David Sloan Wilson is a hardcore evolutionary biologist; Evolution is his religion. That is what makes his approach to studying religion so particularly interesting. Borrowing the term “Secular Utility” from Emile Durkheim, Sloan appreciates and in many ways dissects the importance of religious practices in human prosperity. It makes the reader wonder if religious rules are the source or the product of practices that aided in success. I think his opinion leads more toward the religious rules stemming out of evolutionary success rather than initially causing it. He views religion from an organismal approach, believing the survival of any religion is bound by the same constraints of any organism. In the chapter “The Secular Utility of Religion”, Sloan looks closely at 3 religions and breaks down their practices to their most biologically successful nature.
The Water Temple System of Bali 
Judaism
To say the Jewish people as a whole have had a tough go throughout history would be an understatement. The most interesting part about them though, has to be how long they have endured; their history is enormous, definitely one of the longest surviving religions. Wilson makes the point that what made the religion so successful is not much different than what might make a particular species successful. Judaism is a fairly strict religion that follows the rules given to them in the Hebrew Bible closely. These rules obviously make a group that follows them more functional and cooperational than one which does not. The Hebrew Bible is a little unclear on behavior towards outsiders, at one point saying to ‘not oppress the alien’ and giving instructions for war in another. On the whole, the Jewish people have remained a relatively genetically and religiously pure society. Their strength in kinship has been a great advantage over the past 2000 years, but also their greatest source of criticism. They have been attacked countless times, but the culture always prevails because of their powerful social identity. Judaism is not a religion that actively seeks members like others, and the practice of genetic isolation goes outside the basic principles of group selection, but this genetic isolation has made their brotherhood grow stronger in the literal and figurative sense, creating an altruistic attitude among the Jews as a community. The strict rules of Judaism have served as a secular utility for the Jews, making their culture withstand thousands of years with the same cultural identity.
The Early Christian Church
The strength of the early Christian Church stemmed from an exponential growth over a few hundred years. Scientists were baffled by this boom until Rodney Stark used comparative analysis of 22 Roman cities to examine the growth by measuring city size, distance along trade routes between Jerusalem and Rome, and the presence of a synagogue around the year 100 to measure Jewish influence. Stark took information that had been around all along and made sense of them. Contrary to what most people think about Rome, it was a hectic, violent, unwelcoming place; fires were frequent and the city was divided among many ethnic groups that didn’t get along. By the start of Christianity, Roman culture was inhospitable for reproduction, not in the sense that babies are bad, but the fact that it was a male dominated culture made the desire for male babies much higher than the poor female babies that were many times killed. The introduction of Christianity was attractive to many women in particular because of the rules governing reproduction and more importantly the greater freedom and status it offered. The Christian teachings also encouraged altruism towards all, consequentially increasing the life expectancy of the early Christians (if they didn’t die of the plague helping those afflicted). Christianity established a more free, less threatening Rome. While that is the nature of the religion, as a secular utility it increased reproduction and decreased violence. A heightened community and belongingness helped the people and the religion thrive.
Comparing social groups, religion in particular, to survivability characteristics seen in nature is a fascinating method to understand their purposes and behaviors in a way I have never fully considered before. Upon reading this chapter, my mind was flooded with ideas that related back to ecology classes I have taken in the past. This made it possible for me to form clear connections with the religions being dissected. I think the water temple system of Bali perfectly encompasses the title of this chapter, “The Secular utility of Religion” and provides undeniable support for religion arising from evolutionary success. Combining the practicality of food acquisition with a supernatural sovereignty, these aqueducts have developed into an economically successful system without the emergence of industrialization. Each subak, along with their diverse deities, plays a crucial role in the functioning of this large system. This is comparable to how any social or religious group functions with its individual members each playing a role in the success of the group as a whole. The concept of organismic religious groups is definitely reinforced with this example and forces me to question how the religious groups I am familiar with may be utilizing this type of secular pragmatism. There are certainly none I can think of that use it as basically as the people of the Bali water system. Through strict rules and exclusivity, Judaism, itself, can be said to be an unbelievably pure and strong organism. Though it manipulates some basic fundamentals of natural selection, like intentionally limiting the selection on the basis of belief, Judaism has become an enduring religion in which setting limits is the primary secular utility. It is an organism that has thrived with the help of something (that comes to mind) comparable to genetic engineering. The rules are strict, the consequences are harsh and unless you really enjoy that type of confinement, this is not a religion that would be actively sought out for by many. But it appears this is intentional. Judaism is an extremophile, and like the Deinococcus radiodurans bacterium that can survive a 15,000 gray dose of radiation, freezing temperatures and absence of water, its strength will lead it to prevail in almost any condition or environment. Their history is evidence of this tough disposition. In contrast to isolation, the Early Christian Church took full advantage of what little resources it had and expanded in a way comparable to a population experiencing exponential growth. But it actually began with the limiting factors of a male dominated society and favorability for male babies. Looking at the religion as a species or an organism, these limiting factors put constraints on its reproductive success. So how did the Christian Church survive? Nature parallels this strategy with the concept of a realized niche. Rome was an inhospitable environment for growth, however, this is where the Church (the organism) lived and therefore its realistic approach had to be in constructing a new niche. This new “niche” was its strategy to eliminate the limiting factors by appealing to everyone. The Church set up an altruistic environment that attracted those being oppressed in the alternative society: women. Introduction of women enacted a surplus of possibilities (resources) that allowed the group to experience an exponential growth which still exists today.
I never thought about how the rule of natural selection could effect certain religions. I agree with Wilson's theory of how early Christianity, Judaism, and the Water Temple system of Bali survived. These religions have been around a long time and could not have survived this long had they not had different factors pushing them forward. I agree how one of these factors is genetic, but I personally wonder how the basis of the religion effects its endurance in modern day society. Just think about it, would a religion based on dinosaurs still be prevalent in today's society? How is it possible for these three different belief sets to survive the ages?
I’m sorry, but the section on Rome in the first Century is absolutely misrepresented.
“By the start of Christianity, Roman culture was inhospitable for reproduction, not in the sense that babies are bad, but the fact that it was a male dominated culture made the desire for male babies much higher than the poor female babies that were many times killed.”
Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, as it’s documented in Luke 2:1, Christ was born under the reign of Caesar Augustus; indeed, Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus was the first Emperor of Rome, ruling from 16 January 27 BC to 19 August AD 14. During his rule, Augustus introduced a series of moral legislation called the Lex Iulia (Julian Law) in order to strengthen the structure of the Roman family. One of these reforms was the Ius Trium Liberorum, meaning the “Right of Three Children,” which offered significant social and monetary benefits to families with three children or more. Noble men who achieved this status were excused from the duty of the munera (mandated sponsoring of a public event or service to the city), freeborn women who gave birth to three children and freedwomen who gave birth to four were released from the tutela mulierum (their husband’s legal guardianship) and earned the right of succession to property. Roman culture was by NO MEANS “inhospitable for reproduction,” but rather encouraged Romans to have larger families, indiscriminant of the gender of children in the First Century. This post claims that “Christianity was attractive to many women in particular because of the rules governing reproduction and more importantly the greater freedom and status it offered,” but the Lex Iulia offered unprecedented freedom and status to women in its policies concerning child-bearing. This claim of Rodney Stark’s is absolutely unfounded.
Christianity gained strength in Rome, popping up within Jewish communities as well as attracting “God-fearers,” that is, Romans who were sympathetic towards Judaism, especially after Paul declared that it was not required for the Gentiles to be circumcised in order to be accepted into the gospel of Christ (As the manly-men Romans were extremely opposed to this Jewish practice). Despite this, the majority of Romans were still highly suspicious of monotheism (and its inherent resistance to the Cult of the Emperor), and in particular this new religion, which they perceived (understandably) as simply an extremist sect of Judaism. As the community of the “Christ-faith” grew independent of the Jewish community, it was considered it a “superstitio,” which did not warrant even the basic protection of other foreign “religio licita” (legitmate religions), such as Judaism had barely secured. Hence you see intermittent persecution of the Christiani, like the Jews before them, until the Fourth Century AD, when the Emperor Constantine converted and declared the faith the Official Religion of the Empire. It was by no means embraced so easily as Stark suggests, but achieved its growth through great resistance.
I am not entirely surprised, though, as Stark has in the past published works concerning the church I grew up in, including the 1984 article “The Rise of a New World Faith,” which was then expanded into a full book in 2005, “The Rise of Mormonism.” In these, he similarly reports such sensationalized statistics and projects that by 2080, there will be 267 million members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and that the Mormon movement will rival Catholicism and Islam as the next World Faith. I can assure you, there’s no way in hell this will ever happen. How this guy is considered with any level of legitimacy is beyond me.
In my comment on the previous post, I attempted to answer the question of "Would we be better off without religion?" Your section on the Bali people provides some information here. First of all, I'd just like to say I looked into their water system and it's incredible to me, a civil engineer. These people, bound together by their desire for food and their deities, created an engineering marvel to sustain their lives. Outstanding.
I suppose it only makes sense that once Christianity and its principles took hold in Rome that the city became more supportive of young Christians. The killing of baby girls reminds me of the current situation in China, where overpopulation causes many babies, especially females, to be put up for adoption or suffer much worse fates. I guess this could also be considered an example of religion helping our species as a whole. I mean, if you consider the Romans' contributions to our advancement as helping, which I do. I did not fully understand the last section, but as I understood, Rome grew, was hectic, Christianity comes, less hectic, more babies, more people= further growth? Works for me.
Just a note about the genetic isolation of the Jews, this is not always a good thing. I know a Jewish family who recently had their infant daughter die of a brain abnormality that only occurs within Jewish families. I forget the name of this condition, but it was a depressing event, and the fact that this gene can be traced back so far is a testament to the Jews' genetic isolation I believe.
Sounds to me like Tay-Sachs, a genetic disorder that "progressively destroys nerve cells (neurons) in the brain and spinal cord." It is found almost exclusively people of "Ashkenazi (eastern and central European) Jewish heritage," and generally affects infants.
http://ghr.nlm.nih.gov/condition/tay-sachs-disease
Or, less likely, perhapsFamilial Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease, essentially the human version of Bovine Spongiform Encephalitis (BSE-- better known as Mad Cow Disease), which is also mostly peculiar to the Jewish community.
Either way, that's so sad.
I’m pretty sure David Sloan Wilson is the creator of the evolutionary studies minor and author of Evolution for Everyone which is also the name of the class which bookends the minor. I remember reading Evolution for Everyone sophomore year during ANT 150 and absolutely loving it. I loved the discussion of group selection and was convinced it was absolutely correct (until I took further evolution classes). Justin didn’t care for it as much as I did, but he had a more advanced understanding of evolution when he read it. However, it looks like this chapter is from Darwin’s Cathedral, which I have not read (except the chapter titled “Darwin’s Cathedral” in Evolution for Everyone).
I kind of have to agree with Hannah Gene on the Christianity bit though. In my four years of high school Latin I do not at all remember Rome ever being mentioned in such a state where no one wanted to reproduce. I remember us talking about “panem et circenses” but I’m pretty sure that was years before Christianity, like back when Rome was still a republic. I have recently started to find it very difficult to take published books seriously as there’s no one to really call the authors out on what they have wrong like there is with a peer reviewed article. I think that’s the same problem with the chapter on group selection.
While there is a big problem with what this chapter says about the origins of Christianity, I do agree with it’s main point. Religion has a secular utility. Religion, much like a nation or smaller group, can unite people. And when people are united they are capable of great things.
I think a great example of things like this would any sort of zombie apocalypse move or television show. For instance, in AMC’s The Walking Dead most people wander around in smallish groups. These smallish groups will often kill off other smallish groups. I never understand this. Your greatest enemies here are zombies but you’re still trying to kill other people? The only positive is that those smallish groups are able to gain the resources of whatever other group they’ve killed. However, when you’ve got some great leader like Rick building your group, you end up with a much larger group happily building themselves a nice fortress with vegetable gardens. Until some jerk comes and wrecks it all, but that’s irrelevant. You are way less likely to be eaten by a zombie when you are part of a large and trustworthy group. That’s a fact. So religion is basically the bond that makes those larger groups. *spoilers* Much like cannibalism in the most recent episodes bonds the people of Terminus.
Knowing that there is a practical purpose to religion gives me two very conflicting feelings. I am glad to know that it’s not just people being stupid and refusing to face facts. However, I am not so happy to know that the problem of religiosity might persist until we’ve moved past this adaptation. Oh evolution, why can’t you move a little faster?
Visiting this topic again just a few days after the three year anniversary of the April 27th Tornadoes, as well as in the midst of severe weather now, I am given a new standpoint in how religion is useful. My brother was here in 2011, but I was still a baby in high school. He had a very emotional time on the anniversary as he thought back to his moments taking shelter believing he was going to die. He said he prayed and was brought peace in the midst of the storm. This was true for me last night as I was in a basement on sorority row full of animals, snakes, and hysterical girls. I was comforted by religion as it was bigger than me and the so called tornado.
I was also doing a research paper for my honors seminar on Africa, where I was examining the religion of the Bamileke tribe of Cameroon. I read in a book on their culture and customs that religion largely affected the tribes’ worldview as they based every aspect off of this one. Religion was what these Africans ran to when they lost their job, lost a family member, suffered an illness, or were in danger of any kind. I think religion of any kind is important as it gives you as strong foundation against the unpredictable world that we live in. Who really ever knows what will happen tomorrow or the next day? This question and or statement is directly out of the Christian bible. I am not saying that my religion is the only way to have a type of foundation like this. I am simply saying that anyone can make their own religion where they can find their convictions and deepest core beliefs. You can even make a religion out of not having a religion. Science can be a religion. Really, anything you hold closest to your heart.
We are all merely human, and I think we all deep down want something to believe in and put trust in to. As we discussed in class, the brain is not meant to be fully conscious in all aspects, it would overload and be far too stressful. Religion gives you an outlet to check out in a sense and not worry or reason over everything.
Reading back over this blog post, what stuck out to me the most was the mention of “practical wisdom” shown in the Bali irrigation system. I believe this practical wisdom is visible in all religions if you dig for it, though it certainly has different faces in each one. In the Bali system, the practicality is in the provision they receive from water. It benefits their very survival to keep this system and this faith in it; this seems to be the most literal example of how religion has evolved as a mechanism for people’s survival. In Judaism, the practicality is in the security of their social group. They thrive individually and as a group when they stick to their shared rules, because their culture is held together and they have a strong community to rely on when they need it. In early Christianity, the practical wisdom was that altruism and nonviolence would increase everyone’s life expectancy. These examples demonstrate how practicality acted as a catalyst for the evolution of religion—it created smarter, more sophisticated social groups that benefitted the individual and survived better as a whole. It wasn’t necessarily all about the beliefs behind the religion.
I would also like to tie in the subject of consciousness alteration practices, and inquire about their “practical wisdom” as well. In the shamanistic societies, it is easy to see the practicality of the rituals performed, because they help to heal sick individuals. But what about other practices such as rites of passage (think hooks in the chest) and cave painting rituals? Perhaps these were less about aiding survival as they were about forming the foundation of the religion, and creating a network of committed individuals. Practical wisdom of a religion seems to come naturally after it has been established as a unit of individuals wishing to survive together.
Follow-up Comment:
Now that I've ranted about the inaccuracies of the final section on Christianity in First Century Rome, I can take step back and look at the rest of the blog. (But seriously, reading that last paragraph really grinds my Classics-student gears. Educate yourself, Rodney Stark.)
That Water Temple System in Bali sounds beautiful to me, in a sort of spiritual aestheticism. The perseverance of the Jewish community, after millenia of persecution is really a powerful thing to consider. The evolution of Christianity over the past 1,981-ish years is really fascinating. Visiting Greece this past summer and seeing the setting of the Greek Pantheon was an incredible experience. It's obvious to me that a lot of beautiful things have come about in this world on account of religion.
There was a briefly heated discussion in class during the presentation for this article, condemning religion for causing almost all wars, in response to which I posted on the class Facebook group, and which I think appropriate to re-comment here:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rabbi-alan-lurie/is-religion-the-cause-of-_b_1400766.html
'In their recently published book, "Encyclopedia of Wars," authors Charles Phillips and Alan Axelrod document the history of recorded warfare, and from their list of 1,763 wars only 123 have been classified to involve a religious cause, accounting for less than 7 percent of all wars and less than 2 percent of all people killed in warfare.'
As a Classics student, I am always amazed that people still state that religion is the cause of most wars as if it's fact, because as the article states:
"The wars of the ancient world were rarely, if ever, based on religion. These wars were for territorial conquest, to control borders, secure trade routes, or respond to an internal challenge to political authority. In fact, the ancient conquerors, whether Egyptian, Babylonian, Persian, Greek, or Roman, openly welcomed the religious beliefs of those they conquered, and often added the new gods to their own pantheon."
However, that's not to say that religion can do no wrong and is always a source for good; it would be beyond foolish to take that side of fence so far. Obviously the Crusades and the Salem Witch Trials happened. I myself am a religious individual, and have personally witnessed, even experienced the damage that can come from legalist religions. This blog post made out the strict laws of Judaism to be a positive force for their community. While obviously it has made them a unique and culturally unified group, I can assure you, coming from a religion of strict laws and cultural expectations, it can be polarizing in an extremely negative way as well.
The Bali has to be one of the most interesting religious groups I have heard of. They aren’t only a religion but an entire highly functional community, or maybe even a well-oiled machine. Being an engineer who has spent some time working in chemical plants I can say that I only wish we could operate with this sort of efficiency. In my plant groups are tasked with the operation of specific processes but issues in other units frequently trickle down to the process you’re tasked with. For example if packing experiences fouling in a distillation column, everything upstream will have a increase in pressure, which can hurt yield (waste money) and also be potentially dangerous. Depending on such a complex system of aqueducts for survival would likely be similar and require amazing coordination between all parties. Each subak controls the fate of everyone downstream them, and I would imagine any corruption could be detrimental to the next tribes. This co-dependence is probably a driving force in the importance of religion in this community. If the water is sacred taking extra of the Dewi Danu, or the water goddess, would likely be a sin- or the Bali equivalent. So in the society it seems possible religion coevolved with a necessity to work together, because without a unifying instrument like religion trusting others to not be selfish could be dangerous. In the same way that the Dewi Danu and the Jero Gde unify the entire water temple system, each subak has its own smaller democratic state led by its own priest and deities, and these sub- deities help develop allegiance to a subak.
After understanding the importance of religion to the cooperation of the Bali, we can draw many comparisons to the Jewish community. Over the years the hardships they have faced have forced them band together and kept the culture unified and pure. Just like the Bali they depend on religion for survival, because they developed a tight knit, yet very large, religion they can depend on others during hardships. I know that many Jews live in heavily concentrated areas which have probably always helped diminish persecution and help provide aid.
Probably not too surprisingly the early Christian expansion was also aided by increased survivability. Unlike the first two religions Christians weren’t developed as a close community and didn’t depend on each other for success but it’s pretty cool that their ideals brought about an increased life span for not only themselves but the entire Roman society. Encouraging (some) equality for women and establishing help for others as more of a social norm are excellent qualities for a nation and I never realized Christianity had such a crucial role in forming this. I remember it was around this time that I asked “would the world be a better place if religion never existed?” Although many awful things have occurred as a result of Christianity, we can also see many people experienced great benefits. I always thought man will be man and religion probably won’t make that many people act like a better person. It looks like Rodney Stark just proved me wrong.
Follow up:
I agree with Maddie on how practical wisdom can be found in most religions. Most religions or churches must provide some kind of benefit, otherwise, why would people be a part of them? I’m sure, though, that these benefits can be achieved via other mechanisms as well which is probably why we have been discussing other methods of relaxation and the like. Clearly, in the instance mentioned in that chapter, the focus of these topics is more on the organizational utility of religion.
Religion can absolutely organize a group of people in the same way a nation or culture can. A sorority or university can organize a group as well. Essentially any group with a common goal can get things done if they try hard enough. Sororities raise thousands of dollars for their various philanthropies and organize tons of service opportunities for their members. So, while religion is certainly useful and has proved to be absolutely so in the past, it is not necessary. If everyone gave up their religion they could still act as an organized group for achieving a goal.
There’s a talk called the Empathic Civilization by Jeremy Rifkin which is very interesting, I “stumbled upon” it on the internet my freshman year and Dr. Lynn has mentioned it several times since. My favorite part is when he discusses how religion and nations have been used as ties for people, but what if we had some sort of worldwide culture which connected us all.
Didn't we watch that in class when you took ANT 150?
It’s interesting that Christianity attracted more women at first because of the greater freedom and status it offered. This reminds me of the Sudanese Zār rituals, which are practiced mainly by women as a means of escaping and/or increasing social status in the male dominated society of Sudan. It got me to thinking about what their secular utility of religion might be. Through mesmerizing chants, persistent drumming and wild dancing, the Sudanese women are able to fall into a transcendent state of mind. Sudan, as we know, is a third world country and therefore lacks adequate medical treatment, so individuals must turn to alternative methods. When they perform these rituals for a woman who has fallen ill or become depressed, they ask the spirit that has possessed her body to alleviate her symptoms and refrain from damaging her health any further. It has been shown that these dissociative states have healing properties that can boost the immune system and therapeutic qualities that decrease stress. Perhaps its secular utility serves to increase the general health and happiness of Sudanese women which in turn contributes to increased longevity and chances for reproduction (since the majority of these woman are married). More conspicuously, it serves as a means to gain respect in a masculine society which provides women with a type of security that they otherwise would not easily be granted to them.
Now that I am returning to this post, the portion that deals with Judaism's ability to withstand many hardships because of their exclusivity got me thinking about Tyler's post on the behavioral immune system. Wilson goes over many points that highlight aspects of the Jewish faith that contribute to their longevity and each of these is strengthened when you look at it from the viewpoint of the behavioral immune system. Tyler's post talks about how test groups acted with avoidant behaviors to those who were perceived as being outside of the cultural norm. Since the outsider could possibly be carrying pathogens and does not know the local customs of hygiene, the home group will not associate with that person. This idea reminded me a lot of the Jewish model of exclusivity, particularly because of the note Wilson makes that the reason for Jewish success is because it behaves similarly to an organism. Since the Jewish faith is unique in that it does not actively go out seeking members, this could provide them an evolutionary benefit by stimulating the behavioral immune systems of those in the group to avoid non jews. The Jews' noted strength in kinship creates a culture that does not necessitate a great deal of contact outside of the group either. The effect of the bubonic plague on the jewish population has also been reported (whether accurately or inaccurately, its hard to tell) to be less than that of the Christian population. This could be from a range of factors that worked together such as the sanitary laws of the faith as well as their possible evolutionarily superior behavioral immune system reactions. Pretty interesting!
Going back over this article, I am going to once again assert that the development of religion is fairly situational, but stems from a larger need for a problem to be fixed in a societal sense. We get a lot of moral and social queues from our religious practices and beliefs and these three examples go to prove that. As Hannah said in her comment, the ability for religion to be developed to account for social structure and even help complement parts of society that are lagging is very interesting. Especially in the case of the Romans, this changing of religion from the previous system which would have suited the Greeks better switching over to Christianity which supported the Roman system better is fascinating. Of course, the Greeks worked in terms of city-states and a polytheistic male dominated society would be better in this case, so the religion developed in this way and when it came to Imperial Rome, the monotheistic altruistic view helped cultivate better relations and cooperation. Again, this predisposition to religion allows humans to tailor society as needed due to changing circumstances and this could once again be attributed to the shamanistic practices from where it all stems. Maybe today’s society needs to tailor its religious beliefs more to the time we live in (look at Reagan’s post for what I’m talking about), when we see all the debates about religion going on; however, we have the ability to change religion to suit our social situation better. A good example of this is the Protestant Reformation and seeing the amount of sects of Christianity that exist today.
I always have to chuckle when I see the terms “biology” and “religion” in the same sentence because I have never felt like those are two things that inherently go well together. Don’t get me wrong, I know plenty of religious biologists, but if I have to hear another argument where a person from one area of study is trying to disprove the other, I’m going to scream.
Although Judaism is a religion with strict rules and regulations, Judaism is one of my favorite religions to study (next to Buddhism because I just find the idea of reincarnation fascinating). After attending catholic school for all 4 years of high school, I have seen what one example of religion can be. I noticed that Catholicism was strict in its own right (that is my nice way of saying what I normally say which is “this is what the Catholic Church says and if you don’t agree with it you are going to hell”). In my opinion, who gives anyone the right to think that they can interpret a text written thousands of years ago, and make their interpretation law? I really struggled with this idea (mostly because some of my best friends at school were gay, and I didn’t like hearing them get shut down by an organization led by stuffy, old, white men). This is where Judaism comes in for me. Although the religion is very strict with services to be attended and traditions to uphold, I love the more liberal element of it. What I mean is, if you disagree with a certain aspect of the religion, you get to hold discussion and argue your case. It becomes much more involved and I believe this stimulates much more religious thought and expression than if someone lays out the rules and everyone agrees without batting an eye. My best friend is half Jewish, and the Jewish side of her family is always getting into arguments with each other, but in a productive, progressive type of way (and hollah bread doesn’t hurt the cause either).
To answer the question you pose at the beginning, “How is Religion Useful?”, I believe the answer is in bringing together a community of people who share the same beliefs and want to help others. I know that many churches and synagogues do community service, and are constantly reaching out to help others in the community. I believe that is a very important reason for why religion is useful. Humans are social creatures and enjoy pretty much any reason to come together, so religion is a great way in which that can be achieved.
P.S. Sorry for my rant on Catholicism. Hope I didn’t offend anyone!
In last week's blog we tried to tackle whether or not religion had a measurable impact on bettering the lives of its adherents, and I certainly think we can see this to be the case for all three religious groups presented here. Most interesting to me is the rigid structure and amazing longevity of the Bali water temples. Though the analysis presented here certainly makes the system seem uncompromisingly oligarchical, this combination of the political and the religious for the improvement of the entire community is amazing. I think that something should also be noted, however, about the fact that these people don't have the sorts of access to modern technology that we're used to. I certainly wonder how much this region would change if modern agricultural practices were introduced in mass. It almost makes itself into a parody of an argument for organized religion- as long as your poor and in the middle of nowhere without modern education, your religion can flourish and create wonderful works of engineering.
So then, we should move on to the Christian and Jewish faiths to add another frame of reference. Judaism's strict laws certainly create a strong feeling of community that can relate Jews across continents as closely as any bond of country or creed. However, this sort of closed mating pool can create or spread disorders like Tay-Sachs above what would be experienced outside of the group. However, this sense of community has managed to keep the Jewish cultural alive through millenia of diasporas and ethnic cleansing until the reached the reunification of a Jewish state in the last century, so I certainly think that we can call the Jewish faith a net benefit.
It's interesting that the same religion that would later lead to the repeated sacking of Rome and the Crusades began its meteoric rise through altruism. Of course, it seems obvious in retrospect than any religion that increased stable family units and childbirths among its practitioners would grow.
Whether its through creating strong social bonds, or through creating highly complex architectural marvels that increase crop yields, or by simply increasing through evangelical recruitment and social altruism, its obvious that religion once held, and still holds, a great deal of utility for humanity.