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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The phenomenon of double meaning is a popular thing to rely on, often innocently. Religious preachers can and often do manipulate the text at will in this way. Many times it is accompanied by hinting that those who lack religious education are not qualified to properly understand the text. Is ‘thy hand shall be first upon him to put him to death’ so difficult to understand? Which word specifically is difficult to understand?

This phenomenon becomes annoying when many people are actually speaking the words without giving much attention to the semantics. Every Passover, millions of Jews read (aloud) the “Haggadah”. Many of them reach the paragraph that requests God to:

“Pour out thy wrath upon the nations that know thee not and upon the kingdoms that call not upon thy name … Pour out thy fury upon them, and may the kindling of thine anger overtake them. Pursue them with anger and destroy them from under God’s skies.”

Not too many of the celebrators really bother to pause and think about the real meaning of what they say. Most have never intended any major harm for other nations and kingdoms. They just say these words as part of the ceremony. Some may even know about the history of this paragraph, associated with the Crusades in the 12th century.

Religious leaders or scholars often attempt to soften such hard messages, explaining about the different contexts in which they originated, or about various ways to interpret the words. Others take a different approach – they do understand it literally, and even explain it as such to others (e.g., Abdullah el-Faisal and Ovadia Yosef), but they largely choose not to perform the associated acts themselves. Sometimes there is even a separation between what should be done according to the holy scripts vs. what should be done in reality. The Jewish religion explicitly talks about “Dina de-malchuta dina” – Aramaic for “The law of the land is the law” (which must be observed as long as it doesn’t conflict directly with the religious law). Thus creating a strange mixture of ancient and modern rules.

You can observe such a way of thought and conflict resolution in the “Shulchan Aruch” itself. When it discusses the killing of heretics, it elaborates:

“…He would act against them with cunning, causing their death. If he would see one of them falling into a well, and the ladder is in the well, first he would remove the ladder and say, ‘I must take my son down off the roof, and I’ll bring it back to you’, or some such thing.”

Peace loving in the Christian holy texts should not be taken for granted as well. Note what Jesus has to say when not too many people are around:

“Do not think that I came to bring peace on the earth; I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I came to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law;” (Matthew, chapter 10, verses 34-35)

As expected, the softer interpretation of this passage talks about preaching for the preference of a religious path over certain aspects of family bonds.

Towards the end of the previous millennium the world learned about a new phenomenon: Islamic suicide bombers. As always, things started in and around the Holy Land and were quickly associated with religious justification. If you kill yourself for Allah, then seventy-two virgins will be waiting to serve you in heaven. That is, if you’re a male, of-course.

At first, the Muslim leaders were very much against female suicide bombers. The Koran forbade it. However, the beginning of the new millennium introduced several such heretic ladies in the Middle East. Left with no choice, the local Muslim religious leaders did what religious leaders do best: They bent the religious rules to suit their needs. Suddenly it was all right for a woman to be a suicide bomber, because there were also certain Muslim females who fought in Muhammad’s time. Female suicide bombers were promised, though, only a single lover in heaven. Sex discrimination seems to follow you long after you’re dead.

In mid-2003, the well-known Saudi Sheikh Nasser bin Hamd al-Fahad issued a Fatwah (a religious edict) legitimizing the use of weapons of mass destruction against the United States. It was again based on his interpretation of Muhammad’s words.

It’s debatable whether religions actually kill, but undoubtedly many people have died because of religion.

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“I have always thought the actions of men the best interpreters of their thoughts.” – John Locke

In 2003, Sheikh Abdullah el-Faisal was put in jail for nine years. The judge recommended that el-Faisal, from Stratford in east London (UK), should serve at least half of the sentence and then be deported. Abdullah el-Faisal had attended Brixton Mosque, in south London, and was jailed for urging his audience to kill Jews, Hindus and Americans.

During his trial, el-Faisal took a somewhat surprising approach. He argued that the words he had used were taken from the Koran – the Muslim holy book. The case was presented as if the Koran itself was on trial. However, the judge – Peter Beaumont – told the court: “It does not afford him a defense in law … any more or less than any similar citations from anyone else’s holy book, including the Bible, would be”.

In fact, the killing of unbelievers does appear in the Koran in one way or another. The Koran has Surahs that explicitly instructs to “cast terror into the hearts of the unbelievers”. Resisting Islam is punishable by death or other physical body injuries, and holy war (known as Jihad) is encouraged against those who reject Islam.

Some Muslim scholars explained that the words should not always be interpreted literally, and that the problem lies in the ways old metaphoric text is applied to our modern world.

About half a year later, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef in his weekly sermon in Israel announced that religious Orthodox Jewish Yeshiva students should not be scorned, and that it is allowed to kill those who scorn them. The announcement was aimed at certain political rivals, but nevertheless took place and was made by a person who spiritually led hundreds of thousands.

Similarly to Mr. el-Faisal, Mr. Yosef was also equipped with some holy texts. The Bible, as well as several later Jewish religious verdicts, explicitly allow and encourage the killing of other Jews who are occupied with heresy. Just a few examples:

“If thy brother, the son of thy mother, or thy son, or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom, or thy friend, that is as thine own soul, entice thee secretly, saying: ‘Let us go and serve other gods,’ which thou hast not known, thou, nor thy fathers … thou shalt not consent unto him, nor hearken unto him; neither shall thine eye pity him, neither shalt thou spare, neither shalt thou conceal him; but thou shalt surely kill him; thy hand shall be first upon him to put him to death, and afterwards the hand of all the people. And thou shalt stone him with stones, that he die …” (Deuteronomy, chapter 13, verses 7-11)

“Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate Thee? And do not I strive with those that rise up against Thee? I hate them with utmost hatred; I count them mine enemies.” (Psalms, chapter 139, verses 21-22)

Thus all the important Jewish authorities during the years have ruled that heretics should be killed. The Rambam (Moses Maimonides) literally encouraged the act in the 12th century. Rabbi Yosef Karo compiled the ‘Shulchan Aruch’ (Hebrew for “A Set Table”) in the 16th century. It is considered the most authoritative compilation of Jewish law since the Talmud, and it also explains the issue of killing heretics. This kind of ruling has been followed by several other famous rabbis, as well as by Rabbi Ovadia Yosef.

In a previous chapter we already discussed the vague line that’s drawn between literal and metaphoric interpretation of holy texts. Both the Bible and the Koran have many verdicts that Judge Beaumont would consider worthy. However, it’s the ability to stretch the line according to will, which may prove hazardous to your health, as it did for the late Prime Minister Itzhak Rabin. His assassination in 1995 by Yigal Amir was justified by a religious verdict.

Before Mr. Rabin’s murder, a small group of Orthodox rabbis gave the religious sanction of this act. This was based on two old Jewish religious rules: “Din Rodef” (the duty to kill a Jew who puts at risk the life and property of another Jew) and “Din Moser” (the duty to eliminate a Jew who intends to turn another Jew into non-Jewish authorities).

Of-course, most Jews do not seek heretics to kill and do not decide to murder prime ministers due to religious reasons. Most Muslims do not slaughter Jews, Hindus and Americans. Yet, when the appropriate circumstances are formed for certain individuals, it becomes easy to justify extreme personal preferences by quoting the word of God.

The story of Sir Winston Churchill and the city of Coventry in England became famous about a quarter of a century after the Second World War was over. According to it, Mr. Churchill had certain information from secret intelligence sources, implying that the Germans were going to bomb Coventry. He faced a difficult dilemma: Warning the people of Coventry would mean compromising an extremely important source of intelligence, which would perhaps cost many more lives eventually. He chose not to give the warning. Many people were killed in the attack on Coventry that took place in 1940.

Why is this story important here? Mr. Churchill’s decision was probably based on rational considerations. No offense to Mr. Churchill – Yigal Amir’s decision was largely based on religious reasoning. It is safe to assume that both felt very uneasy taking the decisions. It is also safe to assume that after taking the decision, both felt it was justified. Thus, old religious verdicts may help a killer to consider an act of murder as justified and they may encourage him to think that he is actually saving lives in the long run. With this self-justification, one may find some explanation to the tranquility associated with the behavior of the World Trade Center’s terrorists, for instance. It all depends on how you choose to interpret the meaning of the divine command.

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