13AR18-19

( - previous issue - )

Apologia Report 18:19 (1,155)

May 22, 2013

Subject: Religions, "a fundamental battle for the American soul"

In this issue:

INTERFAITH DIALOG - truth as a deterrent to discussion

ISLAM - a new "life of Muhammad for Western readers"

POLITICS - has liberalism become a religion in its own right?

------

INTERFAITH DIALOG

"How 'Truth' Limits Interreligious Dialogue" by Wm. Andrew Schwartz [Ph.D. student, Philosophy of Religion and Theology, Claremont Graduate University] -- begins: "Schubert Ogden [Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Theology, Southern Methodist University] argues that one can enter into inter-religious dialogue 'only if one can somehow claim truth for one's own religious beliefs without thereby denying, explicitly, that others' religious beliefs also may possibly be true.'" Says Schwartz: "it seems that a correspondence theory of truth is an underlying deterrent for those who wish pursue inter-religious dialogue.

"By 'correspondence theory,' I mean a view which considers a proposition 'true' if that proposition properly represents or corresponds to reality. It is common to consider our own beliefs true and all contradictory claims false. ... By Ogden's standards, then, this approach does not generate dialogue." Schwartz wants to consider "an alternative theory of truth."

Schwartz believes that "a pragmatic theory of truth may prove useful. I will look at the tradition of Buddhism as an example of dealing with religious truth in pragmatic terms. After crossing over into Buddhism, I will then cross back into the Wesleyan context to see what lessons Wesleyans might learn from Buddhism with respect to conceptions of truth. I hope that this exercise in comparative theology will provide new ideas about how a pragmatic theory of truth may open the door of more robust opportunities for Wesleyans to engage in inter-religious dialogue."

Schwartz concludes: "From a pragmatic perspective, as demonstrated by the expediency debates of Buddhism, if two ways are true, but one is more expedient then the other, the less expedient way is not false or untrue. Its truth is not partial. The difference between the two beliefs is not a difference in truth but expediency. In that sense, both can be true yet different. It is not necessarily a matter of true or false. It may be better or worse, maybe; but it is not true or false. In this way, a pragmatic approach to truth can fulfill Ogden's criteria for inter-religious dialogue - whereby different perspectives are reconciled in their difference.

"When applied as a Wesleyan approach to religious truth, in so far as religious 'others' are living holy lives, exemplifying love, and caring for the oppressed, then these 'others' are walking in the truth. In this new pragmatic sense, truth is a lived, not epistemic truth. It is an embodied truth, I believe such a Wesleyan position, informed by an encounter with Buddhism, can yield a new theology of religions in Wesleyan circles, a theology that bridges the gap between exclusivism and relativism." Wesleyan Theological Journal, 48:1 - 2013, pp99-105.

---

ISLAM

The First Muslim: The Story of Muhammad, by Lesley Hazleton [1] -- Hari Kunzru begins his review by acknowledging the challenges for such a biographer in view of "our violent recent history." The author of this "life of Muhammad for Western readers ... describes herself as 'a psychologist by training, a Middle East reporter by experience, an agnostic fascinated by the vast and often terrifying arena in which politics and religion intersect.' <www.ow.ly/lag5l> In 2010, she gave a TED talk <www.ow.ly/lfDFN> debunking some of the more egregious myths about the Koran, notably the salaciously Orientalist '72 virgins.' This is a writer who is working to dispel contradictions, not sharpen them."

Kunzru summarizes Muhammad's beginnings and the birth of the Koran. "Readers irritated by [Hazleton's] straining for a contemporary tone will find it offset by much useful and fascinating context on everything from the economics of the Meccan caravan trade to the pre-Islamic lineage of prophets called hanifs, who promoted monotheism and rejected idolatry.

"In the terms it sets itself, The First Muslim succeeds. It makes its subject vivid and immediate. It deserves to find readers. However, its terms are those of the popular biography, and this creates a tension the book never quite resolves. Though based on scholarship, it is not a scholarly work. Factual material from eighth- and ninth-century histories is freely mixed with speculation about Muhammad's motives and emotions....

"Muhammad’s transition from humble messenger to political leader, and from peaceful preacher to war leader, forms the substance of the story. The factional struggles, political assassinations, night flights and pitched battles that surround it are reminiscent of the experience of another prophet, the Mormon leader Joseph Smith, as is the role of revelation in exonerating sexual impropriety — in Muhammad’s case to allay suspicions of infidelity surrounding his third wife, Aisha. Despite the orthodox Muslim insistence that Muhammad, while possessed of human failings, is irreproachable, some of his actions are deeply troubling. Even Hazleton finds it hard to put a positive spin on the mass beheading of up to 900 surrendered men of the Jewish Qurayza tribe, losers in one round of the factional battles for control of Medina."

Kunzru concludes: Hazleton "hints that the Koran and the Hadith, like other holy books, have a textual history and that certain events in the life of Muhammad are best considered tropes. A fuller examination of these points would have been fascinating, but it would have forced her to embrace the perilous notion that the Koran, instead of being the revealed word of God, might be a text like any other. In evading such material Hazleton clearly hopes to avoid giving offense, but try as she might, she cannot escape the fact that in our time even a well-meaning and fundamentally decent book such as this can never be innocent, because it cannot stand outside our violent recent history." New York Times Book Review, Apr 7 '13, p16. <www.ow.ly/laflZ>

---

POLITICS

"The New Heretics: Believers Are No Longer Credible as Public Citizens" by James Hitchcock, professor of history at St. Louis University, who opens his editorial: "The most astonishing fact about contemporary American politics - that there is not a single Protestant on the Supreme Court, while there are six Catholics - goes largely unremarked....

"[R]eligious animosities are now more intense than they have been for a long time, a fact that is not fully understood because of the deliberately ambiguous use of the term 'religion.'

"The membership of the Supreme Court illuminates this. ... The explanation seems obvious: political ideology trumps religion. ...

"But this explanation falls short, because it fails to understand that in reality there are now two fiercely contending religions in America, which are - trite though the phrase may be - engaged in a fundamental battle for the American soul. ...

"One of the two competing contemporary religions encompasses perhaps most Orthodox Jews, orthodox Christians, and (in theory) devout Muslims. It acknowledges divine authority in the affairs of men, the need to conform the human will to the divine law.

"On the other side, liberalism is now not merely a political philosophy compatible with many kinds of religion but has itself become a religion. ...

"Liberalism is a religion because, for liberals, ultimate meaning lies in a commitment both to the ever-expanding welfare state, which is the fulfillment of the ideal of justice, and to the continuing liberation of individuals from all binding authority, which is the key to personal happiness.

"Liberal ideology ultimately rests on an act of faith. It can never be discredited by historical events, because the believer simply knows it to be right. Liberal ideas are considered self-evidently true, and, in their present ascendancy, liberals prefer merely to assert those ideas rather than discuss them. The religion of liberalism makes demands on the individual that traditional religion is no longer allowed to make. ...

"The history of liberal Christianity and Reform Judaism is essentially the story of progressive emancipation from the binding authority of creeds, so that those movements have finally become anti-credal, thereby enabling the new religion of liberalism to encompass people who are agnostics and even atheists. Conversely, orthodox Christians and Jews are necessarily regarded by liberals with a high degree of suspicion, because they threaten a reversion to credal dogmatism.

"All of which explains why religious animosity is at a higher level now than it has been for decades. ...

"As did most Catholics and Protestants in earlier times, the religion of liberalism considers itself the one true faith that has the obligation (and the power) to impose its beliefs.

"When conservative believers demand their rights as citizens, they fail to realize that, as far as the religion of liberalism is concerned, 'error has no rights.' The religion of liberalism holds that media and the educational system should enshrine liberal beliefs and discredit conservative ones, that government should enforce liberal programs by law, and that it is an open question how far heretics should even enjoy freedom of expression." Touchstone, Mar/Apr '13, pp3-4.

-------

SOURCES: Monographs

1 - The First Muslim: The Story of Muhammad, by Lesley Hazleton (Riverhead, 2013, hardcover, 336 pages) <www.ow.ly/lapHg>

--------

( - next issue - )