Monotheism without institutional violence?

What I mean is that when you combine virtually any idea and power politics someone will find a way to justify violence in that ideas name, no matter how hypocritical it may seem.

I suppose we could say the word "ideology" might be the solution. As often noted, the 20th century ideologies of Communism and Fascism arguably caused more deaths than all the religious wars prior. That in no way takes away from the fact that religion does have a lot of violence to answer for.

It's mankind's habit of searching for some perfect idea of "truth" which is then defended fanatically, that tends to combine with our species' innate aggression to create wars across the centuries.

I stick by my words from way back in the thread. Combine anything and politics (or I suppose just power) and you get conflict and violence more often than not.
 

Perkeo

Banned
I suppose we could say the word "ideology" might be the solution. As often noted, the 20th century ideologies of Communism and Fascism arguably caused more deaths than all the religious wars prior. That in no way takes away from the fact that religion does have a lot of violence to answer for.

But it does take away the correlation between religion and violence. And without correlation, the claim that religion is the cause looses its justification. Whatever people believe in, it will be used to justify violence, no matter if people believe in Christianity, Islam, Atheism or science, the result is the same.
 

jahenders

Banned
Well, you're right that it's complicated ...

A) Monotheistic religions are NOT inherently political, even if several of them sometimes are. Not all Christian groups (and, to some degree, the others) are political -- some work hard to avoid a blending with politics. Nor are even the main ones always political. Thus, the definition of "inherently" fails on several counts.

B) Even were there truth to the claim that monotheistic religions are political, there is nothing to suggest that they are, on average, more political than polytheistic ones. Just look to many of your old polytheistic religions -- many of there were wrapped up in kingship, good citizenship, etc -- politics.

The problem is that monotheist religions are inherently political. The major religions Christianity, Islam and Judaism claim to set out an ideal model for how to run a society. That is about as political as you can get.

Yes, there are inner spiritual aspects to each of these, for example Islam has Sufism. But to respond to the original question of this thread, it's a paradox. On the one hand, yes it is possible for these religions to spread peacefully, and in fact they have done in some parts of the world. But at the same time, the very act of spreading them eventually becomes political, since politicians will inevitably start to play on it at some point.

So therefore, the answer is both 'yes' and 'no. Like much in life, it's complicated!
 

jahenders

Banned
You can blame all of that violence on religion if you wish, but most of this thread has established that religion was often either irrelevant or just a convenient veneer for someone to put on their political aspirations. The true culprit is flawed men and women.

If you do insist on blaming that violence on religion, then do at least be consistent by blaming other violence on atheism (Russia, China, etc) and such.

I suppose we could say the word "ideology" might be the solution. As often noted, the 20th century ideologies of Communism and Fascism arguably caused more deaths than all the religious wars prior. That in no way takes away from the fact that religion does have a lot of violence to answer for.

It's mankind's habit of searching for some perfect idea of "truth" which is then defended fanatically, that tends to combine with our species' innate aggression to create wars across the centuries.
 
You can blame all of that violence on religion if you wish, but most of this thread has established that religion was often either irrelevant or just a convenient veneer for someone to put on their political aspirations. The true culprit is flawed men and women.

If you do insist on blaming that violence on religion, then do at least be consistent by blaming other violence on atheism (Russia, China, etc) and such.

I don't know about that. The Crusades, for example, were both politically and religiously motivated- religion also has internal/external politics as well, which some people seem to neglect. Was Urban II's decision to call the knights of Latin Christendom to crusade a political decision? Yes. Was it a religious movement as well? Yes. Politics can be as idealistic as it can be cynical and the same can be said of religion as a political system.
 
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