Hermetic Library Fellow T Polyphilus reviews The Religious Case Against Belief [Amazon, Bookshop, Publisher, Local Library] by James P Carse
I had very high hopes for this book. Based on the title alone, I expected a strong sympathy with the central thesis, and I had long ago enjoyed author James Carse’s previous book Finite and Infinite Games. So perhaps my expectations were overinflated. Still, I was rather disappointed.
The book is written in a loose, essayistic style. It gives evidence of long contemplation of deep issues, but its arguments are not as clear or tightly-organized as I would like. A few passages consist of long hodgepodges of declarative statements loosely linked by theme, with words italicized in each statement to emphasize the feature that Carse hopes to demonstrate. These masses of disparate detail did not have the persuasive effect for me that Carse clearly intended them to have. Also, many facts mentioned in the book are incorrect. Giordano Bruno was not a “great astronomer” (21). The word “heresy” is etymologically identifiable with “choice,” not with “other” (82). And I had to guffaw when Carse characterized the biblical Apocalypse as having “so little connection to … any other known literary or religious work that it is difficult to know how to weigh its importance” (114). (How about Daniel and Ezekiel, just for biblical angles?) Carse also hypostasizes the “historical Jesus” in a way that I found unhelpful, although it certainly caters to the biases of Christian readers. Even though Carse acknowledges the unknowability of “Jesus,” he treats as unquestionable the actual existence of a single historical person behind the literature and legends regarding the Christian god-man.
My biggest problem with the book, though, was Carse’s inadequate definition of “religion.” Given that defining “religion” is a Sisyphean challenge, I should perhaps cut him some slack, but he offers two criteria, both of which are beset with serious failings. The first of these is what he calls “orality.” He does not use the oral as a counterpart to the written; what he actually means could perhaps better be characterized as discursivity. That, however, would make obvious the problem that discursivity is a pervasive feature of all human thought and enterprise, as scholarship in recent decades has gone to great lengths to demonstrate. So how does it distinguish religion? His second criterion is “longevity.” For Carse, “new religious movements” is a plain oxymoron — he wants to relegate all newer manifestations of religious activity to the purview of the “belief systems” that he opposes to “religion” in sensu stricto. As an example, he insists that Mormonism is not a religion! Presumably, he considers it a “belief system” within Christian religion. In disclaiming any strict quantitative boundary to the “longevity” required of religion, he uses Mormonism as a counter-example, alleging that “It has not yet developed a distinctive culture of its own; there is no music, or architecture, or philosophy, or even theology, that is recognizable as a unique expression of the Mormon faith” (197). I will not present details of the case against Christianity or Islam’s “unique expressions” if Mormonism can be said to have none, but suffice it to say that this categorical dismissal did not satisfy me.
This artificially narrow definition of “religion” may serve a philosophical purpose, but it has especially odious effects when paired with the “freedom of religion” postulated in US civic discourse. No, you don’t have any protected right to your freely-chosen belief system, and your newfangled cult doesn’t qualify as a religion. Shudder. Carse has a reasonably perspicacious take on the state of Christianity in the US, suggesting that it may be “losing its resonance” as it panders to divisive ideologies extrinsic to its traditional concerns (207), and yet he repeatedly calls atheist critics to task for the confusion of religion and belief that is advanced by those whom the atheists criticize.
Some of the best parts of the book are toward the end. I appreciated his discussion of death and evil. He proposes an intriguing musical metaphor to address the difference between religion and belief as he sees it. Also, he introduces the distinction between belief and doctrine, which in many ways is a more apples-to-apples contrast than the one between belief systems and religions. And in the coda (a consciously musical titling, no doubt) he disavows any interest in having presented a perfected picture of the dilemma he discusses. Instead, he wants to inspire, continue, and energize the discussion. And on that basis, I would recommend the book: not as one that gives optimal answers, but as one that asks some excellent questions.
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source https://thegame23.eu/the-religious-case-against-belief/
Amour Fou 