Comparative Religion

One thing is always true in my religious history classes: students simply know little about their own religion or anyone else's faith.  I'm trying to solve that problem one student at a  time, but it's not easy.  Fortunately, a new website has opened to provide educational material for the entire world.  Naturally, it contains courses in far more than religion.  However, I can guarantee one of them does provide background on the shared beliefs, ideas and histories of the three great monotheistic faiths, Christianity, Islam and Judaism.

You are encouraged to take a look at my course:
http://www.udemy.com/comparative-religion-for-dummies/?promote=1

Please let me know what you think.

Praying for Hate

Millions, if not billions, of people do something every day.  They turn their thoughts to heaven and they pray.  What do they pray for?  Good health? Winning the next $600 million lottery?  Success at work?

All good ideas, but religion teaches that all anyone should do is praise God.  That’s what prayer is for.  Of course, that’s not what people really think.  We’ve all read prayers published in newspapers, both thanks to God for some benefit or requests to a saint for assistance.  They used to be very commonplace. 

Praying to harm someone?  You may not do that, but according to a ruling by a Texas judge, it's perfectly fine to ask God to smite a neighbor you don’t like. In fact, if someone hears your prayer and instead of waiting for God to act actually smites your neighbor for you, the judge said there’s no connection to the prayer.

Don’t tell that to Mikey Weinstein a lawyer who founded a group called Military Religious Freedom Foundation, which opposes religious intrusions into the military.  His audacity outraged a former Navy chaplain, Gordon Klingenschmitt, who posted an invective-filled prayer against Weinstein, his family and home on his website.

Michael "Mikey" Weinstein

Weinstein, who calls himself an agnostic, testified that he has been threatened and had swastikas painted on his house.  Windows were shot out, and dead animal were left on his doorstep.

"We are disappointed in the ruling because we believe the judge made a mistake in not understanding that imprecatory prayers are code words for trolling for assassins for the Weinstein family," Weinstein said in an on-line story by the Religious News Service. "I don't think the judge understood that these are not regular prayers.”

Weinstein compared “imprecatory prayer” to Islamic fatwas declared against an opponent.  Author Salman Rushdie, for example, was targeted by a fatwa and had to hide for 10 years because some Muslims take such requests for revenge very serious.

On the other hand, District Court Judge Martin Hoffman does not.  In his ruling, he said “there was no evidence that the prayers were connected to threats made against Weinstein and his family or damage done to his property.”

Gordon Klingenschmitt

Believers cheered.  "Thankfully, the district court recognized that if people are forced to stop offering imprecatory prayers, half the churches, synagogues and mosques in this country will have to be shut down," said John W. Whitehead, president of the Rutherford Institute, a legal advocacy group that supported Klingenschmitt.

Really?  All this time I thought parishioners prayed for things like peace, health and things like that.  Nope, all wrong.  A lot of them want their neighbors smitten.

Klingenschmitt and his cohorts cited Psalm 109, a biblical ode that has a particularly vicious tone. 

7  When he shall be judged, let him be condemned:

and let his prayer become sin.

8  Let his days be few;

and let another take his office.

9  Let his children be fatherless,

and his wife a widow.

10  Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg:

let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places.

11  Let the extortioner catch all that he hath;

and let the strangers spoil his labor.

12  Let there be none to extend mercy unto him:

neither let there be any to favor his fatherless children.

13  Let his posterity be cut off;

and in the generation following let their name be blotted out.

Strong stuff.  It actually gets worse.  The author wants God “to cut the memory of them from the Earth.”

Of course, the author plans to sit on the sidelines and let God do the dirty work:

26  Help me, O LORD my God:

O save me according to thy mercy:

27  that they may know that this is thy hand;

That though, Lord, has done it.

Actually, as Judge Hoffman conceded indirectly, prayers actually have no meaning.  God isn’t going to act.  That only leaves the people who read or hear the imprecatory prayer to do something. In this case, apparently, they did. Too bad Klingenschmitt didn’t consider some other prayer, say:

“I will exalt you, O Lord, for you lifted me out of the depths and did not let my enemies gloat over me. O Lord, my God, I called to you for help and you healed me” in Psalm 30; or “… in the morning I will sing of your love; for you are my fortress, my refuge in times of trouble. O my Strength, I sing praise to you; you, O God, are my fortress, my loving God” in Psalm 5.

Of course, when someone who is a “true believer” like Klingenschmitt who, along with so many others, wants to impose religious views on someone else, people such as Weinstein simply don’t have a prayer. Long-time religious historian Bill Lazarus regularly writes about religion and religious history.  He also speaks at various religious organizations throughout Florida.  You can reach him at www.williamplazarus.com.  He is the author of the famed Unauthorized Biography of Nostradamus; The Last Testament of Simon Peter; The Gospel Truth: Where Did the Gospel Writers Get Their Information; Noel: The Lore and Tradition of Christmas Carols; and Dummies Guide to Comparative Religion.  His books are available on Amazon.com, Kindle, bookstores and via various publishers.  You can also follow him on Twitter.

Reply to comments

One reader called Jehovah's Witnesses a destructive cult.  I guess that would depend on the definition of destructive.  One religion is no different than another: used as a weapon to enforce God's "will," then it is destruction; used as a force to make life better for people, then it's not.  We all know that religion has been wielded like a club through history, but that's balanced somewhat by the charity and support that religion has provided to billions.  The Jehovah's Witnesses are no different.

By the way, and quite appropriately, Jehovah is gibberish.  It was created as a way of making sense of Hebrew used to represent God's name.  The letters themselves had no meaning -- they are simply substitutes to avoid printing God's name in a document that may later be destroyed -- but the translators didn't know that.  A belief based on nonsense syllables is suitably ironic.

To the other reader who questioned the name of the author of Devil's Food: the writer is Paul Winslowe.  He lives in Florida and has written only a few stories.

Romney Not Only Member of a Cult

Rev. Robert Jeffress

The Rev. Robert Jeffress, a Texas pastor, inserted himself earlier this year into the 2012 presidential campaign, by insisting front-runner Mitt Romney, a Mormon, was a member of a cult.  Jeffress (left), a born-again Christian supporter of Texas Governor Rick Perry, also includes the Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Church of Scientology on his cult list.

Naturally, his comment should have been ignored.  After all, Jeffress was already on record for attacking Mormons during Perry’s winning gubernatorial campaign.

Gov. Rick Perry

However, since Perry (right) couldn’t run on his dubious record of achievements and was obligated to end his campaign after a half-hearted effort, he was more than happy to have followers attack opponents on other, less-consequential issues.  What could be less important than someone’s religion in a country that espouses freedom of religion?

At least, Jeffress is on familiar ground.  In this country, religion has always made a soft cushion to batter opposition with.  Thomas Jefferson, this country's third president, was smacked for daring to say he had no interest in neighbor’s religion.  Abraham Lincoln, who is considered one of our greatest presidents, was bludgeoned for his lack of interest in organized religion and rare attendance at church services.

In the 1880s, successful Democratic presidential candidate Grover Cleveland was charged with supporting Roman Catholics.  His Republic counterpart rejected the claim raised by a New York minister, but “Rum, Romanism and Rebellion” entered the political lexicon.

Democratic candidate Alfred Smith was forced to defend his Roman Catholic faith in 1928 presidential campaign and lost to Herbert Hoover.  Smith was probably relieved he wasn’t in office when the Depression began less than a year after Hoover took office.

Eventual winner John F. Kennedy bravely stood up to critics of his Roman Catholic faith in 1960 by speaking out forcefully on his desire to be president and having no intention of obeying the Vatican.  His opponent, Richard Nixon, a Quaker, ignored the issue.

Of course, in 2008, both major party candidates had to separate themselves from controversial ministers to mute attacks on their beliefs.

Why would we expect anything different now?

Besides, Jeffress is correct.  The Church of the Latter Day Saints is a Christian cult.  In fact, so are the Jehovah Witnesses, Christian Scientists and many more.  Jeffress just didn’t go far enough.  

A cult is a small belief that breaks away from a more-established faith.  As such, all religions start as cults.  Christianity was a cult of Judaism; Judaism was a cult of pagan faiths; Buddhism was a cult of Hinduism.  

Does that matter?

Of course not.  A cult today may be tomorrow’s dominant belief.  Just for example, Christians note with pride that Jesus had only a few followers at the beginning.  That’s a cult.  In fact, it was one of many mystery religions of that day – religions that had secret rituals (communion, for example) to allow followers to come into contact with the divine.  Today, Christianity is the world’s largest religion.  It’s not a cult anymore.

L. Ron Hubbard

Personally, as a religious historian, I would bet more money on the cult of Scientology enduring longer than  Mormonism.  Scientology, founded by author L. Ron Hubbard (right), has a radically different belief that allows it to separate itself from other religions.  That’s one way cults attract followers.

Successful new religions that are offspring from existing faiths have to take a different approach.  They have to break away from the established faith; they can’t mimic it.  Mormon founder Joseph Smith saw himself as the new Jesus.  Later followers, trying to become accepted by Christianity, downplayed that part of his theology and Jesus remain supreme.  That’s not the primrose path other successful cults have followed. 

For example, Buddha’s attempts to “purify” Hinduism ended up by eliminating all the gods. Buddhism is now the third largest faith in the world.   Judaism rejected pagan faiths of its day by elevating one god to the supreme position in the pantheon and then, gradually, erasing all competitors.  With that model, Judaism has hung around for more than 2,600 years.

 That’s how successful cults evolve.  If they don’t, they disappear not long after their founders die.

A cult that worshiped John the Baptist (left), for example, whimpered on only for a few hundred years after John was executed and was only recently revived.  Other cults that followed would-be messiahs like Sabbatai Zevi and others are virtually forgotten except by people who study such things.

Cults live and die on their own.  If they can’t attract enough followers, they will become footnotes in history.  Otherwise, like Christianity itself, it will thrive and move beyond cult status.

Eventually, a former cult will be big enough to spawn ignorant fools like Jeffress.

 

Long-time religious historian Bill Lazarus regularly writes about religion and religious history.  He also speaks at various religious organizations throughout Florida.  You can reach him at www.williamplazarus.com.  He is the author of the famed Unauthorized Biography of Nostradamus; The Last Testament of Simon Peter; The Gospel Truth: Where Did the Gospel Writers Get Their Information; Noel: The Lore and Tradition of Christmas Carols; and Dummies Guide to Comparative Religion.  His books are available on Amazon.com, Kindle, bookstores and via various publishers.  He can also be followed on Twitter.