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What
is religion?
How
was religion born on the Earth? and why was it born? With these
two sentences I try to ask the people about the way of thinking of
a believer, and the way of thinking of a not-believer!
First
of all, I will try to explain the meaning of the Religion, for a
believer and for me! (this new question is linked to the first two
questions)
The
believer was born with the passage from prehistory to history,
then to the primordial man, to the first thinking man! In fact
religion was born for filling all the “holes” of men (
Ideological holes, holes in their knowledge).
Believer:
For a simple-hearted one the religion is the need to give an
explanation of all the unknown phenomena, moreover it's a relief
to know that there is a god who protects us!
When
I say "need to give an explanation...." I want to say
that there is, or there are (in the world there both monotheist
and polytheist religions) god/s who play with us; but men are
happy to be the chosen! Why? I think that the answer to this
question is the mystical way of thinking of all religions! In
Stephen King I found
an attempt about the explanation of the meaning of religion.
Stephen
King said:” The beauty of religious mania is that it has the
power to explain everything. Once God (or Satan) is accepted as
the first cause of everything which happens in the mortal world,
nothing is left to chance... logic can be happily tossed out the
window”. (http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/k/q101714.html)
I
agree with it (but only in part) because also for me there is
something or someone who rules our world, but for me the continue
evolution of mankind ( from the intellectual point of view) can
reach this “god” and even pass him!
In
BNW the religion changes
, becomes a sheer pleasure instrument, in fact in chapter 5 we can
find the use of a religion place side by side with soma, only for
concrete delight. What follows is the annihilation of human beings
.In the second chapter, the first
reference to Ford is made . Obviously this society uses it to
replace God. The Director and others seem to worship him as God,
so also the believer change. "Christianity without tears,
that’s what soma is." (Mond in chapter 17) . Here Mond
highlights the true reasoning behind soma, it makes people content
without causing the sadness and guilt of Christianity.
Always in BNW:
"But
I don’t want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real
danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin.": (The
Savage in chapter 17)
Here
the savage explains the old religious point of view of the human
being, in fact all the savage’s sentences are in accordance with with our religion.
Rituals
in our society and in BNW
In
the novel Brave New World
I found only a ritual , named Orgy-porgy. It concerns an exchange
of intercourses among 12 persons (6 males and 6 females),
In
our world, since we are Europeans, our
rituals derive all from the catholic church.
We have about one hundred
rituals, I mention only the most important ones:
Easter,
Christmas, Madonna’s celebration etc………
Some
quotations
Now I list some relevant
quotations taken on the Internet and from a book!
Niccolo Machiavelli said:
“I Wasn’t interested on the conceptual prospective (of it),of
its truth contents, spirituality and neither
like a safety warranty, but only like “instrumentum
regni” namely like a government instruments”(Sistema
Letterario, Guglielmini-Grosser 1b book)
Carl Marx said: “Religious distress is at
the same time the expression of real distress and the protest
against real distress. Religion is the sight of the oppressed
creature. The heart of a heartless world, just as it is the
spirit, of a spiritless situation. It is the opium of the
people. (http://atheism.about.com
)
I
know that the 1st and 2nd quotations have an atheistic mark, in
fact both Machiavelli and Marx were godless.
I
come back to the concept of religion inside the human thought. I
found some relevant contrasts between two or more different
peoples, for example the Indians (from India not the native
Americans ) do not like the Christians even if they like the
beginner of this religion, Christ!
(Mohandas
Gandhi) says: “I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians.
Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.” http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/k/q101714.html)
I
can’t imagine the reason of that, but these problems may
sometimes flow into a war. Look, in these days there is a high
probability that a war brreaks out
and the reason (for occidental point of view, and I think
that is the right point of view) is so stupid, because musclemen ,correctly
fundamentalists musclemen make
an accusation against the Catholic people, do you know why? A book
is the answer!! A book (I cry!), is it possible that a book can
influence million and million of men? its seem it is .
This
is a reason why I’m not religious but I know that there is
someone who is watching us and he or He or they! Are laughing a
lot!
Francesco
Romagnoli
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