Dear Stanley, religions are rarely designed on a desktop. I remember a book of Hans Küng on the future or religions. He is a very well versed and shrewd theologian, nevertheless he also tried to "engineer" a new religion. For a while New Age was the hope for many, as well as the constructs of Ken Wilber and the like. My impression is that religions evolve spontaneously and are based on new (mostly unconscious) world experiences. Reflection on these feelings (formal religions, theology) come much later, when people begin to feel a need to "support" their religion which hitherto was considered to be "natural". This process is excellently depicted in the "Decline of the West" of Oswald Spengler (the first volume of which is just 100 years old). As a historian, you know these things much better than myself. I am sure that still there is enough "power" in the Abrahamic religions for survival. It is quite possible, however, that new interpretations will be attached to them, as it has happened e.g. in the time of the Cluny Reform, or in the time of the reformation.

Why should we reject the Abrahamic religions because of atrocities committed by some practitioners? The religions appear good in themselves, but it is religious actors who strategically manipulate concepts or use the religions to cause harvoc to gratify their selfish needs. We also have to understand that because of the anthropocentric factor we would expect some sorts of demonic elements in all religions, whether Abrahamic or non-Abrahamic.

Can't we improve our religions and thereby ourselves and create a conclusively, if that's possible, ethical one without the violence of the Abrahamic books. What's wrong with a jolly religion?

Let me take the Moses story, although its unlikely to be true but just the imaginative product of temple scribes.

Moses kills an Egyptian defending one of his people. His sense of belonging is perhaps curious and represents more Egyptian sense of place. He then retires (Sinuhe story regurgitated) to Canaan, until he receives a message from YHWH to free Hebrew slaves. (Canaanite slaves were treated very well in Egypt). Well and good. Then begins a lengthy tale of YHWH's and Moses' despotism, murdering anyone who disagrees with them or holds up YHWH's project to take Canaan. Here YHWH acts as a terrifying king, and Moses his right-hand man endowed with the same murderous personality. Before they reach Canaan, Moses dies and Joshua leads the invasion, which to put it mildly is appalling, the deaths of men, women and children described with relish.

Karen Armstrong, the historian of YHWH, Judaism and Christianity, considers this as morality dispensed with on a day to day basis by YHWH and his acolytes. But what evidence prior to this do we have that YHWH has any morality?

Victor, my point is it is not good enough because of the original nature of the god. Its absurd to build a religion on a supernatural thug.

My point is, why do we not devise an ethical one that will meet all needs-keeping it away from priests, etc, or ambitious politicians.

Stanley, why do we not create a history, since you are a historian, that does not include war? If we build a history without war it would be so much easier to then build a peaceful society, as we would have done away with any history of violence. Please note I am merely following what appears to be your logic.

Now religions seem to be ultimately based on an experience of the divine. What the experience is and how it is used to justify some actions are really separate queries. I think that most people who have experienced war find it to be a horrible experience, however the outcome of a preceding war has often been used to justify the next war. Is that not just as bad an action as your perceived violent Abrahamic God?

I would also note that while mystics claim to have direct experience of the divine, they are rarely leaders in any religion, at least not for long when they are recognized. And also, mystics tend to be non-violent and actually tend to agree about what they experienced when encountering the divine. This then raises the question, is it the divine that is the problem or is it those who have not had a direct experience with the divine who are the problem.

And should you wish to cite Moses, please also provide would evidence that we have actual records going back to his time as opposed to clearly idealized records written centuries after the fact.

I believe I added a qualification of my use for the Moses' narrative, which precedes my declaration. I have written about these matters extensively here and elsewhere. My papers on Ancient Fictionality cover, or will cover, these matters.

You appear to focus on the violence I have true myself focused on (therefore hardly surprising) in Abrahamic writings without seeming to wonder if a) it should be there and b) it should be countananced and c) whether it being there causes harm by instituting a form of the divine that considers violence a short term and long term solution.

Violent gods emerged during the Middle Bronze Age, due to the greater impact of war on the societies of the time. This goes hand in hand with greater centalised power, greater central control and violent punishment tropes. The fact that this historically occurred doesn't mean we should approve of it now through continued loyalty to a book that references it. Do you not think that being loyal to such a book shapes us in the present and shouldn't we let it go and do better?

I have elsewhere pointed out that religious people, in this instance largely Christian, are happy to allow their children to read gory details of divine retribution but are repulsed by the idea of letting them watch movies containing sex, even of a moderate kind. In addition, many Christians will reference the Old Testament not the New as guides to life when their positions are radically different, one pacifist, the other mainly but not entirely violent. The Old Testament presents the human condition through the perceptions of a powerful deity, remorseless and kingly, with contradictory morality claims, destroying its creation for the very things it has created. In Islam, children as young as 3 are subjected to the hadiths, many of which display the same horrific violence. Is that really helping them develop responsible and ethical attitudes?

You point out that violence is part of the human condition, and always has been, but actually that is not entirely true. Nevertheless, wouldn't it be better to have religious books, to the extent that we really need them at all, free of this behaviour, not compounding it. Surely religion should raise us up, or attempt to, not back-up our most negative attributes and behaviour? Surely, seeking a properly ethical religion, which none of the Abrahamic religions are, is not too much to ask?

You say that genuine divines experience god (s) in positive ways and that only those who do not have such experiences encourage violence, but experiencing the divine can surely mean a number of things (Aztec priests experienced the divine before digging out another heart from a prisoner's breast)? The patriarchs all apparently experienced the divine, but it was, for them, a violent one.

Stanley, I understand your point. Religion is one of the enigmatic, polysemous and controversial concepts that defies any one universally accepted definition. This is because every one understands it differently. May be my understanding is completely different from yours. But God is not a human creation. My study of the Bible, as an example, shows that people in different eras appear to perceive God differently. in the OT times, people perceived Him as rough and even ruthless in the way He delt with people. But in the NT era, He was seen as loving, compassionate and forgiving. May be, the problem is not with God; since knowledge of Him seems to refine with time as we grow in relationship with Him. The problem is with human perception and not God.

Victor, to go with your logic requires accepting such an entity exists, which I don't. Your argument, good as it is, is the very argument of the Bible in discribing the relationship between YHWH and humankind, that is the problem lies with humankind when anything goes wrong or amiss. Prior to this construct, gods were often held responsible within a relationship of give and take.

You say rightly that the god of the New Testament acts differently, in fact ethically, but do you not think he might have been a different god? I don't recall Jesus using YHWH to describe his god, only Lord (an aristocratic honorific) and Father.

One other thing to impress my point. During the First Crusade the European crusaders besieged Jerusalem, and upon taking it, massacred its inhabitants-men, women, children. The example they referenced was Joshua's massacres in the Old Testament. These were adherents, supposedly, of a pacifist, generous, forgiving god! Bad examples in religious literature cause a response, and, although Moslems deny it, just read the Hadiths and parts of the Qur'an, to find sources of present day violence.

I think not. There's too much breadth in the Abrahamic religions to reject them all, even if one rejects (as I do) Abrahamic religious modalities founded on the belief in a violent God and the accuracy of religious texts that portray God violently. If one concurs with the concept of God adopted by medieval Jewish, Christian, and Muslim philosophers alike as the greatest conceivable being (who would therefore be the source of love and peace), then there seems nothing rationally problematic about it. Moreover, it seems that one can give good evidence for the existence of such a being. For these and other reasons, I am an Anabaptist, namely, a member of the peace church tradition in Christianity.

Kirk, I can see advantages there, but unfortunately Christianity is connected to the Old Testament, particularly the Pentateuch. Many Christians I know express the views of the latter, not realising that there's little of that books characteristics in Christianity. Why don't you separate them, as the Christian god seems very different frm YHWH?

Stanley, given that one can easily dismiss the Pentateuch as not historical, at least one can with a little bit of research, whether or not it is accepted by some people becomes meaningless. It was probably composed several hundred years after the supposed events and for very specific purposes. I know of supposed scientists and historians who hold fast to ideas or events that are easily established as incorrect given today's available knowledge. Does that mean we should reject science or history? I think not.

Now if we look at the parts of the Bible that appear to be composed reasonably close to the events they record, one finds a very consistent and loving God. Thus I would inquire as to how you have developed your view of the Abrahamic religions using your abilities as a historian.

A consistent and loving god? There is no genuine evidence for that. My point is to scrutinise deeply and correctly what religions actually say, debate it clearly and recognise that in many ways it is not good for us. Where science is concerned, my writing takes a similar view.

Many BIG fights claimed the lives of CRORES of people in the past in the question of superiority of one religion above other/s.

Still today, many hot blooded youths are killing innocent people in school, college, market place, blasting trains or planes etc. in the name of some religions. The are brain washed by some MADS to offer their lives to get unending enjoyment after death.

I TRUST: IF THERE IS ANY HEAVEN, NO KILLER HAS ANY ENTRY THERE.

ALL OF THEM, INCLUDING THEIR ADVISERS AND LEADERS, HAVE TO GO TO THE HELL ONLY.

Religions were made to guide people. Some people added some misguiding directions in it. The divided the religions for their own benefits. We, all idiots, following their versions without considering the actual essence of religions.

While I agree with part of your arguments, Shibabrata, I still believe that holding that the problem lies with individuals or groups who misinterpret sound teaching is mistaken. Isis followers for example were and are persuaded not simply by rogue interpretations but by text in the Qur'an and Hadiths, the history of the religion's development and some of its core beliefs. Islam functions through notions of punishment (for disbelievers, those who break its codes, etc) and there lies one problem! Its recent, and in fact long term, unwillingness as a whole to evaluate its teaching, the historical credibility and ethical position of its text are others.

I haven't any idea of the Abrahamic religion

No way! Let us reject genocide. We can not throw away the baby and the dirty water. KLet us only throw awy the dirty water!

The same can be said of any and all of the Abrahamic faiths. Violence has always been linked with these religions, as has intolerance. Early Judaism was a religion for example of ethnic exclusiveness-you couldn't marry outside the faith according to Levirate law, Canaanite culture was evil and had to be destroyed was a much voiced belief. Its prophets constantly advocated violence, as did Muhammed.

agree with @ Stanley Wilkin

regards

Agree with Gyorgy Banhegyi

regards

Ali, Abrahamic religions are those purportedly descended from Abraham.

Abrahamic religions are based on cultural aspects of several millennium ago, when societies were different and their ethics reflect those societies. Their pronouncements are not for all cultures and times. Secular societies work because the societies they function in are being reflected and responded to without overarching ideologies. Judaic law-based religion concerns a time when people had to function as one, as an organic unit, when women, for example, were not protected by state laws.

Arben, there is really nothing or rather very little in the so-called Holy books to confirm this view of religion-it seems that this tends to be what people think is there rather than what is. Morality-no, most definitely not. Honesty-Abraham? Tamar? David? Really? Purity? I'm not certain what you mean by that? The Old Testament is full of trickery, but often for reasons we cannot always grasp.

I'm afraid this idea that your list of character and behavioral ideals is part of religion does not remotely correspond to the books (Pentateuch, etc) I have been researching. Why this discrepancy I wonder?

Actually as you and I both know these matters are not straightforward, but nevertheless would some of these have occurred without the expressed hatred of others, the authentication of violence within the Abrahamic books? The mobilization of hatred to religious ends can be seen in either the books under review, or within their literature, providing the necessary template. My point is, have a religion or religions that successfully confronts these events not provides suitable endorsement.

If you are arguing that these are evidences of secular violence, that would be hard to argue successfully as secularism is free-floating surely and does not commit to ideologies? The violence within the USA could be argued as coming from the Mid-West where many believe in a fundamentalist form of the Christian religion, or appear to, which tends to favour the Pentateuch rather than Christian writings-'an eye for an eye'- . Stalin was educated in Orthodox schools; Japanese violence was embedded in its history and sanctioned by religion, since diluted by secularism; and political movements such as fascism, the Nazi, with their ideology of ethnicity and nationalism clearly follow religious templates. Precisely which theocracy has ever been non-violent?

Wouldn't it be better, rather than denying what is in these books, to go through each one, scouring out the misinformation and hatred?

Thanks, but i do enough. Can you show me where these ideals are? I know what you imagine my position is, but it comes from actual research not accepting what I've been told. Please, demonstrate. One problem is that the books come from a different time and often their sense of ethical correctness is vividly different. I would not call the Pentateuch ethical, but the writers were concerned with loyalty to god and strict community values. I see little ethics in the Qur'an, but I am probably working from a different standard or simply perspective. I believe we must approach these books with pre-conception and understand exactly what they are saying.

I do find the obsession with sex each displays frankly tedious.

What occurs to me reading back is how followers pick and choose what is in these books, denying the more horrendous material, and if we cannot preserve the good parts by debating and excluding the bad. Many fundamental Christians tell me how wonderful the Gospels are and yet quote from the most violent parts of the Pentateuch.

Stanley.

Religiously motivated, Persia (Iran) and Ottoman Empire have had bloody wars for almost 200 years. It took whole momentum of two consecutive dynasties in Iran consuming all the wealths and resources which otherwise could have been used for the good of its own people. Interestingly both sides were Muslims, one shiite & the other one sunny with 99% similarities between two.

The same story was repeated some 30 years ago between sunny Iraqi government & shiite iran with devastating results.

Abrahamic religions are inherently violent. Then crusade wars, now Al-Qaeda, Taliban & ISIS.

I don't think that religion by itself is violent. It is the way people strategically use religion or an aspect of it to cause violence.

Victor Selorme Gedzi

This is a common argument, but simply not true although I would agree that religions, especially monotheistic religions, argue that they are peaceful. This is impossible to prove historically but also from the various texts. Jesus spoke of violent change. Muhammad even more so. For both change and violence, even if often symbolically, was interwoven.

When a group of humans decides to go to war, they will find a justification they can agree on, be it religious or otherwise. When a scholar or group of scholars want to find a reason to dislike something, they will find a justification. No matter what decision a human or group of humans want to justify, they will find a means of justifying it.

Now most often in their justification process they will ignore or dismiss any evidence that runs contrary to their desired conclusions, and most often stop and further investigations once they find a justifiable answer that they approve of, Thus this original question is really a desired position seeking more reasons to be justified, In the case of Abrahamic religions, I would imagine that very few people can identify when or why they became monotheistic. even though that might be a valuable aspect of one's opinion of them. However, very few, exceedingly few, scholars have any idea as to the answer.

William, if our positions are merely subjective or concerning preferences, which actually could be allocated to nearly every kind of research, we should all give up immediately. My view is that monotheisms are violent and over time I have provided reasons, and, honestly, the assertions of their natural peacefulness is hard to actually find but has more to do with desire and hope. The Bible is an intensely violent book.

You are right thinking that many institutions hove towards peace, but really a better word would be stasis. Or on many occasions simply believe what we tell you or suffer the consequences: as with 16th-19th century European colonialism and within the assertions of many present Islamic cultures. Secularism, in terms of its defence against ideologies, created peace or shows a greater desire for it, not religion.