Warning: this thread will offend just about everyone and should not be read.
Consider the question, “what good things have religions done?” This question was posed by a friend of mine over the weekend. We all struggled with it. Feed the hungry? Shelter the poor? Provide a quick and easy answer to challenging scientific questions?
The easy answer is, “gets people into heaven.” But we really have no idea if this is true or not, and even if it is, which religion?
Eventually the counter question was asked, “what harm has religion done?” For this, everyone seems to have an answer: The Holey Wars, Inquisition, Witch Burnings, the many Jihads going on now, 9/11, the treatment of aboriginals, raping and molesting children, the list seems endless. But when you start to add it all up, it makes me wonder, has religion done more harm than good?
I’m beginning to think so, which makes me further wonder, doesn’t this seem like something the Devil would set out to do? Organize people into groups that are willing to slaughter for no apparent reason other than the “divine and spiritual good?”
If you were the Devil, doesn’t this seem like a pretty sneaky way to get people to do what you want?
I’m no great fan of religion. I see a lot of bad things that people have done in the name of their god and it’s easy to come to the conclusion that “religion” is at fault.
The problem is, I think people would do those same things if there wasn’t a religion involved and would find some other excuse.
Look at some of your examples. For the most part they’re all cases where one group that didn’t like -or feared- another group found an excuse to get rid of them or take advantage of them. People have been doing the same things without involving religion for centuries.
I see what you mean that some devil might certainly manipulate people to think they were doing things in the name of religion when in fact they weren’t, but that’s still just another excuse, “the devil made me do it.”
As to what good religions have done, well, maybe a better question would be what good have people done in the name of religion? Looked at that way it’s not so hard to see that there’s been a lot of good done, just as there’s been a lot of good done without involving religion at all.
100% true, although religion seems to have provided a very good excuse for some people.
Is there anybody who thinks there’s a Devil independent of religion? I don’t think that idea existed until religions did, so that strikes me as rather silly. If we dismiss the entire idea of religion as a trick, it’d have to be one played by people who were greedy or wanted to control others or something like that.
I think God and the Devil would have to exist without the concept of religion, since scriptures all seem to start with a guy having a religious experience brought on my God, and then told to spread the word. As a bad example, gravity existed before Newtonian Mechanics…
One way I see this is God decides to enlighten someone in a Moses-on-the-mountains sort of way; feel free to choose which ever version your religion goes with. The Devil sees this and mimics it. Finds someone like Moses, give him a religious experience, and sends him on his way. Just for fun the Devil continues to go around giving people a religious experience, winding them up, and then sending them on their way.
From the view point of a sheppard watching his flock, how would you know if the angel you saw last night was sent by God or the Devil?
Then considere some one like Joan of Arc. Here’s a nice girl with good intentions. The Devil appears to here, tells her the world needs to be cleansed and off she goes.
To re-phrase my question, how much of what we view as religion is really just a game the Devil has come up with?
I think religion has served a negative point to humanity. Though I don’t think it could have been helped.
Religion is yet ANOTHER boundary we have set up in order to diferentiate differing groups.
We have so many of those, religion is just another one.
We have nationality, skin color/race, social background, religion.
All these thigns sets us apart form one another. Unfortunately, we as human beings tend to do the thing that comes instincitvely when we encounter somehting out of the ordinary… we hate it.
All scriptures? There are three - Jewish, Christian, and Muslim - that work that way. That’s three religions, accounting for roughly 1/3 of the world’s people.
There are THOUSANDS of other religions that don’t fit your pattern. Have you heard of Buddhism? My knowledge of Hinduism is more limited, but I don’t think it backs up your point either. The conclusion you’re drawing strikes me as being based only on a very limited, Western-centric perspective.
You’re right, it’s an absolutely awful example. Gravity has been demonstrated empirically to exist, for one. The fact that a character has appeared in a number of books doesn’t lend credibility to their existence. Otherwise, we should be arguing if religion is a trick played on us by Lex Luthor. After all, Luthor has appeared in thousands of comics, and the devil only appears in a couple of works of scripture.
I understand your drift, I just don’t get into the argument because I don’t think any of those things are real anyway. Yes, if one has a religious experience, there’s no way to really prove to anybody else it came from god, the devil, or whoever else. (By the way, may I point out Judaism doesn’t even have a devil? You’re now down to all of two religions that fit this pattern you’re claiming exists, albeit two very large ones.)
Religion invented the devil, period. Straight Dope columns and threads around here have discussed this at GREAT length. So from that perspective, your question doesn’t even really make sense. The real issue is your opinion of religion. And if you think religion is bad, stop believing in it or something. As of right now, your position is confused and utterly contradictory.
This is a little seat of the pants, but hear me out. To answer the question “what good have religions done for humanity?” I have a theory (disclaimer: I think that we are beyond this particular good and that it is time for us to move on).
Christianity, to touch on my own cultural background, has a basic code of moral conduct that in balance is a good thing. I am all for the vast majority of the folks thinking that they will go to hell if the kill, steal, bear false witness and so forth (not so much on eating shellfish or having man-sex though).
On the subject of hell, I think that an important thing that Christianity has brought to the table is the idea that the individual matters, the idea that what you do to others matters and that the state of your individual soul is important.
There are/were (small) semi-animistic religions in which the only supernatural being is a malign spirit or trickster. No cite, just IIRC from a book ten years ago.
Yea, if there was no religion yet still a devil, that is like a catch 22 or something right? It would still implicate a divine being…
So if religion is the work of the devil… there can’t ONLY be a devil. Because that wouldn’t make any rational sense to have one evil demonic being running the universe. So there would have to be a god opposite the devil. Therefore religion was created by this god.
It’s a vicious circle I tell ya
Really? This would explain cancer, plagues, and natural disasters, for one thing. What evidence of a benign creator can be inferred from a physical universe?
Ahh yes, if only religion never existed the world would be a much better place. Well to that, I give this link. http://www.freedomsnest.com/rummel_murderers.html
All of them were atheists. Enough said.
There are trickster spirits in plenty of religions, not all of them animistic (Loki, anyone?). That’s a far cry from ‘the devil,’ who is supposed to be either at fault for all evil, or evil personified.
The moral code is nice at times. On the other hand, I don’t like this thing about making up punishments to scare people into doing what you tell them to. Ends justifying means and whatnot. I think that’s responsible for much of the irrational prudery we’re dealing with these days.
Christianity invented this? That’s news to me.
If I may, I’d suggest that the problem here is belief, not religion. As far as belief goes, Communism (and related things) fulfilled the same function for Stalin, Lenin, Pol Pot, Tito and others that religion does for others. I’d say the same for Nazism, but I consider it a kind of religion.
For many years (in times gone by) it was religious institutions that were centres for learning around the world. How many hospitals and universities were founded/funded by religious groups?
This is not meant to downplay the evil done in the name of religion at the same time, and to be sure, some of the “learning” that was promoted was dodgy at best, but I think it would be safe to say that without the commitment to learning of religious institutions, we’d be a great deal worse of than we are, educationally speaking.
The fact that a character has appeared in a number of books doesn’t lend credibility to their existence. Otherwise, we should be arguing if religion is a trick played on us by Lex Luthor. After all, Luthor has appeared in thousands of comics, and the devil only appears in a couple of works of scripture.