Tag: Christianity

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Books, essays and others

[3031] Context-making and context-stealing while reading Augustine of Hippo’s Confessions

One of the benefits of reading books with related themes back-to-back (or at least within a certain duration where the read is fresh) is that the reader can contextualize the content of latter more deeply than he or she otherwise could. I remember being in awe of the Syed Hussein Al-Alatas’s The Myth of the Lazy Native within the context of Edward Said’s Orientalism. The theses in both work in my head feed on each other and make both of them even more profound. When I read Karen Armstrong’s A History of God, I immediately followed up with Gerard Russell’s Heirs to Forgotten Kingdoms. While Armstrong explained the origin and evolution of Abrahamic monotheism through the lens Judaism, Christianity and Islam, Russell explored the minor offshoots of these three big religions by tracing how that divergence could have occurred. And every time Russell described some of the minor cults, I found myself understanding exactly how that cults’ belief evolved, thanks to material from Armstrong’s book.

I recently finished another of Karen Armstrong’s book—The Bible: The Biography and the next read was something related: the translation of Augustine of Hippo’s Confessions. Any person with a passing interest in philosophy would have heard of Augustine, who lived in the 4th and the 5th century during the common era. He is perhaps better known to most as a major Christian theologian who rationalized certain foundational concepts in Christianity. Without him, Christianity or maybe more precisely Catholicism would have been a very different religion than what it is today.

But Confessions is not primarily a philosophical or theological work. Instead, it is mostly an autobiography full of, well, confessions of the author’s sins. These confessions essentially retell his conversion over the years from Mandeanism (which incidentally the subject of the first chapter of Heirs to the Forgotten Kingdom) to Catholicism.

Karen Armstrong in all likelihood would have read Confessions and she wrote The Bible: The Biography close to 2,000 years later. I can see that some of the points in the latter are obviously influenced by the former. But I experienced these two in the reverse order. And so when I read Confessions, I see echoes of Armstrong’s points, which undoubtedly originated from Augustine. As Augustine wrote centuries ago:

For this reason, although I hear people say ‘Moses meant this’ or ‘Moses meant that’, I think it more truly religious to say ‘Why should he not have had both meanings in mind, if both are true? And if others see in the same words a third, or a fourth, or any number of true meanings, why should we not believe that Moses saw them all? There is only one God, who caused Moses to write the Holy Scriptures in the way best suited to the minds of great numbers of men who would all see truths in them, though not the same truths in each case!

For my part I declare resolutely and with all my heart that if I were called upon to write a book which was to be vested with the highest authority, I should prefer to write it in such a way that a reader could find re-echoed in my words whatever truths he was able to apprehend.

I would rather write in this way than impose a single true meaning so explicitly that it would exclude all others, even though they contained no falsehood that could give me offence. And if this is what I would choose for myself, I will not be so rash, my God, as to suppose that so great a man as Moses deserved a lesser gift from you. As he wrote those words, he was aware of all that they implied. He was conscious of every truth that we can deduce from them and of others besides that we cannot, or cannot yet, find in them but are nevertheless there to be found.

This echoes the point highlighted by Armstrong that I wrote earlier: scriptures and texts should be interpreted and reinterpreted to reveal multiple truths that might not necessarily be evident if we stick to just one interpretation.

But this brings me to a more meta-concern.

The book in my hand is a translated version of Confessions and that, it is not the full Confessions. I was deeply unhappy when I discovered my edition was merely an abridged work, which the publisher failed to make it clear without going through the fine prints. At the time of purchase, I was unaware of its abridged nature since there is no indication of it on the front or the back page. That information was written in the copyright page. I am absolutely livid of this and the publisher should have made the fact plainly at the front page stating it is an abridged translation.

A translated book means a certain kind of interpretation is already set in stone but since I do not read the original language Confessions was written in (which is Latin) and that I do not intend to read multiple different translations of the book, I am happy to accept this limitation.

The worst limitation by far are the cuts made to the book. I learned the from the internet that possibly half, or even two-thirds of the content, had been disposed of.

This had a negative effect on my reading experience. I for one found Augustine’s conversion to Catholicism as unconvincing and his confessions seem… truncated. I was left to wonder if there was more context to consider that could have been his confessions and conversion more satisfying.

The abridge edition also appears to present Augustine as a person with an anti-science bias, as if he was rebelling against his secular training. There are multiple instances in the version where he criticizes those with inclinations to the natural sciences but a little investigation online reveals otherwise, that he has a deep respect science and tries to incorporate rational thoughts into his religion.

So, while I did learn new things from reading this abridged edition, I keep on questioning whether my interpretation of Confessions from this particular edition is trustworthy. Maybe, I managed to gain something out of it, as Augustine would have wanted, as he had indicated in the quoted passages above.

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Books, essays and others Society

[3030] The idea of constant interpretation of holy text in Karen Armstrong’s The Bible: The Biography

Abrahamic religions are interesting in the sense that they share a common history. More specifically, there is a certain evolution of tenets that can be traced from Judaism all the way to Islam. Karen Armstrong’s 1993 A History of God explains this evolution and I remember being blown away by the book when I first read it in the 2000s. A History of God was once banned in Malaysia, and it was only unbanned in the most embarrassing manner for the Malaysian government. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs had invited Karen Armstrong to a panel in Kuala Lumpur, and during the Q&A session, somebody went up to the mic and told the panel that the book was banned.

Earlier this month, I finished another of Karen Armstrong’s book, The Bible: The Biography. It was first published in 2007.

Armstrong is sympathetic to the idea of religion. So, she is no Richard Dawkins. From my readings, I understand that she tends to interpret religions, even the harshest parts of holy texts, through universal values. This is how The Bible: A Biography is written. Central to this idea is that literal interpretation of holy texts is a relatively recent phenomenon and the source of religious bigotry in our modern world. She describes how the Bible, and specifically the Jewish text Tanakh, is meant to be taken figuratively and interpreted again and again across time to fit contemporary needs. The fact that the Tanakh was originally something not primarily written down but instead remembered and recited made constant reinterpretations not only possible but necessary.

When the texts began to put down in written form, there were objections raised that the exercise would make these documents more concrete than they should be. But the objections could not stand in the way of the natural evolution of language. Written texts were inevitable even before widespread literacy and the printing press became facts.

While written texts sowed the seeds of literalism, the culture of constant reinterpretation within the Jewish and later Christian traditions continued to flourish. Several prominent groups across the centuries created a ‘canon within the canon’ to make their religion kinder and perhaps more consistent with universal values, or perhaps just the Golden Rule, which is to treat others the way you want to be treated.

But the coming of the scientific age had a corroding effect on the culture of figurative and constant interpretation. The exacting nature of science seeped into Judaism and Christianity (and dare I say Islam too), which gave literal interpretation a major boost. American Christian groups especially are guilty of literalism, which brings about an aggressive interpretation of Christianity (and Judaism too, which perhaps provided the religious foundation for the genocide in Gaza).

Literalism not only spreads harsher versions of the religions, but it also highlights inconsistencies within the Bible. Given the way the Bible was written by multiple prophets, sages, and preachers across hundreds—if not thousands—of years, contradictions are aplenty. The traditional ways of understanding the Bible through reinterpretation would easily navigate these contradictions. This can be understood through a Talmudic story: during the first century of the Common Era, the sage Hillel the Elder was challenged by a stranger who said he would convert to Judaism if Hillel could summarize the Torah while standing on one leg. Hillel said, “What is hateful to yourself, do not do to your fellow man. That is the whole of the Torah, and the remainder is but commentary. Go study it.”

Armstrong ends with a call for charity and kindness in reading and interpreting all holy texts including the Bible, the Koran, and others. Reading these texts through that lens would help moderate the excesses of religion. As she writes near the end, “What would it mean to interpret the whole of the Bible as ‘commentary’ on the Golden Rule? It would first demand an appreciation of other people’s scriptures. R. Meir said that any interpretation that spread hatred or denigrated other sages was illegitimate. Today these ‘other sages’ must include Muhammad, Buddha and the rishis of the Rig Veda.”

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Liberty Society

[2414] The Church of Hypocrisy

It is quite rich for someone to claim being victims of intolerance when the same person has no qualms discriminating against others. This refers to some Malaysian churches’ opposition to gay marriage.

That is hypocritical. Hypocrisy is exactly what some Christian churches in Malaysia are guilty of. Those churches not only oppose the gay marriage between a Malaysian pastor and his partner, they want the Malaysian authority to prevent the couple from holding a reception in Malaysia.[1][2]

Apart from the intolerance, it is alright for the churches to oppose gay marriage and homosexual relationship at large. They are entitled to their own opinion, for better or for worse. It is part of freedom of conscience. But to demand coercive action preventing the gay couple from holding mere reception is beyond the realm of acceptability.

Rights as defined in libertarianism are not these churches’ concern. These churches are not libertarians. Fine.

But moral authority is something that should bother them. To interfere in private relationship as these churches are calling for strips them of their moral authority to moralize about discrimination and justice. What gives these churches the platform to talk about justice and discrimination given their action?

Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved

[1] — PETALING JAYA: Several pastors have condemned their gay counterpart Rev Ou Yang Wen Feng’s upcoming marriage and want the authorities to ensure he does not hold a wedding reception in Malaysia. [No way to gay’s big day, say pastors. The Star. August 18 2011]

[2] — Mingguan Malaysia’s reports quoted various parties including the National Evangelical Christian Fellowship’s executive secretary Alfred Pais saying that homosexual practices were against the teachings of Jesus Christ. [The Star August 15 2011. August 18 2011]

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Liberty Politics & government Society

[2365] Should action be taken against Utusan Malaysia? A libertarian perspective

Utusan Malaysia recently alleged that Malaysian Christian heads were conspiring to make Christianity the official religion of Malaysia. The conservative Malay daily cited two blogs of questionable credibility to back its front-page report. For a society highly conscious of  ethnicity and religion issues, the report caused uproar and tension between various communities.

Assuming the allegation is false which is likely the case, should action be taken against Utusan Malaysia for reporting it and in effect, spreading falsehood?

Our incentive system is imperfect to say the least. It is not at all surprising to have somebody spreading falsehood, lying or deceiving someone else to get what he or she wants in general. To complicate the matter, those acts might not by wrong all the times. There are times when those acts might be necessary to protect the innocents.

Even when those acts are wrong, unilateral public action through state authority might be out of the question with the principle of free speech in place, along with other typical individual rights.

Individual rights do not include the legitimization of fraud. Any action based on lies and falsehood that adversely affects individual rights cannot be condoned by the state or any authority invested with the powers to protect individual rights. It just cannot be let go off the hook.

One example is this: in a transaction, one party lies about the state of a good for sale to a person. If the person bought the good while supplied with false information, then the lying seller has obtained the money wrongly, with money being a private property of the purchaser. The right to private property is an individual right and the transaction based on deceit violates that right. The lying seller has to be punished by the state — unilaterally — since the prime rationale of the establishment of the state is the protection of individual rights according. The punishment is important not just for the sake of principle, but also for a very pragmatic reason. It is imposes a cost on such act and so discourages such fraud from recurring in the future.

Within the context of Utusan Malaysia and its recent controversial report, was there any violation of rights?

I cannot answer it in the affirmative. Therefore, I cannot to support unilateral state action against Utusan Malaysia. The best I can come up with is that the falsehood affects reputation. Yet, individual rights do not include reputation.

This of course does not mean individuals involved in the reporting — meaning the one reported involved the conspiracy — cannot seek redress against the Malay daily. Conflicts between private parties have always happened and a trustworthy third party can and has always been appointed to resolve the conflicts. The third party here is usually the state. The third party’s judgment then is enforced to resolve the conflict as civil as possible.

In the case of interest, the group accused by the Malay daily can bring their grouse to the courts. If Utusan Malaysia did spread falsehood and that the falsehood adversely affected the reputation of the group, then the daily should be compelled to compensate the group or be fined. The fate of the two bloggers should be the same as the Malay daily.

I like this route the best because it is clean. It makes the issue as a conflict between two private parties and makes the concern of unilateral state action against Utusan Malaysia merely academic if indeed Utusan Malaysia did spread falsehood (which, again, I do not doubt that is the case).

By making it private, it does not mean that there is no public interest in the case. There is but it is hard if not impossible to account for that interest and its very public effect without resorting to discretion.

If unilateral state action has to be taken — which I will contest its legitimacy — there may be a mechanism for that. Robert Nozick’s Anarchy, State and Utopia may have a mechanism that can be modified to justify unilateral state action against Utusan Malaysia. Be warned that I am taking the idea in a very restricted sense. Nozick is concerned with a much larger issue than that which I am focusing on now.

Early in the book, Nozick demonstrates how various insurance and compensation arrangements will address threats and actual transgressions of rights. Insurance and compensation arrangements here are simply different terms used for protection provided by an entity, which can be the state, a private security firm, a gangster group or other entities capable of provide that service. Meanwhile, threat is not simply some kind of warning or a menacing declaration that something will be done if something else is not done. Rather, it is the possibility of something bad happening. The chances of a pedestrian being hit accidentally by a car is one of such threats. The chances of a person makes good of his threat to break your leg is another example of such threats.

Nozick describes how a general open threat creates fear among the threatened. Depending on the credibility of threats and the level as well as the spread of fear the threats create, it will disrupt day-to-day activities of the person or even the society. In order words, there are costs imposed on society by the threats, regardless of realization of the threats.

I think this parallels concerns regarding lies and falsehood. It gives the qualification why some lies and falsehood should be punished. When lies and falsehood creates widespread public anxiety, then there is a case for unilateral state punishment. Under this line of thinking, the priority is fear minimization, or in the parlance of Malaysian political discourse, sedition or incitation of hatred. In the end, Utusan Malaysia clearly must be punished, if this method is adopted.

The question is how widespread before punitive unilateral state action should be taken?

This may require some kind of discretionary powers, which like any discretionary powers, are open to abuse.

The need of discretion is one reason why I do not like this method, on top of the fact it does not follow from the first principle aimed at the protection of individual rights.

Discretion tends to create dissatisfactory judgment. It will inevitably be inconsistent and in the end, ruin the reputation of the third party wielding the power to punish. Discretionary powers will lead to abuse.

The wielding and the exercise of the discretionary powers have caused troubles in the past. Some newspapers have been punished for publishing controversial material while others have been let go. Indeed, Utusan Malaysia has been let go off the hook by the government despite its controversial report of unverified truth. If reported by other newspapers less friendly to the government, that newspapers would have been punished.

So, long story short, no to unilateral state action against Utusan Malaysia but yes to making the case a private conflict between two parties involved.

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Liberty Politics & government Society

[2149] Of there are Malay alternatives to the term Allah and tuhan

I have clarified my position regarding the usage of the term Allah by Catholic group and by extension, any term by anybody. This reasoning forms the basis of my position not to oppose Catholic group’s use of the term. Indeed, I consider this line of reasoning as not only the most convincing for me, consistent with my wider libertarian philosophy that I hold, it is the only line of reasoning that informs my decision not to oppose it. This is the libertarian position. The purpose of this entry is to address another position regarding the lack of alternative.

First, there are other reasons that have been bandied elsewhere. Arguably, the argument I have seen the most is based on historical development of the Malay Bible. As it goes, certain domination of Christianity — and Sikhs — have been using the term Allah well before the 1980s, when the government first interfered in the issue. Furthermore, the first Bible that used the term Allah to refer to the Christian god was first translated into Malay in the 17th century by a Dutchman as part of Christian evangelization effort in Southeast Asia. Notwithstanding the libertarian position, this argument is acceptable because it appeals to historical accident. Moreover, it demonstrates that the use of the term by Christian, obviously, as not a recent phenomenon. Yet, it fails to kill the suspicion that use of the term Allah is really for proselytizing activities, which is one major problem associated with the whole controversy to start with. This failure what convinces me that this particular rationale as imperfect.

I have no problem with propagation of any religion as long as those religions do not violate liberty but in addressing the issue in Malaysia, the suspicion seriously have to be addressed. To say that there is a law to prevent propagation of other religions among Muslims as an answer to that concern is utterly deficient because — ignoring its anti-liberty rationale — would such law work? Do differentiate the normative and positive aspects.

Despite its failure, I reiterate, the argument based on history may have some sway.

The second argument, which is the purpose of this entry, is the point that there is a lack of alternative to describe the term god. Ignore the fact that terms can be imported from other languages, even the Malay language has alternatives to Allah and tuhan. There are more than two words to describe the idea.

While I set out to disprove the argument that there is no alternative to the word Allah and tuhan in Malay, knowing that there are alternatives, my casual research on the language and terms to describe the idea of god really surprises me even.

Consider the fourth edition of R. O. Winstedt’s An Unabridged English-Malay Dictionary published in 1963. For god, Winstedt listed Allah, tuhan, dewa, dewi, dewata, indera and khalik. These words are detailed by Teuku Iskandar’s Kamus Dewan as published by Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka in 1970. Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka’s Kamus Dwibahasa Bahasa Inggeris-Bahasa Malaysia adds another one and that is betara. This has not even considered other words and phrases like pencipta, tuan and dato’ which can be made to mean the same as god within specific context.

There are also older words like Hyang or Sang Yang that are rarely used but remains Malay nonetheless.

I personally have never encountered the word khalik and betara but that shows how, even for a native speaker of Malay, the full breadth of the language is larger, as it should typically be, than everyday popular vocabulary bank. In this sense, arguing that there is no alternative is an act of sheer arrogance of one’s pool of knowledge. Arrogance can be justified but when it is based on ignorance, then humility must take its place.

Thus, this renders the argument of no alternative to naught. In fact, I consider such argument as a point in ignorance, if not outright dishonesty.

This requires highlight in political terms. Even I as a person who is generally dismissive of religions and its activities and as a libertarian who actually does not oppose the use of the term Allah by Catholic Church in Malaysia am distrustful of the motive behind the employment of the rationale. Consider what would conservative Malay Muslims would think? The label conservative Malay Muslims is rather misleading. A lot of not-so conservative Malay Muslims feel distressed about the issue. I can divorce the flaw of the ”˜no alternative’ argument from my overall position but the less libertarian Malays would not do so and would use it instead to strengthen their illberal opposition.

Using the ”˜no alternative’ argument will just give more fuel to the opposition fire. Not only it defeats effort at bridge building, it helps to popularly defeat libertarian position on the matter.

So, my advice is, do not use the argument that there is no alternative. It is simply not true. Just stick to the historical accident and libertarian arguments.