The horribly destructive and divisive power of an assumed powerful God of war is all too evident from ancient history to modern times. The following is a very brief summary of glaring examples of this phenomenon.

Much of the Bible details the merciless fighting, killing, raping and pillaging in God’s name. “He smites mine enemies” over and over and over. Joshua, if the Bible is reliable, had God’s help in taking lands from their just owners. He even had the sun and moon (time) stand still so he could take full revenge on his enemies before darkness set in. See, it really helps to have God on your side. The Old testament’s King Saul and the most famous King David recognized this repeatedly. (However, it was surely not completely according to God’s plan that David would send Uriah, Bathsheba’s husband, to get killed in battle as David hung back so that he could get together romantically with Bathsheba.)

Constantine the Great, who legalized Christianity by the Edict of Milan in 313, fought hard and effectively in the name of God. He re-united the Eastern and Western Roman Empire using sword and cross. Finally this great warlord formally and belatedly became a Christian on his deathbed in 337. (Was he just covering his rear in fear?) Forty-three years later, Emperor Theodosius proclaimed Christianity to be the state religion; other religions were suppressed. Within half a century the Roman empire had disintegrated.

For its part, the Muslim empire grew from nothing right after 600 to become strong enough that its religious fighters could conquer Jerusalem by 637. By this time, the Muslim calendar was only fifteen years old. Four years later these religious enthusiasts
“succeeded” in destroying that greatest world center of culture and wisdom, the great library at Alexandria (641). Less than 100 years after Mohammed fled from Mecca to Medina, these warriors for Allah had extended their Arabian Empire from Spain to China. This devotion to a Higher Power obviously drives believing devotees
to extreme achievement. (Allah beats God?) How much further ahead would real and positive human wisdom be if the library of Alexandria had not been lost to humankind! Again religion gets in the way of human wisdom and progress.

The unhealthy union of Church and State or Cross and Crown was cemented in the West in 800 when Charlemagne was crowned the First Holy Roman Emperor. The Muslims had already shown how successfully they could unite sword and crescent in
the East. Muslim warriors destroyed the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem in 1009. The Church did not like this. When much later (1096) Pope Urban II started the First Crusade, it was billed primarily
as a holy war to take control of Jerusalem from the Muslims. The Warrior Pope promised all kinds of indulgences and spiritual rewards to his Crusaders for Christ. If a soldier died as a martyr fighting the infidels (Muslims), he was rewarded with heaven!
Sound familiar? Thus, in cooperation with Emperor Alexius I, the faith-based initiative called the First Crusade, captured Jerusalem for the Christians in 1099. This was a great Christian victory. (God beat Allah this time?)

Toward the end of the twelfth century, another Holy War, this time a Muslim jihad, united Islam so strongly that they could retake Jerusalem (1187). This faith-based war took place after the abject failure of the Second Crusade under the Holy Roman Emperor Conrad III and Catholic King Louis VIII of France in 1147. (Allah beats God this time?) In fact, the Christian side also lost Crusades IV to VIII (1200—1270).

Probably the most disgraceful of all the many Christian religious Crusades was the so-called Children’s Crusade. In 1212 some 50,000 French and German children marched east to fight for Christ’s cause. Only about a miserable 200 returned. The others likely had believed they would be enjoying heaven. How different was this religion-based abuse of the credulous and immature from what we saw with the brainwashed suicide bombers
of the Middle East?

When a credulous human being is incapable of independent thinking, he can be led to almost any irrational belief and extreme pursuit. When one becomes a believer in the naturally impossible,
reason’s discriminating power diminishes, and the spiritual leader can have near total control. When the leader becomes fanatical or divinely enthusiastic, he demonstrates again the old adage: power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

The modern fight in the Middle East between the descendents of the biblical sons of Abraham has been going on for too many centuries. It is likely to go on for more centuries unless these fervent believers in their divisive religious traditions can break free to think rationally and eat of the Tree of Knowledge or science. This demands an abundance of rational educational efforts.

Osama bin Laden, by his terrorist fighting, according to many, has shown himself to be a true Muslim, fighting the jihad as commanded by Mohammed as Allah’s prophet in accord with the Koran. I am confident that moderate Muslims are offended
by bin Laden’s extreme position, but such is the blinding power of faith in God once reason is overcome by that faith.

In the Bible’s Old Testament reports of the battles of God’s chosen people, you find repeated reports of worse religious attacks on the heathens and infidels than bin Laden was guilty of. Moses,
Joshua, David and many less famous fighters of the Old Testament were as bloody as bin Laden and modern believers in Mohammed fighting their own jihads in the name of Allah. Justifications of holy wars are abundantly plain in the scriptural revelations from both Allah and Yahweh. And that other middle eastern religious founder, Jesus, reputedly said he came not to bring peace, but the
sword. Pick a war-torn period, pick a war or ethnic division, and you are very likely to find it has deeply religious roots.

Have the ravages of divine violence and faith-based initiatives gone on long enough to drive honest, thinking men to the negotiating tables? How long must humankind repeat that he who does not learn the lessons of history is condemned to repeat them? Who do you think ought to go first in admitting the destructiveness of holy wars: Algeria, Bosnia, Chechnya, Egypt, India, Indonesia, Iran, Ireland, Iraq, Israel, Kashmir, Kosovo, Lebanon, Nigeria,
Pakistan, Palestine, Philippines, Somalia, Sudan, Turkey, U.K., U.S.A. or who?

ENEMIES OF GOD MUST BE DESTROYED
Why do religionists think their almighty God needs help in smiting his enemies? Old Testament Jews did it, and created enemies of long standing. Early Christians did it, and modern Christians still do it. Seventh Century Muslims did it, and modern Muslims still do it. George W. Bush got a God-like strength and enthusiastic political backing for the bombing attacks on al Qaeda terror groups in Afghanistan in 2001 and 2002. Such use of righteous power to smite the axis of evil still makes enemies around the world. These enemies made in the name of righteousness readily remind one of
the many enmities the warring Chosen People made on their way from Egypt to the Promised Land in and around Jerusalem.

TRADITION, COSTLY, RETROGRESSIVE TRADITION

Why is it so important that one religious group triumph over another? Is it tradition and the intransigent need to enshrine the “sacred” past? Nature put eyes in the front of our heads so we can look forward. However, today’s bellicose believers seem so hung up on the dark ages of ancient beliefs and the hand-me-downs of syncretism that they cannot let go of prejudices against progress. Buried
places of worship in old Palestine, wailing walls, especially sacred shrines, and so-called promised lands take on nonnegotiable value because of traditional beliefs, beliefs based on ancient, megalomanic false assumptions that have long
outlasted their real value.

The fratricidal fight between Jews and Palestinians will likely go on for more centuries unless these fervent believers in

their religious traditions can become free enough to analyze their holy traditions and think rationally about the present. Bertrand Russell held correctly that the first requirement for becoming a freethinker is to get free from the force of tradition. This freedom demands that thoughtful efforts replace blind faith in “sacred” traditions
that justify bullying by bombs and bullets. We Are Righteous! We Are Right!

I have a lot of hope for the human race, but I don’t see much reason to think that the Mid-East problem involving the so-called holy places will ever see peace in this generation. “There will always be wars and rumors of war” is one prophecy attributed to Christ that remains true of the biblical Middle East.

Sarajevo and Serbia, Israel and Ireland, along with too many other countries, can cry over lost rosperity and what might have been without religious/ethnic wars. Religion causes war causes poverty causes human desperation causes religion, causes war,
causes poverty—and the beat goes on and on. This vicious cycle demands tremendous effort to break. The Mid-East, cradle of three competitive, traditionally Abrahamic religions, Judaism,
Christianity and Islam, remains so deeply mired in old hates and traditions that stable peace and prosperity still seem impossible. Again, as Christ predicted, they will always have the poor with
them.

I wonder, though, what would happen if the believers in Yahweh, Allah, and Christ were to decide to assume for just a day that God does not really exist, that these outdated buildings and
places are not really holy, that you (other) “bad” guys resemble us “good” guys, that we are really quite like each other. You guys get hungry, tired, lonely, rejoice, make love just like we do. Can
we think together, negotiate about real, measurable things, leave out our superstitions, the mysterious and immeasurable, while we make practical, rational deals?

See, the sky doesn’t fall when we set aside, even for a day, such an outmoded and outrageous assumption based on superstition. What is freely or groundlessly asserted, can be freely denied. We
can now see each other more clearly, now that we are not blinded and looking backward because of a blind or unreasoning faith. We can see much more of current reality now that we no longer obsess about the mysterious, out-of-this-world past. Let’s enjoy together now what we know we share in nature.

In the Dark Ages of the Christian Faith, almost everyone assumed the earth was flat; the sky didn’t fall when almost everyone quit believing that; the sky didn’t fall when Christian beliefs did away with Jupiter and Zeus. And the sky certainly didn’t fall in the last decade as the portion of American non-believers increased from about eight percent to about 14% of the population. Don’t be afraid to think! Don’t be afraid to eat of the tree of new knowledge!

“Oh, sure, Skeptical Writer, you can abuse your freedom and deny God now, but you will suffer terribly for it; you will go to hell and suffer forever,” say many of the conventionally credulous. Well, for many years I myself really believed that. But now I don’t think hell is feasible; so I deny your assumption. I can now see that your improbable statement is based on counterproductive tradition.
And that outmoded tradition can be traced to the gratuitous manipulative assumption found in the Book of Genesis.

When I die before long, I will make room for Nature to handle another world citizen. And whether or not that new citizen is wiser than you or me in deciding which traditions to accept and
which to reject, it won’t make any difference at all to me after I’m dead. I will have completed a full life, as full as it will ever get. I have overcome that most common defense, wishful thinking. I don’t expect or wish for more than the great opportunities, loves, and riches that this current life has afforded me in wonderful abundance.

MORE NON.PRODUCTIVE CUSTOMS AND TRADITIONS
A story is told of the young housewife who always cut the shank portion off the Christmas ham before baking it along with the main part of the ham. Her husband asked her why she always did that; he didn’t see any reason for that extra step. His wife said, “I don’t know. Mom always did it that way.” So later on Christmas Day, the husband asked his mother-in-law, “Mom, why did you always cut the shank off the ham before baking it; your daughter
couldn’t tell me why she does it.” Mom: “Well, I always had to cut off the shank because my baking pan was too short.”

So very many customs made sense in the past but have outlived their utility. With much better access to facts today, we are leaping coming far more productive of real goods and services than any generation in the past. It used to make sense to take days to communicate personal thoughts and messages by snail-mail; now we commonly use e-mail, faxes, and phones. It used to make sense to put some oats and water in the vehicle before beginning a long journey. Now we have better ways; we get quicker and greater horsepower without the oats.

In less developed segments of society, a lot of time is spent on pageantry, processions and liturgical ceremonies glorifying the past; more progressive societies spend less and less time commemorating the past, and this leaves more time to spend enjoying present realities and learning of future possibilities. Such freedom from the past allows a freer, more creatively productive approach to the future.

The very best use of the wisdom of the past is as a teacher. History should show us, not just what was good and productive, but also how we can grow beyond the customs and practices of the past to become more perceptive of current realities. A
good teacher shines the light of history onto the realities of the present in order to see more in the future. A God teacher uses history to preserve ancient faith systems, keeping the “sacred” past, enshrining old ways and customs as though they already contained all wisdom.

Credulous devotees who place their faith in the preachments of rabbis, priests, preachers, mullahs, bishops and popes do not develop the ego-strength and independent thought to ask why: Why do we continue to cut the shank off the ham? Why do we
continue to spend so much time wandering in the desert of past mysteries? Why do we continue to weep and wail at a wall that preserves old hates and blocks vision to the future? Why do we continue to run around in liturgical circles letting these religious
leaders continue to tell us we are guilty of crimes of many generations ago? Why should we twenty-first century thinkers sheepishly imitate our forefathers in unthinking faith when we can realistically admit we can learn more about present realities and future
probabilities than our ancestors ever could? Why do we kill each other to claim the so-called holy land where hatreds and religious divisions strive to justify such old insanities? Is it because science/ knowledge is hard to come by?

Knowledge and practical wisdom have to be worked for; the easy, superstitious, logic-free assumptions of faith don’t cut it in the twenty-first century. Get over the past, Jew, Gentile, Christian,
Muslim, Hindu. Tear up your sacred martyrdom manuals; back away from your traditional wailing walls; wake up and smile at the wonderful present. Try, just one day at a time, to be courageous enough, reasonable enough to ask why—why should I believe manipulators who want to use me for their empire? Why should I hate anyone who believes or thinks differently than I? I am free,
and I can patiently show my less fortunate neighbors how much joy that freedom to think for myself can bring.

(pp. 56 to 63 of Imagine No Superstition, ©
Stephen Uhl, 2007)
www.imagineNOsuperstition.com

Next Excerpt:
Modern Young Minds Polluted by Religion