John Gray has entered what is fast becoming ‘the big debate of our post 9 11 age’. Most people have read something from the swathe of anti-religion literature and are genuinely thinking and talking about the issues; the comments of prominent religious figures are heavily scrutinised by the media, and it appears as though Muslims are experiencing a sort of collective identity crisis (in this country anyway). Religion is a hot topic in a way that would have seemed unfathomable ten years ago.
Could this article be a précis of his newest book ‘Black Mass: Apocalyptic Religion and the Death of Utopia’? Joe, with his atheist(ish) stance thinks it’s right on the money (It must be fun being an RE teacher at the moment). I’m not so sure. I wonder whether Christopher Hitchens will write a response.
Well he’s definitely right when he says that many atheists are now just as evangelical as many theists.
What I find odd is that he describes religion as having been politically powerful in the 20th century, something I see little evidence for. Socialism, Soviet communism and German & Italian fascism all happened in spite of religious concerns, not because of them. In fact, Nazism was based on a sort of spiritualist natural-law mumbo-jumbo which was the precursor for the ‘Hippie’ movement of San Francisco some years later and was positively anti-religion.
And also “Islamo-Leninism” Gimme a break.
Ha! I missed that one. Yeah because no-one had been executed until the Red Brigades came along. Give me a break.
As to the use of suicide attacks, they also existed a long time before the Tamil Tigers. Aside from the obvious Kamikaze example, it has long been seen as ’sweet and noble’ to ‘give up one’s life for one’s country’.
Insofar as all soldiers are expected to give up their lives in war, if needs be, the concept of ’suicide murder’ is actually much murkier than Hitchens or Gray admit.
Actually, I haven’t read Hitchens’s book but I disliked The God Delusion. Is God Is Not Great as preachy and irritating?
Thanks for putting this up – it’ll do nicely for my ’secularisation and postmodernism’ lesson next term.
I think you make a good point, Tom, about ’suicide murder’ and war.
Gray writes a very powerful argument and recognises that religion isn’t a belief in a certain set of propositions – well, no more than speaking in any language requires – but a set of symbols with which humans communicate their consciousness in social communities. The meaning of these symbols comes, not only from their use, as Wittgenstein might assert, but also from the very reason to use them at all. This reason is the conscious yet immaterial will, the feeling of purpose. Religion, then, might be said to be the characteristic of doing something for a shared purpose.
Also, Gray is aware that the scientific symbolic language that is useful in predicting things is not necessarily a sufficient set of symbols with which to communicate. Or benign. That said, a belief in God is not necessary, or sufficient or benign either.
I don’t know – perhaps I’m just sticking to an annoyingly wide definition of religion?