Where Have All the Tigers Gone?
The tiger population has moved in exactly the opposite direction. In 1900 it is estimated that there were about 100,000 tigers in India alone. That figure is now down to about 1,700 — out of a total world tiger population of between 3,062 and 5,066. The reason for this drastic decline is the same as for all endangered species — namely, human rapacity, ignorance and greed, in the form of over-hunting, poaching, deforestation and climate change. There is now a roll-call of over 3,000 endangered animal species, not counting those that are already extinct.335
Jainism
Does religion or atheism have anything to do with this inhumanity of man to beast? Only very indirectly. The major religions are just as humanity-centric as atheistic humanism. One religion which is an exception is Jainism, whose central tenet is non-violence towards all living things, whose members will literally never harm a fly, and which teaches the equality of all life forms. Jain monks wear gauze masks covering their mouths to prevent them from inadvertently swallowing any small flying insects.336
Sacred Cow
However, the well-known Hindu reverence for cows has the opposite effect from what was probably intended. As Hindus are not permitted to eat or slaughter cows, cattle are not as well cared for as in societies where they are bred for the table. As a result, there are constantly large numbers of emaciated cattle roaming around freely in the Indian countryside.
Kosher Giraffe Meat?
Jewish and Islamic ritual slaughter, which was intended to allow the animal’s blood to drain out, both in the interests of human hygiene and in order to minimise the animal’s pain and suffering, is now under increasing attack in various European countries, where it is characterised as cruel and inhumane. Both Jewish kosher slaughter and the similar but less strict Islamic halal form of ritual slaughter were banned in Denmark in February 2014 on the ground that “Animal welfare takes precedence over religion”, in the words of Denmark’s ministry of religion. The comment made by Andrew Brown in the Guardian is apt: “It seems to me obvious that the slaughter of animals at the end of their lives is of far less ethical importance than the way they are treated beforehand. The cruelties of factory farming extend over an animal’s whole lifetime whereas the cruelty of ritual slaughter lasts minutes at most. To complain about the halal slaughter of battery chickens or factory farmed veal is a truly monstrous absurdity.”337 The hypocrisy of Denmark’s ban on ritual slaughter is all the more striking when Copenhagen Zoo could at the same time shoot a perfectly healthy 18-month-old giraffe, known as Marius, and feed his carcass to the lions, merely because of a risk of inbreeding — all done in the face of an international petition with more than 27,000 signatures and offers from several zoos in other countries to give Marius a new home.338
Man’s Inhumanity to Man
So much for man’s inhumanity to beast, but what about man’s inhumanity to man? The 20th century ushered in the two bloodiest wars of all time and the 21st century has already witnessed numerous wars and internecine conflict, resulting in major carnage in certain parts of the world. The ideal of brotherly love is as far from reality as ever.
What lies at the heart of all this hostility, enmity and conflict? The New Atheists put the blame squarely on the shoulders of organised religion, and there can be no doubt that religion does indeed bear some responsibility for violence arising out of intolerance and persecution. However, in many cases where conflict is expressed in religious terms the true causes of the conflict are much more deep-seated political, racial or economic factors. The religious labels used in such conflicts only serve to exacerbate the underlying bitterness and to justify both sides’ determination to continue the fight, which is then likely to be seen in moral terms.
The protracted hostility between Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland is an example of a religious or “sectarian” conflict whose roots can be traced to factors other than religion — to a colonial “planter” situation and to ethnic conflict. When King Henry VIII repudiated papal authority in the 1530s and turned the Church of England Protestant, he tried to introduce a similar Reformation in Ireland. But this did not work. Why? Because the indigenous Celtic population of Ireland clung to their Roman Catholic faith as a symbol of resistance against English domination. This was exacerbated when the government injected into Ireland thousands of English and Scottish settlers who happened to be Protestant. The stage was now set for centuries of conflict between the indigenous population and the “planters”. The leading 19th century Irish nationalist leader was Charles Parnell, a Protestant. And, as we saw in Chapter 1, the Northern Ireland “troubles” were essentially political rather than religious, as is shown by the fact that they were (effectively) brought to an end by means of a political settlement. The conflict was often expressed in religious terms but was essentially political.
Middle East Conflicts: Religious or Political?
Even the harrowing apparently religious conflicts in today’s Middle East may in reality be political. Even the Sunni-Shia conflict itself may be essentially political, because, as we have seen, the reason why Iran is Shia is actually political, not religious. The protracted civil war in Syria does indeed look religiously based, with President Assad being an Alawite (a branch of Shia) while his opponents are mostly Sunni. But what can be said about the relationships between the Sunni (non-Arab) Turks, the Sunni (non-Arab) Kurds, the Sunni Saudi Government, the Sunni Egyptian Government, the Sunni Muslim Brotherhood, the Sunni Hamas, the Sunni al-Qaeda, the Sunni al-Nusra Front, the Sunni al-Quds Brigades, the Sunni Taliban in Afghanistan, the Sunni Boko Haram, the Sunni Al-Shabaab, and the Sunni self-styled Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant known as ISIS or ISIL? Some of these organisations are allied or affiliated to one another, but others are either in an uneasy or even adversarial relationship towards one another.
The Kurds (an Iranian people) do not have a state of their own but occupy an area known as Kurdistan, which straddles four countries, one of which is Turkey, where the PKK, or Kurdistan Workers’ Party, fought an armed struggle against the Turkish state from 1984 to 2013 for Kurdish self-determination. At the time of writing the PKK is still designated a terrorist organisation by Turkey (and NATO), though they have a common enemy in ISIL, a Sunni Arab organisation which has captured part of Iraq and proclaims as its aim the establishment of a new caliphate, or a theocratic Islamic monarchy covering the whole of the Levant. In short, therefore, to blame all the conflicts in the Middle East on religion is both unfair and also less likely to lead to a solution. In addition, to impose western “politically correct” values on Islamic societies will only cause offence or even hostility.
Toppling God?
But, even if they were to accept this, the New Atheists would still be as determined as ever to topple God from his pedestal. The next question is whether religion or atheism can offer a better explanation for the beginnings of things. It is important to keep the three main stages in the development of the universe (condensed from seven) separate, which the atheists do not always do. The three stages are:
The beginning of the universe, including the earth: The leading contender here is the “Big Bang” theory espoused by atheists but also enthusiastically embraced by religious leaders starting with Pope Pius XII. As a something-from- nothing theory it has scientific and evidential problems and also logical ones. Stephen Hawking’s explanation that “Because there is a law like gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing” is at best question-begging. (See Chapter 2.) The simplest and best explanation is to attribute the making of the universe to a super-intelligent God — the impersonal God of deism, not the personal theist God of conventional religion. (See Chapter 3.)
The origin of life: The emergence of a single-celled living organism from non-living matter. There is a welter of weird and wonderful explanations for this stage embraced by atheists (and others), but none of these theories has any real evidence to support it. Once again, therefore, God comes to the
rescue as the simplest, most elegant and neatest explanation — but again the impersonal God of deism rather than the personal God of conventional religion. (See Chapter 3.)
Variations and changes in living organisms: There is general agreement among scientists that all life forms have descended from a common ancestor, so that bacteria, bananas and baboons are all related to one another and to man. But evolution by natural selection needs more than just the existence of life to kick-start it into operation. And there are some serious disagreements about the way it operates once it does. Could that be a call for the impersonal deist God again? Moreover, it also now turns out that the chief mechanism of evolution is not natural selection but random genetic drift. See Chapter 3 for this and on the major spat between Dawkins and the celebrated Harvard biologist, E.O. Wilson, who denies Dawkins the title of scientist and dismisses him instead as an “eloquent science journalist”.
Deism Not Weighed Down by Baggage
All in all, therefore, deism has a better claim of credibility than either theism or atheism. Atheism has the weaknesses indicated above, while theism has a lot of baggage which weighs its credibility down, such as belief in a God who is omnipotent, omniscient, receptive to prayer, who doles out reward and punishment, performs miracles and is involved in day-to-day life.
Further baggage weighing theism down in the case of Christianity is the clutch of claims made for Jesus, none of which will stand up to scrutiny. For example, the virgin birth; the Bethlehem story; the claim of Davidic descent; and the claim to be the Jewish Messiah in fulfilment of Biblical prophecies — not to mention the Trinity. (See Chapter 6.)
The impersonal God of deism by contrast is not weighed down by any baggage, but is generally seen simply as the creator of the universe and of natural laws, belief in whom depends not on revelation or on a leap of faith but simply on reason and observation of the natural world. Deism is easy to accept, offers the best all-round solution to the relevant problems, is more tolerant and less arrogant than either theism or the New Atheism, and has been accepted by some of the greatest minds of all time, including Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Jefferson, Mark Twain, Thomas Edison, Albert Einstein — and possibly even Charles Darwin himself.
Summary Of Conclusions
The New Atheists blame religion for all the evil in the world.
Although religion is far from irreproachable, it is a mistake to blame religion for all conflicts that are fought in its name. The long-running and bloody conflict in Northern Ireland is a case in point, which was eventually settled by political means, leading to the curious spectacle of the erstwhile foes Rev. Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness becoming the “Chuckle Brothers”.
There are two types of God that one may believe in, a personal God and an impersonal God. Belief in a personal God is termed theism, while belief in an impersonal God is called deism. A personal God is one who is omnipotent, omniscient, receptive to prayer, who doles out rewards and punishments, performs miracles and is involved in day-to-day life. By contrast, the impersonal God of deism is seen as the creator of the universe and of the laws of nature but without any involvement in the day-to-day affairs of the world.
In their onslaught against belief in God, the New Atheists tend to ignore deism or just lump it in with theism. Deism is an embarrassment to the New Atheists, because it is impregnable against most of the attacks made against theism.
There are also two types of religions: communal religions and creed religions.
Creed religions like Christianity and Islam are centred on a creed or set of beliefs, which promises their adherents “salvation” and “everlasting life”. Creed religions tend to be intolerant of other religions and also of other denominations and groupings within their own religion, and they tend to be imbued with missionary zeal to win converts.
Communal religions, which were the norm in the ancient world, are non-proselytising or even unwelcoming to prospective converts but tend to be tolerant towards other religions and towards other denominations within their own religion.339
Creed religions have an inherent tendency to intolerance of other religions and of other denominations and groupings within their own religion, coupled with missionary zeal to attract new recruits, while communal religions tend to be more tolerant but uninterested in attracting new converts.
Deists are the most tolerant of all, and generally do not belong to any formal religious organisation.
There are essentially three (condensed from seven) main stages in the development of the universe. The beginning of the universe, including the earth: the “Big Bang” is popular, but it is question-begging. Stephen Hawking attributes it to the law of gravity, but where did that come from? The simplest and best explanation is God — but not the personal God of theism with all his baggage: the impersonal God of deism.
The origin of life: None of the weird and wonderful explanations embraced by atheists has any real evidence to support it. Once again, therefore, the impersonal God of deism comes to the rescue as the simplest, most elegant and neatest explanation.
Changes and variations in living organisms: Natural selection needs more than just the existence of life to kick-start it into operation. Could that be a call for the impersonal deist God again? Natural selection isn’t the only mechanism of evolution. It also turns out that the chief mechanism of evolution is not natural selection but random genetic drift. And there is a major spat between Dawkins and E.O. Wilson, who denies Dawkins the title of “scientist” and dismisses him instead as an “eloquent science journalist”.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Dr Michael Arnheim (or “Doctor Mike” as he is commonly known) is a practising London Barrister and Sometime Fellow of St John’s College, Cambridge.
This is his sixteenth published book to date. His previously published books include Is Christianity True?, The Handbook of Human Rights Law, The Senatorial Aristocracy in the Later Roman Empire, Aristocracy in Greek Society, Principles of the Common Law and The US Constitution for Dummies.
Born in Johannesburg, South Africa, Michael Arnheim studied Latin, Greek and Hebrew from an early age. At the age of 13 he became a member of the “Quiz Kids” team of five capped and gowned teenagers who were something of a national institution on South Africa’s Springbok Radio. Entering Johannesburg’s Witwatersrand University at the age of 16, he took a first-class BA in History, Latin and Greek at the age of 19, first-class Honours at 20 and an MA with distinction at the age of 21.
He then went up to St John’s College, Cambridge, on a scholarship, where he was awarded a PhD in record time on a wide-ranging dissertation on late Roman history, which was published by the Oxford University Press. He was subsequently elected a Fellow of St John’s College, where he continued to do research and teach Classics, especially Ancient History.
At the age of 31 he was appointed a full Professor and Head of the Department of Classics back at his old university in South Africa. After some years in that position he returned to Britain, where he was called to the Bar by Lincoln’s Inn in 1988 and continues to practise as a London Barrister.
SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY
This Select Bibliography is mainly confined to books referred to in the text. For articles and websites referred to see the notes at the end of each chapter.
The retrieval date for all websites referred to in the text should be taken as 23 November 2014.
Note: All sources in Latin, Greek, Hebrew and German were consulted in the original.
The Bible
All Biblical references were consulted in the original Hebrew or Greek and the most suitable of the following translations was selected for each quotation:
KJV — King James Version, 1611
NKJV — New King James Version, Thomas Nelson, 1982
RSV — Revised Standard Version of the Bible, 1971
ASV — American Standard Version (Public Domain)
Mishnah Berakhot [Online] www.sefaria.org/Mishnah_Berakhot/; Come and Hear.com, www.come-and-hear.com
/berakoth/berakoth_2.html
The Quran
The Quran, Pickthall, Yusuf Ali & Shakir translations: www.quranonline.net http://corpus.quran.com/translation.jsp
Darwin’s Correspondence & Autobiography
(Correspondence) www.darwinproject.ac.uk/ (Autobiography) http://darwin-online.org.uk
Darwin, Charles (1887) The Autobiography of Charles Darwin.
Darwin, F. & Seward A.C. (1903) More Letters of Charles Darwin, John Murray
FURTHER READING
Adherents [Online] www.adherents.com/Religions_By-Adherents.html
Arnheim, Michael (1984) Is Christianity True? Duckworth.
Arnheim, Michael (2009) U.S. Constitution for Dummies, Wiley Publishing.
Arnheim, Michael (2009) “The ‘Who is a Jew?’ Saga, UK version”, The Jerusalem Post, 5 August 2009.
Asad, Muhammad (1980) The Message of the Qu’ran, Redwood Books.
Barrow, John D. & Tipler, Frank J. (1988) The Anthropic Cosmological Principle, Oxford University Press.
Bin-Laden, Osama (2005) Messages to the World, Verso.
Blau, Joshua (1993) A Grammar of Biblical Hebrew, Harrassowitz Verlag. Breathing Earth [Online] www.breathingearth.net/
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