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Simple enough question.
Today religion enjoys a special place in public discourse. Criticisms of religion are often muted, specially when of a religion which is "controversial", or "beloved of the pseudo-liberals", such as Islam.
My point is this:
If a religion dictates to its followers about matters of this world, then it should be treated as any other ideology relating to those same matters would, insofar as its treatment of those matters goes?
That is, if religion X makes a certain commandment about economics, then it should be open to criticism as any other economic theory would be insofar as its commandments on economics are concerned.
Similarly, commandments on morality, food habits, and other temporal things should be open to the same rational criticism as any other ideology dealing with these things would be.
If, for instance, an ideology said that its followers should kill people who leave that ideological group, would it be spared the harshest criticism? But when certain religions say the same thing, why are they spared? Should not the same standard apply?
The only place where I can see this not applying is when the religion speaks of what religions should speak of: man, his soul, God, and the soul's relationship with him. Here we can use the "religious" standard, and make our criticism more respectful than otherwise.
However, let us note that a God meddling in human affairs, or others equivalent to human affairs, should be open to the same criticism any other entity existing on the temporal plane would be.
Why this double standard?
Why is it that if I claim to be an economist, and say that nobody should charge interest, then people will not hesitate to call me mad, but if I claim to be a "religious" economist, then people will suddenly mute their criticism? If they can say that X is rubbish, why to they go silent when I say, "God said X"? Does the invocation of the G-word suddenly suspend people's ability to think or criticise? More importantly, should it?
Today religion enjoys a special place in public discourse. Criticisms of religion are often muted, specially when of a religion which is "controversial", or "beloved of the pseudo-liberals", such as Islam.
My point is this:
If a religion dictates to its followers about matters of this world, then it should be treated as any other ideology relating to those same matters would, insofar as its treatment of those matters goes?
That is, if religion X makes a certain commandment about economics, then it should be open to criticism as any other economic theory would be insofar as its commandments on economics are concerned.
Similarly, commandments on morality, food habits, and other temporal things should be open to the same rational criticism as any other ideology dealing with these things would be.
If, for instance, an ideology said that its followers should kill people who leave that ideological group, would it be spared the harshest criticism? But when certain religions say the same thing, why are they spared? Should not the same standard apply?
The only place where I can see this not applying is when the religion speaks of what religions should speak of: man, his soul, God, and the soul's relationship with him. Here we can use the "religious" standard, and make our criticism more respectful than otherwise.
However, let us note that a God meddling in human affairs, or others equivalent to human affairs, should be open to the same criticism any other entity existing on the temporal plane would be.
Why this double standard?
Why is it that if I claim to be an economist, and say that nobody should charge interest, then people will not hesitate to call me mad, but if I claim to be a "religious" economist, then people will suddenly mute their criticism? If they can say that X is rubbish, why to they go silent when I say, "God said X"? Does the invocation of the G-word suddenly suspend people's ability to think or criticise? More importantly, should it?
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