The Myth of Religious Violence (Chapter One, Part Two)
In part one of chapter one we looked at three scholars that Cavanaugh sees as putting forward the argument "religion is violent because it is absolutist." Now we turn to three who, roughly argue that "religion is violent because it is divisive" (and remember these categories are heuristic, all nine scholars use various arguments, Cavanaugh is singling out certain emphases for representation of arguments).
Religion Causes Violence Because It Is Divisive
Here the basic claim is, to no suprise "is an indictment of religion based on religion's tendency to form strong identities exclusive of others, and thus divide people into us and them. Religion, so to speak, creates discord.
Scholar One: Martin Marty. Marty argues "those called to be religious naturally form separate groups, movements, tribes, or nations. Responding in good faith to a divine call, believers feel themselves endowed with sacred priviege, a sense of chosenness that elevates them above all others. This self-perception leads them to speak negatively of 'the others'..." (p.26) Right off the bat Cavanaugh notes that it is odd that among the historical examples Marty designates Ronald Reagan's designation of the Soviet Union as an "evil empire" as an instance of religious division. "Surely it is certain that Reagan and his supporters often professed to see the US as a nation uniquely blessed by God, it is not at all clear why such an example would count as evidence against the violent tendencies of religion as opposed to those of nationalism or patriotism."
One thus hopes that Marty would proffer his own definition of religion--to which he exceeds expectations and offers seventeen to illustrate a wide range of possibilities. He thus feels compelled to forgo a precise definition, since scholars will never agree unilaterally on the phenomenon, "and instead point" to the phenomena to help describe what we are talking about. Thus he lists five qualifiers:
Scholar Two: Mark Juergensmeyer. For the sake of not having to type his last name a lot Im going to call Juergensmeyer "J" from now on. J argues regarding the absolutist and nonrational nature of religion, but focuses especially on the propensity of religion to divide people into friends and enemies, "us" and "the other." Specifically J employs the concept "cosmic war,"--namely religious images of cosmic struggle--which causes religion to "Satanize" the other as an eternal, perpetual enemy. He creates an analytical tool for his purposes--a distinction between acts of violence done for utilitarian purposes, in other words that clearly further a practical end, and on the other hand acts of violence which seem to have no practical outcome, no 'strategic' value, and whose purpose J labels as "symbolic violence," which is solely meant to terrorize or embody a symbolic act bringing to mind a reality greater and beyond the immediate object of focus." Thus J's analytic of violence allows him to say that in general religion tends to focus on symbolic rather than practical targets.
Immediately though J's own analysis breaks down when he begins to admit the symbolic nature of politics. J wants to maintain a division between symbolic/religious and real/political, but he "gives the game away by admitting [in a manner reminiscent of Foucault] that 'real' power rests on 'mere' perception." In addition to Foucault, he appeals to the work of Pierre Bourdieu on symbol and power, from which J says "our public life is shaped as much by symbols as by institutions." Rather than conclude like Bordieu that the political can be just as symbolic as the religious, J concludes that public ritual "has traditionally been the province of religion...which is why performance violence [e.g. symbolic violence] comes so naturally to activists from a religious background." Thus J's argument becomes severely unstable and quite viciously circular: the argument oscillates between saying explicitly "religion employs symbolism" to "if its symbolic, it must be religious." Thus Cavanaugh notes "J's argument would be much clearer...if he simply dropped the term religion and analyzed the symbolic power of violence." (30).
J's theory of Cosmic War is similarly tenuous. He uses the concept as an additional analytic to help explain why religious violence is "so especially vicious." This is because religious violence is essentially the enactment of a cosmic scale drama on a micro scale, embodying a greater struggle of good over chaos, light over dark. J says conflicts are likely to be characterized as "Cosmic War" under the following 3 conditions:
Scholar Three: David C. Rapoport.. Rapoport (R) has five reasons why religion causes violence in the name of identity and exclusion.
1) Religion inspires ultimate commitment. Ironically however R also notes that "nationalism sometimes [in this manner] acts like a religion." Nationalism is like a religion but is not religion. Which means that R does the same flip that J did with symbolism: the argument switches from "religion is absolutist" to "anything absolutist is a religion or has religious elements." Thus nationalism somehow maintains a secular identity while nonetheless occasionally demonstrating contamination of "religious elements" of certain forms of absolutism (p.37).
2) Religious language is full of violence, thus it perpetuates violence. Here ironically Rapoport cites several examples of movements such as the Stern Gang in Israel, Saddam Hussein's Ba'ath Socialist Party, and the Palestine Liberation Organization, who have all taken language from religious traditions for the service of violence. Yet instead of concluding that secular liberation movements "can inspire just as much passion and commitment nd villence as religious movements can--or, as Stern himself acknowledged, dedicated to a kind of religion, which throws the whole religious secular distinction into question--R offers Stern as evidence that religion has a disposition toward violence."
Im going to skip the third reason which utilizes an analysis of Rene Girard which is in some sense a recapitulation of argument 1.
4 and 5) The fourth is the tendency of religions and states to return to their origins in times of crisis, which are violent. The fifth is that contemporary religious believers may feel desperation when they feel time is running out due to Messianic or millenarian expectations, which make them act with sudden bursts of violence (Cavanaugh notes that this is the exact opposite of J's argument above, where he said that religious activists are prone to violence because, since they operate with an eternal, cosmic time scale, their time frame is unlimited and they can fight without an end in sight--p.39). Cavanaugh concludes this section with a summary of R:
Religion Causes Violence Because It Is Divisive
Here the basic claim is, to no suprise "is an indictment of religion based on religion's tendency to form strong identities exclusive of others, and thus divide people into us and them. Religion, so to speak, creates discord.
Scholar One: Martin Marty. Marty argues "those called to be religious naturally form separate groups, movements, tribes, or nations. Responding in good faith to a divine call, believers feel themselves endowed with sacred priviege, a sense of chosenness that elevates them above all others. This self-perception leads them to speak negatively of 'the others'..." (p.26) Right off the bat Cavanaugh notes that it is odd that among the historical examples Marty designates Ronald Reagan's designation of the Soviet Union as an "evil empire" as an instance of religious division. "Surely it is certain that Reagan and his supporters often professed to see the US as a nation uniquely blessed by God, it is not at all clear why such an example would count as evidence against the violent tendencies of religion as opposed to those of nationalism or patriotism."
One thus hopes that Marty would proffer his own definition of religion--to which he exceeds expectations and offers seventeen to illustrate a wide range of possibilities. He thus feels compelled to forgo a precise definition, since scholars will never agree unilaterally on the phenomenon, "and instead point" to the phenomena to help describe what we are talking about. Thus he lists five qualifiers:
1) Religion focuses on ultimate concern (one can hear Tillich's definition of faith in this)One immediately notices that all five apply equally well to politics, and this does not escape Marty's notice. In fact it is part of his project to illustrate how closely intertwined politics and religion are. "What he fails to do," says Cavanaugh, "is provide any criteria to separate the two."
2) Religion builds community
3) Religion appeals to myth and symbol
4) Religion is reinforced through rites and ceremonies
5) Reigion demands certain behaviors from its adherents. (27)
Of course any definition is contestable, and scholars cannot afford to get bogged down in searching for a definition on which all can agree before intellectual inquiry can begin...but a definition of X should at least claim to provide a way to distinguish X from not-X. Marty's definition of religion claims the opposite; politics has the same features as religion. And yet, somehow, the list of five features is still meant to help us know what religion--as opposed to not-religion--is. If a thing can fulfill all the criteria of a definition of X and yet still be identified as Not-X, then the definition is not very useful.Marty tries to get around this by saying he is merely providing a loose definition in order to help point to the phenomenon of religion, rather than give a unilateral, final definition.
Marty, however, is pursuing an argument about religion per se. If one is trying, as is Marty, to convince the reader that "religion divides" and "religion can be violent," then one ought to be clear about what religion is...As with Kimball [see Chapter One Part One] the problem is not that Mart is vague about what religion is. The prolem is that...he is unjustifiably clear about what counts as religion and what does not...despite demolishing the distinction between religion and politics, Marty continues to warn of the dangers of religion, while ignoring the violent tendencies of supposedly secular politics. (28)
Scholar Two: Mark Juergensmeyer. For the sake of not having to type his last name a lot Im going to call Juergensmeyer "J" from now on. J argues regarding the absolutist and nonrational nature of religion, but focuses especially on the propensity of religion to divide people into friends and enemies, "us" and "the other." Specifically J employs the concept "cosmic war,"--namely religious images of cosmic struggle--which causes religion to "Satanize" the other as an eternal, perpetual enemy. He creates an analytical tool for his purposes--a distinction between acts of violence done for utilitarian purposes, in other words that clearly further a practical end, and on the other hand acts of violence which seem to have no practical outcome, no 'strategic' value, and whose purpose J labels as "symbolic violence," which is solely meant to terrorize or embody a symbolic act bringing to mind a reality greater and beyond the immediate object of focus." Thus J's analytic of violence allows him to say that in general religion tends to focus on symbolic rather than practical targets.
Immediately though J's own analysis breaks down when he begins to admit the symbolic nature of politics. J wants to maintain a division between symbolic/religious and real/political, but he "gives the game away by admitting [in a manner reminiscent of Foucault] that 'real' power rests on 'mere' perception." In addition to Foucault, he appeals to the work of Pierre Bourdieu on symbol and power, from which J says "our public life is shaped as much by symbols as by institutions." Rather than conclude like Bordieu that the political can be just as symbolic as the religious, J concludes that public ritual "has traditionally been the province of religion...which is why performance violence [e.g. symbolic violence] comes so naturally to activists from a religious background." Thus J's argument becomes severely unstable and quite viciously circular: the argument oscillates between saying explicitly "religion employs symbolism" to "if its symbolic, it must be religious." Thus Cavanaugh notes "J's argument would be much clearer...if he simply dropped the term religion and analyzed the symbolic power of violence." (30).
J's theory of Cosmic War is similarly tenuous. He uses the concept as an additional analytic to help explain why religious violence is "so especially vicious." This is because religious violence is essentially the enactment of a cosmic scale drama on a micro scale, embodying a greater struggle of good over chaos, light over dark. J says conflicts are likely to be characterized as "Cosmic War" under the following 3 conditions:
1) The struggle is perceived as a defense of basic identity and dignityYet, to cut to the chase, what he says about Cosmic War is indistinguishable (surprise surprise) from "normal" war. In fact what J himself notes about war in general is ironically virtually identical to his definitions of Cosmic war. War itself cuts off the possibility of compromise. War itself provides the reason to be violent. "The division between mundane war and cosmic war seems to vanish as fast as it was constructed," writes Cavanaugh. Indeed J says himself "the concept of war provides cosmology, history, and eschatology, and offers the reins of political control," and "secular nationalism, like religion, embraces...a docrtine of destiny. One can take this way of looking at secular nationalism a step further and state flatly...that secular nationalism is a religion." Cavanaugh notes this is a very true and important concession, yet if true, it undermines J's entire analytic. More examples abound in Cavanaugh's exposition of J (pp.31-36) but it represents the same basic problem. In fact they represent a certain mystification of the subject and Cavanaugh notes J's entire study would be more interesting if it was just an examination of the circumstances under which ideologies become violent and symbolism becomes utilized in a terrorizing manner.
2) Losing the struggle would be unthinkable
3) The struggle is blocked and cannot be won in real time or in real terms. (30)
Scholar Three: David C. Rapoport.. Rapoport (R) has five reasons why religion causes violence in the name of identity and exclusion.
1) Religion inspires ultimate commitment. Ironically however R also notes that "nationalism sometimes [in this manner] acts like a religion." Nationalism is like a religion but is not religion. Which means that R does the same flip that J did with symbolism: the argument switches from "religion is absolutist" to "anything absolutist is a religion or has religious elements." Thus nationalism somehow maintains a secular identity while nonetheless occasionally demonstrating contamination of "religious elements" of certain forms of absolutism (p.37).
2) Religious language is full of violence, thus it perpetuates violence. Here ironically Rapoport cites several examples of movements such as the Stern Gang in Israel, Saddam Hussein's Ba'ath Socialist Party, and the Palestine Liberation Organization, who have all taken language from religious traditions for the service of violence. Yet instead of concluding that secular liberation movements "can inspire just as much passion and commitment nd villence as religious movements can--or, as Stern himself acknowledged, dedicated to a kind of religion, which throws the whole religious secular distinction into question--R offers Stern as evidence that religion has a disposition toward violence."
Im going to skip the third reason which utilizes an analysis of Rene Girard which is in some sense a recapitulation of argument 1.
4 and 5) The fourth is the tendency of religions and states to return to their origins in times of crisis, which are violent. The fifth is that contemporary religious believers may feel desperation when they feel time is running out due to Messianic or millenarian expectations, which make them act with sudden bursts of violence (Cavanaugh notes that this is the exact opposite of J's argument above, where he said that religious activists are prone to violence because, since they operate with an eternal, cosmic time scale, their time frame is unlimited and they can fight without an end in sight--p.39). Cavanaugh concludes this section with a summary of R:
What does the word religion pick out in this analysis? At many points, religion seems to be synonymous with something like "the ideologies, rituals, and institutions through hich violence is controlled and legitimated in any given social order."..[To define it as such] however, threatens the distinction between the religious and the secular, and R must persist in assuming that religion is something else. What exactly that something else is, he never says, but religion would appear to be a sui generis set of beliefs and practices, distinct from secular reality, which controls and legitimtes violence in religious social orders, but only secondarily lends itself to nonreligious secular orders like the state. All of which is tautologous.The essential problems stems from R's use of Girard, because in Girard's work secular culture is also religious, says Girard "the failure of modern man to grasp the nature of religion has served to perpetuate itse effects. Our lack of belief serves the same function in our society that religion serves in societies more directly exposed to essential violence." And what he means, says Cavanaugh "is that the belieff in a fundamental divide between the rational, secular state, and an irrational, mystifying religion itself has a mystifying function, a function that staves off the disintegration of social order," (41) but which is itself still "religious," or ideological. If anything it is supremely ironic that R utlizes Girard, as Girard argues quite forcefully that any progress we have made away from scapegoating, mimetic violence, and structural evil is due to the death and resurrection of Christ, the revelation of our evil. The gospel undoes the myth of the scapegoat. What is ultimately clear, and what we will leave this post with, is that Girard's theory cannot be utilized as a secularist argument against religion without equivocating on the term religion. These arguments, much like the last post, can find no successful way to define their target, "religion," as opposed to other secular phenomenon, and thus should ideally redirect their inquiries into violence in general, its historical locations, how ideologies can be manipulated, and the actual contingent course and interactions of history which lead to the barbarisms we have all seen and heard about, rather than a mystifying discourse which attempts to identify an essential transhistorical transcultural core to religion and provide deductive analysis of this essence as a fundamental cause of violent tendency.
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