Holy Book!
As I left campus today I was handed a book by a stranger. She smiled and nodded as she gave me the book and said in heavily accented English “Jesus loves you.” Which is fair enough I suppose. I guess he might. What do I know? I took the book, as I’m always looking for new ways to practice my Chinese and I figured the Bible would be as good a way as any. This particular volume is made extra useful as it has both English and Chinese texts so I can instantly check my translating.
Christianity has a reasonably long history in the East, but it really took off with the huge surge in global missionary work in the 19th century. Missionaries spent much of their lives living and preaching throughout East, and Southeast Asia. Much of the early Western scholarly work on the region is a direct result of this missionizing. Some of these missionaries claim to have converted tens of thousands of individuals. While their claims are dubious at best, there is no doubt that Christianity has had a lasting impact here. China is under increased pressure to recognize the Vatican (it still doesn’t as the Vatican recognizes Taiwan which is a no-no according to China). Korea has spawned Christian sects with global reach. Other Asian countries have large, vocal, and evangelical Christian populations.
When the woman handed me the Bible I started thinking about the history of missionaries and both the harm and good they have caused around the world. Their effects were global in scale, but highly differentiated by locality. It seems that in areas without strong recorded mythologies (I include all religions under this term) the missionaries exerted a force for rapid change. The Bible subsumed traditional religion. In areas with recorded religious texts the challenge was much greater, and thus the lasting effect not as great. Resultantly the world’s unwritten religions have either largely disappeared, or been written as obituaries. What we’re left with are a few religions, each with their own canonical texts. These texts must thus act as the ultimate arbiters of moral or faith based questions for those who ascribe to these religions. The problem with this is that these texts do not evolve. They are static, having been written from a certain historical frame of reference their applicability and pertinence decrease with time. Updated translations can help to keep them relevant, but they are not nearly as fluid as a pre-literate religion would have been. A pre-literate religion was largely arbitrated by local wise men or women. It was up to them to interpret beliefs for their parishioners. This allowed for more tailor made spiritual solutions to the problems of the day.
I’m forced to wonder whether this decreasing relevance of religious texts is somehow related to falling attendance rates at Churches, and a rise of secularism. Furthermore I wonder how long we will have to live in a world where those who are religious claim that their mythology is the mythology, that their book is the word of God (or the Gods) and holds the ultimate truth. I feel sophomoric harping on about such an overly discussed and argued about issue, but come on. I mean how long are people going to claim that God really wants women to walk around shrouded from head to toe? When will people stop claiming that God chose their tribe of desert dwelling shepherds as the bestest people in the world, and that everyone who doesn’t follow the minutiae of the contemporaneous notes taken during their conversations with the big man upstairs is going to burn in everlasting torturous Hell?
Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for religion. I think tradition and ritual are incredibly important. However religion, ritual, and tradition must be allowed to evolve as we do, or there will be a fundamental disconnect between who we are and who we believe we are.
Comments
I've enjoyed browsing your blog. I lived in Taiwan for about 7 years as a child. The culture has always intrigued me.
I could not stop myself from commenting on this post.*grin* Your observations and commentary are hardly sophomoric. You raise some very good questions. Contemporary Christians are starting to ask the same questions of themselves and of their Bible. The fact is that most of the Bible consists of old testament texts that are heavily laden with do's and don'ts. Many of them are not at all relevant or practical today. But the central message of the Bible is found in the gospels. Here we are shown that Christ came to earth and took our sins upon himself and suffered in our places. Viz, the wrath of God's judgment was poured out on him. By acknowledging this sacrifice that Christ made for us and by trusting that our sins have thus been washed away, we are saved from said sin (past, present,and future.) Where the Jews depended on observance of old testament laws and the ritual sacrifice of animals to find favor with God and to bring about righteousness, the modern Christian relies fully on Christ's sacrifice. That is not to say that the modern Christian is free from any moral obligations, rather, it means that they rely on Christ's transforming work within them to bring about righteousness.
Even in the new testament, there are laws that are not relevant to today's cultures. I.E. that women should wear head coverings. While most Christians don't insist on practicing such law, they generally agree that the spirit of such laws should be preserved. Viz, that women should dress modestly (within reason) so as not to rouse men to lust.
I am a Christian, and I believe the Bible is the inherent word of God. I respect those who do not believe as I do. Do I KNOW that it is the word of God? Barely. Plato said that knowledge is Justified True Belief. I'm still working on justifying my belief. But when one accepts the bible as true and accepts it as a philosophical foundation for their world view, it does a remarkably good job of making sense of the world around us. Much deductive reasoning can be done with the Bible as a foundation. Thus I find that my beliefs are intellectually sound.
If you read the Bible, I encourage you to focus on the gospels, i.e., Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Pay special attention to Jesus. He's remarkable.
There's so much that I could say. Sorry for the long comment. Keep up the blogging. I'm enjoying it.
Posted by: Joshua Hewlett | June 26, 2008 8:18 PM