Is religion to be at the service of humans?

The above question may generate different reactions. Some may regard it as flippant as it appears to put religion in a subservient position to humans and reduce it to something with only a utility value. This may upset a significant number of people who regard religion as occupying the most elevated station in all human affairs. Thus, there is little wonder if an overwhelming majority would take exception to this rather ‘wicked’ and reductionist view, for religion has an inviolable place in our minds, manifestly, in theory. Surely, we would defend to the hilt our religion’s unique capacity for guiding us towards that ‘good life’ although we wouldn’t be too keen to play the game, as it were. Experience tells us that, frequently, the precepts are more useful “in the breach than the observance” (with apologies to Shakespeare).

The followers of every religion consider theirs to be the definitive path to ‘redemption’, although in no way does it mean the same to devotees of different religions. In day-to-day affairs, the term “redemption” may be used broadly to mean freeing, rescue, protection, restoration, recovery, liberation, emancipation, and the like. However, each religion gives its specific meaning to what it calls “redemption”, which may not see eye to eye with that of any other. In all honesty, depending on who looks at which religion, one’s response to the idea of ‘redemption’ may shift between two extremes: the sublime and the absurd.

Let’s come back to the rather contentious issue of the relative positions of religion and human beings in the hierarchical order of importance. Surely, we will have no problem thinking of education, ethics, philosophy, art, aesthetics, science, technology, etc., as systems that are, in a sense, at the service of humans and not vice versa. Of course, you may, agree or disagree on “art for art’s sake” based on a set of criteria, but whichever side you may belong to, you wouldn’t consider it sensible to take sides in a debate on “religion for religion’s sake”. How come? When it comes to art, you may argue, with justification, either for or against the idea that art has an intrinsic value devoid of any social, political or ethical innuendo. Yet, religion with its inextricable links with an afterlife is unanimously regarded as the fail-safe entry permit to that blissful afterlife. Thus, considering our deep-seated desire for a ‘blissful’, or at least an improved existence after death, “religion for man’s sake” will have more weight than “religion for religion’s sake”. In this light, thinking of religion as something to be put at the service of the humanity wouldn’t necessarily be construed as deserving hellfire.

The other reason which justifies our tendency to see religion as having a utility value is our deep conviction of its overt ‘ethical’ significance. Consequently, it may support the seemingly impious assertion that religion had little significance if it wouldn’t serve some purpose. The historian, Noah Harari who makes a distinction between religion and spirituality says that many would resent religion being shown as a “tool”. He says, “The assertion that religion is a tool for preserving social order and for organising a large-scale cooperation may vex those for whom it represents first and foremost a spiritual path”. In other words, depending on their devoutness, people may have their reservations about religion being seen as a discipline like education, philosophy, science, etc. Couldn’t this fervent regard of awe and reverence towards one’s own religion to the exclusion of all the others have contributed in some degree to triggering enmities between different religious communities, which have sullied our history time and time again?

Perhaps, peoples’ acquired feeling that religion is way above all sciences and arts, it being the supreme path to a ‘salvation’, which means different things to the followers of different religions, contributes in some measure to religion-based discrimination. How so?

Firstly, as all will agree, our religion, which contains the ‘ultimate truth’, eclipses all the other religions and we rarely stoop to look at them. As such, for those who place religion above all other human attainments aiming at ‘ultimate happiness’, the religion that occupies this grand position is only theirs. No other religion, notwithstanding what you would say about them in public, is fit to take its place. Will this bias leave any room for them to have any respect for the followers of other religions, who, by implication, appear to them to be pathetically misguided? Wouldn’t this partiality make the devotees of each religion feel ‘superior’ to all other ‘fellow sufferers in this temporary abode of earthly existence’?

Perhaps, religion, as a social institution, would be a much less discordant topic if we could become aware of its uncommon hold on us and feel less self-righteous and complacent about our own religion’s ‘superiority’. After all, in religious conflicts, like in all other conflicts based on race, ethnicity, wealth, political power etc., the “first casualty” (also the last) is human life and not “religion” as such. Above all, what is most pathetic is that emotionally volatile issues like religion, race and ethnicity, can easily become the handiest weapon in political maneuvering. If religions, which were meant to morally elevate people, were to be an irritant and a convenient divide-and-rule tactic, it is a cause for concern. Disconcertingly, the more fervent you get about your religion, the more indifferent it makes you view other religions and the more easily you become putty in the hands of shrewd tacticians. It’s not so infrequently that such strong ‘identities’ have been used to deflect people’s opposition against the status quo.

Thus, it would be good for the sanity of society and the common wellbeing of all to not shy away from looking at the different ways in which religion influences us and, particularly, is made to influence us. Perhaps, the first step towards such a constructive scheme is to look impartially at how religion can serve us. Because, the idea that humans are “at the service of religion”, however mystical or uplifting it may sound, may entail more minuses than pluses in a multi-religious milieu. Human concerns have to take primacy over everything else, secular or religious.

Susantha Hewa