Author Akinfenwa Oluwaseun also has evidence in his article “The Role of Religion in Society…” that would effectively support claims and ideas made by Salman Rushdie in “Imagine There’s No Heaven.” In his article, Rushdie was questioning the causality of some gruesome things allowed through religious practices. He proposed, “…many unbearable things-female circumcision to name just one-can be excused on culturally specific grounds, and the universality of human rights, too, can be ignored?” (Rushdie 518). This was a very strong sentence in Rushdie’s work. He takes up a sarcastic tone in this sentence, by asking if human rights can also be ignored, and it would be just fine. Obviously, Rushdie believes ignoring basic human rights is not fine, …show more content…
This is effective at showing how religion can make terrible things ethically and “morally” correct, despite in the right minds of a lot of people it wouldn’t actually be. On a similar subject, Oluwaseun was concluding his findings when studying cases in different areas of the world and said how he found that religions actually had a negative effect on societies. He concluded, “Religious theories have become negotiable at the intellectual market and consistently sold to the highest political bidder. These theories have become a radical material force” (Oluwaseun 16). Oluwaseun is using high diction to explain his conclusion of his findings. Using high diction appropriately shows that she is an educated woman and knows what she is talking about and demonstrates great knowledge in the …show more content…
Wilkinson would stray from the other two authors and effectively complicate Rushdie’s argument in his article. In “Imagine There’s No Heaven”, Rushdie is explaining how many conflicts in history, those today and those in the past, have resulted from those of different cultures and religion disagree with one another. He urges, “The victors in that war must not be the closed-minded, marching into battle with, as ever, God on their side” (Rushdie 518). Rushdie’s word choice in this particular sentence helps effectively convey his message. He chooses to have the words “war” and “God” in the same sentence, and it’s ironic because when one thinks of God and religion, they typically think of peace and harmony, and a general heaven-like setting. However, when one thinks of war, they generally think of the exact opposite, with death and destroyed surroundings all around them in a hell-like setting. Rushdie does this to convey his feelings that religion is effectively destroying society and time after time turning men against one another and creating warzones. In addition, he chooses to add “closed-minded” to the same sentence, as he implies that all those who practice religion are close minded and are not open to other ideas, which can be harmful for society, just like war is, which is why Rushdie sincerely believes religion has no place alongside humankind. On the contrary, Wilkinson would disagree with this belief. After stating to his readers that the study he conducted
Religion is a part of society that is so closely bound to the rest of one’s life it becomes hard to distinguish what part of religion is actually being portrayed through themselves, or what is being portrayed through their culture and the rest of their society. In Holy Terrors, Bruce Lincoln states that religion is used as a justifiable mean of supporting violence and war throughout time (Lincoln 2). This becomes truly visible in times such as the practice of Jihad, the Reformation, and 9/11. The purpose of this essay is to show that as long as religion is bound to a political and cultural aspect of a community, religious war and destruction will always occur throughout the world. A historical methodology will be deployed in order to gain
“Religion Gives Meaning to Life” outlines how life is given meaning through theistic religion in Louis Pojman’s opinion. In this short reading, autonomy is described as in the meaning of freedom or self-governing and argues how it is necessary for ideal existence. By being honest and faithful with ourselves shows how we can increase our autonomy. “I think most of us would be willing to give up a few autonotoms for an enormous increase in happiness” (553) shows our willingness to practice good purpose.
In his essay, Rodriguez believes that the diplomatic affairs we see on the evening news are merely being disguised as a religious war. The fight over oil or land when in reality it is the fight between whose side God is on, the attacks under the control of Al Qaeda when perhaps it’s the greed for power or world domination. According to Richard, these religious wars are allowing terrorism to become prevalent; often times within the same culture (147).
For example, Mrs.Turpin explains how if Jesus were to ask her if she “either had to be a nigger or white trash” she would tell the lord to “wait until there 's another place availible” (Revelation). Mrs. Turpin is too infatuated with her physical appearance and is oblivious to the face that God recognises her lack of inner beauty. Jacky Dumas and Jessica Hooten Wilson wrote that “by combining biblical references with classical allusions, we want to argue that the most “striking disclosure” of “Revelation” may well be that Ruby Turpin’s reactions are possibly as close-minded as they are eye opening.” (Dumas) As casual as this language may be to Mrs. Turpin’s social circle, the rest of society and God himself see through her hurtful words. O’Connor alludes to religious references to emphasize how corrupt these racist women are in the eyes of the lord. This highlights another attitude of the so called “southern bell”. The upper class women of this time period like Mrs. Turpin and The Grandmother are very hypocritical. In “A Good Man is Hard to Find” reference to religion is used to highlight hypocrisy when the Grandmother cries out for Jesus as she is confronted by the Misfit. She tells the misfit that “if you would pray, Jesus would help you.” (A Good Man is Hard to Find). The only reason she choses these as her dying words were out of fear and hope that the lord sees
Then, he said, “in order to give us the weapons of instinct” as to say all the pain was worth it just so that they could survive. Later, he said, “It has reinforced us with dullness” that the pain had made them a shell of dullness that can protect them from all mental pain. After, he said, “so that we do not go to pieces before the horror” witch means so they don 't go insane from all the horrors of war. Finally,, he states, “which would overwhelm us if we had clear, conscious thoughts.” if they had their conscious thought that they had a civilians they would of died along time ago. Also, in WWI there were more than 14 million deaths and over 100 million casualty (injures plus deaths) all of these humans came from societies all over the world. They came from families that lived in societies. Almost all the comrades that a soldier had were friends from home and there were 14 million deaths. All those deaths hurt society 's because all the
Religion and the Igbo People The Igbo are a profoundly religious people who believe in a benevolent creator, usually known as Chukwu, who created the visible universe (uwa). Opposing this force for good is agbara, meaning spirit or supernatural being. In some situations people are referred to as agbara in describing an almost impossible feat performed by them. In a common phrase the igbo people will say Bekee wu agbara.
Author and atheist, Salman Rushdie, is a very confident man which may compel or influence people to believe his notions. It's quite ironic that he writes against dogmatism because his statements come across as extremely dogmatic. The fact of the matter is, Salman Rushdie's narrow-minded view on religion has made much of his logic very flawed. The first example of his flawed logic is in the first sentence of the third paragraph. Salman Rushdie states, "Many of these stories will strike you as extremely beautiful, and therefore seductive."
There are many social institutions that have major impacts on society. One of the trickiest social institutions would have to be, religion. Religion seems to have a huge impact on a society even if it’s directly or indirectly. Why is that? Do we need it? Does it let us live a more fulfilled life? What effects does it have on society? Is it necessary for a functioning society? According to Dalton Conley (2013:611) sociology defines religion as being a unified system of beliefs traditions, and practices around sacred things; a set of shared “stories” that guide belief and action. Religion is a way for people to make sense of the world, it keeps society in line with expected behaviors. Without religion people would subside to create their own rules and would deem to follow a path that could harm a society and come to an end. Religion is necessary for a society to function, prosper, and for someone to learn how to be a well moral contributor to society.
“It is science, and not religion, which has taught men that things are complex and difficult to understand”-Emile Durkheim. Understanding religion is a very difficult task, with so many views and thousands of different religions. No matter what the religion is, or where it is located they all have an importance for society. The importance religion has is establishing what is correct and what is not. Religion has been around for many years, so has the many different understanding of the purpose religion has on society. Most of all the three key factors of religion that has an impact on society are; Social support, experience, maintain social control.
Over the years, society has come to evolve and progressively become more efficient as society’s viewpoints and perspectives on various aspects of life have also changed. However, the one aspect of life that has stayed constant has been religion. The impact of a constant religious opinion on a changing society has detrimental and benign effects on the populace of such a society.
they do not believe wars are caused by religion but simply the wars we come to see as being caused by religion are simply “wars of nationalism, liberation of territory or self-defense.” i will agree that some of the wars that have occurred in history are not related to religion but Greg, Todd and Thom are mistaken because they overlook recent events that have taken place in the world. for example, 9/11. the terrorist attacks did not occur on self-defense or liberation of territory. those acts were brought on by their own religious beliefs in the Koran.
There are many different religions in the world but they are all capable of doing similar things. Religion plays a significant role in the book Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe. In this book religion is important to the people of Umuofia ,which is the village where the protagonist, Okonkwo lives. The people of the village believed there was only one religion ,and when another religion was introduced to them they would not believe in it. This religion was Christianity. During the novel the power of religion both guides and destroys the society of Umuofia.
The book “The Sacred and the Profane: The Nature of Religion”, written by Mircea Eliade, investigates four aspects of the sacred universe: space, time, nature, and self. Eliade splits each aspect into two forms of perception, the sacred and profane. Religious men, specifically the ancient, traditional men, view the universe as sacred. In other words, they acknowledge a distinct qualitative difference between a sacred and profane (non-sacred) universe; whereas, nonreligious, specifically modern men, are unable to understand such differences in the world. This claim rests on the on the concept of heirophanies or manifestations of the sacred. A hierophany is the religious man’s source of absolute reality and it illuminates the glory and power of God. This manifestation of divine glory charges a site with special significance, thereby losing a sense of homogeneity throughout the universe. Eliade’s underlying thesis is that due to the human experience of both the sacred and profane in day to day life, the transitional zones between the two are exceptionally illuminated and charged with the divine glory of the sacred.
Although, there is one thing to remember. The author believes a Christians mind is different than a secular’s. Christians are influenced by a secularistic point of view even thought their minds are different. However, secular ideas are similar to Christian ideas in many ways which makes them “partly right.” These secular ideologies are “pervasive, and felt to be so self-evident, that they are not visible as beliefs to those who hold them” which is why Christians fall victims to them. That is why they need to be shown so Christians do not fall victim to
Nigeria is undoubtedly one of the most religious countries in the world. As a multi-ethnic, multi-religious country, Nigeria’s broad religious geography reflects the historical exposure of its northern communities, Islam, and its southern parts of Christianity (CIA World Fact Book ). The country is divided regionally into the north and south. The three dominant religions in nigeria are traditionnal religion, Islam, and Christinanity. All these religious ideologies allow for interaction between religion and politics (Danjibo and Oladeji). Nigeria has three religious divisions with 50% of the population being Muslims, 40% Christian, and 10% practicing traditional religions. When Nigeria attained independence in 1960, it officially became a secular state (CIA World Fact Book ). Despite Nigeria’s secular constitution, religion has become increasingly important in the public state (Danjibo and Oladeji).