A Religion of Peace?

Is there such a thing?

Most religions have a pretty patchy record when it comes to spreading brotherly love. Christianity has certainly had its moments, from the Crusades to the Spanish Inquisition to present-day bombing of family planning clinics. Hinduism has fuelled the inter communal strife in India that killed many thousands of people before and after partition in 1947. Even Buddhism, which usually gets a very good rap for non-violence and love of all creatures has its ugly side as recent events in Myanmar have shown. And then there is Islam.

In 2015 Islam features at the top of the charts for religious controversy. Groups claiming to act on behalf of its god have been responsible for massacres, bombings and destruction of historical artefacts all over the world. There has been an inevitable backlash, some of it very nasty, some of it very stupid, much of it both. Muslims have been told that they must speak out against the Islamists, whether they be called ISIL, Boko Haram, Al Shabaab or something else, and many Muslims have done just that. They say that Islam is a peaceful religion and that the actions of the Islamists are forbidden by their god. They probably believe it too but I think that they – and the self-appointed guardians of whatever are missing the point completely.

Religion is the oldest form of politics. It is used by elites to exercise control over the masses. Always has been, probably always will be. It is infinitely malleable. Bronze age shamans claimed to interpret the commands of the spirits who caused the lightning to flash and the thunder to roll.

“The gods are angry. You must sacrifice a goat. And by the way I happen to have some goats for sale”.

Down many generations populations have been kept in line by commands from unseen deities interpreted by their selfless agents on earth.

“You must not eat this type of food or consume that kind of drink”

“You must conceal that part of your body at all times”

“God will not love you unless you have your head dipped in water”

“You must abstain from food/drink/sex/pleasure of any kind for arbitrary periods of time that I shall disclose to you”.

These are all mechanisms by which the powerful maintain control over the rest. They have existed since the first human societies sprang into life and they continue to exist today.

The leaders of ISIL and the rest are driven by the desire for power and/or liberation from the power that someone else has over them, which algebraically speaking is the same thing. Religion is merely the tool kit they use to manipulate their followers.

I have lived and worked in an Islamic country. Its laws placed some restrictions on my freedom that I accepted because I was a foreigner in the land and anyway the money was good. Friends and colleagues who lived and worked there with me were mostly believers in god but recognised that many of the rules made in his name were entirely human constructions. They went along with them because that was the culture and that was what the powerful people in the state demanded of them. In Kuwait in the 1980s this was a relatively benign set of conditions but it is not hard to see how a different and more fanatical type of leader could use those levers to altogether more malevolent ends.

So, is Islam a religion of peace? How about Christianity, Buddhism and the rest? Not really. It’s a cultural construct that can be used to manipulate behaviour. Depending on who is in charge it can be used for good or evil. It wasn’t a supernatural being who shot down 130 people in Paris ten days ago or blew up  40 in Beirut the week before. It was human beings who had been directed to do so by other human beings. Religion was just one of the tools used to make them do it.

There is absolutely no question that the vast majority of the world’s 1.6 billion Muslims are peace-loving people who just want to create a happy life for themselves and their families. The same is true of the members of all the other faiths and we would do well to remember that. However as long as people are willing to surrender any part of their autonomy to the supernatural some of them will always be open to manipulation by the powerful, the unscrupulous and the plain evil.