Atheism and religion
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Atheism is the lack of belief in a god or gods. The degree to which one can be considered an atheist while simultaneously being and adherent of a sect of a traditionally monotheistic, polytheistic, or non-theistic religion is the subject of ongoing theological debate[citation needed]. Some people with what would be considered religious or spiritual beliefs call themselves atheists; others argue that this is a contradiction in terms.
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[edit] Judaism
In general, formulations of Jewish principles of faith require a belief in God (represented by Judaism's paramount prayer, the Shema). In many modern movements in Judaism, rabbis have generally considered the behavior of a Jew to be the determining factor in whether or not one is considered an adherent of Judaism. Within these movements it is often recognized that it is possible for a Jew to strictly practice Judaism as a faith, while at the same time being an agnostic or atheist, giving rise to the joke: "Q: What do you call a Jew who doesn't believe in God? A: A Jew." It is also worth noting that Reconstructionism does not require any belief in a deity, and that certain popular Reform prayer books, such as Gates of Prayer, offer some services without mention of God.
Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook,[1][2] first Chief Rabbi of the Jewish community in Palestine, held that atheists were not actually denying God: rather, they were denying one of man's many images of God. Since any man-made image of God can be considered an idol, Kook held that, in practice, one could consider atheists as helping true religion burn away false images of God, thus in the end serving the purpose of true monotheism. Few if any atheists accept this point of view.
Some Jewish atheists reject Judaism, but wish to continue identifying themselves with the Jewish people and culture. See, for example, Levin (1995). Jewish atheists who practice Humanistic Judaism embrace Jewish culture and history, rather than belief in a supernatural god, as the sources of their Jewish identity.
[edit] Christianity
By necessity, Christianity, as a theistic and proselytizing religion views atheism as sinful. According to Psalm 14:1, "The fool hath said in his heart, there is no God." Additionally, according to John 3:18-19,
3:18 "Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God's one and only Son.
3:19 "This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil." (NIV)
implying that all who reject the divinity of Jesus (and presumably its attendant theism) do so "because their deeds are evil", rather than evil being a consequence of disbelief.
A famous but idiosyncratic atheistic belief is that of Thomas J. J. Altizer. His book The Gospel of Christian Atheism (1967) proclaims the highly unusual view that God has literally died, or self-annihilated. According to Altizer, this is nevertheless "a Christian confession of faith".[3] Making clear the difference between his position and that of both Nietzsche's notion of the death of God and the stance of theological non-realists, Altizer says:
To confess the death of God is to speak of an actual and real event, not perhaps an event occurring in a single moment of time or history, but notwithstanding this reservation an event that has actually happened both in a cosmic and in a historical sense.[4]
However, many would dispute whether this is an atheist position at all, as belief in a dead God implies that God once existed and was alive. Atheism typically entails a lack of belief that any gods ever existed, as opposed to not existing currently. For further discussion, see Lyas (1970).
There is group with Christian roots whose members include significant numbers of atheists:Unitarian Universalist.
A 2001 survey by Faith Communities Today found that 18% of Unitarian Universalists (UU) consider themselves to be atheists. For comparison, 13% of UUs consider themselves to be Christian, 13% to be Pagan, 16% Buddhist, and 54% Humanist, according to this study.
[edit] Islam
In Islam, atheists are categorized as kafir (كافر), a term that is also used to describe polytheists, and that translates roughly as "denier" or "concealer". The noun kafir carries connotations of blasphemy and disconnection from the Islamic community. In Arabic, "atheism" is generally translated ilhad (إلحاد), although this also means "heresy".
The Quran is silent on the punishment for apostasy, though not the subject itself. The Quran speaks repeatedly of people going back to unbelief after believing, and gives advice on dealing with 'hypocrites':
Sura 9:73,74 - "Prophet, make war on the unbelievers and the hypocrites and deal rigorously with them. Hell shall be their home: an evil fire. They swear by God that they said nothing. Yet they uttered the word of unbelief and renounced Islam after embracing it. They sought to do what they could not attain. Yet they had no reason to be spiteful except perhaps because God and His apostle had enriched them through His bounty. If they repent, it will indeed be better for them, but if they give no heed, God will sternly punish them, both in this world and in the world to come. They shall have none on this earth to protect or help them." [Dawood]
The Hadith expound upon dealing with apostates, whether they become atheist, Christian, Buddhist, etc.:
Bukhari, volume 9, #17 "Narrated Abdullah: Allah's Messenger said, 'The blood of a Muslim who confesses that none has the right to be worshipped but Allah and that I am His Messenger, cannot be shed except in three cases: in Qisas (equality in punishment) for murder, a married person who commits illegal sexual intercourse and the one who reverts from Islam (Apostate) and leaves the Muslims.'"
Bukhari, volume 9, #37 "Narrated Abu Qilaba: Once Umar bin Abdul Aziz sat on his throne in the courtyard of his house so that the people might gather before him....He replied 'By Allah, Allah's messenger never killed anyone except in one of the following three situations: 1) A person who killed somebody unjustly, was killed (in Qisas,) 2) a married person who committed illegal sexual intercourse and, 3) a man who fought against Allah and His messenger, and deserted Islam and became an apostate....'"
Bukhari, volume 9, #57 "Narrated 'Ikrima: Some Zanadiqa (atheists) were brought to 'Ali and he burnt them. The news of this event, reached Ibn 'Abbas who said, "If I had been in his place, I would not have burnt them, as Allah's Apostle forbade it, saying, 'Do not punish anybody with Allah's punishment (fire).' I would have killed them according to the statement of Allah's Apostle, 'Whoever changed his Islamic religion, then kill him.' [italics added]"
Other relevant Hadithic verses include Bukhari, volume 9, #58, 64, 271.
Atheists in Islamic countries and communities frequently conceal their non-belief, (as well as other condemned qualities such as homosexuality). Many sociologists interested in the Islamic nations wonder how Islam will continue to deal with these issues as these nations are exposed to Western worldviews, traditionally founded on Enlightenment-based secularism and tolerance, the Enlightenment being a movement that was largely absent from the Muslim world.
[edit] Asian spirituality
It is difficult to categorize Eastern belief systems in distinct terms of theism or atheism. Beliefs that would be characterized as atheistic in the western sense, often have some theistic tendencies, and vice versa.
Samkhya, though a school in the Orthodox (Astika) variety of Hinduism, can be considered atheist because of the lack of a 'higher being' that is the ground of all existence. Sankhya proposes a thoroughly dualistic understanding of the Cosmos, in which two parallel realities Purusha, the spiritual and Prakriti, the physical coexist and the aim of life is the gaining of liberating Self-knowledge of the Purusha. Here, no God (better stated theos) is present, yet Ultimate Reality in the form of the Purusha exists. Therefore, Sankhya can be said to be a variety of Hinduism which falls into the classification of Theistic Atheism.
Carvaka (also Charvaka) was a materialist and atheist school of thought in India, which is now known principally from fragments cited by its Astika and Buddhist opponents. The proper aim of a Carvakan, according to these sources, was to live a prosperous, happy, productive life in this world (cf Epicureanism). There is some evidence that the school persisted until at least 1578.
Buddhism is often described as atheistic, since Buddhist authorities and canonical texts do not affirm, and sometimes deny, the following:
- The existence of a creation, and therefore of a creator god
- That a god, gods, or other divine beings are the source of moral imperatives
- That human beings or other creatures are responsible to a god or gods for their actions
However, all canonical Buddhist texts that mention the subject accept the existence (as distinct from the authority) of a great number of spiritual beings, including the Vedic deities. From the point of view of Western theism, certain concepts of the Buddha found in the Mahayana school of Buddhism, e.g. of Amitabha or the Adibuddha may seem to share characteristics with Western concepts of God, but Shakyamuni Buddha himself denied that he was a god or divine.
Confucianism and Taoism are arguably agnostic in the sense that they do not explicitly affirm, nor are they founded upon a faith in, a higher being or beings. However, Confucian writings do have numerous references to 'Heaven,' which denotes a transcendent power, with a personal connotation. Neo-Confucian writings, such as that of Chu Hsi, are vague on whether their conception of the Great Ultimate is like a personal deity or not. Also, although the Western translation of the Tao as 'god' in some editions of the Tao te Ching is highly misleading, it is still a matter of debate whether the actual descriptions of the Tao by Laozi has theistic or atheistic undertones.
- See also: Atheism in Hinduism
[edit] Satanism
Traditional Satanism recognizes Satan as a real deity to be worshiped. The actual qualities of this deity can vary greatly from one sect to another. He (or She) is sometimes perceived as the Muse and the Bestower of knowledge (Gnosis). Satanists may place a great emphasis on the Serpent in the Biblical tale of Genesis, in which Satan blessed mankind with the "forbidden" fruit of knowledge of good and evil. Other devil worshippers though reject this idea, and see themselves as enemies of "Good" and servants of "Evil" in the name of Satan, who they see as the God of all that is Evil.
LaVeyan Satanism does not believe that Satan is a god; rather the function of God is performed and satisfied by the satanist him/herself. That is, the needs of worship, ritual, and religious/spiritual focus are directed, effectively, inwards towards the satanist, as opposed to outwards, towards God. It follows that Satanism shuns the idea of belief in all other deities as well, including, to the surprise of many, Satan. It rejects outright concepts such as prayer, the after-life, and divine forces and is therefore atheist per se.
There are some organizations falling between these two extremes. The First Church of Satan, formed as an offshoot to LaVeyan Satanism and makes no claims about the personification of Satan. Individual members are left to decide for themselves whether Satan is real, fictional, or conceptual.
[edit] Scientology
Scientology claims to be universally compatible with all other religions[citation needed]. Although there is some question about the extent of the claim's veracity, the Church of Scientology does not overtly make any claims about the existence of a deity.
Scientology does have a concept known as a Thetan, which is equivilent to a human soul. Through intensive Dianetic therapy, a person is supposedly able to achieve the level of a pure Operating Thetan -- the church's own version of a super-human or trans-human.
[edit] Non-religious ideologies
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Many secular atheists reject all supernatural beliefs, but embrace what they consider to be a non-religious ideology or philosophy, such as humanism, naturalism, or materialism. Others adopt nihilism, the philosophy that all choices are without moral consequence, because there is no true moral system.
[edit] Citations
[edit] References
- a b Altizer, Thomas J.J. (1967). The Gospel of Christian Atheism. London: Collins. Retrieved on 2006-10-27.
- ^ Amoss, George (1999). The Making of a Quaker Atheist. Retrieved on 2006-10-27.
- ^ Rachmani, Rav Hillel (2002). Introduction to the Thought of Rav Kook, Lecture #16: "Kefira" in our Day. Retrieved on 2006-03-05.
- ^ Rachmani, Rav Hillel (2002). Introduction to the Thought of Rav Kook, Lecture #17: Heresy V. Retrieved on 2006-03-05.
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