

The campaign also calls for the Arbitration Act 1996 to be amended so that all religious tribunals are banned from operating within and outside of the legal system.

In the words of the Campaign Declaration: ‘Rights, justice, inclusion, equality and respect are for people, not beliefs. In a civil society, people must have full citizenship rights and equality under the law. Clearly, Sharia law contravenes fundamental human rights. In order to safeguard the rights and freedoms of all those living in Britain, there must be one secular law for all and no Sharia.’

Roy Brown, immediate past president of the International Humanist and Ethical Union said, “IHEU is lending its full support to this campaign. It is intolerable that the very values on which UK society is based – human rights, equality and the rule of law – are being undermined by the quiet and insidious application of systems of law that have no basis in equality or justice.”

Terry Sanderson, president of the National Secular Society, which is also supporting the One Law for All campaign, said: “It is a grave error for the authorities in this country to give credence to Sharia in any form – whether legally or in terms of informal arbitration. When women are being subjected to violence in their marriages, it is not acceptable for religious authorities – which are, by definition, misogynistic – to arbitrate. A two-tier legal system, with women’s rights being always secondary to religious demands, is unnecessary, undesirable and ultimately unjust.”

To RSVP to attend the launch or for more information, please contact Maryam Namazie, email: onelawforall@gmail.com, telephone: 07719166731; website: onelawforall.org.uk. The campaign’s website will be available on the day of the launch.

One Law for All

Campaign against Sharia law in Britain

Declaration

We, the undersigned individuals and organisations, call on the UK government to bring an end to the use and institutionalisation of Sharia and all religious laws and to guarantee equal citizenship rights for all.

Sharia law is discriminatory

Sharia Councils and Muslim Arbitration Tribunals are discriminatory, particularly against women and children, and in violation of universal human rights.

Sharia law is unfair and unjust in civil matters

Proponents argue that the implementation of Sharia is justified when limited to civil matters, such as child custody, divorce and inheritance. In fact, it is civil matters that are one of the main cornerstones of the subjugation of and discrimination against women and children. Under Sharia law a woman’s testimony is worth half that of a man’s; a woman’s marriage contract is between her male guardian and her husband. A man can have four wives and divorce his wife by simple repudiation, whereas a woman must give reasons, some of which are extremely difficult to prove. Child custody reverts to the father at a preset age, even if the father is abusive; women who remarry lose custody of their children; and sons are entitled to inherit twice the share of daughters.

The voluntary nature of Sharia courts is a sham

Proponents argue that those who choose to make use of Sharia courts and tribunals do so voluntarily and that according to the Arbitration Act parties are free to agree upon how their disputes are resolved. In reality, many of those dealt with by Sharia courts are from the most marginalised segments of society with little or no knowledge of their rights under British law. Many, particularly women, are pressured into going to these courts and abiding by their decisions. More importantly, those who fail to make use of Sharia law or seek to opt out will be made to feel guilty and can be treated as apostates and outcasts.

Even if completely voluntary, which is untrue, the discriminatory nature of the courts would be sufficient reason to bring an end to their use and implementation.

Sharia law is a quick and cheap way to injustice

Proponents argue that Sharia courts are an alternative method of dispute resolution and curb legal aid costs. When it comes to people’s rights, however, cuts in costs and speed can only bring about serious miscarriages of justice. Many of the laws that Sharia courts and religious tribunals aim to avoid have been fought for over centuries in order to improve the rights of those most in need of protection in society.

Sharia law doesn’t promote minority rights and social cohesion

Proponents argue that the right to be governed by Sharia law is necessary to defend minority rights. Having the right to religion or atheism, however, is not the same as having the ‘right’ to be governed by religious laws. This is merely a prescription for discrimination, inequality and culturally relative rights. Rather than defending rights, it discriminates and sets up different and separate systems, standards and norms for ‘different’ people. It reinforces the fragmentation of society, and leaves large numbers of people, particularly women and children, at the mercy of elders and imams. It increases marginalisation and the further segregation of immigrant communities. It ensures that immigrants and new arrivals remain forever minorities and never equal citizens.

One law for all

Whilst arbitration tribunals are part of British law, they are subject to such safeguards as are necessary in the public interest. Clearly, public interest, and particularly the interests of women and children, requires an end to Sharia and all faith-based courts and tribunals.

Rights, justice, inclusion, equality and respect are for people, not beliefs. In a civil society, people must have full citizenship rights and equality under the law. Clearly, Sharia law contravenes fundamental human rights. In order to safeguard the rights and freedoms of all those living in Britain, there must be one secular law for all and no Sharia.

Petition

One Law for All

• We call on the UK government to recognise that Sharia and all religious laws are arbitrary and discriminatory against women and children in particular. Citizenship and human rights are non-negotiable.

• We demand an end to all Sharia courts and religious tribunals on the basis that they work against and not for equality and human rights.

• We demand that the Arbitration Act 1996 be amended so that all religious tribunals are banned from operating within and outside of the legal system.

In an ideal world people would perhaps live such healthy lives that medicine would wither away. In this spirit, utopias are portrayed as realms where the ills of the world at large are ruled out both in principle and in practice.

Among the first genuinely preventive medical measures was the control of traffic into and out of municipalities hit by the plague, a policy that may have contributed to the eventual disappearance of that scourge from Europe.[1] In some cases visitors from plague-infected regions were temporarily confined on an island. A utopia might be envisioned as such an island writ large, except that in this case the quarantine secures against infection from the surrounding world instead of the other way around. Utopias are fantasies of prevention.[2]

The prevention imperative governs the original utopia, Plato’s Republic, where a policy of censorship or moral quarantine excludes all corrupting influences beginning with the Homeric myths and fables. Because anything a young person “receives into his mind . . . is likely to become indelible and unalterable, it is most important that the tales which the young first hear should be models of virtuous thoughts.” The young are to be kept not only from hearing but seeing and imitating certain things lest they grow up with deformed minds and bad habits. Here then is radical prevention. The Republic is designed not to reduce the incidence of degeneracy among the guardian class but to make such degeneracy impossible by shutting off the sources from which it springs. Similarly ambitious policies of exclusion are at work in other utopias, most notably, perhaps, the one responsible for the word “utopia” itself—More’s fantasy by that name.

Like the Republic, Utopia (a man-made island as it happens) represents an exercise in prevention. Utopia eradicates the very possibility of the division between rich and poor that is the shame and ruin of Europe, eradicates it by doing away with the source of the evil: money and private property. More than this, the desire for riches is rooted out of the islanders’ hearts by the conditioning regimen to which all are subjected, generation after generation, from an early age. (They are taught to despise gold, a lesson illustrated and enforced by the sight of slaves decked with the metal.) Besides, why would the good citizens of Utopia seek to amass treasure and lord it over their neighbors when they already have everything they want? In addition to ruling out the glaring evils that afflict a Europe split between rich and poor, the Utopian way of life performs a more subtle kind of prevention. It precludes, eliminates at the source, the oppressive anxiety that is an everyday condition in the world as we know it. Nature itself enjoins the Utopians “to lead a life as free of anxiety and as full of joy as possible, and to help all of one’s fellow men toward that end,”[3] and this dictate they take to heart. Citizens can be permitted to pursue their own pleasures in Utopia precisely because they are such easygoing beings—because the darker passions are virtually unknown to them. As two thoughtful commentators have written, Utopia

is not a rigorously regulated and repressive society whose constraints were dictated by fear. This is the feeling conveyed to later generations. Utopia was a society of do’s, not do not’s. . . . Perhaps the Utopians were low on the transcendental, esteemed commodiousness too much, but they lived in peace and tolerance. More set the tone for the utopia of calm felicity that dominated much of Western consciousness up to the end of the eighteenth century: a quiet, stable existence free from anxiety, marked by honest allowable pleasures.[4]

The Utopians are free from anxiety because the wisdom of their institutions has precluded it from occurring. By no means did the ideal of an anxiety-free existence die out in the eighteenth century, although neither did the Utopian ideal so dominate consciousness that it was spared satirical commentary and analysis.

In Johnson’s Rasselas the children of the Abyssinian royalty are confined in a Happy Valley surrounded by mountains on all sides—in effect, quarantined.

Here the sons and daughters of Abissinia lived only to know the soft vicissitudes of pleasure and repose, attended by all that were skillful to delight, and gratified with whatever the senses can enjoy. They wandered in gardens of fragrance, and slept in fortresses of security. Every art was practiced to make them pleased with their own condition.

Like More’s Utopians, the prince of Abyssinia lives a designed existence, surrounded with licit pleasures and shielded from the sources of anxiety. Quite as if Johnson were satirizing the Utopian ideal, however, in the case of Rasselas a prescribed existence serves only to breed the unhappiness it was intended to prevent. “When he looked round about him, he saw himself confined by the bars of nature which had never yet been broken.” In a Johnsonian paradox, the young prince is subjected to a prevention regimen so rigorous that it defeats itself. Happy Valley is at once utopia and dystopia, as indeed the ambition of managing human life in the name of prevention contains ominous as well as promising potential. As an illustration of the usage of “prevent,” the OED offers the sentence, “The idea is to prevent a crime, rather than wait for it to happen, by looking out for people who fit a suspicious profile.” Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four can be read, just so, as a dystopian fantasy in which the Party identifies a suspect and nurtures, superintends, and crushes his rebellion against its own power, all in the interest of testing some fantastic, hubristic theory that crime can be rooted out—prevented—before it matures and manifests itself. If the ideal of prevention presides over utopias, the perversion of prevention presides over the supreme dystopia.

More’s Utopia, it is said, is a society of do’s, not do not’s. The ideal of a life free of the restraints and regulations of the world as we know it has inspired not only paper utopias but actual experimentation, most recently perhaps in 1960s when untold numbers of communes, cults, and co-operatives were launched in the name of human liberation. As I have argued, the language of the pop psychology movement now so fully institutionalized dates traceably back to the human-potential jargon of the 1960s.[5] In other words, it is utopian in spirit, and this being so, it is no wonder that it plays on and with visions of an alternative reality where people live lives of innocent enjoyment, free of self-reproach, anxiety and stress, in the manner of the original Utopians. Pop psychology inveighs continually against prohibitions—do not’s. Among the more radical aims of libertarian visionaries a generation ago was to bring up children communally, or in any case in such a way as to spare them the prohibitions and guilt that await anyone subjected to the hegemony of “society”—also a term of universal odium among pop psychologists. In theory, the lucky children would be the beneficiaries of radical prevention. Amid a society poisoned by false ideas and dying of its own way of life (much as Rousseau said), they would grow up healthy in mind and body.[6] The psychologists seek to extend similar benefits to those who had the misfortune to be born in society.

Afloat in our cultural biosphere is the notion that the tensions of modern life are very bad for both mind and body, with the implication that if only we led an equable, anxiety-free, uncompetitive existence like the Utopians we would enjoy better health. While marketed by the mass media, this proposition has also made its way into the medical literature. Recently, for example, a paper in Urology reported on the Prostate Cancer Lifestyle Trial, in which subjects already diagnosed with the disease but committed to watchful waiting rather than immediate treatment were assigned either to a control group or to “a 1-year intensive lifestyle change program,” including in addition to a vegan diet “stress management techniques” and a “1-hour weekly support group to enhance adherence to the intervention”[7] (all loosely reminiscent of the “temperate living” that renders More’s Utopians “liable to fewer diseases” than the rest of humanity),[8] to see if these measures had any preventive effect. Of 181 patients judged eligible for the study 93 participated, the reported reasons for the large percentage of refusers being “an unwillingness to make or not make the comprehensive lifestyle changes and/or a refusal to undergo periodic testing.” One suspects the deterring factor was an unwillingness to make, not an unwillingness to be barred from making, wholesale changes to one’s way of life. Like many or most men, those who declined to enroll in the PCLT may not have wanted to adopt a theoretically ideal behavioral regimen, and indeed may not have had the leisure to do so. How many are able to devote their life to avoiding stress? If the ideal of a frictionless existence has utopian echoes, an experiment in which half the eligible subjects decline to participate seems to be telling us something about the limits of the possible. Knowing they had cancer, the 181 potential subjects were presumably motivated.[9]

The paper reports that after one year the subjects in the experimental group showed a “significant” reduction in PSA (a biomarker associated with prostate cancer). In point of fact, their PSA declined marginally—by 4%, a figure that in any single case would be regarded as negligible, virtually within the margin of error of PSA testing.[10] Even if PSA is taken as a surrogate for the progression of cancer—and as the authors note, the very question of “what constitutes cancer progression” in patients like those in the PCLT has no conclusive answer—the PCLT provides less than compelling evidence that therapeutic rituals and dietary reform served to slow the disease. Although the experimental group did record fewer “prostate cancer-related clinical events”—in other words, underwent less treatment for the disease—two years after the trial, that is because the men in the group chose less treatment, perhaps in the belief that the behavioral regimen was itself a treatment. After all, the subjects in this study, unlike those in, say, the landmark Prostate Cancer Prevention Trial which ran from 1993 to 2003, were not blinded; they knew very well which group they were in. (The finasteride group in the PCPT showed a 25% decrease in the incidence of prostate cancer.) The authors themselves conclude, “the observed group difference in the incidence of treatment might not necessarily imply a group difference in cancer progression.” As in this case, some factor beyond the evidence seems to be driving interest in the theory that we can slow, arrest, or altogether preclude cancer by reforming our behavior. That factor I believe to be the utopian fantasy of a preventive way of life. The architects of the PCLT conclude that whatever the clinical effect of the “comprehensive lifestyle changes” in question, at least the experimental group by and large avoided the harms and expenses consequent on medical treatment for two years. According to More, the Utopians have less need for doctors than any other people.

Participants in the Prostate Cancer Prevention Trial underwent a total of some 1800 biopsies. No such hard evidence was collected in the PCLT, though the subjects’ reports of their own behavior was deemed evidence. (“Adherence consisted of self-reported diet, exercise, and stress management behaviors that were used to compute an index of adherence to the lifestyle program.”) The report, or avowal, is the enabling convention of utopian literature. As in More’s serio-comic tale, a traveler who stumbles on a wonderland tells the world of his discovery in the manner of a reporter, usually in language devoid of the convincing detail of good novelistic prose.[11] Papers on the PCLT give only the barest sketch of the behavioral regimen in question—“gentle yoga-based stretching, breathing, meditation, imagery, and progressive relaxation for a total of 60 minutes daily”—leaving a reader with little sense of what it really consists of.[12] What is “imagery”? Are we to believe that the 200,000 American men who stand to be diagnosed with prostate cancer this year will dedicate themselves to “breathing” in the hope of arresting the disease? At least the PCLT’s experimental diet, supplemented by vitamins C and E and selenium among other things, is specified to some degree. A few weeks after the paper was published, the SELECT Trial (Selenium and Vitamin E Cancer Prevention Trial) was halted when it was determined that selenium and vitamin E do not prevent prostate cancer. As for the diet itself, shortly after the initiation of the PCLT, published results of studies involving thousands of men showed that a vegetarian diet had no effect on prostate cancer mortality.[13]

Nevertheless, by its own logic the authors’ recommendation that “an intensive lifestyle program might allow patients choosing active surveillance to delay conventional treatment” (perhaps implying that the lifestyle regime represents unconventional treatment) could go much further. For if, as they believe, such a program shows promise for prostate cancer patients, would it not make sense to institute it well before the day they become patients, in other words preventively? Why not pre-empt the disease rather than simply waiting for it to happen? It is known to have a long latency period, after all. However, to follow a sort of quasi-religious preventive regimen for years on end would place men in the position of obsessively concentrating their lives on the prospect they want to avoid, which hardly seems the way of health. I believe the reason the PCLT is open to all these quarrels and criticisms is that while the study followed some of the protocols of a clinical trial, and while its results were reported in a medical journal, it was animated by a utopianism foreign to evidence-based medicine.[14]

No doubt it would be better to prevent a disease like prostate cancer than to treat it, if only we had means of prevention both safe and effective. But as interest in prevention grows—and prevention after all is on the frontier of medicine—it is important not to fall into utopian thinking. Prevention is so strongly associated with the utopian tradition, and utopian notions continue to exert such attraction, that even medical research may find itself drawn toward utopianism by a kind of gravitational pull. When utopianism does enter into medical reasoning it can only feed fantasy, as when the authors of the PCLT paper hold out the hope that certain mental and social practices can not only slow but, incredibly, actually “reverse” existing cancer. It bears remembering that utopia means nowhere.

Notes

[1] “Perhaps local and national policies of exclusion through quarantine and the cordon sanitaire finally worked.” Roy Porter, The Greatest Benefit to Mankind: A Medical History of Humanity (New York: Norton, 1998), p. 238.

[2] Writes Chernyshevsky in What Is to Be Done?: Under the existing system the hardships visited on women are “inevitable. . . . It was exactly the same with smallpox in the days of old, before people learned how to prevent the disease.” That is, following the transformation of society into a utopia, the oppression of women will disappear. What Is to Be Done?, tr. Michael R. Katz (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1989), p. 197.

[3] More, Utopia, tr. Robert M. Adams (New York: Norton, 1975), p. 55.

[4] Frank E. Manuel and Fritzie P. Manuel, Utopian Thought in the Western World (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1979), p. 134.

[5] Stewart Justman, Fool’s Paradise: The Unreal World of Pop Psychology (Chicago: Ivan R. Dee, 2005).

[6] See the utopian manifesto included in Wallace Stegner’s Angle of Repose (New York: Penguin, 1971), pp. 513-15. Stegner may have invented this document in part or in full, but in any case it captures the tune of the times very well.

[7] J. Frattaroli et al., “Clinical Events in Prostate Cancer Lifestyle Trial: Results From Two Years of Follow-Up,” Urology, e-publication ahead of print 2 July 2008.

[8] More, Utopia, pp. 61-62.

[9] Other studies of healthy-behavior programs report compliance rates of less than 5%. M. A. Moyad and P. R. Carroll, “Lifestyle Recommendations to Prevent Prostate Cancer, Part II: Time to Redirect Our Attention?” Urologic Clinics of North America 31 (2004): 306.

[10] The PSA of the control group rose by 6%. The paper by Frattaroli et al. also reports that after one year the serum from men in the experimental group inhibited a strain of prostate cancer cells at eight times the rate of the control group. The clinical significance of this finding is unknown to me.

[11] In and of itself, the sharpness and urgency of detail in Nineteen Eighty-Four signals an ironic departure from the utopian norm.

[12] A paper on a related study has subjects attending “a 3-day intensive residential retreat.” Exactly what the content of this experience was is left to our imagination. Dean Ornish et al., “Changes in Prostate Gene Expression in Men Undergoing an Intensive Nutrition and Lifestyle Intervention,” PNAS, June 17, 2008: 8373.

[13] T. J. Key et al., “Mortality in Vegetarians and Nonvegetarians: Detailed Findings from a Collaborative Analysis of Five Prospective Studies,” American Journal of Clinical Nutrition 70 (1999): 516S-524S.

[14] Reminiscent of the communitarianism of Utopia is the New Age conclusion of another paper on the PCLT: “A sense of belonging to something greater, along with all the lifestyle program components, creates a synergy that helps men [in group sessions] feel positive and optimistic. . . . There is less conflict in their lives and they value a sense of community.” C. Kronenwetter et al., “A Qualitative Analysis of Interviews of Men With Early Stage Prostate Cancer,” Cancer Nursing 28 (2005): 106.

Stewart Justman is Director of the Liberal Studies Program at the University of Montana.

If you walk at random in any Muslim district in Europe, you will certainly find somewhere an Islamic butcher with the word ”halal” written on its shop-window. For meat products, the word “halal” is a badge of Islamic quality.

Muslims believe that since blood is not ritually a pure substance, slaughter is necessary to inhibit the thorough draining of all of the animal’s blood. Furthermore, the verse” Bismillah al Rahman Al Rahim”, in the name of Allah the Beneficent the Merciful, is necessary to render the meat halal or lawful to eat.

The word halal refers, here, to meat killed and prepared in line with Islamic dietary laws. Jewish and Islamic religions demand that slaughter be carried out with a cut to the neck or throat, rather than the more widespread and humane method of stunning with a bolt into the head before slaughter.

Generally, halal means anything permissible under Islamic law, in contrast to haram, that which is forbidden. This includes behaviour, speech, dress, conduct. The term halal is also used to judge the right of sexuality after marriage, even temporary marriage which is a Shiite tradition called “Sigheh,” which is believed by some to be legalised prostitution. To rape a female slave or even a non-Muslim prisoner of war is halal—in this light, many political female prisoners of the Islamic Republic of Iran who were considered “non-Muslims”, were ”legally” raped by their Islamist torturers before being executed.

In an extended sense, halal means fairness of business dealings or other types of transaction or activity. Therefore, it represents values that are held in high regard by Muslims. It contains standards for social norms, morals, foods and other services that meet Islamic regulations. Needless to say, in Islamic countries, these are the only available standards for Muslims and non-Muslims alike.

Slaughter is an old tradition of Jewish and Islamic clan society. As a matter of best practice, the killed animal is supposed to be distributed among the members of the clan right after being slaughtered so that each family can often have fresh meat to eat. Like many other traditions, this one was also accepted as a principle in Islam.

Slaughter reminds us of an old instinct of pre-historic hominids, to which a prey must be killed by the hunter—the instinct can be seen in a great number of beasts of prey. In another perspective, we see a characteristic disposition of this instinct beyond Islamic laws (Sharia), where beheading and amputation of the accused resemble routine rituals, where blood of the accused is figuratively considered as halal and the executer does a halal job.

Halal blood can be also a reason for honour killing in Islamic societies. Honour killing is committed by male family members against female family members, who are perceived to have brought dishonour upon the family. A female can be targeted by her family for a variety of reasons, including: refusing to enter into an arranged marriage, having sex outside marriage, or even being the victim of a sexual assault.

Halal has nothing to do with prophylactic or hygienic precautions or medical meaning. To better understand halal, we must see what its opposite term “haram” means. Haram has roots in revulsion which is an old instinct of evolution. Revulsion is a sense of loathing without any logical reason or clear explanation. As an instinct, it was a necessary reaction of early human beings when exposed to an unknown food, unknown object, or an unconventional situation.

The object of revulsion is culturally conditioned. It means that what is repulsive for the members of one society does not necessarily provoke the same revulsion for others. In a historical sense, terms like halal, haram, and negis are nothing but the instinctive reflections, which were integrated into Islam.

In many cases, Islamic commandments and rituals are not only the traditional reflections of desert dwellers of pre-Islamic Arabia, but also based on the Prophet Muhammad’s habits, his sexual preferences, his favourite things, and his dietary habits.

Since sexuality is taboo in Islam, sexual organs, vaginal secretion and sperm are considered as “negis” (loathsome and impure). Therefore, they should not be touched – if they are unintentionally touched, ceremonial washing and rituals must be done. Blood and any slimy substance secreted by a mucous membrane of the body have more or less a similar sense of negis. Needless to mention, all these secreted or mucous substances, regardless of their odour and colour, belong to normal functions of our body.

Not only non Muslims, ethnic groups, slaves and women, but even animals in Islam are not freed from this discrimination. Dogs and pigs are the most negis animals. The term “negis” characterises their absolute and unchangeable impurity. Pork meat is absolutely haram, and the dog as a “negis” animal can never be a proper pet in a Muslim house. Touching a dog, especially a dog’s saliva, requires a ritually hygienic procedure to get the hand clean—if a dog eats from a dish, the dish must be washed 7 times, the first time with sand. The dog, despite all its uses in many ways, is discriminated as a negis creature.

While Marriage of Muslim men with women of the Book (Muslims, Christians and Jews), based on Islamic rituals, can be permitted, all varieties of marriage between Muslim women and non-Muslim men are considered haram. As a patriarchal religion, Islam granted a little concession only to Muslim men. Muslim women are not allowed to marry men outside of Islam (unless the men convert to Islam). No marriage is permitted between Muslims and “Mushriks” (atheists, polytheists, other belief systems which are considered by Muslims negis). The Koran says, “A believing slave woman is better than a mushrik woman”!

As mentioned, terms like halal, haram, and negis are not more than rituals of particular conditions and environment. These terms have no logic and scientific credentials at all. They are only the legacy of per-Islamic values of the Arabian clan- society which still impose themselves on today’s society.

The cliché goes that atheism is a form of theism; Tina Beattie writes:

A professor of theology (Denys Turner) tells of how he makes a bet with his students that, if they can tell him why they do not believe in God, he will tell them which Christian denomination they were brought up in. He says he usually wins the bet.

I’d love to make that bet with Turner: being a liberal atheist born to liberal atheists, I suspect it’d be easy money for me. (Admittedly my great-grandfather was a Glaswegian missionary, and I’ve always regretted that he died before I was born.) But in this critique of the ‘New Atheists’ Beattie often treats unbelief the way that Turner apparently does: as an immature reaction, like the bourgeois teenager painting her bedroom black.

Thus: ‘the God that Richard Dawkins does not believe in may be the God of his own childhood experience, as the son of affluent colonial middle-class parents who gave him ‘a normal Anglican upbringing’ and sent him to an English public school from an early age.’ Christopher Hitchens is also slung onto Beattie’s couch: ‘Those who have witnessed Hitchens grumping and growling his way through an interview or public lecture may detect just a distant echo of a man made in the image of the God he rejects.’

These ersatz psychological ruminations sit well in a book that attacks the New Atheists for who they are rather than what they say. Beattie approvingly quotes Terry Eagleton’s description of Dawkins as ‘a readily identifiable kind of English liberal rationalist… one can be reasonably certain that he would not be Europe’s greatest enthusiast for Foucault, psychoanalysis, agitprop, Dadaism, anarchism or separatist feminism.’ Boring old Richard Dawkins, with his boring evolutionary biology and boring Oxford professorship. Yes, Dawkins’s atheism ‘belongs to a specific cultural context’ and Beattie takes care to discuss only those thinkers in that same cultural context of rich white males: Hitchens, Sam Harris, A C Grayling, Dan Dennett, and, for good measure, the novelists Martin Amis and Ian McEwan. McEwan’s novel Saturday is contrasted with Zadie Smith’s On Beauty in this way: ‘The author of life as a black postcolonial woman, perhaps, rather than as a white establishment Englishman.’

Man is the operative word. Beattie criticises the ‘testosterone-charged nature of this debate… this perennial stag-fight between men of Big Ideas.’ As an example of the aggressively masculine nature of the New Atheism she quotes Johann Hari, who said admiringly that Christopher Hitchens ‘can still intellectually get it up.’ Her sole other piece of evidence for the male-dominated nature of the faith debate is…a review on Amazon which describes a text questioning religion as ‘a smart, ballsy book.’ Well, if Beattie finds the New Atheism a bit of a boys’ club, can I point her in the direction of Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Maryam Namazie, Taslima Nasrin, Mina Ahadi, and our very own Ophelia Benson? All are kickass unbelieving feminist babes, but Beattie does not allude to them in her book: perhaps because their inclusion would disrupt her thesis that atheism is a fad of upper-class imperialist males.

For, yes, Beattie bends over backwards to entwine rationality with colonialism:

While European nations were on an adventure to conquer the world and to superimpose Western civilisation on ‘savage’ and ‘darkened’ cultures, European thinkers were on a no less ambitious venture to conquer the human mind and superimpose their version of science and reason on the dark intellectual legacy of religion and superstition.

You can see where this is going and sure enough, later in the book we get a long chapter on Iraq, with an attempt to tie the New Atheists into the New Imperialism. Hang on: only Christopher Hitchens actually supports the war; other prominent nonbelievers like Dawkins and Grayling are fierce critics of the Bush administration. No matter: ‘the relentless assault’ by atheists on religion ‘may contribute to this climate of indifference to the deaths of Muslims.’ Beattie apparently subscribes to the Tinkerbell Phenomenon: every time we say we don’t believe in Islam, a Muslim somewhere dies!

Never mind the fact that actual imperialists followed Harry Flashman’s credo: ‘Don’t monkey with the local gods; it don’t pay.’ Or as Caroline Fourest put it: ‘During the colonial period, the occupying nations rarely modified the habits of the occupied countries. They maintained most traditional provisions in the name of that cultural differentiation.’ You’d think, wouldn’t you, that someone who throws the word ‘imperialism’ around so recklessly would take the trouble to read about the subject.

I’ve been harsh on Tina Beattie in this review and so I must say that she gives fascinating accounts of the histories of science and religion. She is smart, subtle and can write lyrically on art, mystery and the universe: she is certainly correct in saying that mankind is essentially pans narrans, the storytelling ape. As a feminist theologian she is aware of the suffering experienced by vast numbers of women in Muslim cultures; she damns the sexual apartheids of the Islamic world.

There’s a sense, too, that Beattie is aware of the contradictions of her own position: a feminist defending belief systems that, indirectly or not, condemn the female gender to a slow lifetime of oppression. But Beattie consistently takes the wrong side: ‘Some Muslim scholars such as Tariq Ramadan have called for a reformation in Islam similar to that which transformed Christianity in the sixteenth century,’ she writes approvingly. Any ‘reform’ imagined by the fundamentalist reactionary Tariq Ramadan does not, to be honest, bear thinking about – for Muslims or anyone. Why not consult genuine reformist Muslims like Irshad Manji or Ed Husain?

When I used the Peter Pan analogy just now, I wasn’t exaggerating. For in Beattie’s world:

The assault on religion by a clique of Western polemicists risks becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy in its labelling of religion as violent and extremist, for it is stoking the fires of resentment at a time of global volatility when, for many of the world’s people, religious faith holds out the only possibility of living a meaningful and dignified life.

Don’t you know these poor savages need their delusions? How dare you Western rationalists take away their toys! Seriously, though, I wonder if Beattie has ever considered that problems for people in the developing world stem from too much religion: too much faith, and not enough of anything else.

The New Atheists, Tina Beattie, Darton, Longman and Todd (reprinted 2008)

Earlier this month, the BBC reported that Pope Benedict XVI had opened a Synod of more than 200 cardinals and bishops from around the world to examine the modern lack of interest in the Bible.[1] As in many of his recent pronouncements, the Pope took the opportunity to repeat the same tired old claim that because modern Western society is apparently turning away from Christianity and the Bible, we are seeing the growth of ‘destructive influences’. Once again, secularism is blamed for the ills of modern society, while the Pope proposes that a return to ‘Scripture’ will solve our problems.

I decided it was time to take the Pope’s advice and re-read some ‘Scripture’.[2] Having previously come away from reading the Old Testament with a distinctly unpleasant taste in my mouth,[3] I decided this time to start at the beginning of the reputedly far more ‘beautiful’ New Testament. The first book is, of course, the Gospel of Matthew, and in this article I shall present what I found upon re-reading it in full. Matthew is an important gospel for the Roman Catholic Church, for it is here that we find Jesus stating, ‘You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church’ (Matthew 16:18), a passage that the church has long used as ‘evidence’ of its supposed lineage stretching back to Jesus himself, for it claims Peter as its founder.

So, what do we find upon reading Matthew? – Intelligent and convincing discourses by Jesus, the kind and loving redeemer and ethical teacher? Timeless truths of universal relevance and a superior moral vision that can heal the world? A book of great literature with a positive vision for the future? Let’s dive into this spiritual treasure chest and find out…

Who was Jesus’ message intended for?[4]

In the first two chapters of the book, Jesus is referred to as ‘the Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham’ (1:1), ‘the child who has been born king of the Jews’ (2:2), and ‘a ruler who is to shepherd my people Israel’ (2:6), all of which set the tone for the fundamentally Jewish message and concern of Jesus and the Gospel. In chapter 3, John the Baptist is introduced. We read that he ‘appeared in the wilderness of Judea, proclaiming, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near”‘ (3:1-2) and that ‘Even now the axe is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire’ (3:10). John baptises ‘with water for repentance’ but says of Jesus that he will ‘baptise you with the Holy Spirit and fire’ and that Jesus’ ‘winnowing-fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing-floor and will gather his wheat into the granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire’ (3:11-12). Following the arrest of John the Baptist, Jesus started to preach a similar message: ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near’ (4:17) and ‘Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire’ (7:19). Both the message of John the Baptist and Jesus, then, are apocalyptic in nature, and grounded in Jewish notions of the ‘Kingdom of God’ or ‘Kingdom of Heaven’ that ‘has come near’.

Jesus’ target audience is clearly Jewish, as he teaches on topics only of relevance to Jews. So, for example, we find him warning his audience that ‘until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the [Old Testament] law until all is accomplished’ (5:18). In a number of passages, Jesus makes it clear that his mission is intended only for Jews. He states that ‘I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel’ (15:24) and tells the twelve disciples to ‘Go nowhere among the Gentiles, and enter no town of the Samaritans, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel’ (10:5-6). He also makes it clear that their preaching mission will be incomplete at the time of the end of the world, saying that ‘you will not have gone through all the towns of Israel before the Son of Man comes’ (10:23). Of this coming of the Son of Man, he states: ‘Just as the weeds are collected and burned up with fire, so will it be at the end of the age. The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will collect out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all evildoers, and they will throw them into the furnace of fire, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth’ (13:40-42). It is said of the time of the coming of the Son of Man and the judgement that will follow: ‘Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place’ (24:34).

That Jesus’ message and ministry was intended for Jews, for the redemption of the people of Israel in the last days, and not for a 21st Century multi-ethnic audience is also made clear by Jesus’ references to ‘the Gentiles’. Had his message been delivered to, and pitched at, an audience that included non-Jews, he would not have made statements such as: ‘When you are praying, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do … Do not be like them’ (6:7-8); ‘for it is the Gentiles who strive for all these things’ (6:32); and ‘You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them’ (20:25). ‘The Gentiles’ are referred to as ‘them‘, which disqualifies the notion that Jesus had a universal message.

In Matthew, Jesus’ message is Jewish apocalyptic in content; the supposed ‘good news’ (gospel) is that within the lifetime of his Jewish listeners, the God of Israel will be sending the ‘Son of Man’ (in Matthew, equated with Jesus) to judge the world, taking a remnant into an eternal Kingdom, while sending the majority to an immense holocaust. While some of those saved will be Gentiles, they are not Jesus’ concern as they are not bound by the laws of the God of Israel, and will consequently not receive judgement under the Law. Jesus sends out his followers with the explicit instructions to ignore the Gentiles (the disciples need not waste the short amount of time they have left on them); he was sent only for the children of Israel, and they should only preach to the children of Israel.

There are a few occasions in Matthew in which Jesus possibly has a more universal message. In chapter 24, we read that ‘this good news of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the world, as a testimony to all the nations; and then the end will come’ (24:14), yet the time frame for doing this is extremely short given ‘this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place’ (24:34). We cannot tell what Jesus understood by ‘all the world’, but it is clearly the case that he couldn’t have been thinking of them preaching in obscure areas of far off lands such as America, Australia, China, Russia, and so on, as there simply would not be enough time for one generation to accomplish this. It seems far more likely, given his previous command that his disciples should ‘go nowhere among the Gentiles, and enter no town of the Samaritans’ that this testimony ‘to the nations’ actually refers to the Jews of the surrounding areas, the people referred to in the opening greeting of the Letter of James as ‘the twelve tribes in the Dispersion’, or ‘the twelve tribes scattered among the nations’.

In chapter 28, the resurrected Jesus tells his disciples to ‘Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit’ (28:19). Given this command was made by a man who had supposedly come back from the dead, we can safely assume it to be unhistorical. But, even assuming its authenticity, or that it is in continuity with teachings of Jesus delivered in his lifetime, this alone cannot possibly be seen to annul the bulk of his previous teachings which were entirely oriented towards a Jewish audience, and which all assume the imminence of the end of the world. Even this dialogue of Jesus contains imminent apocalypticism, for the risen Jesus ends by telling his disciples to ‘remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age’ (28:20). He doesn’t say, as many modern Christians would like, ‘I am with all believers until the end of the age’, but rather, speaking directly to his disciples, ‘I am with you’. In other words, even here, Jesus’ message is directed at a specific group of people, alive at that time, standing before him, who would still be alive at the coming of the Son of Man for judgement and the establishment of the Kingdom of God on earth (6:10).

Jesus’ teachings in Matthew, then, are integrally based around the ‘good news’ that the end of the world is at hand. Most of his teachings assume an entirely Jewish audience, and all of them are directed solely at people who were alive when he was teaching (certainly not to generations living in the 21st Century). His message was for people of his time, and it stands or falls on the truth or falsehood of his claims about events that were soon to occur, in the lifetime of his followers. Manifestly, all of his original followers are dead. The generation he spoke of and to passed away without any of the apocalyptic events he promised taking place. The world turns on. Jesus’ message was therefore predicated on entirely erroneous assumptions and beliefs. His message has been invalidated by history, and it was not meant for us.

A closer look at Jesus’ attitude to non-Jews

We have already seen that in Matthew, Jesus’ message was Jewish in content and meant primarily, if not exclusively, for a Jewish audience. However, in his gospel there are some occasions on which Gentiles are directly engaged with, and I shall now examine three of them.

The first involves a centurian at Capernaum:

When he [Jesus] entered Capernaum, a centurion came to him, appealing to him and saying, ‘Lord, my servant is lying at home paralysed, in terrible distress.’ And he said to him, ‘I will come and cure him.’ The centurion answered, ‘Lord, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof; but only speak the word, and my servant will be healed. For I also am a man under authority, with soldiers under me; and I say to one, “Go”, and he goes, and to another, “Come”, and he comes, and to my slave, “Do this”, and the slave does it.’ When Jesus heard him, he was amazed and said to those who followed him, ‘Truly I tell you, in no one in Israel have I found such faith. I tell you, many will come from east and west and will eat with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven, while the heirs of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ And to the centurion Jesus said, ‘Go; let it be done for you according to your faith.’ And the servant was healed in that hour. (8:5-13)

The context in which this story is found is amongst a long selection of healing ‘miracle’ stories that make up chapter 8, most of which involve the healing of fellow Jews. The story could be seen as an example of the universal nature of Jesus’ mission, and taken as evidence that Jesus was followed by a mixed group of both Jews and non-Jews, and, indeed, this is how most Christians would view it. However, this is only a plausible reading if one chooses to ignore the exclusively Jewish nature of most of the rest of Matthew’s gospel. When seen in its proper context, this story is being used not to illustrate Jesus’ universal appeal, but rather to berate his Jewish followers, and more generally, the Jews of his time as a whole. Jesus is said to have been ‘amazed’ by the centurian’s faith, so this was clearly not something he expected of Gentiles. He then compares the faith of this Gentile with the faith of his people, Israel. He condemns his generation for what he perceives to be their lack of faith and reiterates the Jewish belief that righteous Gentiles will also be saved. However, he goes further, and states that even though the Jewish people are the heirs to the coming Kingdom (a Judeocentric worldview), many will lose out to Gentiles, because they have such poor faith. While they, the rightful heirs to the Kingdom of God are thrown into a place of torment and darkness, righteous Gentiles will be allowed to usurp them. The centurian, therefore, is not placed on an equal par with Jews – he is not one of those for whom the Kingdom is their inheritence through being the special people of God (the children of Israel) – but rather used as an example of the supposedly retrograde nature of the Jews of Jesus’ time. The essential message is that it is a disgrace that a mere Gentile, a man who has no covenant with the God of Israel and who is not of God’s chosen people, should have a greater faith than the Jews for whom Jesus came. This is not a message primarily of inclusion or of universalism, but rather a warning to Jews, and, as such, conforms to the general Judeocentric nature of Matthew’s gospel. The Gentile here does not have significance in and of himself, but rather as a corrective to Jesus’ actual audience, his fellow Jews. The faithful Gentile here is primarily used to put the Jews to shame, and not to celebrate the equality and brotherhood of Jews and Gentiles, and his presence does not alter the Jewish oriented thrust of Jesus’ message.

My second example can be presumed to involve Gentiles, although this is not specified in the text, and is the story of a ‘healing’ of ‘demoniacs’:

When he came to the other side, to the country of the Gadarenes, two demoniacs coming out of the tombs met him. They were so fierce that no one could pass that way. Suddenly they shouted, ‘What have you to do with us, Son of God? Have you come here to torment us before the time?’ Now a large herd of swine was feeding at some distance from them. The demons begged him, ‘If you cast us out, send us into the herd of swine.’ And he said to them, ‘Go!’ So they came out and entered the swine; and suddenly, the whole herd rushed down the steep bank into the lake and perished in the water. The swineherds ran off, and on going into the town, they told the whole story about what had happened to the demoniacs. (8:28-33)

Given the fact that in Judaism the pig is an unclean animal and its consumption forbidden, it seems unlikely that the swineherds mentioned here were Jews, for Jews would have no reason to keep pigs, unless they were doing so for Gentiles (which is still fairly implausible given the supposedly ‘unclean’ nature of pigs). Leaving aside the notion of the casting out of demons for now, according to this story Jesus happily sent a whole herd of pigs to its death, which would presumably be ruinous for the people whose livelihood relied upon them. Jesus shows no regret for this act and no compassion towards the swineherds or the pigs themselves. The incident is supposed to prove Jesus’ power over evil, and again, the Gentile characters (assuming that is what they are), as with the centurian, are solely included for the purpose of illustration.

My final example is that of the healing of a Canaanite woman’s daughter:

Jesus left that place and went away to the district of Tyre and Sidon. Just then a Canaanite woman from that region came out and started shouting, ‘Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David; my daughter is tormented by a demon.’ But he did not answer her at all. And his disciples came and urged him, saying, ‘Send her away, for she keeps shouting after us.’ He answered, ‘I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.’’ But she came and knelt before him, saying, ‘Lord, help me.’ He answered, ‘It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.’ She said, ‘Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table.’ Then Jesus answered her, ‘Woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you wish.’ And her daughter was healed instantly. (15:21-28)

This story shows a particularly arrogant and contemptuous attitude towards non-Jews on the part of Jesus and his followers. When the woman comes to him asking him to have mercy he initially ignores her, and then informs her that his mission is only for Jews (‘the lost sheep of the house of Israel’). Then, with her kneeling before him in an act of self-abnegation, he refers to non-Jews as ‘dogs'[5] and states that it would not be fair to the ‘children’ (the Jews) if he were to help her. Only when the woman makes the sickening statement that non-Jews are indeed inferior ‘dogs’ but requests that some ‘crumbs’ should be thrown to these ‘dogs’ from the ‘master’s table’ does Jesus relent and help her daughter. He congratulates the woman on her faith, but only after she has affirmed his racist, Judeocentric worldview. This story does not illustrate a universalism in Jesus’ message or in his dealings with non-Jews. As with the centurian, he seems impressed by the faith of a Gentile, but, unlike in the case of the centurian, his underlying contempt for non-Jews is on full display.

Modern Christians see Jesus as a universal teacher and saviour, the Son of God who became incarnate to teach, to heal, and to bring redemption to all humankind. By way of contrast, Matthew’s Jesus has no intrinsic interest in non-Jews. Where they are useful to make a point, whether that be about the perceived unfaithfulness of the Jews of Jesus’ time or to illustrate his divinely given powers, Gentiles make an appearance, but they are at no point integral to Jesus’ teaching mission or to his worldview. Jesus makes a point of telling his followers not to bother preaching to Gentiles, he claims to have come only for the people of Israel, and he displays an attitude towards non-Jews that is variously contemptuous, dismissive, patronising, and simply uninterested. This should come as no great surprise. Jesus’ mind was infested with Jewish apocalyptic fantasies and his cosmology was based on a Judeocentric universe created and ruled by the god of the Old Testament. We should not be shocked to find prejudice and ignorance in such a man. We should, however, be shocked every time we see someone today enthusiastically leafing through Matthew’s gospel or spouting inane rubbish about it being the ‘Word of God’.

Unscientific and superstitious ideas in Matthew’s gospel

We have already seen above the healing story of the ‘demoniacs’ of Gadarenes, and this is one of numerous examples of unscientific and superstitious notions to be found in Matthew’s gospel. In this case, two people who would probably be classed today as mentally ill are presented as being ‘possessed’ by ‘demons’. In some primitive societies such beliefs remain even today, and, sadly, even amongst some modern Christians. In a pre-scientific age in which illness, especially of the mental variety, was an unexplained phenomenon, it is perhaps understandable that people whose minds were in every sense drenched in superstition should conclude that some kind of evil power was responsible. The inclusion of such ideas throughout the gospel, and the evidence that Jesus accepted and taught these ideas comes as no surprise, as it is a historically situated text and Jesus was a man of his time. What is absurd is the notion that a book filled with this kind of scientifically illiterate material has any relevance in the 21st Century.

We find in the Gospel that Jesus reportedly ‘cured’ by mystical means ‘various diseases and pains, demoniacs, epileptics, and paralytics’ (4:24), an ‘unclean’ leper (8:1-3), another paralytic (8:5-13), a woman with a fever and ‘many who were possessed by demons’, and that ‘he cast out the spirits with a word, and cured all who were sick’ (8:14-16). In addition to illness being caused by demons, we also read that paralysis can be caused by ‘sin’ and ‘cured’ by forgiveness of those ‘sins’ (9:2-8). Jesus is said to have cured the blind purely by touching their eyes (9:27-30), and cured ‘a demoniac who was mute’: ‘when the demon had been cast out, the one who had been mute spoke’ (9:32-33). We hear of another ‘demoniac who was blind and mute’ being cured (12:22) and read of ‘unclean’ and ‘evil’ spirits (12:43-45). Reading on we find further accounts of the healing of an epileptic (‘Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of him, and the boy was cured instantly’ – 17:14-18), the blind, the mute, the lame, a woman with haemorrhages, and more people ‘possessed with demons’. Even more incredibly, we read of Jesus bringing a dead girl back to life (9:18-26) and that he told his disciples that they too could ‘cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons’ (10:8). We, of course, read of Jesus supposedly coming back from the dead, and also hear of others emerging from their tombs:

At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. The earth shook, and the rocks were split. The tombs also were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised. After his resurrection they came out of the tombs and entered the holy city and appeared to many. (27:51-53)

What are we – modern readers living in a world of science, technology, and medicine – to make of such claims?

Firstly, there is the issue of illness. Jesus and his followers clearly advocate the view that illness and disability are caused either by a person being possessed by ‘demons’ and ‘unclean spirits’, or by the afflicted individual having unforgiven ‘sins’. At no point do we find any rational understanding of illness, but rather pure ignorance and superstition. We should not think too badly of Jesus and the people of his time for holding such views, for they did not have the benefits of modern scientific knowledge. We should, however, find it ridiculous to hear people suggesting we should see a book filled with such nonsense as relevant to our lives today.

Secondly, there is the issue of miraculous cures. Just as Jesus misunderstood the causes of illness, so also the reports of supposed miraculous healings debunk themselves by virtue of their dependence on notions of demonic possession to make sense. In the worldview of Jesus and his followers, illness was caused by demons and cured by the removal of these demons. Whether or not the placebo effect may explain some of the healing stories in the gospel, the majority are plainly fictitious and fanciful nonsense. Illness is not caused by demons; therefore illness is not cured by removing demons. To take these stories – these mythical tales – seriously as historical accounts is to deny the reality of how the world really works.

Finally, there are the claims of dead people coming back to life. As we have seen, Jesus and his followers believed in the imminence of the end of the age, a time in which the living and the dead will face judgement and then go bodily either to live in the Kingdom of Heaven on the newly regenerated Earth (an Earth without suffering or hardship) or to be thrown into a pit, or into darkness, or into flames, or all three, where they will suffer eternal torment, wailing and gnashing their teeth in agony.

Not all Jews of Jesus’ time accepted the notion of bodily resurrection and indeed some mocked it (22:23-32), but it was absolutely key to Jesus’ apocalyptic worldview. He taught his followers to believe that in their lifetime all the apocalyptic events he spoke of would come to fruition, including the coming of the Son of Man and the resurrection of the dead for final judgement. Consequently, his followers fully expected the dead to soon be coming back to life. In Jesus and his ministry the Kingdom of God was seen to be already coming into effect, and his reported healings and raising of the dead prefigure the age to come (in which God will heal the sick and there will be no more death). Jesus is seen to be central to the consummation of history and in Matthew not only does he raise the dead, he is also raised, and at the same time yet more walk out of their tombs.

The fact of the matter is, however, we know that people do not walk out of tombs and come back from the dead, and we know that no-one has the power to make this happen. Jesus claimed his followers would be able to raise the dead, but we never hear any credible accounts of anyone today managing this feat, so there is absolutely no reason for us to believe an ancient apocalyptic book brimming over with fantasy and delusion when it claims this actually happened. Some Christian apologists, usually of the more liberal variety, often downplay the unscientific aspects of the New Testament while holding on to the resurrection of Jesus, which is referred to as The Resurrection, an event which is seen to be unique and consequently evidence of Jesus’ divinity. However, Matthew does not simply speak of the resurrection of Jesus: as we have seen, a dead girl is said to have been raised by Jesus and he exhorted his disciples to do likewise. At the time of Jesus’ supposed resurrection we read that other people were also raised from their tombs. There is not a resurrection here, but rather a series of them, and it was believed that they were soon to be followed by the general resurrection of all the dead. In order to believe in Jesus’ resurrection, we must also logically believe that a number of other dead people were raised during the lifetime of his followers. These resurrections obviously did not happen, any more than demons were expelled from the sick, or any more than the world has come to an end.

Matthew’s gospel is filled with unscientific and superstitious ideas that bear no relation to what we know of reality. Illnesses are not caused by ‘demons’ and dead people don’t walk out of their tombs. If demons cause illness then how does medication cure it? If people can be raised from the dead then why don’t Christians do this today? We know these ideas are false, and they are ideas of another time, effectively another world, to our own. To present Matthew’s gospel as ‘Holy Scripture’ is to sanctify ignorance.

Jesus’ moral teachings

Even among secularists and non-Christians, Jesus is often presented as a great moral teacher. Pithy sayings about helping the poor or loving your neighbour are taken out of context and there is an aura that surrounds Jesus of wisdom and ethical insight. The reality, as seen in Matthew’s gospel, is somewhat disappointing to say the least.

Slavery

A good place to start is the issue of slavery. Once widespread, slavery is now banned in all civilised societies and is seen as an utterly unacceptable and criminal practice. It has often been said that Christianity inspired many of those who worked to abolish slavery and that those who supported slavery ‘twisted’ the Bible to justify their position. The truth, though, is that in Matthew’s gospel there is no condemnation of slavery at all, and Jesus is happy to uncritically use slaves as characters in many of his parables.

For Jesus and his followers, the books of ‘the Law and the Prophets’ found in the Old Testament today were divinely inspired documents; these books were Jesus’ ‘Bible’. Looking at the Old Testament, we find that slavery is not condemned, but is, rather, condoned. For example in Leviticus chapter 25 (44-46) we read:

As for the male and female slaves whom you may have, it is from the nations around you that you may acquire male and female slaves. You may also acquire them from among the aliens residing with you, and from their families that are with you, who have been born in your land; and they may be your property. You may keep them as a possession for your children after you, for them to inherit as property. These you may treat as slaves, but as for your fellow Israelites, no one shall rule over the other with harshness.

And in Exodus chapter 21 (20-21), we read: ‘When a slave-owner strikes a male or female slave with a rod and the slave dies immediately, the owner shall be punished. But if the slave survives for a day or two, there is no punishment; for the slave is the owner’s property’.

The ‘holy books’ revered by Jesus endorse the keeping of slaves and the notion of human beings as ‘possessions’ and ‘property’. Jesus said nothing to oppose this. The centurion at Capernaum informed Jesus that ‘I say … to my slave, “Do this”, and the slave does it’ (8:9), yet Jesus did not take the opportunity to condemn slavery, nor does he do so at any other point in the Gospel of Matthew. In his references to slaves, Jesus accepts, rather than condemns, the practice. So, we see Jesus using slaves in his parables. In chapter 24, Jesus warns his followers not to give up their faith if the end does not come as quickly as they might expect. He uses the analogy of a master who leaves his slaves and then returns while they are unprepared:

‘But if that wicked slave says to himself, “My master is delayed”, and he begins to beat his fellow-slaves, and eats and drinks with drunkards, the master of that slave will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour that he does not know. He will cut him in pieces and put him with the hypocrites, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth’ (24:48-51).

In chapter 25, we find the parable of the talents, which ends as follows: ‘As for this worthless slave, throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth’ (25:30).

Here, Jesus uses slaves as characters in his parables, showing an acceptance of the practice of slavery, and, through the analogy, suggests that he is the master and his followers should see themselves as slaves. Those who do not believe in him and his apocalyptic delusions are ‘worthless’ and deserve to be cut into pieces and thrown into darkness to suffer endless torture.

Again, we see that Jesus’ message is entirely historically situated and without universal relevance. In the parables cited above, Jesus manages to mix acceptance of slavery with both apocalypticism and threats of eternal punishment. To the modern mind, all three of these should be seen as primitive, irrational, and hateful. Yet, unbelievably, modern people turn to the Bible as a guide to life.

Masochism as morality

Having looked at a little discussed aspect of Jesus’ moral teachings, I show now examine the more famous moral expressions found in Matthew’s gospel, the bulk of which are found in chapters 5-7.

In order to understand Jesus’ moral teachings in Matthew, they must be seen in the context of his general teaching mission and worldview. We have already seen that the mental framework in which Jesus’ ideas are situated is Jewish imminent apocalypticism. As with all of his other teachings, his moral message was primarily if not exclusively aimed at apocalyptic Jews such as himself; people who shared his belief in the impending end of the world and divine judgement. Central to their concerns was an obsession with faith, purity, and receiving the rewards of the world to come (entry to the Kingdom of God). Jesus’ moral teachings are therefore very specifically historically located, and not meant for us (given we should not even be here as the world should have come to an end within the lifetime of Jesus’ companions). However, despite this, could there be anything of value here for the modern reader?

Let us first examine the much vaunted ‘Beatitudes’ found at the start of chapter 5:

Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.
Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.
Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy.
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.
Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.
Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

What we immediately notice is that each one of these pronouncements is focussed on the rewards of the world soon to come following the apocalypse (in the lifetime of those hearing these words). Many cite the Beatitudes as moral teachings, yet there is really no ethical teaching here at all, simply bland statements about future rewards to be bestowed by God. At best, this is wish fulfillment of the most obvious kind, and at worst, these statements are an endorsement of the ‘value’ of human suffering, and this certainly appears to be the more accurate reading.

In the scenarios spoken of by Jesus, a negative condition in the present world is contrasted with its opposite in the world to come. With the exception of the merciful, the pure in heart, and the peacemakers, these sayings all refer to a situation that involves passive suffering. So, we find that those who mourn and suffer persecution and ill treatment are in fact ‘blessed’ in their suffering and should ‘rejoice’ in it, for through their suffering they are those who will be rewarded in the world to come. What the Beatitudes do not present is a coherent programme for social change. One cannot read these verses and hope to change the world, for they speak of the inevitability of suffering and proclaim that those who suffer will be rewarded. The negative implication of such a message is that it suggests that in a sense the best possible life to have in ‘this world’ is one afflicted with sadness and suffering, for the greatest reward in the Kingdom to come is reserved for those who suffer and struggle now.

As we shall see, this perverse and masochistic ‘morality’ is not confined to the Beatitudes. A number of oft quoted sayings of Jesus contain exactly the same endorsement of the supposed value of suffering. There is the famous command to ‘turn the other cheek’, for example:

‘You have heard that it was said, “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” But I say to you, Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also; and if anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give your cloak as well; and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go also the second mile. Give to everyone who begs from you, and do not refuse anyone who wants to borrow from you.’

And there is the ‘love your enemies’ teaching:

‘You have heard that it was said, “You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy.” But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous. For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax-collectors do the same? And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.’

Neither of these celebrated sayings present a well thought out, practically applicable moral system, but they were never intended to do so. These teachings were given by an apocalyptic prophet who believed that the end of the world was at hand and that those who suffered injustice would be rewarded by God. So, we find Jesus advocating ideas that in the modern world – or indeed in anything other than a world seen to be in its final days – are useless as a guide to living.

Jesus claims that one should not ‘resist an evildoer’ and that, if attacked, one should offer the other cheek for further abuse. If someone wants to (presumably on false grounds) sue you and take your property, you should give it to them, and give them more still. If someone forces you to go somewhere with them, you should offer to go even further. If someone begs from you, you should always give them money, and you should always lend things to people without question. And if someone makes themselves an enemy of yours, or if you regard someone as your enemy, you should offer them love. These are not presented as good principles for living in general, but rather are presented as the key to receiving divine rewards; rewards soon to be given upon the end of the world.

Any who see the teachings cited above as ‘profound’, ‘universal’, or ‘wise’ needs to think carefully about the implications of following such teachings in the real world. Following Jesus’ arguments, domestic abuse should not only be tolerated by the victim, but actively encouraged in an act of self-abasement. If a woman’s husband comes home drunk and punches her in the face, she shouldn’t take any action, but should rather offer him her other cheek for further abuse. If someone decides to bring a malicious lawsuit, the victim of this swindle should not contest the injustice but should instead offer more than the original lawsuit demanded. If a bully forces someone to accompany him somewhere, the victim should not escape at the earliest possible opportunity, but should instead offer to accompany him even further. If a drug addict tries to beg money from you in the street, you should give her some money regardless of the reason she wants the money. If an arrogant, selfish, and manipulative person wastes all his money on drinking and gambling and fails to pay back loans given to him by his family, according to Jesus he should be lent further money, even if it is obvious that the loan cannot be paid back and is in fact contributing to his demise. And if people make themselves our enemies by launching terrorist attacks against civilians, we should reach out to these Jihadists with ‘love’. We should not hate them for killing innocents and attacking civilisation, but should instead crawl before them, offering a sickly and contemptible ‘compassion’ in order to prove that we are ‘perfect’ and worthy of ‘reward’. Think about it: would ‘love’ for Hitler have stopped his genocidal, racist, expansionist campaign? And would ‘turning the other cheek’ to the Nazis have been a ‘moral’ act?

In practical terms, these teachings are clearly not simply flawed, but actively immoral, in that their application would actually lead to injustice. But to return yet again to the central point, these teachings were never meant for us. In Jesus’ apocalyptic worldview, these teachings do actually make a perverse kind of sense. Jesus teaches that those who suffer are the heirs to divine rewards, and as following these teachings will lead to greater suffering, their application will lead therefore to a greater potential for future reward. Jesus proclaims that those who ‘hunger and thirst for righteousness’ and are ‘reviled and persecuted’ occupy the moral high ground and that their condition is a precursor to their entry to the Kingdom of God. So, when Jesus tells people to offer the other cheek for further abuse, or to submissively endure cruelty, indeed to actively encourage more of it, he is teaching people to embrace victimhood, for it is precisely through becoming victims that they will receive the greatest reward. Herein we find the inspiration for the Christian ascetic tradition, stretching from the desert fathers through to the self-hating monasticism of the Middle Ages, in which self-inflicted poverty, suppression of sexuality, self-injury, self-starvation, contempt for the body and health, and contempt for life itself reached its apotheosis in the lives of the ‘saints’.

Of course, all this rests on a misunderstanding, for there is no suggestion in Jesus’ preaching that he is thinking in terms of the long term future of the human race. He is not offering us a guide to living; he is instead offering an interim ethics for First Century Jews who believed, as he did, that they were living on the brink of the apocalypse.

The morality of fear

We have already seen that Jesus’ moral teachings are useless for those today who seek to encourage justice and live a better life for they embody a twisted ideology of apocalyptic spiritual masochism. But this is not the only unsatisfactory aspect. There is also the fact that Jesus invalidates the claim that he is a great moral thinker by the way in which he seeks to persuade people to accept his ideas. Of a genuinely great ethical philosopher, one would expect arguments that are rationally justifiable and which make a case for a certain moral position based on intelligent analysis of the issue in question, providing evidence or reasoning for why one should adopt such a position, and acknowledging the importance of debate and self-criticism in formulating one’s arguments. In totalitarian thinking we find the opposite, with arguments based on dogma, ‘tradition’, and superstition, and enforced with the threat of violence or death. We see such a ‘morality’ today in the actions of the Taliban and Jihadists, for example – people who know they have the truth and will kill you if you disagree. In Jesus, we do not find a man who advocates killing, but we do find a man who argues that all those who do not accept what he has to say will suffer eternal punishment, torment, and agony. Jesus does not need to adovate killing, for in his thinking God will be bringing all this to pass within a generation. One can live with the ‘evil doers’ for now, as there is very little time left, during which people should discard all normal worries and ‘strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness’ (6:33).

In presenting his arguments, such as they are, Jesus peppers them with threats of future horrors for any who refuse to listen or would even dare to question aspects of his teaching. His vision of what will happen to the majority of human beings (7:13) at the end of the age makes the Holocaust pale in comparison. During the Holocaust millions suffered, were killed, and their bodies burnt. In the holocaust promised by Jesus, billions will suffer burning fires and other torments without end. Just think about it: burning forever with no chance of escape. This is such a sickening and perverse thought it is hard to see how this aspect of his teaching alone does not lead all civilised, rational people to discard Jesus as a monster.

In Matthew, we are presented with numerous examples of this disordered thinking. Jesus speaks of ‘the hell of fire’ (5:22), bodies going ‘into hell’ (5:30), people being ‘weeds’ to be ‘thrown into the fire’ (7:19), people as weeds ‘in bundles to be burned’ (13:30), people as weeds ‘collected and burned up with fire’ (13:40), people ‘thrown into the furnace of fire, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth’ (13:42; repeated in 13:50), people ‘thrown into the eternal fire’ (17:8), people ‘thrown into the fire of hell’ (17:9), people ‘cut into pieces’ and put ‘where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth’ (24:51), people thrown ‘into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth’ (25:30), and makes other threats of ‘eternal punishment’ (25:46). It should be clear to all that this is not the thinking of a man with a balanced mind, and certainly these are not the words of a great moral teacher.

Jesus does not just offer these punishments for individuals, but speaks also of entire cities facing collective punishment if his followers fail to win converts there. He sends his followers out to proselytise Jewish communities (‘Go nowhere among the Gentiles, and enter no town of the Samaritans’ – 10:5), and states of villages and towns that do not welcome his message, ‘Truly I tell you, it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah on the day of judgement than for that town’ (10:15). He then berates cities he has visited who have refused to ‘repent’ (i.e. accept his apocalyptic ranting), saying of Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum that they will be ‘brought down to Hades’ and that ‘on the day of judgement it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom than for you’ (11:20-24). Sodom and Gomorrah are of course the famous towns on which the God of Israel is said to have rained ‘sulphur and fire’, destroying ‘all the Plain, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and what grew on the ground’ (Genesis 19:24-25).

Surprisingly, while Jesus condemns people to these punishments who have committed acts of injustice and persecution, he also promises punishment in eternal fire for trivial reasons such as being ‘angry’ with someone or calling someone a ‘fool’ (5:22), using ‘careless words’ (12:36), or for a man looking at a woman with ‘lust in his heart’ (5:28). Jesus states that the remedy for some ‘sins’ such as looking at a woman with lust is self-mutilation, telling his listeners that ‘If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away; it is better for you to lose one of your members than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away; it is better for you to lose one of your members than for your whole body to go into hell’ (5:29-30).

So, in seeking to persuade people to adopt his moral vision and thereby enter the coming Kingdom of God, Jesus condemns the majority of the world’s population to eternal torment in the flames of hell, even for the most minor reasons, and adovocates cutting body parts off in order to avoid the coming judgement. And all this from a man proclaimed to be God incarnate and lauded for his message of ‘love’ even by non-Christians!

The objectionable character of Jesus

As if spewing a message of apocalyptic madness, expressing racism towards non-Jews, showing tolerance for slavery, encouraging capitulation with oppressors, and condemning multitudes to eternal hellfire wasn’t sickening enough, in Matthew, Jesus also shows himself to be a thoroughly unpleasant individual from his use of language. While warning of eternal punishment for those who are ‘angry’ of who use insults or ‘careless words’, he regularly engaged in this himself. Unable to present a moral vision that is not drenched in blood, he was also unable even to articulate it using civilised discourse. So, we find that in dealing with those he disagreed with, rather than rationally engaging them in debate and persuading them with convincing arguments, he instead hurled insults. In Matthew, the insults start on the lips of John the Baptist. When Pharisees and Sadducees come to him for baptism, he calls them a ‘brood of vipers’ and threatens them with being burned by God (3:7-10). Jesus then continues in a similar vein. When speaking to the Pharisees he on one occasion calls them a ‘brood of vipers’ and asks them ‘How can you speak good things, when you are evil?’ (12:34) On another occasion he shouts at them, ‘You snakes, you brood of vipers! How can you escape being sentenced to hell?’ (23:33). In the same exchange, he also tells the scribes and Pharisees that they ‘are like whitewashed tombs, which on the outside look beautiful, but inside they are full of the bones of the dead and of all kinds of filth’ (23:27) and says that they ‘cross sea and land to make a single convert, and you make the new convert twice as much a child of hell as yourselves’ (23:15). Twice he refers to his listeners as an ‘evil and adulterous generation’ (12:39; 16:4) as well as simply an ‘evil generation’ (12:45). Jesus even speaks contemptuously to his own disciples. When they fail to ‘heal’ an epileptic he rants at them: ‘You faithless and perverse generation, how much longer must I be with you? How much longer must I put up with you?’ (17:17). These are the words of a man who at them same time claimed that anger, insults, and careless words would lead someone to hell.

Conclusion

In conclusion, having read Matthew’s Gospel, what do we find? The reader is transported into a Judeocentric world of superstition, filled with angels, demons, a Devil, the ‘God of Israel’, ‘miracles’, corpses coming back to life, illness understood as ‘possession’ by evil spirits, morality framed in terms of masochism and fear, threats of eternal torment in the fires of hell, and a ‘redeemer’ who promotes bigotry towards non-Jews and hurls threats and insults at those who will not accept his message of the imminence of the end of the world. Reading Matthew’s Gospel as what it is – a piece of fanatical writing from a primitive mind of the past – as opposed to surrounding it with a holy aura and treating it as one of the high points of human thought (or worse still, as the ‘Word of God’), we find a book brimming over with notions that are contrary to everything we know to be real about the world. We find a book that promotes ideas that are scientifically ignorant, delusional, unjust, and in the case of threats of hellfire, cruel and perverted.

If the Pope is right and we are seeing a significant decline in interest in the Bible throughout the West, we should be thankful. The greatest mystery of the Bible is not its supposed spiritual insights, but rather that anyone in their right mind ever took it seriously to begin with.

Notes and References

[1] David Willey, ‘Pope laments decline of scripture’, BBC News, 5 October 2008.
[2] The translation of the Bible I have used is the New Revised Standard Version.

[3] On this, see my article ‘Brutality, War Crimes, Genocide, and Rape – Should Children Be Reading this Book?’
[4] As scholars and thinking Christians have long been aware, there is no single ‘message of Jesus’, as each gospel writer has given their own twist to the stories and words of Jesus. Therefore, when I speak of ‘Jesus’ message’ and the words and acts of Jesus in this article, I am restricting myself to the Jesus of the Gospel of Matthew and not making generalised claims to have distilled the ‘essence’ of his message from all four canonical gospels. Nonetheless, Christian tradition claims that each gospel presents an authoratative account of Jesus’ life, albeit focussing on different aspects of his message and actions. Consequently, Matthew is seen as a book of ‘Scripture’, divinely inspired in some way or other, and as authoratative and accurate as the other canonical gospels, so its contents are seen as an integral part of the Christian message and therefore of eternal relevance to all of us. Hypothetically, as all the gospels and other New Testament writings are said to present essentially one message, despite their different slants, one should be able to be in possession of only one of them and still have enough to go on to know the Christian message. Certainly, there would have been early Christian communities for whom Matthew was the gospel, so, given it is said to be authoritative, one should be able to find the allegedly universal message of Jesus as much in this gospel as in the others. However, what we actually find in Matthew poses serious problems for this notion.
[5] We find similar language used by Jesus in Matthew 7:6: ‘Do not give what is holy to dogs; and do not throw your pearls before swine, or they will trample them under foot and turn and maul you’. In the story of the Canaanite woman, Jesus contrasts the ‘children’ (Jews) with ‘dogs’ (Gentiles). It seems likely that here again in Matthew 7 we see Jesus teaching his followers not to take the message of the Kingdom to non-Jews (for it is only for ‘the lost sheep of Israel’). ‘Dogs’ and ‘swine’ almost certainly refer here to non-Jews: ‘dogs’ being the word he used to describe non-Jews when speaking to the Canaanite woman, and pigs being ‘unclean’ animals in Judaism.

The article by Charles Murray, discussed in a Note and Comment with a measure of disapprobation, raises awkward questions that need to be faced and which rarely are. The problem is that liberal-minded people, and I am one such, are not immune from falling into the trap of believing what we wish to be true rather than that which is true.

Let me first digress to tell a story. Almost twenty years ago, a senior colleague of mine became quite well-known for
writing highly regarded books on relativity and quantum mechanics (the `Uncle Albert’ series) that were targeted at
young teenagers. He gave our (physics) department a talk on the research that he did in preparation for writing
these books. It included getting down on the floor amongst children at the local public library, the better to
understand what appealed to them. More relevant to my present point, he also did research into the
current state of research into Piaget’s theories of cognitive development. In particular, he cited the then recent work by
Shayer and Adey which showed that Piaget’s series of transitions did indeed seem to occur in the order found by Piaget.
However, Piaget had studied small groups and had failed to pick up the fact that the final transition (effectively that to
abstract thought, the one that is essential to understanding multi-parameter or multi-causal systems) is undergone
by no more than 20 percent of the population.

I clearly remember how shocked some members of the audience at the talk were. The belief that we can teach
science, at least at foundation level, to `anyone’ if only we learned to teach it properly, has been deeply held by
many in our institution. Indeed, it is closely linked to the ethos of our founders. And yes, what Shayer and Adey
claimed, has deeply political consequences, especially in a climate where the word `elitism’, its vague and mutually
contradictory meanings notwithstanding, has become a fearful political weapon. However, for many of us who had
spent many years teaching physics to a wide range of students, it made everything fall into place. It is hard to escape
the biological fact that many students simply do not have the mental templates on which the understanding, which
we strive to impart, can fit.

What Shayer and Adey said seemed to fit with our experience, but that does not prove they were correct.
Were they? I spent some time in the library trying to see what had come out in the wash over nearly
two decades. One of the two authors (I forget which) had spent the intervening period trying to devise ways in which
special coaching could get students to make the jump. The results seemed to be very marginal. This is a matter
which desperately needs an agreed consensus – so much educational policy rests, or at least should rest, upon
it. Maybe there already is such a consensus, but I have not heard it; but then it is far outside my field of expertise.
I suspect that politics does not help.

In the meantime, in the UK, we have a school curriculum that, at lower levels at least, is tailored to getting
as many as possible of the 80 percent though a monkey-see monkey-do test. One teacher has characterised the
curriculum as training in not thinking. Many students will, at 16, pass `GCSE science’ and still have
an understanding of the world so remote from reality that they are suckers for every form of snake oil. Can we face
the fact that this might always be so? In the USA there are special breadth requirement science courses at college level,
and my small experience at coaching students for such a course suggests that not much is gained. There are no
courses of this kind in UK universities. In UK secondary schools there are not, at pre-17 year levels, what Piaget’s
biology seems to make essential: parallel science courses requiring different cognitive levels. I don’t expect soon
to see the required courage from the educational authorities, although it was just this morning that one privately
agreed with me that such was needed.

I often feel that I can tell from listening to someone speak whether that person is in the 20 percent or the 80 percent.
I do believe, in all seriousness, that we (the UK) got into the Iraq war through having a leader who got a good degree in
spite of being in the 80 percent that are not strong on multi-causal situations.

So, you see, I don’t think that Charles Murray was completely wrong in everything he said, which, I thought, was far
more than an attack on pointy headed intellectuals. I can well see that the issue I have raised, is just one corner of
the huge one of how to assimilate Nature’s capricious distribution of abilities in a democratic and egalitarian society.
The specific `elitism’ issue that has been prompted by the recent US election is just another aspect of it. There are
many others: I was first jolted into an awareness of the issue when, in 1966, some professor of music claimed that
Beatles’ songs were as good as Schubert’s, something I went along with for a couple of days, until I next listened to
Schubert. The depth of the problem is signalled by the fury that can be aroused when I state my views on this
among young people. Is it too much to hope that an examination of these issues will cease to be a victim of crossfire
in the left-right war?

Raymond Mackintosh is Emeritus Professor of Physics at the Open University.

At long last, a protracted and often fierce election campaign is over. America has selected its new president. We congratulate Barack Obama, and we pledge our support for his efforts!

President-elect Obama will face awesome problems left over from the Bush administration. But let us focus on the positive. Obama is the first person of mixed Anglo-African parentage to attain the presidency. Heroically, he represents a significant extension of the scope of American democracy. His election reminds us that the United States really is the universal society on this planet and reconfirms America’s identity as a truly (if not yet perfectly) multiracial, multi-ethnic, multicultural nation. Bravo!

The United States is the first major country founded under the ideals of the Enlightenment, committed to the secular values of “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” America is a land of opportunity and individual achievement; its civic faith in progress, education, science, humanism, and democratic values is well justified.

Yet it comes at a price. Almost a century was required to overcome the moral blot of slavery. It has taken another century and a third since the Civil War to make the nation significantly more inclusive. America has elected a biracial president; had the Democratic primaries turned out differently, the nation would most likely have elected a woman. How long will it take before an open nonbeliever can be elected to high office? The U.S. Constitution states that “no religious test shall ever be required” to hold “any office or public trust.” Yet surveys still show that a majority of Americans would not vote for an atheist candidate for president. Clearly there is more work to be done to realize a truly secular society.

In order that the ideals of democracy may be extended further, we offer some basic, humanistic ethical principles and goals that we hope the nation can achieve in the coming years. Even as they confront an economic crisis of massive proportions, we call on President Obama and the new Congress to base their actions on the following principles:

• Renewal of regulation for the protection of the public. The unlimited free market has been discredited. Virtually every other democratic society displays a mixed economy with robust public and private sectors. America needs to learn from this example.
• Universal health care. We view health care as a human right. Every major democracy except the United States has universal health care. While preserving a significant private component, it is time to enact legislation that ensures that every American is covered.
• The right to privacy. Every person should have the personal freedom to pursue his or her values and style of life, so long as he or she does not prohibit others from exercising like rights
• Equal access. Every person, regardless of gender, race, ethnicity, or class, should have the opportunity to realize his or her goals without being hampered by discrimination.
• Equality of concern. All individuals should (a) be considered as equal before the law; (b) have the same right to education, whether poor or rich; and (c) enjoy the opportunity to pursue gainful employment.
• Civil liberties. In a free and open democratic society, any effort to censor or restrict free expression must be impermissible. This encompasses the right of each individual to believe in and practice a chosen religion—but also the right of dissent and nonbelief.
• Separation of church and state. The United States needs to adhere to the First Amendment. We call upon President Obama to rise above his campaign rhetoric on this issue and end public support for faith-based charities as a violation of the First Amendment.
• Commitment to developing alternative energy sources. We need to refocus national policy based on an energy mantra that exhorts us to go green, green, green! in place of drill, drill, drill.
• Restoring respect for U.S. leadership in world affairs. The war in Iraq needs to be resolved by the new administration as soon as possible. Ideally, this should include some form of truth commission that would investigate key members of the previous administration for their roles in taking the nation to war on false pretenses, establishing an illegal doctrine of preemptive warfare, and instituting such repellent practices as torture and indefinite detention. America should refocus its foreign policy and commit to using first diplomacy rather than military force as it seeks to resolve conflicts peacefully in cooperation with others in the world.

POSTSCRIPT

Finally, we recommend two reforms of the electoral system.

First, the election just concluded consumed two years, tremendous energy, and unprecedented levels of funding. We recommend that a special commission be appointed by the president in consultation with Congress to move beyond the grueling state-by-state primary system, perhaps to regional primaries and a shortened electoral process.

Second, we recommend that vice-presidential candidates be selected by regional primaries and political conventions, not simply chosen by the presidential nominee. Three twentieth-century presidents died in office (William McKinley, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and John F. Kennedy) and were succeeded by their vice presidents. Although we think that Obama’s selection of Joseph Biden was a sensible choice, John McCain’s selection of the unqualified Sarah Palin was not. Clearly the present process is insufficient. In our view, the vice president should be selected by the public through the primary process rather than being the sole and autocratic choice of the candidate. Let the people decide!

Usage My friends Energizing the base (1) Energizing the base (2) Gaffe Straight talk Palling around with terrorists Health care Charismatic Ready to be president Underestimating Sarah Palin Joe Six-pack Joe the plumber Maverick Real American Hero “Tested” Energy policy Environment Elite Change (real) Reaching across the aisle Economic policy Race card Real America Socialist Bold new vision Pit bull Feminist Socialist Second Amendment Rights Surge Strong on foreign policy Strong on security Early voting

Definition Rabble Inciting to riot Wink and wave Inadvertant Straight talk scripted comment Conversation with Mensa members Tea Draws breath Charismatic Listening to Sarah Palin One of my friends Joe Six-pack’s dumber brother Unbranded range animal Shot down over Nam Anger issues Drill baby drill What we see when we breathe Other people’s cocktail parties What to do with a subject Present in Senate chamber “The Bush Tax Cuts” The one up my sleeve Where my friends live Other people’s neighborhoods New eyeglass prescription; tea What lives under Joe Sixpack’s trailer Hockey mom with pregnant teenager Hockey mom on unemployment Dead timberwolf mother Mop and bucket Can’t locate Iran on a map Foreign policy overrated anyway Lottery

The fact that nearly half of all Americans reject evolution is depressing enough, but the opinions of college graduates may cause despair. One in three holders of bachelor’s and postgraduate degrees deny that “Darwin’s theory of evolution [is] proved by fossil evidence.” Even more dismal, only about one-third of U.S. college graduates and postgraduates admit to a “belief in evolution”—while about sixty percent accept Creationism or its Trojan Horse, Intelligent Design.[1] In over thirty countries, including every other advanced society, a higher percentage of the general population accepts evolution: in pious Ireland, for example, the number accepting evolution is sixty percent higher than in the U.S.! Americans are just as likely to choose to believe in ghosts and UFOs as Creationism, and only somewhat less likely to believe in witches and astrology.[2] Three-quarters of Americans admit to at least one “weird belief,” to use Michael Shermer’s apt phrase, including clairvoyance (26%), ESP (41%), telepathy (31%), and communication with the dead (21%).[3]

Was the Enlightenment overly optimistic to express confidence in ordinary people’s ability to make sense of their lives and the world? This was once, after all, a radical claim about human capacities. Immanuel Kant proclaimed: “Dare to know! ‘Have courage to use your own understanding!’—that is the motto of enlightenment.”[4] It has become a civilizational social, political, and intellectual starting point to affirm the general human capacity to develop reason, answer life’s essential questions, live according to one’s own lights, and become full and active citizens. One shining example is the first article of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which says: “[A]ll human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience.”

If this is true, why is our society awash in weird beliefs, which people embrace despite an absence of scientific support and against logic and evidence? Why did 30% of Americans continue to link Saddam Hussein with 9/11 long after this had been disproved and disavowed? Our seemingly ineradicable gullibility before half-truths, official lies, and media manipulation is truly remarkable in a society so based on education, science, technology, and information—so dependent on the intellect and demanding that we be rational at every turn. How is it possible that today has become in Susan Jacoby’s words, the “age of American unreason”—a time characterized by growing hostility to science, intelligence, and rationality?[5] As Jacoby points out, we can not reassure ourselves by pretending that those who reject science and rationality are holders of recently eclipsed beliefs living earlier lives in rural backwaters—they are modern people rejecting modernity, and using its chosen tools to get out their message. These realities would make the Enlightenment weep.

There are two ways to approach this problem. One is to focus on the conditions that make for the “intertwined ignorance, anti-rationalism, and anti-intellectualism” of today’s America. Jacoby does this by exploring the deleterious effect of television, the internet, and popular culture, the dumbing-down of politics and education, and perhaps above all the rise of religious fundamentalism.[6] These shape the environment for all of us today. But people are not simply the products of the environment. They choose, create their own behaviors, and have good reasons for doing as they do. “The problem is,” says literary critic Laura Miller, “when push comes to shove, we don’t always feel like facing reality.” As she argues insightfully in a review of The Age of American Unreason, we must also focus on people’s motivation for choosing to not be rational, to believe weird things—to be ignorant.[7]

“Choose,” Embrace,” “accept,” and “deny,” are all crucial starting points of this discussion. To choose to know is to encounter the world in a specific way. It is a way of acting. It is to decide to reveal an aspect of the world, or to let it be revealed, or to accept what others with appropriate credentials, arguments, and evidence have revealed about it. Jean-Paul Sartre, in a little-known posthumously published book, Truth and Existence, stressed the connection between the two meanings of the French ignorer: to not know, and to ignore. In English we preserve this link in the shift from ignore: not paying attention to ignorant: the condition of not knowing. Creationists ignore, turn away from, refuse to acknowledge, what is there and waiting to be seen, and for which there is ample evidence: modern science’s complex but compelling understanding of how the earth, plants, and animals came into existence. To choose not to know that humans have evolved over millions of years is to ignore what we have collectively learned is so.

To choose not to know is an act of bad faith: we seek to deny what we in some sense already know is there, and we degrade ourselves by willfully suppressing our awareness of it. We do so because we don’t want the situation we ignore to be the way it is. Through imprisoning ourselves in ignorance we seek a kind of fantasy makeover of the world to fit our desires, crippling our understanding rather than adapting ourselves to the world by knowing it as it is and acting accordingly. We deny what may be troubling or disheartening, threatening or terrifying.[8]

There are many reasons why someone would choose to ignore evolution, or turn away from it, or deny it. Whether or not people are motivated to accept or reject it is, of course, often conditioned by forces well beyond their immediate control—being raised in a subculture that believes in absolute knowledge based on faith and authority, being trained in the schizophrenic attitude of rejecting science while living by its fruits, schooling in Biblical interpretation that insists on accepting the literal truth of chosen passages of the Bible, obedience to parents and Fundamentalist religious authorities who anathematize evolution, being part of a community that stipulates belief in Creationism as a requirement of belonging. Most churchgoing African Americans are Creationists, for example, because accepting evolution entails going against the primacy their pastors accord to a literal reading of the first book of Genesis. Whatever the motivation, embracing Creationism is a refusal to undertake the hard and threatening work of reconciling one’s faith with the realities of life.

Creationism is only one way people choose not to know today. Another appears again and again throughout American culture: the maxim, “Everything happens for a reason.” In addition to the conditions described by Jacoby, this form of bad faith is motivated by people’s weak preparation for coping with the enormous and rapidly increasing amount of essential knowledge explaining an increasingly complex world. A single day in any life today demands that we learn constantly about both the basics and the latest knowledge concerning health, politics, household management, and many other broad areas. It requires plowing through enormous quantities of information and imposes constant decisions about what is relevant and what is not; when one has learned enough about a topic; how to integrate new information into what one already knows; and how to apply it.[9] We must become active, intentional, and adaptive learners of new ideas and information rather than passive absorbers of a relatively stable body of knowledge. It is up to us to make sense of it all, constantly synthesizing knowledge drawn from several disciplines.[10] These habits or abilities are always mentioned among the key aims of contemporary liberal education.[11]

The problem is that the American education system does not achieve this. How often do students go beyond the passive learning of absorbing and trying to remember what they are reading and hearing—to active learning in which they gain experience in questioning, validating, and applying it? The little objective evidence that has been gathered indicates that only only 6% are “proficient” and 77% “not proficient” in critical thinking, which is, after all, not a “subject,” but a set of attitudes and abilities learned throughout one’s education—or not.[12] It is not learned by taking undergraduate survey courses in various disciplines (the distribution or general education requirements) which are, furthermore, kept in separate watertight compartments and not brought or thought together. And it is not learned in undergraduate majors, whose main function is to prepare students to specialize and one of whose main goals is to recruit graduate students. From the research university to the community college, students are rarely encouraged to integrate different disciplines.[13]

Belonging to an impatient culture promising instant answers, often poorly equipped and overwhelmed, most people struggle to piece together their fragments of faith, knowledge, and experience as best they can. Some of the most curious spirits restlessly surf the internet in hot pursuit of questions that their schooling has not helped them even to ask, let alone answer. They often begin by being rightly suspicious of all official stories and seeking more compelling explanations. In the infinite space of the internet, with the whole culture at one’s fingertips, millions of answers cry out. It is the freest of all free markets, yet people are rarely trained to negotiate it.

With immense energy people search their way among gurus, conspiracy theories, spectacular short cuts, easy answers, the latest political scandal, parodies of ancient wisdom, pseudo-scholarship decked out in scientific trappings, real knowledge and thoughtful reflections, newfangled or eclipsed religious and political wisdom, every established and every insurgent point of view, and sheer nonsense—and they are free to consume and reassemble it as they wish.

In this situation and with the tools our culture provides, people produce today’s most common weird belief: “Everything happens for a reason.” This expresses a complex contemporary mood that life is filled with connections beneath the surface; that no-one knows what these are or how they operate; that they can only be thought about in a quasi-religious way. We hear the phrase at every turn in the United States today: spouses telling why they met each other or why they broke up, one baseball player explaining why he didn’t make the team, another explaining why he made the team, anyone reflecting on a coincidence, a student softening the blow of a failing grade, a cancer patient coming to grips with her illness. Good happenings or bad, personal tragedies, disasters, matters of chance, striking coincidences, enormous disappointments, the unexpected—all become rationalized as being part of a larger plan.

At its root, the maxim mixes events that do indeed have comprehensible causes outside of ourselves along with pure accidents, and mixes these up with results that we ourselves produce through our own actions. All become the mush of a totally deterministic universe in which every last thing has a meaningful cause (but no one knows what it is) or is planned by a superhuman mind, presumably directing things for the best (and whose logic is also unknowable). Our dependence on specific structures and forces is erased, with all of its specific detail, supplanted by a vague and unrecognizable force or will. One’s own responsibility for oneself and the world dissolves into this. And those who may be held culpable, individuals and institutions, are spared any reproach for whatever goes wrong. As this low-grade sense of fate or God or whatever percolates below the surface of American life today, many of us who lack a sense of control over our lives fall back on it, as do many traditionally religious people—and so many others.

And it cannot be completely dismissed. “Everything happens for a reason” claims, vaguely, that what we experience, but whose reasons we can’t comprehend, is part of a larger pattern—which is often true. It expresses people’s hunch, often quite wise, that what happens is linked to larger forces and causes than those we have been trained to grasp. And it is often a wish to see justice done, even if only ultimately, and a hope for real meaning where there seems to be sheer randomness.

But it is cast in a way that usually ends discussion rather than beginning it. A healthy sense of linkages, larger purposes, and logics and forces beyond our control might lead people to environmental, epidemiological, sociological, political, economic, and historical study, and yield important but troubling insight. Is it any surprise that people are motivated instead to avoid making this vague intuition concrete, and instead continue recirculating empty profundities?

Creationism and “Everything happens for a reason” are not the only ways people embrace ignorance today. The opposite choice, to know, to reveal, to use one’s reason, depends on an increasingly rare understanding that it is possible to know. This means overcoming the widespread postmodern skepticism toward objective knowledge, as well as the puzzling and even more widespread ignorance about how much we humans already do know. Being able to do the first depends on understanding what objective knowledge really is. Knowing is a matter of humility. It entails allowing oneself to enter into discussion, to submit what one says to the judgement of others, to be proven wrong by them, to be seen as fallible, and thus to realize that any particular piece of knowledge is always tentative, always subject to revision, always demanding verification. This in turn implies a commitment to a communicative process in which we are always in dialogue with others, and in which they are always looking over our shoulders and commenting on what we claim to be true.

Truth is never absolute, but is objective. It is never raised above humans, but always takes place with, for, and about others. It emerges in “communicative action” and follows rules, which themselves are always up for discussion.[14] This is even, or especially, so of science. Its knowledge is self-consciously provisional, can be challenged and even overturned—which makes it dramatically different than the supposed “absolute knowledge” conferred by religious faith.

Truth, then, can never be the realm of the dogmatic, inflexible demand and the obedient, submissive response. Nor is it the postmodern space occupied by a near-infinity of individual and group points of view. Its spirit is not best imbibed passively, by rote, or by accepting that everyone’s claim to truth is as valid as everyone else’s. It is generated actively, among people, questioningly, challengingly. To choose to learn today is to accept living within this process, to embrace being part of the widest possible human community.

What, then, can we know today? When I started thinking about this essay, I asked friends and acquaintances what they thought were life’s most important unanswered questions. The responses were fascinating: How can the world become a better place? After death, will you meet the people from your life who have died? Would I be different if I were born on a different day? What causes envy? Is there life after death? Why in every society are men more violent than women? What is it that makes me myself from one moment to the next? Is paranormal experience possible? Is truly altruistic behavior possible? What is beauty? What causes cancer? What is/ where is/ who is God? Where will I be after death? How do you know if you’ve chosen the best path for your life? Are we reborn in different forms? Is there a soul that exists separately from the body?

After a short while, I realized what was wrong with my original question. It encouraged among my friends the sense that life’s most important questions were in fact unanswerable. I myself had been unconsciously participating in one of our culture’s great weird beliefs, thoughtlessly pointing people toward life’s great mysteries rather than the great human achievements in making sense of our world.

I realized my mistake while watching a PBS program on the human heart that focused on what was learned by the Framingham Study of Risk Factors in Heart Disease. Its first published results, in 1961, revolutionized how we think about heart attacks by confirming the decisive effect of smoking, diet, and lack of exercise.[15] We now know all this! We know dozens, hundreds, thousands of things that are vital for human understanding and well-being—have verified, confirmed, and implemented them. In this, the twenty-first century, so much that was once cloaked in darkness is known, and so much that is really essential to our lives is knowable. We sell ourselves short to pretend otherwise. We have developed methods of analysis, synthesis, and reasoning that can be taught and learned. All of this is now part of what John Dewey called the “social consciousness of the race” and it belongs to all of us. It is waiting to be claimed and used.

As a result, either at present or in the foreseeable future, we can know when the earth came into being and how. Why black Americans are poorer than white Americans. How human freedom evolved. How life began. Why cities like Detroit, Manchester, Liverpool, Leipzig, Halle, and Ivanovno have been shrinking for a generation. What people need to have the chance to live better lives. Why Creationism flourishes in the United States. How the human brain operates. Why Americans are more religious than people in every other advanced society. How many people the earth can support at an adequate level of subsistence. Why the Holocaust happened. Why Pizarro conquered the Incas and not the Incas Spain. Why Americans are less tall than members of other advanced societies. Why the British were able to dominate massive areas of Africa. Why so much of Africa remains poor today. Why the U. S. murder rate is higher than any other advanced society. Why Honduras and South Africa have the highest murder rates in the world. Why Greenland and the polar ice caps are melting. Why university costs rise faster than the rate of inflation. How the incredible diversity of plants and animals has evolved from single-celled beings over the last 3.6 billion years. Why Israel is reluctant to make peace with the Palestinians. Why Palestinians are reluctant to make peace with Israel.

We can answer most of these already, and none of the remainder will remain shrouded in mystery forever, or even for very long. Each reader will be able to make a similarly impressive list of life’s answerable questions. This is the important list. It tells us where we are. It is the one we can use to live our lives and make sense of our world. It is the one from which we can take bearings. It provides what we need to create a decent life—if we choose to know.

Notes

1. “Belief”?—even the designer of the survey fails to understand this difference between science and faith, that the evidence of the first compels assent, not belief.

2. According to Harris Interactive Nov 30, 2007.

3. Shermer has made a career of doing battle with anti-rational and anti-scientific currents—on talk shows, in debates, as editor of Skeptic magazine. See Why People Believe Weird Things (New York, 1997), 24-43.

4. Immanuel Kant, “An Answer to the Question: What is Enlightenment?”

5. Susan Jacoby, The Age of American Unreason (New York, 2008).

6. Jacoby, xx.

7. Laura Miller, “America Closes the Book on Intelligence,” February 15, 2008.

8. Ronald Aronson, “Introduction: The Ethics of Truth,” Jean-Paul Sartre, Truth and Existence (Chicago, 1992).

9. Traditional education in societies’ stable traditional knowledges used to form an essential aspect of human life, in all cultures and for nearly all of history. Most of what one needed to know was passed on directly and experientially, by one’s elders and parents, during the long process of growing up. By watching, by practicing, by listening, by memorizing stories, young persons acquired the necessary skills as well as what Dewey called the “social consciousness of the race”—the society’s historically developed cultural outlook. Dewey, “My Pedagogic Creed”

10. These are connected with the “scholarship of integration,” “scholarship of teaching,” and “scholarship of application” described by Ernest Boyer in Scholarship Reconsidered: Priorities of the Professoriate (Princeton, 1991).

11. They are included in Greater Expectations: A New Vision for Learning as a Nation Goes to College, published by the Association of American Colleges and Universities, an impressive clarion call to transform American higher education.

12. Liberal Education Outcomes: A Preliminary Report on Student Achievement in College (Washington, D. C., 2005), sections 4 and 5.
13. For the most part, active learning takes place during graduate education which, however, is professional training with a greatly narrowed focus. Even so, except for Creationism, here is where the sharpest drop-off in weird beliefs can be seen. Perhaps this is because graduate students become intentional learners by setting their own goals, and because they engage in active research—no longer simply receiving and recalling knowledge, but now applying and creating it. Active researchers who knows what it is to know will have significantly less tolerance for believing in UFOs, witches, astrology, or the devil (although apparently more accept reincarnation!).
14. Jürgen Habermas has written a number of works developing this theme, above all Theory of Communicative Action 2 vols. (Boston, 1982, 1987).
15. Affairs of the Heart, PBS Documentary, #4, “How’s Your Heart?”

Ronald Aronson is, to quote The New Humanist, ‘internationally recognised as the foremost Sartre scholar in the English-speaking world.’ His latest book is Living Without God: New Directions for Atheists, Agnostics, Secularists, and the Undecided, from which this is an extract.

James Parker comments bluntly in the November Atlantic that ‘The average Christian—as if we needed reminding—makes a piss-poor apologist for his own faith. One might expect a doctrine as insolently extraordinary in its claims as Christianity to have produced some tip-top debaters, but oh dear…’ This teasing remark seems apt for the best-known Anglophone Christian apologist, C S Lewis, at least to anyone who has been unimpressed by the ‘lunatic, liar or Lord’ trilemma. In this engrossing book John Beversluis takes the trouble to analyze Lewis’s arguments in detail.

Beversluis gives an account of Lewis’s Christian apologetics over a wide range of books, especially Mere Christianity, The Problem of Pain, Surprised by Joy, and A Grief Observed. He begins with Lewis’s ‘argument from desire’ and what is wrong with it, including in Lewis’s own terms. Lewis’s ‘Joy’ is a desire for something unknown, a desire ‘which no natural happiness will satisfy’ (p. 41) and the pain of which is itself ‘more desirable than any satisfaction.’ It sounds familiar – in fact it sounds adolescent. I remember irritatingly vague yearnings on spring evenings when I was 16, myself – I even remember trying to figure out what the yearning was for. New York?, I would wonder, since I loved going there. But that didn’t seem to be it. Neither did anything else. I didn’t identify it with God, though, much less conclude that the existence of such a yearning entails the existence of something to satisfy it and that that something is God. Perhaps, one might think, Lewis’s was a completely different kind of feeling: more dignified, more elevated, more Wordsworthian. But Beversluis concludes that ‘the pursuit of Joy is a childish thing’ and Lewis’s complaint that he had tried everything and been disappointed ‘underscores its childishness.’ He asks whether Joy is really a salutary experience, ‘the prelude to a momentous discovery,’ and answers that people who are not susceptible to its promptings ‘are less prone to disparage such precious temporal goods as they are fortunate enough to enjoy as being poorer than some allegedly greater nontemporal good for which they are searching.’ (pp 68-9) He adds that claiming that reality does not meet one’s standards is not profundity, ‘it is adolescent disenchantment elevated to cosmic status,’ so perhaps not so different from my meaningless pubescent moods after all.

Beversluis then considers Lewis’s ‘Moral Argument for the existence of a Power behind the moral law,’ and in doing so points out that one of Lewis’s ‘serious weaknesses as a Christian apologist’ is a constant resort to the false dilemma. Over and over again Lewis tells readers that they are forced to choose between two views ‘that allegedly exhaust their alternatives, but almost invariably do not.’ In doing so he leans heavily on the scales: he presents one view as obviously sane and reasonable, and the other as an absurdity, ‘a preposterous straw man.’

After analyzing Lewis’s arguments for God and Christianity (and finding them unsuccessful) Beversluis devotes a chapter to Lewis’s portrayal of nonbelief and nonbelievers. Lewis’s arguments, he says, typically imply that opposing positions are so feeble that they can be demolished with a few sentences. His polemical passages have a characteristically jokey tone, a ‘palpable delight’ in setting up straw men and knocking them down, a ‘slightly superior air of dispelling nonsense and putting the embarrassed opposition to flight.’ (p 196)

The core of the book, as it is perhaps the core of Lewis’s thought and of contemporary Christianity, is the problem of evil, or as Lewis called it, the problem of pain, which Beversluis discusses at length in chapters 9 and 10, ‘The Problem of Evil’ and ‘C S Lewis’s Crisis of Faith.’

Whether one sees evil as a problem, Beversluis notes (p 291), depends on what one means by calling God good. Is the meaning of ‘good’ the same as ordinary usage, or not? This is the Euthyphro question: are pious things pious because they are loved by the gods or are they loved by the gods because they are pious? Christians influenced by Platonism take the second view. ‘Morality is not based on divine commands and prohibitions’ but on the real nature of good, God is good ‘in our sense.’ The other view Beversluis calls Ockhamism, because Ockham ‘set it forth very unflinchingly.’ This metaethical theory, theological voluntarism or divine command morality, holds that God’s will is free to command anything God pleases: ‘“right” does mean “whatever God commands” and “wrong” does mean “whatever God forbids”.’ (p 230) This is the Calvinist view, and also more compatible with the biblical God than the Platonist view is. There are a few people in the bible, like Job, who question god’s goodness from a moral point of view, but they are ‘glaring exceptions to the standing rule that God is to be obeyed no matter what – that is, no matter how flagrantly his commands violate moral rules including the Ten Commandments.’ (p. 291)

Lewis reconsidered his own views on this subject after his wife died and God seemed to him like a ‘Cosmic Sadist.’ The explanation he comes up with is that his faith had been a house of cards, an ‘imaginary faith playing with innocuous counters labelled “Illness,” “Pain,” “Death,” and “Loneliness”’ (p 282) and that God had known this. God had knocked down Lewis’s house of cards so that he would learn the truth about himself – which seems to mean that Lewis considered his wife a teaching tool for him, and God someone who uses some people to teach lessons to others, which, again, makes God seem less than ‘good in our sense.’ As Beversluis notes (p 284), ‘few who have grasped the nature of the rediscovered faith and the process by which it was rediscovered will regard it as a source of “comfort and inspiration”.’ A Grief Observed in fact reveals that Lewis’s faith was recovered at the price of leaving unanswered the very questions he began with. The answer he ends up with – the shift from the Cosmic Sadist to the Great Iconoclast – is a shift from the modified Platonist God to the view that things are good only because God says so.

Beversluis’s account of the complications and tensions of these views, and Lewis’s struggles with them, is compelling, and also sympathetic. Beversluis is critical of Lewis’s faults as an apologist, in particular of his constant resort to straw men and false dilemmas, but he also respects him.

One minor point is that there are numerous typos, which is especially unfortunate with such a closely-argued book. I don’t like to scold copy-editors, but – it’s unfortunate.

John Beversluis, C. S. Lewis and the Search for Rational Religion, Prometheus Books 2007.

What would it be like to have world-class athletic ability, and to spend years of intensive training honing that ability, only to suddenly lose it all in the instant it takes your physician to utter a few words?

Hayden Roulston, a professional cyclist from New Zealand, has experienced this. After several seasons competing for the top-flight professional teams Cofidis and United States Postal Service, Roulston was diagnosed with arrhythmogenic right ventricular dysplasia (ARVD), a rare and incurable heart disease known to cause sudden death in athletes. Notably, the prognosis is good for ARVD patients who refrain from exercise early in the course of the disease, which is why medical experts advise ARVD patients that they “should not do vigorous exercise.”[1]

Exercise simply does not get more vigorous than professional cycling. World-class racers commonly compete in six-hour nonstop events that cover over 150 miles, and completing six or seven of these events in a week is not unusual. Cyclists can maintain heart rates above 150 bpm for hours at a time, and during the most intense periods of a race they will push their heart rates to exceed 190 bpm, close to physiological limits, for a chance to win. Clearly, professional cycling and ARVD are incompatible, and so, following his diagnosis, Roulston reluctantly retired from professional cycling in 2006.[2] He was only 25 years of age and, under normal circumstances, could have expected the best years of his career to be ahead of him.

Not long after this, Roulston had a chance encounter in a pub[3] with a woman who claimed to practice “reiki”, an alternative medicine approach “based on the idea that there is a universal (or source) energy that supports the body’s innate healing abilities.” In reiki,

the client lies down or sits comfortably, fully clothed. The practitioner’s hands are placed lightly on or just above the client’s body, palms down, using a series of 12 to 15 different hand positions. Each position is held for about 2 to 5 minutes, or until the practitioner feels that the flow of energy—experienced as sensations such as heat or tingling in the hands—has slowed or stopped… typically, the practitioner delivers at least four sessions of 30 to 90 minutes each.[4]

The woman convinced Roulston that by doing this, she could cure his ARVD. Two months later, Roulston won New Zealand’s national road racing championship. Then, this summer, he capped his comeback when he took silver and bronze medals in cycling’s demanding pursuit events at the Beijing Olympics. “Reiki is the be-all and end-all for me,” says Roulston. It [ARVD] doesn’t even enter my mind now.”[5]

This sequence of events raises a question. If Roulston’s condition was so easily cured by some hand positions that channel universal healing energy, why did Roulston have to meet the supposed savior of his career in a pub? Why didn’t his physicians prescribe reiki? One possibility, of course, is that they had never heard of reiki at all, and so could not have had any medical opinion, pro or con, regarding the practice. Or, more likely, they may have known enough about reiki to know that it has no medical effects whatsoever,[5] such that prescribing it to a patient with a potentially fatal disease would be irresponsible, dangerous, and a clear violation of medical ethics. Perhaps they went even further and recognized that reiki has no medical effects because the “universal energy” on which it is based cannot possibly exist, for if it did, it would have to do so in contradiction of the conservation of mass-energy principle, and that is as well supported by scientific evidence as practically any principle that we know.[6]

So if reiki does not work – indeed, cannot work – how has Roulston managed to return to the top of his sport without a fatal result? Perhaps he was misdiagnosed, and never actually had ARVD. Or, possibly, Roulston did have ARVD previously, but has since experienced a spontaneous remission that is the result of natural bodily processes. Both of these possibilities are extremely unlikely given what we know about ARVD, but note that each of these is much more likely than the possibility that a person he met at the pub is in possession of magical curative knowledge and procedures that have been entirely missed by medical science. Ominously, though, the most likely explanation of all is that Roulston still has ARVD, but that it has not interacted with his strenuous training and competition to kill him. Yet.

Proponents of reiki are quick to assert that it “cannot do harm.”[7] (Apparently the life force energy on which it is based, which is otherwise so willing to be called on and directed by reiki practitioners, somehow knows when it is being summoned to do evil, and refuses.) But what if undergoing reiki causes you to be deluded? What if it blinds you to medical evidence? What if it causes you to ignore sound medical advice such that you return to the most demanding aerobic sport in the world, despite the fact that doing so is likely to cause heart failure and sudden death?

What if reiki, because it is nonsense, is only capable of doing harm?

Roulston is contracted to race alongside the current Tour de France champion as a member of the newly formed Cervelo Test Team in 2009.[8]

Christopher A. Moyer is an Assistant Professor of Psychology at University of Wisconsin-Stout, and a former competitive cyclist.

References

[1] Johns Hopkins Medicine. (2008). Arrhythmogenic right ventricular dysplasia: Q & A. (2008). Retrieved October 5, 2008.

[2] Roulston retires for health reasons. (2006, August 31). Retrieved October 5, 2008.

[3] Olympics: Hayden Roulston lone rider. Sunday Star Times. (2008, July 27). Retrieved October 5, 2008.

[4] National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine. (2008, July). Reiki: An introduction. Retrieved October 5, 2008.

[5] Jarvis, W. T. (1999). Reiki. Retrieved October 5, 2008, from National Council Against Health Fraud Web site.

[6] Mook, D. (2004). Classic experiments in psychology. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press.

[7] Allison, J. (2008). My journey with reiki healing. Retrieved October 5, 2008.

[8] Hayden Roulston signs with Team Cervelo.
(2008, October 2). Retrieved October 5, 2008.

In the past two years the debates on religious conversions, caste and communalism have gripped India in a serious imbroglio which is fallout of the present nature of state politics in the country. The years 2007-08 have been the most volatile ever since the anti-Godhra riots in the state of Gujarat in 2002, which exposed the role that the governments in India have played in arousing communal passions through state machinery. These are difficult times, and the time that would follow poses more complex challenges for state-politics in India. We can trace the beginnings of these events in the year 2007, though hypothetically, to a controversy in Punjab: the chief of Dera Sacha Sauda (a religious sect founded 1948, which has a large following among dalits), Gurmat Ram Rahim, supposedly emulated Guru Gobind Singh, the tenth Guru of the Sikhs, at a religious ceremony in Sirsa; this has led to often violent exchanges between the two groups. Since then the states of Punjab, Haryana and some districts of Rajasthan are boiling in religious tensions, reminiscent of the crisis between Akalis and Nirankaris in 1978. This year India is already in the midst of a communal backlash against Christian converts in Orissa, primarily among tribals, in the wake of the killing of Swami Lakshmananda of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), who had been spearheading an anti-conversion campaign in the tribal belt of Khandamahal. The fire has now spread to Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh and other parts of India.

There is another issue of terror-strikes which has rattled major Indian cities this year. Fortunately it has not as yet led to any communal reaction against Muslims. But that is merely on the surface, as discrimination against Muslims in India is at an all-time high, which has now been transformed into a large-scale social discrimination. Since educated Muslims have now allegedly been framed in these events of terror, it only reflects how deeply religious discrimination in India now touches a class which was earlier related to the mainstream Indian elite. A prominent film and theatre personality like Shabana Azmi has come up with these startling revelations of denial of a residential flat merely because she is a Muslim. Even states like Punjab have reported a case of expulsion of a daughter-father duo from a school in Phagwara, because it was discovered that despite his name, Mangat Chaudhary, the father was a Muslim. (The name ‘Mangat’ is rare among urban Muslims of Punjab, both east and west.) The trend of branding ordinary Muslims as terrorists or sympathisers has serious implications for Indian democracy as the real issues underlined in the Sachar report on social exclusion among Muslims are undermined.

The most significant aspect of the religious conflicts in recent times is that they now reach out to rural India, a domain which was earlier considered a symbol of communal brotherhood. Communalism in India is extending its tentacles. It is no longer an urban phenomenon and in this era of globalisation the anxieties of growth and economic security have started spreading its tentacles to the crude representation of religious identities. The fundamental right to practice the religion of one’s choice has been guaranteed in Article 25 of the Constitution of India. But violent and forcible closures of Dera naam charchas (religious congregations) and Christian congregations in various parts of India remind us that we are heading towards a new complexity where religion has become an instrument to fuel social tensions. The debate on conversion in India has generally been viewed as an expression against religious orthodoxy and its deep rooted social discrimination against dalits and tribals, but it also strikes at economic backwardness and lack of access to better ways of livelihood. The latter should be seen as the failure of the Indian state to reach out to the poor and needy.

Poverty and social alleviation has been an integral part of Indian governance in the post independence period, but has become a farce in this era of globalisation, and it is precisely against this backdrop that we need to understand the claims of religion and re-conversion in India. India has traditionally been and continues be a caste-ridden society, where maintenance of caste-based hierarchies has been instrumental in defining the power structures. And this power-structure has traditionally been maintained by keeping dalits and tribals in a state of permanent economic dependency. Owing to the post-independence initiatives of the state for the socio-economic alleviation of dalits and tribals, and their political resurgence in the wake of the Mandal recommendations in 1980, national and regional politics in India today banks heavily on ‘politicised’ caste. But the question remains whether these developments brought any tangible change in the lives of the people. The dominant dalit and tribal politics in India is as elite as any other electoral politics in the country. The state and electoral politics has failed to have an impact upon the lives of the depressed among dalits and tribals.

If we go through the organisation of these Deras in Punjab and missionaries’ institutions in various parts of India we are indeed struck by the infrastructure, primarily educational (both schools and colleges), hospitals and programmes for poverty alleviation (micro-credit, agriculture innovations, etc.) undertaken by them in the interior parts of India. The appreciable part of these programmes is that these interventions do create an impact on the lives of the poor and marginalised. Conversions have to be looked at from this perspective too. It is not inducement or force to convert but the force to bring about change in their living conditions that has been crucial to shifting religious identities. Here again, we see the near total absence of state infrastructure, the space which is continuously being taken over by non-state actors.

Significantly the changing socio-economic condition of dalits and Christians has also given them political expression at the local level. It is pertinent to note that the forceful political articulation of Dera-followers, against the recent anti-Dera agitation by the various Sikh groups, has been the most significant expression of dalit politics of Punjab and Haryana. The incidents of forceful closure of naam charcha continue unabated in the rural parts of the Malwa region of Punjab, yet there is also opposition (often violent) to such incidents by the Dera-followers who are primarily dalits, Sikhs and Hindus. The Jat-dominated Gurdwaras have gone to the extent of announcing a social boycott of dera-followers, and have refused to give them access to the holy Guru Granth Sahib for their social and religious ceremonies. Conversely there have been instances of dalits adopting novel ways of marrying, for instance, by circumambulating the photograph of Bhagat Singh, a revolutionary Punjabi martyr of pre-independence India who is revered throughout India. Increasing instances of clashes between Sikh Jats and dalit-Christians in rural areas is a similar expression of social tensions in this region.

The vocal and articulate assertion of dalits and tribals, and converts among them, has also led to a reactionary mobilisation of upper castes, for instance against Dera-politics in Punjab or religious conversions throughout India. The shifting economic base of dalits from agriculture, the tensions of the traditional rural structure, and articulation of ‘disobedient dalit subjects’ have important implications for the communal scenario in India. These debates are significant for an understanding of the future of democratic politics in India. Some scholars have suggested that the violent communal scenario at the present time is a result of the shrinking secular space in India. I would add that the failure of secular institutions of Indian democracy to reach out to the poorest and the needy has led to the growing menace of communal disharmony in this country. The decay of the rural infrastructure of schools and primary health centres has inadvertently led to the shrinking space of secular politics in India. This is the greatest challenge that Indian democracy faces today in a neo-liberal era of globalisation.

Yogesh Snehi has been contributing to the broadening of debates on historical aspects of northern India, especially Punjab, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh, and has worked on areas such as conjugality, gender and social reform, development and literacy movements. His interest in social history has enabled his contribution to the understanding of popular syncretism and sufi shrines (dargahs) in Punjab. He is also critically engaged with the rhetoric and reality behind debates on female infanticide and foeticide in Punjab. Presently he is working on the issues of communalism in the popular history textbooks of Punjab. He teaches History and is working at DAV College, Amritsar.

In general, where religious values are dominant, gender discriminations remain influential at all levels in society. The monotheistic religions – Judaism, Christianity, and Islam – not differently from the primitive or undeveloped cultures, adamantly conserve their gender biases. In this article, I argue that gender inequalities in Islam go beyond the gender biases of other monotheistic religions.

The main reason for gender inequalities in Islam has roots in a traditional division of society into the two groups of “mahrams” and “non-mahrams.”: the mahram group contains the non-marriageable adult people who are close members of family, whereas the non-mahram group refers to the rest of people.

Asserting of non-mahram dogma in Islam is not initially unrelated to the Prophet’s concerns about his harem. As described by Ali Dashti, an Iranian scholar, in his book “Bisto-Seh Saal” (23 Years), “the Prophet Muhammad used Koranic verses of Surah Ahzaab to consolidate his authority against his much younger wives and to force them into absolute obedience and chastity.” However, the two sources of Islam, namely the Koran and “Hadith” (sayings of the Prophet) have not fixed a dress code decreeing an Islamic standard of clothing for women.

To the Islamic morality, touching, seeing, and being alone with a non-mahram woman may lead to uncontrollable or passing temptation and immorality for a man. Therefore, a Muslim woman should not show her beauty, adornment, and dress to a non-mahram man. As a solution, the form of head-to-foot hijab with a black cloth, which is not transparent, is today recommended by Mullahs in Iran.

Non-mahram is not limited to Islamic hilab; in addition a series of social norms and attitudes have emerged in relation to the dogma of non-mahram. Norms have been created which have no real equivalence in non-Muslim cultures. They go too far to implicitly define a man’s moral right and duty to defend the taboo red lines around the body of his mahram circle (mother, sister, wife…) when those are violated or even threatened by a non-mahram. This “moral right” may even lead to honour punishments or even crimes routinely committed in Islamic communities.

Non-mahram is therefore a very influential dogma in character formation at the level of a collective culture from which we can retrace the footsteps even in Islamic architecture – palaces, mosques, madreseh (traditional school), and today, the women-only parks which have been inaugurated in some Iranian cities. All of these misogynistic measures are based on a division of mahrams from non-mahrams. Everywhere, non-mahram’s taboo values are recognised, from Iranian post-Islamic art to literature and to any domain of public life, the red line of non-mahram dogma around the woman’s body remains the impenetrable line separating a Muslim woman from a non-mahram visual and acoustic field.

For example: a typical Muslim house is built around a central, mostly rectangular, courtyard. The interior space is important, not the outside. Part of the house is separated for females. The men’s reception room tends to be located next to the entrance lobby of the house so that non-mahram visitors do not meet the females. The windows face the inside not the outside of the house so that eye contact between non-mahrams does not happen. In the big house where several generations can dwell together measures are taken so that the contact between non-mahrams, like cousins or brother/sister-in-law of opposite sex dwellers, does not lead to temptation.

More strictly than in a traditional Islamic house, segregation was in the past in Islamic palaces where no access of non-mahram to the harem area was possible – except for castrated servants. Paintings, frescos, three-dimensional imaginary or real sculpture, any female figure or representational visual imaginary on display have been unacceptable. Also, in such places, there was no official role for a female as an artist, singer or musician.

When Shah Isma’il Safavid decided to impose the Shi’ite sect on the Iranian people at the beginning of 16th century, he had to import Shiite Mullahs from Arab countries to help the process of Shi’itisation. Facing his rival of the Sunnite Ottoman Empire, the process was for the Shah existentially important. As a state religion, Shi’ism was violently established with the guidance of the imported Mullahs, who allegedly were the descendants of the Prophet Muhammad. Because influential Mullahs enjoyed living among the urban population as an elite class under both the Safavid and Qajar dynasties, their Sharia-based teachings of Islam affected directly urban women rather than rural women. Therefore, rural and tribal life in Iran remained relatively intact from the invasion of non-mahram side-effects.

As Nikki R. Keddi described in Modern Iran, in Iran and the Middle East, nomadic tribeswomen do most of the tribe’s physical labour. They are unveiled and are less segregated than urban women. Rural women also do hard physical work and “reports from the nineteen century indicate that they were mostly unveiled. Veiling has been mainly an urban (and hence minority) phenomenon.” As mentioned, the separation of men and women is not a tradition of Iranian culture, but until today a product of Islamic-based ruling states.

Under the dynasties of Safavid and Qajar, Iran was as late introducing modern secular education as it was in introducing gender equality. The educational system was monopolised by clerical power. Teaching was Islamic, limited at lower levels to reading, writing, and learning the Koran and religion. At the end of the Qajar dynasty, the madreseh (a higher school to teach the basics for Arabic and theology) only received boys.

Nikki.R. Keddi writes “Many functions that in modern states are governmental were carried out in Qajar Iran, as in most traditional Muslim societies, by the ulama (Islamic scholars). These included all levels of education, most forms of judicial and legal activity, and social and charitable services.” A combination of social attitudes, values, and a cognitive behaviour system are made of this long period of religiosity which still influences the mind-set of most contemporary Iranians. Today, for the IRI, a return to this archaic system is vital to prevent any secular and democratic understanding of the world.

Based on the morality of non-mahram, premarital love between a man and a woman passes the level of decency. Despite many love stories and much romantic literature in Iranian history, love is considered as a feeling incompatible with Islamic culture. In this context, marriage is arranged by the families rather than being based on mutual love and harmony of the two partners. Love and harmony may appear after the marriage, or may not. Arranged marriage, with no premarital love and harmony, also favours “Sigheh” (temporary marriage). Sigheh flourishes in Shi’ite pilgrimage centres where Mullahs could be intermediaries; the affair is often regarded as legalised prostitution. It temporally removes the non-mahram barrier between the two non-mahrams.

The idea of love associated with sin is not completely different from the other established monotheist religions. The idea implies that women have by nature the desire to be looked at, adored and cherished, while men are disposed to non-mahram women.

Love is rather associated with sin and lust than wisdom and emotion; a pious follower of Jesus – a priest or bishop – would not share his life and emotion with a woman. Early Christianity invented the idea that not only Eve herself but also all daughters of Eve were full of sin, therefore man was better off not to marry. Since this would be the end of mankind the same people found apparently a compromise and virtually decided that only the impious men marry. Legitimate love seems the one for the Truth and Devotion with a spiritual path. This is the level of lifetime love to God. Such an ambiguous comprehension of love is allegedly guided by a force greater than a feeling of inter-human relation. Such a love, despite its level of illusion and even perversion, is presented in the Iranian post-Islamic mystics and lyrics and has considerably influenced Muslims’ mindset. Love for a non-mahram, especially from a woman to a non-mahram man, is regarded in Islam as similar to an act of indecency.

Although, woman’s rights in Islamic societies are more limited by restrictions of non-mahram, no other monotheist religion permits a woman to be ordained a religious higher rank as a “Mujthaid” (a qualified Shiite religious scholar to interpretation of scriptures), an “Alim” (an Islamic scholar, mainly in Sunnite Islam), a Rabin for Jews, or a bishop for Christians. These remain in the domain of men. The Catholic Church refuses to even talk about ordinary women as priests. Many Protestant traditions and denominations have done the same, says Jim Seers in his book, The Religion Book. However, no other religion except Islam considers women excluded from their “non-mahram” environment.

For many foreign observers, especially the Western analysts, who know little about the concept and influence of non-mahram dogma, a vision of an Islamic society has been, mechanically, amalgamated with the Islamic hijab. They do not understand the deeper phenomenon beyond hijab which is a tool separating non-mahrams. So, the division of society into mahram and non-mahram imposed gender-segregation whose Islamic hijab is simply a by-product.

In my opinion, non-mahram dogma is the morality-based philosophy of gender-inequalities in any Islamic societies. Although the Islamic hijab is a symbol and blockade to woman’s freedom and gender-equality, it is not more than a simple product of the dogma. As long as we cannot recognise its origin, we will not be in the right position to free women from this traditional yoke. If we tackle the problem correctly, then we will be able to influence the entire attitude structure of our society to remove all the inequalities from which our women suffer, including Islamic hijab.

Non-mahram dogma remains today the main barrier against woman’s rights for freedom and equality. An identifiable change in peoples’ values with the criteria of non-mahram must start with recognition of this dogma, which is so complex that it easily can go beyond any obvious understanding.

The long-term effects of reluctance and apathy of Iranian intelligentsia toward gender-related issues deprived our women of any serious support. So, today the ruling Mullahs can invade people’s minds with the norms, values, and criteria of their Gender-Apartheid. Gender-based segregation in public life was institutionalised after the inception of the Mullahs’ regime in Iran.

This article is excerpted (with permission) from the Center for Inquiry report Islam and human rights: Defending Universality at the United Nations by Austin Dacey and Colin Koproske (pp. 5-6, 9, 16, 17, 21-2, 23). Read the whole report.

As this paper is being written, sixty years after the issuance of the world’s first and greatest
statement in favor of universal human rights, both the document and the institution put in
place to protect its ideals (what has, since 2006, been called the UN Human Rights Council)
are threatened more than ever. There is now an alternative human rights system, infused with
religious language and layered with exceptions, omissions and caveats. The movement toward
“Islamic human rights” (IHR) has been successfully presented to the Human Rights Council (HRC) as
merely “complementary” to the UDHR.[1] The meager opposition to this subversion is suppressed,
as “religious matters” are increasingly forbidden from discussion in UN chambers. Western powers
have either failed to stand up for the UDHR or withdrawn from the human rights discussion
altogether. In what follows, we will trace the development of these worrying trends, and look
briefly into the leading historical explanations of political Islam’s emergence into the arena of
international relations.

The Universal Islamic Declaration of Human Rights (UIDHR) provides a useful starting point.
While opposition to the UDHR under the banner of conservative Islam was widespread even
during its inception in 1948, this 1981 document was the first official political statement of
Islamic exceptionalism in the realm of human rights. The UIDHR was written by
representatives from Egypt, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and various other Muslim states under the
auspices of the London-based Islamic Council, a private organization affiliated with the
conservative Muslim World League (Mayer 2007, 30). This declaration drew little criticism, as it
was rife with ambiguous, equivocal language and had an English translation that masked
many of its overt religious references. In its original Arabic, the UIDHR often requires Islamic
considerations that limit rather than enshrine human rights as outlined by international norms.
For example, compare the English and Arabic versions of Article 12, which outlines the “Right
to Freedom of Belief, Thought and Speech”:

English: Every person has the right to express his thoughts and beliefs so long as he remains
within the limits prescribed by the Law. No one, however, is entitled to disseminate falsehood
or to circulate reports that may outrage public decency, or to indulge in slander, innuendo, or
to cast defamatory aspersions on other persons.

Arabic: Everyone may think, believe and express his ideas and beliefs without interference or
opposition from anyone as long as he obeys the limits [hudud] set by the shari’ah. It is not
permitted to spread falsehood [al-batil] or disseminate that which involves encouraging
abomination [al-fahisha] or forsaking the Islamic community [takhdhil li’l-umma].

The English version reads as an innocuous restatement of well-established norms, embracing
rights to speech and generally accepted limits involving slander and libel. In its original
Arabic, however, this article demonstrates a clear religious test for speech: one may not
express oneself where limits are set by Islamic law, and one must not “encourage
abomination” or “forsake” the Islamic community. The concepts of “falsehood,”
“encouraging abomination,” and “forsaking” are unclear and dangerously open to potential
abuse by religious courts. It is apparent that it is not citizens which are protected, but the
umma (Muslim community). The rubric of judgment is not public law, not universal standards
of justice, but shari’ah (Islamic law).

Those familiar with the numerous objections to international human rights law originating from
Islamic nations over the last three decades will be surprised to learn that almost all of these
nations were not only signatories to the UDHR and later agreements such as the ICCPR and
ICESCR, but also active contributors in their formulation. Studies by Susan Waltz, professor of
public policy and international relations at the University of Michigan, indicate that the major
powers generally played less significant roles in the later stages of drafting the UDHR than did
their smaller, Eastern (and often Islamic) counterparts (Waltz 2004). While particular
representatives from Muslim states expressed discomfort with various articles involving
marriage, family law, and freedom of religion, such opposition was no more pronounced
than the resistance from some non-Islamic nations. Further, the universality of human rights
was not an object of great concern for Muslim states during the drafting process; most
showed general support for the motivations and prescriptions therein, and none cast a vote
against the resulting document (Saudi Arabia was alone among Muslim states in abstaining,
joining South Africa and various Eastern Bloc states) (Mayer 2007, 15). Contemporary leaders
who would denounce the UDHR as an exclusively “Western project” therefore
fail to acknowledge the important contributions of Islamic states to its creation. In their ignorance
of history, they reveal the harmful political dimension of their cause—the appropriation, rigidification, and
politicization of Islam as an obstacle to international human rights law.

What happened between 1948 and 2008? Why are many of the original supporters of the UDHR
(such as Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon and Syria) now contesting its universality and core principles? One
critical factor has been the rise of Islamist thought and politics.[2] The Islamist ideology
prevalent in Arab and Muslim societies today is not an intractable relic that has survived
through modernity (as many in the West mistakenly believe), but in an important sense it is a
reaction to modernity, forged in the fires of political and economic strife and fueled by a
painful struggle for identity.

Even a casual inspection of the Cairo Declaration, the IDHR, and other IHR literature shows
that in general, IHR schemes “have consistently used distinctive Islamic criteria to cut back
on the rights and freedoms guaranteed by international law, as if the latter were excessive”
(Mayer 2007, 3). For instance, Article 22 of the Cairo Declaration states “Everyone shall have
the right to express his opinion freely in such manner as would not be contrary to the
principles of the shari’ah.” This Article permits limitations on freedom of expression that
clearly are not permitted by the UDHR, whose Article 19 simply states, “Everyone has the right
to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without
interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and
regardless of frontiers.” The Cairo Declaration mentions shari’ah fifteen times, mostly in order
to qualify various rights by stipulating that they must be exercised within the limits of shari’ah.

A central tenet of international human rights law is that persons are equal in dignity and
rights. By citing shari’ah as the source of law and a constraint on individual freedom and
rights, the IHR literature makes a presumption of inequality in rights, for under classical
shari’ah, there is no equality in rights for women, non-Muslims, and apostates. The IHR
literature does nothing to remove this presumption. As a result, the only plausible way to
understand the IHR movement, despite public statements regarding its compatibility with
international standards, is that it seeks to use the instrument of Islamic law to curtail the
equality in rights accorded to women and non-Muslims by those standards.

In the classical interpretation of shari’ah, when a woman commits apostasy she may be
coerced through imprisonment and beatings to return to the fold, unlike male apostates, for
whom the punishment is death (Schacht 1964, 126). With regard to courtroom testimony
and inheritance, she is counted as half a man. Christian and Jewish subjects under Muslim
rule occupy a separate legal class in classical shari’ah: the dhimmis. Dhimmis are
understood as a “covenanted people” or “protected people.” The term dates back to the
Treaty of Khaybar in 628 C.E., in which the Jewish inhabitants of Khaybar surrendered to
Muhammad’s forces. In return for the right to live peacefully in a Muslim state, dhimmis were
obliged to pay special taxes and to accept various forms of social subordination to Muslims
(Schacht 1964, 130).

The Cairo Declaration contains no endorsement of equality of rights, and instead says in
Article 1 that all human beings “are equal in terms of basic human dignity and basic
obligations and responsibilities, without any discrimination on the grounds of race, color,
language, sex, religious belief, political affiliation, social status, or other considerations.” As
Ann Elizabeth Mayer observes, equality in “dignity” and “obligations” does not necessarily
signify equality in rights (Mayer 2007, 102). In Article 19, the Declaration states that “All
individuals are equal before the law, without distinction between the ruler and the ruled.”
According to Mayer, “this might seem to be an affirmation of equal rights, but in the context
of a document that carefully avoids guaranteeing equal rights or equal protection of the
law for women and non-Muslims, it should be read as meaning only that the law applies
equally to rulers and ruled—that is, that rulers are not above the law.”

The pattern of evading the question of equality of rights is even more blatant in the UIDHR. In
Article 3.c, the English version of the “Right to Equality and Prohibition Against Impermissible
Discrimination” reads: “No person shall be denied the opportunity to work or be
discriminated against in any manner or exposed to greater physical risk by reason of religious
belief, color, race, origin, sex or language.”

In the Arabic version under the rubric “Right of Equality,” the corresponding section,
Article 3.b, says that all people are equal in terms of their human values (al-qaima alinsaniya),
that they are distinguished in merit (in the afterlife by God) according to their
works (bi hasab ‘amali him), that no one is to be exposed to greater danger or harm
than others are, and that any thought, law or rule (wad’) that permits discrimination
between people on the basis of jins (which can mean nation, race, or sex), ‘irq (race
or descent), color, language, or religion is in direct violation of this general Islamic
principle (hadha ‘l-mabda al-islami al-‘amm) (Mayer 2007, 107).

It is clear from other provisions of the IHR documents that they were not intended to
challenge the basic inequality in rights accorded to women under classical shari’ah. For
example, the UIDHR contains a section on the “Rights of Married Women.” There is no
corresponding treatment of the rights of unmarried women, or the rights of married (or
unmarried) men.

The desire of some Western liberals to accommodate the cultural sensitivity of Islamic nations
runs contrary to the wishes of those within those states who desperately need the protection
of human rights. As Afshari has shown, when Westerners concede the argument over
universality to Islamist activists, they are not “respecting difference.” They are in fact enabling
autocracies to stifle internal dissent, resist criticism, and violate the rights of their citizens.
“Many Iranians,” he explains, “rely on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights for moral
and legal support . . . . international human rights law serves as a prestigious platform for
dissident views that demand changes in all cultural practices that sustain and legitimize
human rights violations” (Afshari 2001, 289).

It is clear that if the ideals of the Universal Declaration are to be realized, nations and
peoples committed to human rights must take it upon themselves to reverse the present
trends toward the compartmentalization of rights and censorship of free speech. Therefore,
we join with many civil society organizations around the world in opposing the Islamic human
rights movement and denouncing the unnecessary, unwise, and immoral developments at
the United Nations Human Rights Council and the restrictions on freedom of expression being
entertained by the General Assembly.

The noble purpose of the International Bill of Rights and the United Nations is not to close any
one matter off from discussion within society, but to open all societies to free, public
discussion of every matter. Liberal rights are not guaranteed; we must constantly defend
them against those who would trade our liberties for security, order, control, or conformity. A
common standard of achievement, and not special cultural or religion rights, is the best
guarantor of equal freedom and mutual respect.

Endnotes

[1] On Human Rights Day, 10 December 2007, the Ambassador of Pakistan, addressing the Human Rights
Council on behalf of the OIC, spoke glowingly of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, noting the
contribution made to its creation and to the two international covenants by many Muslim countries. He
then went on to claim that the Cairo Declaration of Human Rights in Islam: “is not an alternative,
competing worldview on human rights. It complements the Universal Declaration as it addresses
religious and cultural specificity of the Muslim countries” Taken from the International Humanist and
Ethical Union.

[2] We use the term “Islamist” (rather than “fundamentalist,” “extremist,” or “radical”) to represent
broadly that ideology which views Islam as the only valid source of law and seeks complete, exclusive
control over state and society.

Bibliography

Afshari, Reza. 2001. Human Rights in Iran: The Abuse of Cultural Relativism. University of
Pennsylvania Press.

Mayer, Ann Elizabeth. 2007. Islam and Human Rights. 4th Ed. Boulder, Colorado: Westview
Press.

Waltz, Susan Universal Human Rights: The Contribution of Muslim States
Human Rights Quarterly – Volume 26, Number 4, November 2004, pp. 799-844

Austin Dacey is a philosopher and the Center for Inquiry’s representative to the United
Nations. He is also on the editorial staff of Skeptical Inquirer and Free Inquiry magazines. He is
the author of The Secular Conscience: Why Belief Belongs in Public Life (2008), and his writings
have appeared in numerous publications including the New York Times, USA Today, and
Science. In 2002 Austin earned a doctorate in philosophy from Bowling Green State
University.

Colin Koproske is completing a graduate degree in political theory at Oxford University,
where he is a Marshall Scholar. He graduated from the University of Southern California in
2007, receiving degrees in political science and music, and was named Valedictorian of his
graduating class. Colin is a visiting scholar at the Center for Inquiry’s United Nations branch in
New York City, and previously interned with the Center in 2006.

‘Though it may wound the amour proper of some postmodernist humanities scholars to discover that a mere physicist could learn their jargon well enough, in a few months’ library research, to write a half-convincing simalcrum of it, that is, alas, exactly what happened.’

A lot has been written on this site about postmodernism, and especially its stylistic hallmarks: ambiguity over clarity, irony over actual humour, the buzzwords and red flags of management-speak. Deconstructionist writers portrayed themselves as radicals, often purporting to argue against capitalism or to support oppressed peoples. But as Nick Cohen pointed out, all they really offered was a dull satire of the ‘hegemon’. He quotes an American philosopher, Martha Nussbaum:

[R]esistance is always offered as personal, more or less private, involving no unironic, organised public action for legal or institutional change… It tells scores of talented young writers that they need not work on changing the law, or feeding the hungry, or assailing power through theory harnessed to material politics. They can do politics in the safety of the campuses, remaining on the symbolic level, making subversive gestures at power through speech and gesture. This, the theory says, is pretty much all that’s available to us anyway, by way of political action, and isn’t it exciting and sexy?

One of the few bad products of the 1960s social revolutions, postmodernism hit its peak in the nineties and was still staggering on by the time I did my postgraduate studies a few years back. In 1995 Alan Sokal, a physics professor from NYU, cracked. ‘I confess,’ he writes, ‘that I’m an unabashed Old Leftist who never quite understood how deconstruction was supposed to help the working class.’ He wrote a spoof postmodern article, lashing together the silliest quotations from renowned deconstructionists to create an intimidating and verbose but essentially meaningless essay.

Sokal submitted the finished article to a cultural studies journal, Social Text. He gave himself a 50/50 chance of having his piece accepted for the journal. The article, ‘Transgressing the Boundaries: Towards a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity’ was published by Social Text in April 1996. It was to become the most famous academic practical joke since the Dr Fox experiment.

In Beyond the Hoax Sokal reproduces the parody in all its ridiculous and derisive glory. The volume is worth buying for this essay alone: perhaps OUP could release it as a chapbook.

At first it’s hard going. You’ve got Sokal’s fake essay on the right-hand page, which is annotated on the left hand page; you’ve got Sokal’s parodic annotations which are also annotated. The result is a complex tesseract of a joke, almost like a postmodern essay in itself.

But unlike postmodern essays, Sokal’s hoax rewards your attention. He has an eye and flair for style that makes the satire work. Effortlessly he sends up the stock tones and phrases of academic prose: the ‘overwrought modesty’ in sentences like ‘It should be emphasised that this article of necessity tentative and preliminary; I do not pretend to answer all the questions that I raise.’ The lazy argumentative trick of throwing your opponent’s words back to them in quotemarks: ‘that these properties are encoded in ‘eternal’ physical laws; and that human beings can obtain reliable, albeit imperfect and tentative, knowledge of these laws by hewing to the ‘objective’ procedures and epistemological strictures prescribed by the (so-called) scientific method.’ Sokal notes that ‘reality (even physical reality) has become in certain circles a no-no concept, which must be placed in scare quotes.’

He buttressed the parody by flattering and quoting from Social Text editors, and with the use of unnecessary French-language quotations and pseudo-intelligent puns (‘Manifold Theory: (W)holes and Boundaries’). ‘I am very proud of this paragraph,’ Sokal says in one footnote (we can imagine him cackling away over the keyboard) but then he adds, ruefully, ‘this was the only instance in which I was inspired enough to produce such a perfectly crafted crescendo of meaninglessness.’ Sokal underestimates himself. The parody transcends its targets. It is a tour de force of bad writing, a Swiftean satire on pretension. You don’t have to be an academic (and I’m not) to laugh aloud while reading Sokal. There’s an underlying sensibility here, and it’s warm, wise and full of laughter.

After this we get several long essays on the hoax, in which Sokal discusses what the stunt proved and, perhaps more importantly, what it did not prove. He then goes on to discuss relativist and anti-Enlightenment thinking in the contemporary world. Some of these essays have dated better than others: the section on the worthless ‘Therapeutic Touch’ treatment, still included in nursing textbooks at time of writing, and the attacks on science and reason by ‘anti-imperialist’ thinkers in India, are fascinating and little known. However, the passage on postmodern ‘eco-radicals’ now seems laughably obscure; you would expect Sokal to acknowledge that today the main source of environmental pseudoscience is the climate change denial movement of the Right rather than the Left. Say what you like about today’s left, at least it acknowledges reason and evidence when they show us that we’re fucking up the planet.

Critics of this approach – Dan Hind is probably the most articulate – have suggested that postmodernism isn’t that important in the scheme of things and that defenders of Enlightenment values have a petty sense of priorities. In an interview with bookseller Mark Thwaite, Hind said this:

But politicians and businessmen have journalists killed when they stumble on a story, or simply when they are in the wrong place. Now it is not a subtle point, but it is worth making; post-modernists don’t kill journalists as part of their efforts to derail Western metaphysics…I wanted to reach people who get upset and angry about the threat posed to secular liberal society by religious fanatics, postmodernists and New Age crystal healers. I wanted to suggest that they were possibly being distracted from some other issues that are a sight more serious.

However, the fact is that pseudoscience can and does end life – particularly in Africa, where a monstrous double act of Vatican teaching on contraception and anticolonial conspiracy theory is killing the population with AIDS. The human cost of religious fundamentalism is spattered over our newscasts, daily. And patients with serious health conditions can die needlessly if they accept some of the wilder claims of New Age therapies to the extent that they reject actual medicine.

But Sokal is not content to laugh at obscure theorists. He is ‘far more profoundly worried by a society in which 21-32% [of the American people] believe that the Iraqi government under Saddam Hussein was directly responsible for the attacks of September 11.’ He explores the ways in which elites have to some extent abandoned universal standards of truth and reason, summed up best in this quote from an unnamed senior Bush adviser:

[You people] in what we call the reality-based community… believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality. That’s not the way the world really works anymore. We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality.

The meaning of the term ‘reality-based community’ has been somewhat compromised by its repetition on 9/11 conspiracy websites, but this is still a chilling insight into the way that postmodernism has seeped into the strata of government. And we wonder why Bush cut off funding for family planning programmes in the developing world and wishes to hand America’s welfare state over to faith-based charities.

What Hind fails to understand is that this isn’t either or. In his powerful broadsides against the Bush administration, Sokal argues that ‘the kind of critical thinking useful for distinguishing science from pseudoscience might also be of some use in distinguishing truths in affairs in state from lies.’ Exactly. For how can we speak truth to power if we don’t know why truth matters?

Beyond the Hoax, Alan Sokal, Oxford University Press 2008