From: grimoire@byron.u.washington.edu (John Greer)
Subject: Re: I waste my time (was: Hitler as Occultist (was: Numbers))
Organization: University of Washington, Seattle
Date: Wed, 12 Aug 1992 21:08:48 GMT

smayo@wang.com writes:

           (comprehensive flame deleted)

Sigh.
Yes, Scott, I know.  As I think I've mentioned, we've heard this one more
than once.  The dog still won't hunt.

I'll be as brief as possible:

a)  Politics are more or less the same throughout history and around the
    world: pretty much the lowest common denominator of human behavior,
    granted.  And I would tend to think that human nature (however defined)
    doesn't vary much, either.  Given these facts, and your claims, one
    would tend to expect that every religion would tend to be used as a
    cloak for political atrocities to about the same extent.
    However, that's _not_ what the historical record shows.  Most faiths
    have been used in this way, true -- but to a widely varying extent.
    Some of the Eastern traditions are near one end of the spectrum.
    Christianity is at the other.
    If you want to rephrase my question as "what is it about Christianity
    that makes it so extremely vulnerable to political use in these par
    ticularly bloodthirsty ways?", I won't argue too loudly.

b)  Ideas affect behavior.  Religious ideas can dominate it.  When I see
    repetitive behavior patterns coming out of a particular religious
    tradition, despite a very wide range of political contexts, I feel
    it's appropriate to suggest a link.  Which brings me to...

c)  The period of extreme Church dominance in European history  is far from
    the only example of the behavior patterns I've been talking about.
    You are quite correct to note that it was an atypical period in many
    ways.  Very much so...but the so-called "Burning Times", or in more
    academic language the period of maximum religious persecution against
    witches, heretics, etc., can't really be said to begin until the
    power of the Church was well past its peak -- say, around the time of
    the Albigensian crusade.  Furthermore, the Reformation didn't exactly
    put an end to this behavior -- in fact, witch-burnings were at or close
    to their peak at that time, and every little Reformed sect seemed to
    think it was their primary purpose to oppress all the others, along
    (of course) with Jews, Catholics, and so on.  Look into the habits
    of the much-lauded Pilgrims in this country for a good example -- and
    I'm not particularly talking about Salem; or read up on John Calvin's
    theocracy in Geneva.
    For that matter, look up the persecutions of heretics and pagans in 
    the late Roman Empire, or some of the atrocious things that "missionaries"
    in the Third World are up to at present...well, I hope I'm fairly clear
    about what I'm saying.

d)  No, Hitler was not a Christian; agreed.  I think the long and nasty
    history of Christian antisemitism in Europe did a lot to make him
    a possibility, but that's another point.
    
e)  No, Scott, despite what you seem to have read into my posting, I don't
    hate Christianity...and I think your imputation that I take joy in
    its crimes, just to have something to bash it with, is pretty tacky
    to say the least.  As I think I mentioned in my post (did you read it, 
    or just go into flame mode?), it has an enormous amount of good to its
    credit, along with the evil; my point is simply that it needs to be 
    accountable for both.  Unfortunately, there is one form of "bambi-ism"
    (nice term) in Christianity; Christian writings are both very thought-
    ful and very eloquent on the subject of the flaws in human nature, but
    the basic premises of the faith preclude analysis of the flaws I've
    been trying to point toward...within the structure of the doctrines 
    of the faith itself.  As I mentioned earlier, ideas shape behavior...

As a final note, a few months ago religious factions in the Republican
party in the state where I live pushed through a party platform which
would, among other things, deprive gay and lesbian people of their civil
rights, forbid P/pagans from a range of occupations (including teaching),
and mandate specifically Christian prayer in the schools.  Ideas do,
indeed, shape behavior.

Well, this turned out rather less brief than I'd hoped.  I'll try not to
post again on the subject; I'm sure you all have better things to read.

-- John Michael Greer