The 2084 Precept (51 page)
"So you agree with Islamic law in this
case?"
"I neither agree nor disagree. Nor am I
saying that the marriage law is based on purely sexual motives.
There are other motives for marriage. Mohammed himself married some
of his soldiers' widows in order to take over the responsibility
for providing for them. So let us just say that I understand it,
that I accept it."
"And the third big difference?"
"And the third big difference, according to
these very same experts, is between the two religions' scriptures
themselves and what they preach. But on this, these particular
experts are factually wrong. It is the other way round. Both
scriptures' teachings are in fact very similar."
Is that an opinion of yours, Peter, or is it
a fact?"
"It is a fact."
"That means that you are personally
acquainted with the complete content of both these scriptures?"
"I am indeed. I have read the Christian
Bible and I have read the Islamic Koran. Both were actually
compiled and collected—collated might be a better word—by human
beings following the respective deaths of Jesus and Mohammed. The
main subject dividing the opinions of the different groups of
experts is the subject of tolerance. Tolerance toward others and,
specifically, tolerance toward other religions—in other words,
toward the 'non-believers' of each respective religion."
"But the scriptures are similar, you
say?"
"Yes. If you read the Koran, you will find
several passages which preach tolerance toward other religions. For
example, Verse 32 in Chapter 5 states that whoever kills another
human being is as guilty as if he had killed all of mankind.
Furthermore, you will find that Allah is prepared to 'forgive'
non-believers for not believing, on the condition, however, that
they are prepared to repent and reject their previous beliefs.
Nevertheless, there are also passages in the Koran, including the
final teaching on this subject, which clearly state that Islam
should be imposed by the use of force against all non-believers. By
murdering them all, if necessary. A form of 'Jihad' is justified
against the list of 'Unbelievers' (who are hence the enemies of
Allah) and that list includes not only pagans but also Christians
and Jews. One example of the many paradoxical teachings is Verse 92
in Chapter 4, which clearly states that a Muslim may not kill
another Muslim. From which one must deduce that Muslims may kill
non-Muslims
."
"And the Christian Bible contains similar
views?"
"Absolutely. Similar views or similar
paradoxes, one should say. On the one hand, we have the 'turn the
other cheek' passages. Jesus is quoted as telling us to 'love your
enemies, do good to them which hate you, bless them that curse you,
and pray for them which despitefully use you'. However, most
Christians largely ignore this and follow the 'eye for an eye and
tooth for a tooth' principle, also to be found in The Bible. Same
paradoxes."
"Did you say that the Christians largely
ignore the love-your-enemy teachings?"
"Indeed I did and indeed they do, and
fortunately so in many cases. Otherwise, Hitler, or rather his
successors, would currently be reigning supreme. The Holocaust
murderers would not have been executed and their successors would
have continued to apply their grisly skills to even broader swathes
of the human population, and we would all—those of us allowed to
survive, that is—be eating sauerkraut right now, a food which I
personally happen to detest."
"Ah hah, a joke."
"Yes, Jeremy, but there are
a lot of
unfortunate
examples
of human beings using force—in
particular, in order to impose their chosen religion on other
members of the species. The Christian Crusades, The Christian
Inquisitions, the Christian missionaries including the Protestants
introducing the 'Word of God' into North America by committing
genocide against hundreds of native Indian tribes, and of course we
have the Islamic Holy Wars. And we don't stop there, we also have
the use of force between the religious
sub-divisions
, the
Catholics versus the Protestants in Northern Ireland, the Sunnites
versus the Shiites, and all the rest of them."
"So the two religions share a lot of
similarities…"
"Yes, but there are also plenty of
dissimilarities. And these are not confined to who is the true God
or the true prophet or whatever."
"For example?"
"For example, a Christian, even if he is a
priest, is allowed to change his religion if he wishes to. This is
not the case with Islam—worse still, the penalty is death. I
remember reading the tale of Yousef Nadarkhani, an Iranian priest,
married and the father of two sons, who converted from Islam to
Christianity and who was subsequently arrested (in the year 2009)
at the age of 32, and thrown into jail. The following year he was
condemned to death by an Islamic court. Thanks to external
political pressures, the execution was postponed and he was given
another year to revert back to Islam or be executed. I don't know
what eventually happened to him, but I am sure you can find out on
the Internet. In any case, Jeremy, the enforcement of religious
belief by force and violence is still alive and well on our
planet."
"Difficult to believe."
"Maybe, but simple to check out. And there
are plenty of smaller religions, Jeremy. And newer ones. Sikhism,
for example, was founded in the Punjab region of India in the
16
th
century by a self-proclaimed guru who said that God
had spoken to him. Further self-proclaimed gurus kept the religion
going and the tenth guru founded Khalse, a Sikh sect. This god says
that you may not remove any body hair, although doubt remains as to
which of the various reasons given for this is the correct one.
Head hair is wrapped n a cloth of about 5 meters in length. This
cloth is called a turban. It also supposedly pressures the 26 bones
of the skull, thus permitting the brain to concentrate more closely
on spiritual thoughts. Or so I am told. And you may not use
tobacco, alcohol or any other intoxicants. Nor may you eat the meat
of an animal killed in the Muslim way. So I am told, anyway…"
"Yes, yes" said Jeremy hastily, "But I don't
think we need to go through any of your minor religions, Peter." He
tugged at his shirt cuffs, fingered his cufflinks. Nervous. Had a
business appointment soon perhaps?
"O.K. The third largest religion on our
planet is Hinduism."
"No…no thank you, Peter. I think I have the
general idea. One could say that each of these beliefs originated
via a single human being—or perhaps, in the case of Jesus, a spirit
in human form—who lived and travelled around the desert. Jesus
stated that there was only one God and that he was his son. And
Mohammed said that no, Jesus wasn't God's son at all. On the other
hand God had spoken to him, Mohammed, when he got to be around
forty years old, and he in fact was the true prophet of God. Of
Allah."
"Yes, that is a fair summary."
"But in you only have their word for
it."
"That is so."
"And your species believes that what these
two persons said about themselves is in fact true."
"Not quite. Some believe in the one, some
believe in the other, and some believe in other ones. And some
don't believe in any of them. Our species is divided on this."
"O.K. But the ones who
believe
don't
actually
know
if it's true for a fact.
"No, of course not, Jeremy. If they
knew
, they wouldn't be able to
believe
. In fact
belief would be redundant. Religion depends on belief—believing
what you're told. Oscar Wilde summed it up very well. ‘Religions’,
he wrote, ‘die when they are proved to be true. Science is the
record of dead religions.’"
"O.K. So, sticking to the two big religions,
Peter, the differing claims of the two main personages you
mentioned have been perpetuated since then by other human beings
who felt it was their responsibility to do so. But I have a couple
of questions."
"Go ahead."
"If I understand correctly," continued
Jeremy, "these religions state that God or Allah created the human
animal, an animal which not only slaughters itself—war, murder,
abortion, suicide—but also other animals, which in turn slaughter
others, and so on in an intricate chain of non-stop death right
down to the spider killing the fly. A ghastly Planet of Death,
Daily Death. Now why would God or Allah or anybody else want to
create something like that?"
"Well, some of it is what we like to call
the 'food chain', Jeremy, a nourishment system created by whichever
god you happen to believe in," I said. "But the answer to your
question is that I don't know."
"You don't know. Well. Whichever god it is
apparently also created you and the other animals as creatures
requiring oxygen to breathe, water to remain hydrated, fuel to
renew energy (food you call it), systems to continuously remove all
of these things after use—lungs, bladders, intestines and
sphincters—and then bones, muscles and nerves to provide mobility,
other complicated organs such as livers, kidneys and genitals, a
system of neurons and electrical impulses to direct your actions,
an entire arrangement of major and minor pipes to irrigate all the
working parts with a mysterious fluid called blood, a pump to
circulate this mysterious fluid, and so on. And the whole caboodle
is inhabited by bacteria, full of defects and open to disease,
cancer, breakdowns, suffering, death, cessation. Now why would
anyone want to create something as complicated as that?"
"I don't know."
"And you were also designed to have to spend
a third of your existence in a state of total unconsciousness—sleep
as you call it—and if you don't, you die. Now, what possible
purpose could anyone have had in wanting to create that?"
"I don't know."
"You don't know, but you hold everything to
be possible?
"Yes, and for that very reason—I don't know.
I do not have the required information to reject the possibility of
anything at all. Nor to query why anyone might want to create
anything in the first place. I have no idea."
"How about the Big Bang as an
explanation?"
"I don't reject that either. I just don't
know. It could be possible, but again, I don't have the necessary
information to understand how something which didn't exist in the
first place could then explode. There must have been something
there beforehand."
"Oh yes, and indeed there was, Peter. Let me
enlighten you on that. There have been countless big bangs in fact,
over a period of time going back into what you might call infinity.
But infinity is not a concept your species can grasp. You have to
have a 'Beginning' and an 'End' to everything, you cannot conceive
of anything else."
O.K., so now I'll nail him. The past is one
thing, the future is another. I wonder what kind of answer he is
going to give me on this: "So what about the future, Jeremy, what
about the fate of the universe?"
He didn't pause for a second. He needed no
time for consideration. The question was, for him, a simple
one.
"I read," he said, "that your cosmologists
have many, many theories in that regard. At the current point in
time, there appears to be a growing consensus among them toward the
presumption that the universe is flat, and that as such it can, and
probably will, continue to expand for ever and ever. This theory
may or may not be allowed by their colleagues to survive, as it
involves the as yet, for them, unacceptable concept of infinity.
But they are right in one way, Peter. The ultimate fate of the
universe is indeed dependent upon its shape. It is, however, also
dependent upon the role dark energy will be playing as the universe
ages. And your cosmologists' tentative conclusion is, due to their
lack of knowledge, an incorrect one, I can assure you. What will
happen is that there will be an implosion, a big bang in reverse so
to speak, and then there will be another 'normal' big bang and so
it will go on, a process repeating itself countless times on and on
into infinity. One day your species will have to try to grasp and
understand the concept of infinity.
"Well…be that as it may," I said, "I cannot
conceive of it, as you have correctly pointed out. But I can accept
it as a possibility. And in any case, in your scenario, the big
bangs may also be created by God or Allah or possibly by someone or
something else."
Jeremy smiled. A benevolent glance in my
direction. In the direction of the ant colony.
"Alright," he said, "let's leave it at that,
Peter. I think we have covered the subject of beliefs quite
sufficiently, and time is running out for me today. Could we deal
perhaps with the topic of superstitions…in just a few words
perhaps?"
Oh yes, no need to worry about that. In very
few words indeed. I need to get out of here. These meetings are not
my kettle of fish. And in any case, I am in dire need of a
cigarette. I am in dire need of two cigarettes. Three.
"Yes, Jeremy. In addition to the beliefs, we
have a lot of superstitions which, by the way, are also beliefs,
but unfounded ones. Take the number 13, for example. In many parts
of the world, people believe this to be an unlucky number. Many
airlines do not allow a row 13 in their aircraft, presumably
because they would lose business. Their customers would think that
an aircraft with a row 13 would fall out of the sky. Some aircraft
don't have a row 17 either, because that is also an unlucky number
in countries such as Italy and Brazil, and such planes would also
presumably fall out of the sky. Superstition rules and it serves no
purpose to point out to superstitious humans that aircraft without
these row numbers crash.
And Friday the 13
th
is an unlucky
date for most of us in Europe—but not if you're Spanish. In Spain,
it is Tuesday the 13
th
. And I will not bore you with any
of the more ludicrous superstitions—astrology, voodoo, tarot and
the like—as it would be a waste of your time, Jeremy. But we also
have many
religious
superstitions and a couple of examples
of these may serve as useful illustrations."