Does any major religion not believe in life after death?
Cecil states: “On the latter point” (“whether there is a spiritual or immaterial realm that transcends this mortal coil”) “every religion I have ever heard of argues for the affirmative–else why have a religion?”
I would be surprised if Secular Humanism argued for the affirmative in this case.
Powers &8^]
Secular Humanism is a religion?
Secular humanism is a religion?
That was creepy. Get out of my head.
Are you denying me? 
Cecil’s snarky comment that “everybody believes in life after death” isn’t true if you consider solipsism a religion.
What about Judaism? I had the impression that the Old Testament hardly mentions any afterlife.
Cecil states: “On the latter point” (“whether there is a spiritual or immaterial realm that transcends this mortal coil”) “every religion I have ever heard of argues for the affirmative–else why have a religion?”
Jehovah’s Witnesses do not believe in an afterlife. Instead they believe what the bible says at Ecclesiastes 9:5 “For the living are conscious that they will die; but as for the dead, they are conscious of nothing at all, neither do they anymore have wages, because the remembrance of them has been forgotten.”
And what it says at john5:28,9 “Do not marvel at this, because the hour is coming in which all those in the memorial tombs will hear his voice 29 and come out, those who did good things to a resurrection of life, those who practiced vile things to a resurrection of judgment.”
The question of life after death first became important in Judaism about 2,000 years ago. The Pharisees (the creators of the synagogue-based worship that was to leave them the only party with a viable program after the Zealots’ disastrous rebellion against Rome) were for it; the Sadducees (the party favoring collaboration as long as the Temple was left alone) were agin’ it. You can see this several times in the NT, where it is taken for granted. (At one point, St. Paul wiggled out of a tight spot by doing a “Let’s you and him fight” on the issue.)
Modern Judaism, though descended from the Pharisees, has pulled away from that position, but not universally. Some Jewish writers inclined toward an attitude of “True Judaism is whatever is the opposite Christianity” deny it altogether, but the very Chassidim still believe, as small-o orthodox Christians do, in a General Resurrection.
Resurrection IS life after death.
Cecil was refering to “a spiritual or immaterial realm that transcends this mortal coil.” I was not.
I have a JW friend, and she believes that 144,000 people will rule with God in heaven. Isn’t heaven “a spiritual or immaterial realm that transcends this mortal coil.”?
Religions share two common goals: 1) accumulate wealth 2) gain power and control over their adherents. They accomplish these goals by exploiting the human fear of death.
So, no, Cecil - you missed this one.
I agree. Religious feeling is ALL about people wanting reassurance that they won’t really die; taking advantage of that for wealth and power is the MO of most organised religions. If Unca Cece was right and it was all about understanding Life, The Universe and Everything then philosophies would have followings like religions do.
I disagree. Organised religion is a type of religion, but it is not the universal form. Whatever aspersions you might like to cast because of your own biases and/or experiences, religion as a whole is not uniformly the act of a power-elite seeking to exploit the masses. Please note that I am not saying any religion is correct, nor am I asserting that exploitation has not been a common act by those looked to as spiritual leaders.
Religion is structured spiritualism. Spiritualism is the belief in supernatural things, typically of a nature neither verifiable nor disprovable by science. Philosophy is attempts by one means or another to understand various aspects of existence, to seek ‘truth.’ Religion uses spiritualism to attempt to assert a particular philosophy and pass it down as tradition, thereby requiring a degree of consensus on what a given religion constitutes (this is where the model breaks down, because all religions are dividing amongst at least a few major or minor factions with conflicting interpretations).
Cecil is more right than anyone else; most spiritualism seems to begin as one form of mythology or another, attempting to explain why things are the way they are. Religion is mostly an evolution of this natural process, attempting to prescribe an ideology of how we should conduct ourselves. The logical next step is that religion typically does become about consoling people in the face of adversity, particularly the ultimate threat of our inevitable demise. So if you were to assert that religion would have died out long ago in the face of science without the assertions of an afterlife and so on, I wouldn’t argue the point. But on whether that is the primary reason for religion, I’d say no, it isn’t.
As for ekaminski’s comments… I can’t say anything one way or the other about Jehovah’s Witnesses, but it seems to me that your conflating two points Cecil was trying to separate.
[ul]
[li]Whether or not all religions believe in life after death[/li][li]Whether or not their is a spiritual realm or higher plane outside our mortal existance[/li][/ul]
You’re quoting and responding to a question (and Cecil’s assertion) of whether all religions believe there is a spiritual plane, with an answer about whether all religions believe there is an afterlife. Now if you’re asserting that JW’s believe there is no Heaven, Hell, or existence outside the material realm, and that the good will be resurrected in this world, then you’re comments make sense, but otherwise you seem to be confused.
Cecil’s whole point is that these are distinct notions, and that all religions believe in some form of spiritual realm, but not all religions believe in an afterlife. In the manner Cecil is defining things, your description IS a form of life after death. Just not one in a spiritual realm. It has no bearing on his assertion of whether or not all religions believe in a higher plane unless you expand that statement along similar lines to what I outlined in the previous paragraph.
As to the OP; like Czarcasm and Priceguy, I doubt that Secular Humanism can be reasonably called a religion. It is a philosophy.
As to the discussion of Jewish beliefs, while John W. Kennedy’s information was interesting, CurtC’s question was somewhat irrelevant since it was already addressed (though in a much less informative manner) in the column itself, if he had but read it.
The world’s most badass religion, Norse mythology, is interesting in this regard. Good warriors are promised an afterlife of drinking in Valhalla, but this is only temporary. At Ragnarokk, they will fight alongside the gods in a battle they’ve known all along they’re going to lose, and that will be the end of it for what they’re concerned. So technically, there is an afterlife, but as it’s not eternal, it’s a different matter entirely, at least as far as I can tell.
I had seen it categorized as a religion in the past, but you’re correct that it’s not clearly so.
I could just have easily have mentioned Satanism (of the LaVeyan flavor) or Pantheism. I believe both of those are considered religions without belief in anything supernatural.
Powers &8^]
A) Early Judaism does not have anything to say about an afterlife, and classical paganism doesn’t have much – Hades (where all souls go) is a dark half-life without hope, and it is noteworthy that a dead warrior’s “soul” is distinguished from “the man himself”, who is eaten by carrior birds.
B) Secular humanism is a religion in certain senses: it is a possible answer to the question, “What is your religion?”, and there are some secular humanists who act as though it’s a religion, actively proselytizing and so forth. (There are also a good many muddle-headed folk who make a de-facto religion of Evolution.)
That’s like saying “no” is a type of left-handedness, because “no” is a valid answer to the question “Are you left-handed?” By this standard, anything becomes a religion. A high-school geography teacher is actively promoting understanding of geography - therefore geography is his religion.
That isn’t an argument, it’s a couple of puns.