Is Karen Armstrong right about the change in religious belief?

Look at the schism that happened between Protestants and Catholics centuries ago. Look at the divide between American Christians (the ones more likely to take the Bible literally) and most Christians abroad nowadays.

Differing views inevitably lead to branching/forking over time. To deny that there has been a change in religious belief over time is to say that there is only one religion that has been unchanging since the dawn of humanity; a provable falsehood.

I think that there has been a change in the way humans view religion, that denying such a change is at best revisionist history, and that Dawkins is mistaking Agnosticism with Atheism. I’m not so sure if the 17th century is really all that special in this context, but I think there is at least a grain of truth to Armstrong’s words.

I haven’t read that particular article—I will do so later today.

But I have read both Armstrong and Dawkins in the past, and I have some broad statements based on my readings.

Armstrong seems to be pretty darned objective, or as objective as you can be as an ex-nun who is writing about religion. In her chapters about Judaism, she seems fairly accurate (at least in parallel with what I was taught) and is not overtly Christological in her analyses. I see her readings as informative.

Dawkins, on the other hand, has an agenda. It seems to me that his analysis and evidence is generally making points in support of his agenda, as is not necessarily objective in a scholarly way. So while he is controversial and occasionally entertaining, I’m not sure I would go to him for an even-handed assessment of a biblical writing.

But again, those are my impressions from previous reading, and not from this essay, which I will have to read tonight.

I don’t know enough about early religious views to say whether or not she is correct about the change in nature of religion and religious beliefs over time but I do like her views.
It seems to be an argument that religions need to focus more on spirituality and less on the processes of worship.
I too have questioned how a given religion or sect can consider every other religious view as idolatry and yet not see the same in their own; they all seem comparable to me.
I also question her premise that fundamentalism is a reaction to radical liberalism. I don’t see that as clearly defined. I understand that you get a simultaneous growth, or escalation, and that you would not have one without the other but I fail to see where you can say which came first. We can consider it the typical “chicken or the egg” argument. It would be just as valid to say that the radicalized liberal theology was a result of increasingly narrow and radicalized fundamentalism.

The discussion as to whether it is the existence of God or the belief in God that matters seems pointless. Believers can’t prove His existence, and atheists are confronted with the impossible task of demonstrating the nonexistence of an omnipotent being. To me, it is the fact that believers are so readily manipulated to foment endless episodes of hell on earth that needs attention. Objectively speaking, it seems the primary necessity for belief is faith (gullibility). There is no possibility of accepting the fantastic myths and tenets underpinning any of the world’s major religions absent the suspension of observable reality.

I don’t know enough to say whether she is correct or not, but I think the ideas expressed are potentially compatible with the thought processes of pre-modern people. The Bible and Qu’ran are the only major religious books that are said to be infallible by their believers. Ancient religions were far more fluid, even in societies that had a written tradition. Cults worshipping one god over another would rise and fall, as different qualities of character were emphasised.

Any assumption that the ancients were less intelligent than ourselves are quickly dispelled with a cursory look at their architecture, astronomy, poetry, and politics. If consistency in religious doctrine was their goal, they could quite easily have applied the logic that allowed them to make fantastically accurate astronomical observations. The conclusion must be that the moral goal was more important than something so superficial as an accurate story. If I interpret her work correctly, I think it is a very likely explanation she puts forward.

Is Armstrong right about the change in religious beliefs—from my own studies I can say, yes, she is very accurate.

One of my hobbies for over 25 years is researching, studying, and comparing religions. I find Bible history fascinating and enjoy finding parallels and similarities between world religions and myths. This hobby basically developed out of resistance to the “do-not-question” Evangelical environment I grew up around in the South and a forced conversion to Mormonism when I was 17. I went through a phase of deep hatred for religion, seeing how religion can be used as a method of control through fear and division.

At one time I considered becoming an Episcopalian priest, but decided I didn’t want my daily life dictated by the whims of others.

Once I learned the true purpose of the Council of Nicea commissioned by Emperor Constantine, read Aquinas and St. Augustine, studied the 7 Deadly Sins and 7 Virtues in depth, read the Apocrypha, and read other holy books, I came to my own conclusions. I also found connections between lesser known Greek and Irish myths and Biblical stories. One example—the trinity concept is found in many cultures. I saw that stories had evolved over the centuries in response to political, economical, cultural and linguistic shifts. I was amazed to find the same conclusions in Karen Armstrong’s words.

I love how the Tao Te Ching begins—the Way that can be named is not the True Way. This is basically what Karen Armstrong is saying.

Fun fact—Kellogg’s and Posts invented cereal in response to a rise in turn of the century evangelical religious fervor that advocated for a vegetarian lifestyle. Think about that when you chow down your Cap’n Crunch and Wheaties.

@linguaphile

Regarding the Trinity concept:

Q. How many Christians does it take to change a light bulb?

A. Three but, um, they are really one.

She is correct that the original / essential meanings are metaphorical, and are about personal spirituality rather than literal fantasy idols to worship. Jesus’ crucifixion is an example to show us how to relate to mortality, and not at all “you have to believe that Jesus died for your sins or you will burn in hell” at all.

Biblical literalism is a big mistake.

So too is interpreting Biblical messages in a modern context.

So too is not realizing the parables are there to shake you up and show people (2000 years ago) the errors of their thinking and NOT as positive examples of what to do.

For example, the modern meeting of “good Samaritan” is someone who selflessly does good deeds. The parable of the good Samaritan is to show its audience that their vilification of all Samaritans is an error, by telling a story about a Samaritan who treated a Jew in need better than the Jews did, despite the enmity between the two groups.

It’s not just a 17th Century change, though – people were missing the points and misinterpreting things since before Jesus died.

Thanks for your answers. For those who go along with Armstrong, what are we to make of the idea of salvation, which I, as an outsider, always took to be the defining principle of Christianity? At what point did the idea of salvation become prominent? What message does Christianity have without it? Is there a way of interpreting the idea of salvation without referring to an afterlife?

Aquinas and St. Augustine had a completely different concept of salvation than the Puritans did. The concept of salvation that many evangelicals have now started, pretty much, with the Puritans (i.e. Jonathan Edward’s Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God)

Before that, salvation was an ongoing process, not a one-time make-or-break event.

I agree with @linguaphile. In the church I grew up in, the concept was referred to as “righteousness by faith”, being where you are saved purely for believing, or “righteousness by works”, where you are saved through penance, assisting the poor, a certain number of Hail Marys etc. However they were missing the point. In earlier Christianity salvation was not achieved through works, the works were implemented to help a person reach a particular state of mind. Monks isolated themselves not because the pain of rejecting the world somehow saved them, but because the whole hearted focus drew them closer to God.

Found an article about another book Karen Armstrong wrote.

@linguaphile I have a copy of that on my dining room table, waiting for me to get to it. I love her writing.

@linguaphile , My feeling about the connection between religion and warfare is that religion has historically served to reinforce the tribalism that leads to war. In pagan societies especially, it is pretty difficult to find a dividing line between politics and religion. The assumption was that if your side was conquered, then the gods of the other side were superior and you therefore adopted the religion of your conquerors. Nobody could understand why the Jews held onto their religion through multiple conquests.

@LostInParadise What @linguaphile and @FireMadeFlesh said.

The “salvation and afterlife” interpretation is (I and many scholars would say) a twisting of the original message of original sin, so that it becomes something headed in the direction of devolving into something like, “all humans are bad by nature, and doomed to burn in hell for eternity unless they say they ‘accept Jesus Christ™ as their savior’ and then they get to go to paradise and live happily ever after.’ The Catholic church capitalized on this rather extortionist interpretation for centuries, carving it into our cultural heritage while extracting massive wealth selling forgiveness and indulgences.

The stories of original sin, resurrection, salvation, and rebirth are a remix of earlier religious stories which were about transcending ego attachments, finding divinity in oneself, connection with the world, and the cycle of death and rebirth.

…“transcending ego attachments, finding divinity in oneself, connection with the world, and the cycle of death and rebirth…” That is the core of most religions, really!

Off the top of my head, this is very similar to the Buddhist theology, isn’t it?

How then does Christianity differ from Buddhism or any other modern religion? Can a person be an atheist and go along with what you say? I, as an atheist, can accept most of it, though I am not sure what it means to find divinity in myself. Dawkins’ criticism is that Armstrong’s religion is so watered down that it ceases to be a religion.

@LostInParadise Dawkins can’t tell anyone whether they believe in a god or not. This is an old atheist saw, that if you believe this little, that you may as well not believe at all. Until reading your comments, I thought this sort of condescension was reserved for agnostics. ;)

I kid when I call it condescension, though – I do tend to agree that most self-proclaimed agnostics might as well come out and call themselves atheists. Many people I have met choose to call themselves agnostics when they can’t be bothered to decide what to think. I have met many agnostics here on Fluther who have thought about it a great deal – and I respect the label in such cases. Karen Armstrong has considered her own faith more profoundly than most, and I do not say this lightly. I think if she were an atheist, she would not only know it, she would be forthright about it.

My point is that I have no problem going along with @linguaphile ‘s list, apart from the matter of finding divinity from within, whose meaning I do not understand. I nevertheless remain an atheist. If Armstrong has nothing more to add to the list, then I would have to regard her as an atheist as well. I know that she says that the nature of religion goes beyond words. If that is the case then there quite literally nothing to talk about.

In many cases there is not much distinction between agnostics and atheists. Technically, I would have to say that I am an agnostic. I can’t say with 100% absolute certainty that there is no God, but then I can’t say with 100% certainty that the sun will come up tomorrow. There is, however, nothing that I do that is predicated on either the possibility that there is a God or that the sun will not rise.

@LostInParadise I think you’re confusing terms, between the modern concept of God as a singular entity, and Armstrong’s concept of God as the unexplainable infinite. Sure, she doesn’t appear to believe in an individual being called God, but according to mediaeval Christianity God is Being rather than a being. And in that sense, she believes. Dawkins isn’t a great philosopher though, and tends to use the “No True Scotsman” fallacy to argue against a single form of Christianity rather than taking account of sometimes drastic differences in belief. But her belief is hard for the modern mind to accept, since we’ve been told all our lives about a God who is “out there” as a physical being, when in fact much of the Bible is probably only written that way to make it accessible to ordinary people, rather than a high philosophy text. That is why the early Church did not recommend reading without the assistance of a priest, although this principle unfortunately turned into an aid for their greatest abuses.

As far as the atheist vs. agnostic labelling goes, I don’t think an atheist needs to show 100% certainty. An atheist can say “I don’t know for sure if there are gods or not, but I think it is unlikely”, while an agnostic would say “I don’t know if there are gods or not, and I cannot say whether it is likely or unlikely.”

@LostInParadise

Christianity differs from Buddhism in its history, stories, characters, practices, teachings, texts, monotheism, non-cyclical life, and the specific factions and communities, which do almost all inherit much from Catholicism, including very heavy emphasis (even definition) on Jesus’ resurrection and what it means. The Christian religion and communities do tend to be very focused on saying their idols and doctrines are the right ones, and that one’s immortal soul is in danger and that accepting Jesus is the path to salvation, etc. That’s the religion, but the original spiritual intent is a different thing.

I feel that the core spiritual intent of almost every spiritual tradition (and thus the religions built on them) is basically the same, and involves transcending earthly ego concerns and becoming enlightened and one with the world, and so at peace, and able to peacefully let go of our attachment even to our life and peacefully accept whatever comes, even death and what may come after. The specific stories and teachings are just the details of means to an end.

(By the way, the historical Jesus was an educated man who grew up in a trade city on the spice road and so was exposed to various spiritual traditions including Buddhism.)

As for religion, it is not needed for a spiritual life, and it may get in the way, particularly for an educated modern Westerner surrounded by so many dysfunctional, tragic and conflicting religious messages. I may be wrong, but I don’t think Jesus would have said he was religious, in the sense I mean it. That is, not belonging to an organized social group with idolized writings and idols and physical artifacts and ranks and doctrines and so on. They can be useful tools, but they can also get in the way. Many of the most spiritually hard-core early Christians would go live in the wilderness (deserts, mountains, caves) to avoid distractions from their spiritual paths, which is basically like being a yogi in other traditions.

“Finding divinity in yourself” is a realization that can come when you for example shed your ego identity and attachments, identify as being an inseparable part of the universe, and realize that includes being a part of the cause of things and the invention of meanings, that you’re not a separate creature struggling against the plight of being one beast in a harsh universe, but that you’re part of creation, and whatever happens is ok and other insights that bring a lot of peace and possibility. Jesus demonstrated this as an example to follow in his surrender to crucifixion and his ascension. Again, it’s a good example of a parable to shake up our thinking and not a suggestion to go get martyred. But that is the actual original metaphorical meaning of the crucifixion – and certainly not to treat him as an idol and object of worship, or to think of ourselves as bad and in need of proclaiming our belief that he gave himself to redeem us and that we are therefore “saved” from eternal torment in hell. No way! The point was that we are all bigger than that and don’t need to fear death if we get his example. Jesus didn’t “take the fall to buy us a pass if we believe.” Original Sin is a metaphor for the mistake of getting wrapped up in our lives and material attachments, and if we don’t follow his example of tuning out of that, our souls will suffer all right, but because we get stuck in a self-tormenting frame of mind worried about our mortality and credit card debts and so on.

I can accept all of these beliefs, but I do not see where God has anything to do with them. I steadfastly remain an atheist. If what you outline is what Karen Armstrong believes then she is atheist too. As near as I can make it out, Karen Armstrong’s concept of God is something akin to having an imaginary friend,. where you are perfectly aware that the relationship is imaginary. If that makes her happy that is fine with me, but imaginary friend is not the same as actual being.

@LostInParadise Regarding God as an imaginary friend is to remain trapped in the modern idea of God. He is the infinite, so to think of him as an extremely powerful person is still to limit him, and defy the definition.

That doesn’t mean he doesn’t exist, it means that the popular concept is wrong. Clarifying the definition has absolutely no impact on the argument of existence.

I appreciate your point of view and do not wish to argue with it. What I do want to discuss is Karen Armstrong’s point of view, which seems to have a lot of followers. Armstrong says that whether or not God exists is unimportant and that what counts is whether or not we believe in God. To be as kind as possible to this point of view, I would say that she is using God as a metaphor or rhetorical device. If I were to be less charitable, I would say she is talking nonsense.

Here is a quote from page 118 of Armstrong’s book, History of God.

Today many people in the West would be dismayed if a leading theologian suggested that God was in some profound sense a product of the imagination. Yet it should be obvious that the imagination is the chief religious faculty. It has been defined by Jean-Paul Sartre as the ability to think of what is not. {39} Human beings are the only animals who have the capacity to envisage something that is not present or something that does not yet exist but which is merely possible. The imagination has thus been the cause of our major achievements in science and technology as well as in art and religion. The idea of God,however it is defined, is perhaps the prime example of an absent reality which, despite its inbuilt problems, has continued to inspire men and women for thousands of years. The only way we can conceive of God, who remains imperceptible to the senses and to logical proof, is by means of symbols, which it is the chief function of the imaginative mind to interpret.

@LostInParadise Armstrong is a former nun speaking in a Christian context. I haven’t read more of her than what’s been written here, but she seems to be saying that people may as well, if they choose, continue to relate to God the way they have, even if they also appreciate that the Bible is metaphorical and not literally about a male humanoid god figure.

(I would also say she is almost certainly wrong that, “Human beings are the only animals who have the capacity to envisage something that is not present or something that does not yet exist but which is merely possible.”)

I don’t know what Armstrong would suggest for atheists, but I would say “to each their own”, and that it would be counter-productive for most people who identify as atheist, to “try to believe in the existence of God” per se. To atheists interested in what Christianity has to offer them, I would suggest reading “God” as “the universe” or “all that is”.

@LostInParadise What I have been describing is my understanding of the older Christian understanding of God, before the ridiculous modern notion of what is essentially a philosophical Superman took hold. The little I know of Armstrong is what I have read since responding to this thread.

Given that quote, I can understand why she may be regarded as an atheist. Certainly she seems to regard God as, in part, a useful psychological tool. In that sense God is reduced to a memeplex, which is a very non-Christian idea. God cannot be co-dependent on human consciousness and remain God. However the impression I get from that quote is that she would like to amend Jean-Paul Sartre’s quote to read ‘the ability to think of what is not present’. She is noting the apparent absence of God from the day to day affairs of the world, and the fact that God defies reason as we understand it in the Enlightenment tradition. Therefore abstract reasoning in the form of imagination is required to understand God. This starts to look a lot like Aquinas’ Argument from Contingency.

But I’d hate to put words in her mouth. I’m just playing with the idea.

Also like @Zaku I disagree with the animals idea. If it is not completely wrong, it is at least impossible to demonstrate, given our lack of access to the internal cognitive environments of other animals.

Going off a bit on a tangent, when I read Sartre I wondered about his assertion concerning animals. I do agree that the concept of nothingness is a prerequisite for consciousness, but does having this concept automatically make you have consciousness? If you leave your pet dog alone at home and it gets mopey because it has nobody to play with, is the dog actually thinking about you, or is it incapable of such thoughts? Maybe someday neuroscientists will be able to answer this question.

@LostInParadise You may be interested in this article, and one of the studies it mentions. I’m quite sure they’re feeling the full range of emotions we are, just with different inputs and judgements.

I made a video in college about this concept…

Imagine a lake the size of Lake Superior. Imagine 1000 people standing around the lake at different points with buckets of different sizes- some large, some small. Each person walks away with a bucket.

God is the lake, the water in the buckets are religions. What people put into the bucket is dogma. When someone sees another bucket that looks different than theirs, they will fight to protect the integrity of their own bucket.

@LostInParadise My hope is that some day, neuroscientists will ascend to the level of perceptive pet owners in their appreciation of animal consciousness.