There are many words of wisdom in the Old and New Testament, as well as in the Koran and the Talmud. The Jewish Mishnaic tractate of ‘Eduyot’ says: “Your actions bring you closer, and your actions bring you further”, which simply and most wisely implies, “Judge things individually”. There are good things done by various religious people, and there are bad things performed by religious people. There are good things done by various secular people, and there are bad things carried out by secular people. If someone acts in a way that deserves criticism according to your opinion, then it’s okay to criticize that someone, whether he or she is a religious person or a secular one.

A somewhat related topic, but of a different ilk, has to do with associating the religious behavior of a group of people with having special protection from God. Religious Jews will generally tell you that it’s specifically their religious habits (especially following the Bible and keeping the Sabbath), which have kept the continuous existence of the Jewish people over the years. This follows the idea that it pays to be faithful, because it guards your community. Many Muslims will boast the fact that Islam has united them and their peoples, and will also claim divine safekeeping.

In a way, the above statements are right. A group’s tendency to live in relative isolation has always contributed to the survival of the group as a whole, with or without relation to any religion. Nevertheless, there are a few important points to note in this strange competition for celestial protection:

• Religion contributes to its own survival. There’s no wonder it works – this is what religion is built to do. A large part of religious content is tailored especially to protect the religious belief against external influences, regardless of them being true or false, good or bad.
• The survival and protection of the group is not the same as the survival and protection of the people. Many ancient nations have not survived, but their descendants live happily among us today as Muslims, Jews, Americans, French, Germans or whatever, time and again being very proud of their current people’s history.
• Furthermore, even groups and nations that have survived are generally different from their ancestors. During the years, habits and customs have changed. Some have changed slightly and others have been drastically altered. In most cases even the genes (i.e., the race) have been mixed with those of other peoples and groups.
• An old culture may wonder about its own survival and seek reasons for it. However, by definition, there will always be only those who survived – that is what survival is all about. Those who didn’t make it, for whatever reasons, are not here with us to philosophize on the matter, regardless of their original belief being more right or wrong. In other words: Where there is a finite set of nations, there must be a most ancient one. There is no reason to wonder that something that must happen has happened.
• For a group of people, being more ancient than another group does not entitle them to anything more or better. There are no points collected and no game to win. Just a little bit of pride (which is not bad in itself). Generally speaking, it should be more important to look ahead and plan for the future than to advocate the past.
• If keeping religious commands is associated with things happening to the group, then why only connect it to the survival of the group? It can be associated just the same with the suffering of the members of the group over the years, which has been unfortunately true in the Jewish case as well as (recently) in the Muslim case.
• And finally, with our modern world becoming amazingly and rapidly smaller, it seems that given enough time – perhaps hundreds even thousands of years from now – the ethnic issue will simply die of natural causes. That is, if mankind does not succeed in exterminating itself sooner.

Some researchers view monotheism (the belief in a single god) in the Western religions, as a root of arrogance, which leads to racism: Your gods are not legitimate, only ours is, hence we are superior to you.

A famous joke explains how cheap it is to call God on the phone from a certain location, because it’s a local call. The exact location depends greatly on the person telling the joke. It could be Ireland. It could be Jerusalem. It could be Alberta, Canada. It could be other places.

Are we special? Sure! We’re all special! We are human beings!! This is what makes us special. We should not forget and should not violate this uniqueness, by strange and foolish attitudes towards other human beings.

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“Us, and them. And after all we’re only ordinary men.” – ‘Us and Them’, Pink Floyd, Roger Waters

Using passive voice is a great thing, a must for skillful politicians and salesmen. “Promised Land” and “Chosen People” are both amazing expressions without needing to explain who promised and who chose.

So, who are God’s chosen people? In what way are they chosen? The answer depends of-course on whom you ask. Many faithful Christians will say that the Jews used to be the chosen ones, until they abandoned the real faith, thus “the truth abandoned them and took refuge in the Church” (St. Ambrose). Many religious Jews simply know they’ve never ceased to be the “chosen ones”. Some of them may even explain about the myth of the Jewish genius. The faithful Muslims, not very surprisingly, seem to know a whole different story of choice.

Certain Melanists believe that the black pigment called melanin, in our skin, contributes to our intellect and spirituality. Guess who promotes this theory? You guessed right – this theory is promoted mainly by some black people. The Ku Klux Klan (KKK), on the other hand, believes that white people are inherently superior to any other race, and that they are following the Bible in doing God’s work. In fact, they’ve often used the religious symbol of the cross for various activities… The Nazis believed that the Aryan race was superior, and acted to exterminate supposedly inferior races such as the Jews.

Rest assured, each of the above has brought a wealth of evidence to support the appropriate claims. Yet, there are a few interesting questions to be asked in this context.

Does God check your genes? Or is it your behavior that determines your being chosen? According to St. Ambrose mentioned above, it’s clearly the behavior of the Jewish people that disqualified them from being “chosen”. According to the Orthodox Jews, there is a clear option to join the chosen group by going through the process of proper conversion to Judaism. What’s a proper conversion? Ahhh… weeks of Israeli parliamentary activity has been spent on this issue.

According to Jewish Orthodoxy, the definition of a Jew is someone whose mother is a Jew, or someone who has been converted to Judaism the Orthodox way. Every experienced software programmer will tell you the problems concerned with the recursive nature of this definition. In simple words: Verifying the Jewish-ness of the mother is in essence the same task all over again.

It gets more complicated, since, for instance, an Orthodox Jew will not consider the conversion process done by a Reform rabbi as proper (but not necessarily the other way around). Conversely, for Muslims, the chosen genes are generally attached to the father. This may of-course raise various flavors of strange situations when one parent is officially Jewish, and the other is Muslim.

However, if Judaism is generally inherited, it makes one wonder how come Jews from African countries are darker? And why is there a large percentage of Jews with blonde hair in Russia? Evolution doesn’t work that fast. Apparently, whilst the Israeli parliament and its religious parties were not watching, there have been some, well, you know…

Racism is bad – most people will tell you this. Yet this confusion between genes and way of life has been known to produce false accusations of racism. For example: Is it okay to criticize certain religious beliefs and customs, or is it racism? Does Islam, just as an example, represent a race of people (or several specific races), and it is therefore wrong to speak against? Do the ultra-Orthodox Jews constitute a race, or is it valid to claim they’re wrong and criticize their habits? And what about the Amish? The Zulu? Others?

The question is not purely theoretical – it may have practical implications: If I run a factory that needs seven-day shift workers, is it legitimate to reject the candidacy of an Orthodox Jew who refuses to work on the Sabbath? How come it’s considered okay, for the wine industry in Israel, to employ solely Orthodox Jewish men in the wine manufacturing process (in this case, for the employees not to work on the Sabbath is one of the requirements, in order to get the kosher stamp for the wine)?

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“England and America are two countries separated by a common language.” – George Bernard Shaw

Religion deserves a dictionary of its own, and indeed there are already quite a few. However, they typically use a very serious approach. How about something lighter, but one that still carries the correct meaning of things?

So here it comes – The Ultimate Religious Dictionary:

Angel – An alien humanoid of male gender, with wings and knowledge of the Bible. Typically guards the righteous (see ‘Righteous’).

Ape – Charles Darwin’s grandfather.

Bless – Recite ancient text while looking as if you’re making an effort.

Christian – (if the speaker is a Christian:) A good man; (if the speaker is a religious Jew:) A pagan; (if the speaker is a Muslim:) A criminal and a conqueror.

Church – A place where God wants us to be without hats.

Democracy – A regime that conducts elections.

Dinosaur – A non-existing animal, part of some anti-religious scheme.

Evolution – A fantasy designed by some poor lunatics in order to demonstrate their hate of the truth (see ‘Hate’, ‘Truth’).

Freedom – Your option to choose what your priest or rabbi or sheikh tells you.

God – (There’s no definition to this word, but you’re supposed to understand it anyway.)

Hate – Possessing non-religious opinions; Opposing the religious way of life; Criticizing religious beliefs.

Heretic – One who dares to say things, which religious literature defines as heresy, regardless of their meaning and content.

Jew – (if the speaker is a religious Jew:) A good man, if religious; a potentially good man, if non-religious; (if the speaker is Muslim:) a conqueror with American friends; (if the speaker is Christian:) a chosen person who might or might not abandon the right way.

Kangaroo – An animal that swam all the way from Noah’s Ark to Australia, some 4000 years ago.

Kosher – Food (and sometimes other things) stamped by a well-paid person, who has learned kosher rules (see ‘Learn’).

Learn – Study the text of the Bible and other religious literature; Practice logic rules that appear in ancient religious texts (such as the Talmud) as long as the outcome is identical to the one that is found in the text.

Love – Converting one’s belief to religion (‘Love of Israel’ – converting one’s belief to Orthodox Judaism).

Messiah – An unclear title, for which there is a strong competition between Jesus of Nazareth, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson of Chabad-Lubavitch, and a futuristic stranger riding a white donkey.

Miracle – Something that perhaps happens and that makes you feel good if it happens.

Mosque – A place where God wants us to be with no shoes on.

Muslim – (if the speaker is a Muslim:) A good man; (if the speaker is a Christian:) A terrorist; (if the speaker is a religious Jew:) A somewhat primitive religious person.

Pluralism – Justification for missionary activity.

Protein – The evidence for evolutionists’ conspiracy.

Psalms – A Jewish medicine for everything. Since the Gulf War in 1991 it has been known to stop missiles.

Pure – Exercising not having sex for a long time; not being dead; not during menstruation.

Purpose – The plan designed for the future of a thing or a person in the blueprint of the universe drawn by God.

Righteous – A person, typically a male, who performs religious rituals in detail.

Save – A Christian flavor of ‘Love’ (See ‘Love’).

Sex – Something that God lets you get away with, under certain conditions.

Strengthen – Act in a way that encourages others not to think rationally.

Sun – A big source of light created after Earth, circling Earth ever since.

Synagogue – A place where God wants us to be with hats.

Tradition – A logical method of proving things beyond doubt.

Truth – Anything that correlates with the speaker’s belief.

Unity – A situation where everybody follows my religious rules.

Okay. Now you may put the book aside, have a short break, freshen up and come back soon invigorated.

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“In India, as elsewhere in our darkening world, religion is the poison in the blood. Where religion intervenes, mere innocence is no excuse. Yet we go on skating around this issue, speaking of religion in the fashionable language of “respect”.” – Salman Rushdie

“Where one burns books, one will soon burn people.” – Heinrich Heine

You may have heard that some Christians have a thing against Harry Potter. Rev. John Hagee, the famous pastor from San Antonio, Texas, devoted several of his shows to battling “the great evil of Harry Potter”, as part of his war against so-called witchcraft.

Certain Christians find the justification they need for such a battle in the New Testament:

“Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils; Speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with a hot iron;” (1 Timothy, chapter 4, verses 1-2)

Whether Harry Potter encourages kids to delve into witchcraft (as claimed by some parent organizations across the US) is yet to be seen. One should wonder what is witchcraft anyway – not too many parents seem to ban Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, though similar reasoning may apply in this case. Does it sound too absurd? Not if you ask Rev. George Bender of the Harvest Assembly of God Church. On March 2001, the congregation gathered around a bonfire in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and burned Harry Potter books, together with Disney videos such as Pinocchio, some rock CDs and literature from other religions. The act was naturally justified as based on the Bible.

In various states in the US (especially in the south) there is a history of book banning. All over the world many Orthodox Jews have banned the New Testament itself. In recent years the issue of Harry Potter has appeared in several Jewish discussions because a central part of Judaism is the 613 Mitzvot (613 commandments) derived from the Bible, of which the 62nd one reads: “Thou shalt not suffer a sorceress to live” (Exodus, chapter 22, verse 17).

Burning witches in the past millennium was more of a Christian business. Yet, burning printed material and destroying other precious things – in the name of religion – has been the business of others as well. Islamic revolutions, such as the one in Sudan during the late 80s, experienced breaking and destroying many bottles of wine and other forbidden alcoholic beverages. The destruction of the huge stone Buddhas by the Taliban in Afghanistan in 2001 shook the civilized world. The famous Egyptian Sphinx escaped a similar Fatwah (a religious edict) in the beginning of 2006. The Satanic Verses, a famous book by Salman Rushdie, was for Iran’s Ayatollah Khomeini much more than what Harry Potter has been for Rev. John Hagee. In 1989, the now deceased leader of Iran declared that the book was blasphemous, and called for the death of Mr. Rushdie. Salman Rushdie went into hiding, with the protection of the British government. A million dollar reward was offered for Rushdie’s murder, and worldwide, many people associated with the book’s publishing were physically attacked.

It seems that some religious leaders are eager to limit the possibilities for the flock under their care to even know of other things, whether factual or fictitious. Not knowing seems to be a major part of not believing. Is religious belief so fragile that it needs to be nurtured all the time?

The issue is even deeper – it’s related again to the sensitive matter of believing vs. knowing. If people knew (scientifically speaking) about a God above who enjoyed our doing certain things, then there wouldn’t be any real reason to prevent them from reading opposing literature and opinions. Hence the very existence of the thought police is the best indication for the need for its existence. Guard and protect – this is one of religion’s self-defense mechanisms.

Orthodox Judaism generally forbids causing any harm to written religious texts. A hand-written official Bible even gets a proper burial ceremony if damaged. Yet, there seems to be a good excuse for anything when it’s arbitrarily deemed necessary. For example: When written by a heretic, the book should to be burned.

In the year 2000, a small Israeli organization named Daat Emet (Knowing the Truth) compiled and distributed interesting pamphlets among ultra-Orthodox Jewish communities in Israel. Most of the content of those pamphlets consisted of actual quotes from traditional Jewish religious literature, such as the Talmud, and even the Bible. However, the material was well organized in a way that demonstrated numerous contradictions and factual errors in the ancient texts.

The people who compiled the pamphlets obviously had a background in Judaism. Their purpose in creating the pamphlets was simple: Encourage people to raise doubts and be able to criticize, while talking their own language, using the very same texts that are studied on a day-to-day basis.

The response to the pamphlets was in many instances quite extreme and varied from public slander to actual violence. In several cases, the pamphlets were gathered and burned in public. Needless to say, in privacy many religious people did read the forbidden material, just as many of John Hagee’s followers probably read Harry Potter and many Iranians read Salman Rushdie.

With a bit of luck, this book will be banned as well.

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Man: It’s the influence of television. Yeah, now Marshall McLuhan deals with it in terms of it being a-a high, uh, high intensity, you understand? A hot medium … as opposed to a …

Singer: What I wouldn’t give for a large sock o’ horse manure.

Man: … as opposed to a print …

Singer: (addressing the audience) What do you do when you get stuck in a movie line with a guy like this behind you? I mean it’s just maddening!

Man: (addressing the audience) Wait a minute, why can’t I give my opinion? It’s a free country!

Singer: I mean, d- He can give you- Do you hafta give it so loud? I mean, aren’t you ashamed to pontificate like that? And-and the funny part of it is, M-Marshall McLuhan, you don’t know anything about Marshall McLuhan’s…work!

Man: Wait a minute! Really? Really? I happen to teach a class at Columbia called “TV Media and Culture”! So I think that my insights into Mr. McLuhan – well, have a great deal of validity.

Singer: Oh, do yuh?

Man: Yes.

Singer: Well, that’s funny, because I happen to have Mr. McLuhan right here. So … so, here, just let me – I mean, all right. Come over here … a second.

Man: Oh.

Singer: (To McLuhan) Tell him.

McLuhan: (To the man) I hear – I heard what you were saying. You- you know nothing of my work. You mean my whole fallacy is wrong. How you ever got to teach a course in anything is totally amazing.

Singer: (addressing the audience) Boy, if life were only like this!

Taking it even one step further: A Biblical verse, if containing some controversial idea, will most likely be criticized or dismissed as “misunderstood” when quoted by a non-religious person (try it – it’s fun). The interpretation in this case may often be proposed as a wrong one. However, the same verse may get lots of attention, perhaps even hours of lecture time when presented by a religious authority. The interpretation then is not to be argued, even if it’s similar to the previous one.

The issue of the alleged divinity of the sages has another interesting perspective. Theoretically speaking, there are two contradicting options: Either those who wrote the Talmud, for instance, were speaking the actual words of God, or they simply wrote whatever was on their human minds. If they did quote the Almighty on everything, then this raises considerable doubts about His Holiness’ knowledge of the world he’d created. Doesn’t he know insects are not formed of human sweat (the tractate of ‘Shabbos’)? Doesn’t he know cats and birds don’t carry poison in their fingernails (the tractate of ‘Chulin’)? Isn’t he aware of the fact that the trachea does not reach the heart and the liver (again the tractate of ‘Chulin’)? Doesn’t he know rabbits, hares and badgers don’t ruminate (the books of Leviticus and Deuteronomy)? Is he confused about the relative movement of the Sun and the Earth (the tractate of ‘Pesachim’)? Hell, he can’t even properly count the verses of his own Bible (the tractate of ‘Kidushin’)! And there are many more similar examples!

On the other hand, if they simply wrote whatever was on their earthly minds, then why follow the ancient dictated rules? Why follow commands that were perhaps more appropriate for the era when they were written? Why not adopt an updated codex of rules, made also by humans – but humans who are equipped with modern knowledge of our recent time? And even more importantly: Why not allow the questioning and changing of the old man-made rules?

Even if we do distinguish (as some people do) between the Biblical text and the later extensions – as it happens, most of the religious day-to-day rituals and rules are derived from those extensions and not from the original Bible. This is certainly true for Islam, Christianity and Judaism.

So we make good use of our ancient messengers, our “middle men”. In practice, they are our gods much more than the concept we use to name as such.

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“Wise men make proverbs, but fools repeat them.” – Samuel Palmer

How do we know God wants us to refrain from stealing from others? How can we be so sure the Almighty is against adultery? After all, it’s kind of difficult to pinpoint any individual meeting with him (her? them?) recently. Yet, millions of people seem to know exactly what this mysterious super-power requires from them, to the very last detail.

Not to worry. Where the distance between God and man appears to be too big, there comes the messenger. He is typically a male figure. He carries with him some impressive personality and often also certain extreme physical characteristics. Painters and sculptors love him. He seems to have had breakfast with God every other day. What’s much more important – he has been dead for quite a while now, so there’s no way to really ask him about God’s favorite kind of coffee. Some say he’ll come back one day, as part of the overall deal, so there’s another good reason to follow his messages.

We call them “prophets”, “saviors”, “sages” and “Messiahs”. We name them “Moses”, “Jesus”, “Eliyahu”, “Muhammad”, and other ancient names. It’s easier for us to relate to their human appearance and to the tangible texts they allegedly left behind, than to some abstract God. They of-course penetrate our mind at a young age, together in the same package with heaven, angels and respect to the unknown.

So, not all men are created equal. If you ask the Christians, not all men are even created men – some are genetically related to God (hmmm). Actually, the Hebrew Bible also mentions “sons of gods” in various places (Genesis, Psalms), which seems to be inherited from older Canaanite texts. The Jews have it organized a bit differently: The sages are said to be closer to God and succeeding generations are said to lessen in spiritual power – thus simply reversing the facts of human and cultural development.

Our tendency to look for cosmic conspiracies makes it easy for us to glorify ancient events as well as old heroes. The stories about them are found here and now, but their human weaknesses are not visible to us. Can you imagine your favorite hero in some embarrassing situations? Perhaps cheating someone, having a sexual fantasy, or even suffering from diarrhea? Instead we typically imagine them with shiny eyes, standing powerfully in a high spot, speaking words of guidance.

Alas, even the words they speak in our books are not necessarily their own words. We almost take for granted the way modern media and politics alter what leaders and politicians have to say. Yet we totally ignore the fact that this trend has not been recently invented. Putting words in someone else’s mouth is a very old art. Modern studies demonstrate many such cases in the Jewish Talmud, for example. It requires a great measure of naivety to assume the absolute integrity of any ancient text, especially one that deals with people.

If you came across the legendary British TV series “Yes, Minister” (and later named, “Yes, Prime Minister”) – lucky you! Manipulating someone else’s words can be done directly, but the more elegant and stealth way to do it is to reinterpret the meaning. You can say almost anything you want about someone’s words as long as he or she is not there to defend their original meaning. The Talmud is literally full with “X said Y but he actually meant Z”. The sentence gets extra strength when the interpreter himself (never herself!) is also considered sacred enough.

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