“
TIME TO STAND UP “ (TTSU)
Now, the invention of the scientific method is, I'm sure we'll
all agree, the most powerful intellectual idea, the most powerful framework for
thinking and investigating and understanding and challenging the world around
us that there is, and it rests on the premise that any idea is there to be
attacked. If it withstands the attack then it lives to fight another day and if
it doesn't withstand the attack then down it goes. Religion
doesn't seem to
work like that. It has certain ideas at the heart of it which we
call sacred or holy or whatever. What it means is, "Here is an idea or a
notion that
you're not allowed to say anything bad about; you're just not.
Why not?--because you're not!" If somebody votes for a party that you
don't agree with, you're free to argue about it as much as you like; everybody
will have an argument but nobody feels aggrieved by it. If somebody thinks
taxes should go up or down you are free to have an argument about it. But on
the other hand if somebody says 'I mustn't move a light switch on a Saturday,'
you say, "I respect that."
The odd thing is, even as I am saying that, I am thinking
"Is there an Orthodox Jew here who is going to be offended by the fact
that I just said that?" But I wouldn't have thought "Maybe there's
somebody from the left wing or somebody from the right wing or somebody who
subscribes to this view or the other in economics" when I was making the
other points. I just think "Fine, we have different opinions." But,
the moment I say something that has something to do with somebody's (I'm going
to stick my neck out here and say irrational) beliefs, then we all become
terribly protective and terribly defensive and say "No, we don't attack
that; that's an irrational belief but no, we respect it."
Why should it be that it's perfectly
legitimate to support the Labor party or the Conservative party, Republicans or
Democrats, this model of economics versus that, Macintosh instead of
Windows--but to have an opinion about how the Universe began, about who created
the Universe . . . no, that's holy? What does that mean? Why do we ring-fence
that for any other reason other than that we've just got used to doing so?
There's no other reason at all, it's just one of those things that crept into
being and once that loop gets going it's very, very powerful. So, we are used
to not challenging religious ideas but it's very interesting how much of a
furor Richard creates when he does it! Everybody gets absolutely frantic about
it because you're not allowed to say these things. Yet when you look at it
rationally there is no reason why those ideas shouldn't be as open to debate as
any other, except that we have agreed somehow between us that they shouldn't
be.
The great unmentionable evil at the center of our culture is
monotheism. From a barbaric Bronze Age text known as the Old Testament, three
anti-human religions have evolved--Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. These are
sky-god religions. They are, literally, patriarchal--God is the Omnipotent
Father--hence the loathing of women for 2,000 years in those countries
afflicted by the sky-god and his earthly male delegates. The sky-god is a
jealous god, of course. He requires total obedience from everyone on earth, as
he is not just in place for one tribe, but for all creation. Those who would
reject him must be converted or killed for their own good.
"Couldn't God have just given
the hijackers a heart attack or something instead of killing all those nice
people on the plane? I guess he didn't give a flying fuck about the Trade
Center, didn't bother to come up with a plan for them." (I apologize for
my friend's intemperate language but, in the circumstances, who can blame her?)
But how do we understand something like this? Why does God allow
evil like this to take place? Perhaps that is what you are asking now. You may
even be angry at God. I want to assure you that God understands those feelings
that you may have.
Well, that's big of God, I must say.
I'm sure that makes the bereaved feel a whole lot better (the pathetic thing
is, it probably does!). Mr. Graham went on:
I have been asked hundreds of times in my life why God allows
tragedy and suffering. I have to confess that I really do not know the answer
totally, even to my own satisfaction. I have to accept, by faith, that God is
sovereign, and He is a God of love and mercy and compassion in the midst of
suffering. The Bible says God is not the author of evil. It speaks of evil as a
"mystery."
Richard Dawkins is professor of the
Public Understanding of Science, University of Oxford, and author of The
Selfish Gene, The Blind Watchmaker and Unweaving the Rainbow.
