Posts tagged “A History of God”
Mystical religion is particularly bad for stupid people
From Karen Armstrong’s A History of God: The 4,000-Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam: Not everybody was capable of philosophical thought, however, so Falsafah was only for an intellectual elite. It would confuse the masses and lead them into an error that imperiled their eternal salvation. Hence the importance of the esoteric tradition, which kept […]
Religious truth doesn’t describe the world
From Karen Armstrong’s A History of God: The 4,000-Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam: Science demands the fundamental belief that there is a rational explanation for everything; it also requires an imagination and courage which are not dissimilar to religious creativity. Like the prophet or the mystic, the scientist also forces himself to confront the […]
What’s wrong with the religious right?
From Karen Armstrong’s A History of God: The 4,000-Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam: The problem of predestination and free will … indicates a central difficulty in the idea of a personal God. An impersonal God, such as Brahman, can more easily be said to exist beyond “good” and “evil,” which are regarded as masks […]
Just one reason we shouldn’t be nation-building
From Karen Armstrong’s A History of God: The 4,000-Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam: Politics is not extrinsic to a Muslim’s personal religious life, as in Christianity, which mistrusts mundane success. Muslims regard themselves as committed to implemented a just society in accord with God’s will. The ummah has sacramental importance, as a “sign” that God […]
Religious tolerance under Arab imperialism
From Karen Armstrong’s A History of God: The 4,000-Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam: Nobody in the new empire was forced to accept the Islamic faith; indeed, for a century after Muhammad’s death, conversion was not encouraged and, in about 700, was actually forbidden by law: Muslims believed that Islam was for the Arabs as […]
Monotheism doesn’t necessarily mean sending all non-believers to hell
From Karen Armstrong’s A History of God: The 4,000-Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam: The image of the olive tree in [certain Koranic] verses has been interpreted as an allusion to the continuity of revelation, which springs from one “root” and branches into a multifarious variety of religious experience that cannot be identified with or […]
And that arrogance has led to so much trouble
From Karen Armstrong’s A History of God: The 4,000-Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam: Denys’s God has two aspects: one is turned toward us and manifests himself in the world; the other is the far side of God as he is in himself, which remains entirely incomprehensible. He “stays within himself” in his eternal mystery, […]