More challenges to Religion: Literary Theory

In my last blog entry, I talked about the challenges that sociology has in store for any religion. By treating and analyzing religious groups like any other social group, sociology challenges the "organized forms" of religion: Churches and all other organized religious associations.
A different challenge to religion aims directly at the core of religious beliefs that rely on the written word: Modern literary theory.

One of the fundamental ideas (or desires) behind any literary theory really, is the wish to understand and interpret a given text. Numerous literary theories and concepts were developed to provide the tools needed to do just that.

But let's start at the beginning:
"Who gives meaning to a text?" Or put differently: "Who or what determines which interpretation of a text is correct?" This implies that there is usually more than one way to understand any text. Sometimes the deviations are small, sometimes they can be very significant - even a matter of life or death.

The obvious answer to the question above is: The author gives meaning to a text. The author who wrote the text expressed what he/she wanted to say, therefore he is the one who determines the meaning of the text.
But this overlooks the fact that a text is nothing if nobody reads it. A text always requires a reader, otherwise it is just specs or smudges on a smooth surface. Like someone remarked when he saw all the neon signs in a metropolis (New York? Las Vegas?): "It must be beautiful if you cannot read" In other words, the author-centric theory overlooks that the reader plays an important role in creating and imparting meaning to a text.

In fact, the reader is not merely a passive recipient of the information that the author provides, he has to actively contribute to "make a text work". This aspect should not be underestimated.

Literary theory set forth to analyze the role of the reader. This school of literary theory is called "reader-response" theory. It is in fact a response to other theories that focus on the author or on the form of a text. Many of the author-centric theories posit that there can be an "objective" meaning of a text, independent of the reader and his or her circumstances. Proponents of reader-response theory beg to differ.

One very fundamental aspect that became apparent to the literary sciences very soon is: Readers try to make sense of a text. In fact this is a trait that applies to anything new we encounter: We try to figure it out and make sense of it, be it an image, a object or a text. Once a reader has made sense of a text he/she tends to defend this interpretation. You may have encountered drawings/images that show something different depending on how you look at it? If you have, you may have found it hard to "see" the other image, if you get too used to seeing it the other way.
Modern literature, like much of modern art in general, toys with this idea, plays with the mind of the reader in his quest to "make sense" of what he/she is reading.

There are a host of aspects that determine how a person reads and understands a text:
Personality:
- Ethnicity, race, culture
- Sexual Orientation
- Mental and physical ability
- Age
- Gender

Environment:
- Geographic location
- Income
- Religious beliefs
- Education/training
- World views
- Personal relationships
- Class
- Hobbies
- Family structure / marital status
- Appearance
- Health
- Parental status
- Employment

This is where reader-response theories line up with constructionist theories and hermeneutics:
Constuctionist theories propose that people actively construct mental models of the world around them. As we learn, we expand our knowledge of the world. People constantly compare these internal models with their experiences and adjust them as necessary. In a person's mind, the world consists of many models of varying sophistication. Models of environments that are not close to the individual may be simplistic (stereotypes), whereas other models closer to everyday life may be quite sophisticated. For example: A person may have a very sophisticated "mind-model" of his or her immediate family, being aware of the individual characters, hobbies, tastes, preferences etc. Yet he/she may have a very simplistic model of how to fly an airplane.
The model has to be good enough to "get by" in his/her environment and is developed further and adjusted as the need arises and people learn something new.
But, the model not only serves as a "simplified to be good enough" version of the complex world around us, it also describes the relationship between the person and the world, thereby imparting "identity". That is why a person's identity is not necessarily fixed. It may change over the years as he/she learns more about the world. (On a side note: This is one of the reasons why "brainwashing" works - the individual's perception of himself/herself in relationship with the environment is changed as part of the brainwashing process.)

Whereas constructionism states that people learn and develop their mental models, hermeneutics is a theory that focuses on how people learn. In literary theory, hermeneutics holds that understanding of a text as a whole is established by understanding the individual parts (read: the words) and the understanding of the individual parts is possible by references to the whole.
Since the whole text and its individual parts cannot be understood without reference to one another, it is a circle, the famous "heremeneutic circle".

Some reader-response theorists responded to challenges from other theories that they lost sight of the actual text by developing the theory of the "implied reader". This is the reader that the author had in mind when he/she wrote the text. Every author is subject to certain assumptions, paradigms, belief systems etc. These assumptions and paradigms may not be mentioned explicitly in the text but form the underlying basis. The author's "implied reader" meets the "real reader" as the text is being read. The effect that the text has on the real reader leads to that individual's interpretation of the text. In essence the assumption is that the author generally places a "sense" in a text that would be understood by the "implied reader", but this may differ from what it means to the real person who reads it.
To put it simply, the question is no longer: "What does the text mean?", but rather "What does the text mean to you? Besides constructionism two more literary theory must be mentioned here at least briefly:
Marxist theory interprets texts in the light of Marxist/Leninist theories. While I think these theories are a thing of the past and have outlived their life (literary theory moved on as communism receeded), they did make an important contribution in the sense that they stressed the importance of the author's as well as the reader's economic situation.
Feminist theories interpret texts in the light of the relationship between men and women - particularly in light of male dominance versus female powerlessness and the perpetuation of this state. They bring aspects of the role of women to the fore that may only be implied in the text as well as influences/ beliefs on the part of the author/reader that stem from certain discourses and paradigms in society (e.g. paternalistic societies vs. liberal societies). Their contribution to literary theory is valuable for bringing the aspects of (usually male) power to light, but just like Marxist-Leninist theories, by interpreting a text solely from one perspective, important other aspects of a literary work are overlooked as they do not fit this structure.

This was a rather lengthy introduction to what I was going to talk about in this blog entry: How is literary theory a challenge to religion?
Literary theory treats the Bible, the Koran or any other "holy book" first and foremost as "a book". It has one or more authors, it was written at a certain time in history and it reflects the "Zeitgeist" of the time.
Clearly, both Bible and Koran were written by someone at some point in time. The Koran in a frame of a few decades, the Bible over several millenia. Nevertheless it is inevitable that the authors introduced their own beliefs and paradigms into the text. This is where Marxist-Leninist and Feminist theories come in. They focus on the society that the author lived in and its influences on him/her. They expose implicit male-dominant or even chauvinistic paradigms.

This for example leads to the ironic situation that Mohammed actually strengthened the role of women in Arab society through the Koran. The role of women as described in Koran was ground-breaking and meant a drastic improvement of women's lives at the time.
But times have changed - nowadays the role of women as described in the Koran seems outdated and "traditional" in a negative sense. Not only are they not allowed to develop their lives as they wish, feminist theories will be quick to point out that men, who dominate the official interpretation of Koran to this day will ensure that this male-centric interpretation of the Koran will continue.

However, the most crushing blow to anyone who claims the right to interpret a religious text comes from reader-response theorists: Who is the Pope to say what the Bible means? Who is the Imam or an Islamic scholar to say? What authority do they have to tell me (the reader) what to make of the text in front of me? The Koran, the Bible may mean to you or me something different than to the next guy - and who is to say who is right and who is wrong?
One may argue at this point that text interpretation cannot be completely arbitrary. You cannot interpret a text as you please without at least some facts found in the text to support your case.
One answer to this lies in the "implicit reader" concept outlined earlier: The author will have had an implicit reader in mind as he/she wrote the text - but keep in mind: The Koran and the Bible are centuries old! The implicit reader has long passed away!
It is therefore highly likely that the understanding that you and I gain from reading the holy books is very different from what the author intended at the time anyway - just because we are so far removed and so different from him/her.
It all boils down to this: No person and no entity has the right to prescribe a certain interpretation of a religious book and ban divergent interpretations as heresy. The Koran and the Bible were written by humans and therefore contain (implicit) assumptions and beliefs prevalent at the time they were written. In addition, the author(s) personality influenced the work as well.
My personal opinion is: The Bible and/or the Koran are not God's word. But God's word can be found in them.
You may be of a different opinion and you have every right to be. All I ask is that I have the right to think this way.

The real challenges to Religion

Evolution vs. "Intelligent Design" - this discussion seems to be a hot topic particularly in the "bible belt" of the U.S. I must admit, most Europeans are shaking their head about it, but this does not take away from the fact that it is a serious topic that the U.S. society will have to come to terms with.
There are a number of questions associated with that discussion:
Was the world created a few thousand years ago, or 4.5 Billion years ago?
Is evolution essentially a more or less haphazard process, based on the "survival of the fittest" and arbitrary gene mutation, or is there an "intelligent design", some intelligent force (read: God) behind the scenes determining the direction, ultimately leading to the existence of humanity?
Finally, one of the underlying questions is: Can you read the Bible (in this case, the book Genesis) as an account of what really happened when the world was created, or is it more of a metaphoric or allegoric account that tries to explain why we are here?
I do not want to get into this argument here - my point is simply this: For the core of Christian belief, this is of marginal importance.
I think that wether God created the world in 7 days as Genesis says, or in 4.5 Billion years as scientists say, does not affect the core of Christian belief at all. It is not as big of a challenge as it is made out to be. It does not affect Jesus' teachings. Or have I missed something?
The struggle between Christianity and natural sciences is a thing of the past centuries. That battle probably started with Galileo Galilei's famous "Eppur si muove!" ("and she does move!") and ended in the 20th century. Since then it is generally accepted that the Bible is not intended as a scientific account, but was written for a very different purpose. It is time to move on.
The real challenges for modern religion (not just Christianity, but any religion really) have nothing to do with physics or biology or any other natural science. I believe the real challenges come from another direction, that nobody seems to be aware of: Sociology.
Scientific progress in modern sociology raises questions that challenge any religion. In this blog entry I will talk about some of them.
1. Let's imagine you found yourself stranded in a very different culture from the one you grew up in. For this example, let's assume you are a pious Christian who grew up in the bible belt of the USA. You believe in Christ, go to church on Sunday, read your bible and pray every day. For some reason you find yourself stranded in Saudi Arabia, with no contact to your own culture. You will suddenly be exposed to people with a belief that differs enormously from your own. First of all, Jesus is not the messiah, the saviour for them, he is merely a prophet. Instead of going to church on Sundays, people around you go to the Mosque on Fridays. They don't believe the bible is the word of God, they believe it Koran is. They use a different calendar and follow very different religious rites. Five times a day you hear the Muezzin call from the Mosque and it will remind you that they believe in something you don't. Those are just some of the things you will be faced with. Assuming that the people you are suddenly surrounded with are just as devout and upright Muslims as you are a devout and upright Christian, you will sooner or later have to come to terms with the fact that everyone else around you believes something different than you do. And they honestly do! They think you are wrong. You think they are wrong. It is a dilemma:
Humans have a hard time accepting two mutually exclusive views as both valid. You will start to question yourself. Could I be wrong and they are right? Or are they all misguided and have not seen the light? Or is there a middle ground, where we're both partially right?
Whatever the outcome of your introspection and self-questioning is, whatever your personal answer to these questions is: The point is that you will start questioning yourself and you will have to find a way to deal with the fact that your deeply held beliefs are different from the rest of society.
This is essentially the first sociological challenge to religion: People tend to believe what the people around them believe.
Let me phrase it in a provocative question: Could it be that religions are a nothing but a form of organized and constantly perpetuated mass illusion? Are they the "opium for he masses" as Karl Marx claimed? Could it be that religions exist because people keep telling each other that what they believe is true and not because they really offer valid truths about God and the world?

2. Sociologically speaking, a religious group is a sociological group like any other. Social groups are established, exist for a while and cease to exist at some point. This applies to churches too. The "Shakers" in the USA are a good example of a religious group that became extinct. A social group will be created when people come together with the same interest. In this case it is an interest in reading the Bible or the Koran, but it could just as well be an interest in building model airplanes. Social groups persist as long as they satisfy the wants and needs of the group members. In other words, people "get something out of it". This could be the comforting belief that they will go to heaven, or it may be something else. Social groups disband when people stop going there because their wants and needs are not satisfied any longer. In addition, social groups face threats from other social groups. Social groups are locked in a constant struggle for power and influence. If you analyze successful social groups and compare them with less successful ones, certain characteristics become apparent:
- Since there is always a certain fluctuation in any social group (e.g. people moving or passing away, etc.), successful social groups are good at "recruiting" new members. The most successful social groups attract significantly more people than they lose.
- Successful social groups are good at imparting and maintaining a certain mindset of its members: A feeling of Identity (e.g. "I am a Baptist") and a feeling of being different from the rest of the world. There has to be a clear separation between group members on the one hand and those outside of the group on the other hand.
- Social groups face an implicit (or sometimes explicit) pressure from society as a whole - on the one hand they have to be different from the rest of society for them to be able to justify their own existence. On the other hand, the more different they are, the harder it is to keep the group from falling apart. As described above, everyone feels the pressure to "be like the rest". The further away you are from what society as a whole believes, the more "closed" the group has to be to maintain their internal mindset and belief system.
- Social groups have to have an internal organization that determines how power is awared and shared in the group and how the group's teachings are preserved, developed and perpetuated. Again, the more the group's views differ from the rest of society, the stricter and more hierarchical the group's internal organization has to be to counter the external pressure. Every group needs leaders, the more powerful they are, the easier it is to keep the group together.
Let's take Jehova's witnesses as an example. I do not wish to make a statement here about the validity of their teachings. All I want to say is that those teachings are quite different from what the rest of society believes. For Jehova's witnesses to survive as a social group, they have to become "close-knitted" and they require strong internal leadership. Power has to be limited to a select few. They determine the way forward and the rest has to follow. Unless they limit the group members social interactions outside the group, and unless they constantly re-affirm their belief systems (e.g. bible study, bible classes, sermons, daily readings and prayers, etc.), they risk that the members of the group "drift away". This is inevitable.
What challenge to religion lies in this? Let me phrase it as a provocative question again: Could it be that not the "true religions" have survived over the centuries, but rather the sociologically most successful ones? Maybe the Shakers had all the answers. But since they were not as successful, sociologically speaking, they did not survive.
The challenge continues: If it is true that the religions that are best at recruiting people, those that are internally well-organized, are well-established in society and have found efficient ways of maintaining the group-internal mindset, have the best chance to survive, this is a form of natural selection that leads to polarization (if not extremism). Could it be that the sociological laws outlined above lead to an "evolution" of religions in which only the best organized, the most evangelic and most polarizing religious groups survive? Is it a sociological "survival of the fittest"?
No wonder we see more and more intolerant religions - and no wonder more and more terrorist groups are drawing on more or less obscure religious ideas to justify their murders.

Whatever you may think about Darwin's theories about fauna and flora. It seems that sociologically speaking, he was on to something without even knowing. Now isn't that ironic?

Note: Give credit where it's due: Many of these ideas where taken from the book "Rumours of Angels" by Peter L. Berger. Unfortunately it is out of print. His ideas are too valuable to be forgotten, so I felt some of them deserved being published in my blog.