Reason and Religion Herman Philipse
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FI Feb-Mar 07 Pages 12/26/06 12:56 PM Page 33 Reason and Religion Herman Philipse some of the most spectacular examples. On the morning of November 2, 2004, the Dutch secularist filmmaker and columnist Theo van Gogh was brutally slaugh- tered in Amsterdam by Mohammed Bouyeri, a radicalized sec- eing a secularist in Europe today is a mixed ond-generation Muslim immigrant from Morocco. Whereas this blessing, particularly for those who publicly was to some extent a Dutch drama—both victim and murderer criticize religion. On the one hand, secularists were riding bicycles when the killing began—the imported reli- Bin Western Europe may feel victorious, since reason now seems gious motivation of the murder was obvious. After firing seven to override faith in the population at large. Religious institutions bullets into his victim’s body from behind, Bouyeri cut Van are withering in most countries. Between 1970 and 2003, for Gogh’s throat in accordance with what he thought of as Muslim example, weekly church attendance declined in the Netherlands ritual and used a knife to pin a letter on the corpse, saying that from 41 percent to 12 percent and in France from 23 percent to critics of Islam such as Van Gogh and Ayaan Hirsi Ali would be 8 percent. Personal religious beliefs are becoming less common, punished by death. Hirsi Ali, a Dutch Member of Parliament and as well. In 1947, 80 percent of the Dutch believed that the a refugee from Somalia with whom Van Gogh had made a short Christian god exists, whereas in 2004 only around 50 percent film criticizing the religious justification of violence against held this belief. At the turn of the twenty-first century, between women by Muslims, was forced to hide after the murder and 10 and 20 percent of Western Europeans and 12 percent of could not fulfill her parliamentary duties because of the strict police protection to which she had to be subjected. Other barbarities will linger in our memories also. One is the affair that was occasioned by the publication of twelve cartoons “. secularists in Western Europe may feel depicting the prophet Muhammad in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten in September 2005. Over several months, a victorious, since reason now seems to override group of Muslims living in Denmark carefully nurtured indigna- faith in the population at large. On the other tion throughout the Islamic world, not eschewing lies and manipulations in order to achieve maximum effect. In February hand, those in Europe who publicly defend secu- 2006, pandemonium finally broke out. Danish flags were burned larism and criticize religion now face challenges that only five years ago were thought to belong to a barbarous and distant past.” Russians said that religion is very important in their lives. (This contrasts sharply with the United States, where 57 percent of respondents ranked religion as very important.) On the other hand, those in Europe who publicly defend secularism and crit- icize religion now face challenges that only five years ago were thought to belong to a barbarous and distant past. Let me intro- duce my topic of reason and religion by reminding the reader of Pakistani Sunni Muslims burn a Danish flag during a rally in Lahore on February 24, 2006. The rally was held to protest against the publication of Herman Philipse is a professor of philosophy at the cartoons and caricatures depicting the Prophet Muhammad in European University of Utrecht, the Netherlands. newspapers. REUTERS/Mohsin Raza 33 http://www.secularhumanism.org Feb./Mar. 2007 FI Feb-Mar 07 Pages 12/26/06 12:56 PM Page 34 in Muslim countries, Danish products were boycotted, and the Islam fear that Europe might degenerate into “dhimmitude”— cartoonists were threatened with murder. Christian churches in the name of the Islamic system of government imposed upon Pakistan were set afire, and nine people were killed during an non-Muslim populations conquered during jihadi warfare— attack on an Italian consulate in Libya. Muslim demonstrators an alarming prospect for secularists. In contrast, many non- in Britain and elsewhere carried banners saying things like Muslim religious groups seem to welcome the new public inter- “Slay those who insult Islam” and “Behead those who say Islam est in religion that Islamist threats have engendered. They is a violent religion.” Whereas in most countries ideological hope to extract some profit for their own churches by jumping groups that incite to murder are considered criminal organiza- on the religious-sensitivity bandwagon. In so doing, they per- tions, many Western politicians and journalists hastened to versely reinforce the case of the Islamists. Fortunately, howev- express their sympathy with the hurt feelings of their Muslim er, French intellectuals and journalists reacted fiercely compatriots rather than defend freedom of speech. against Gilles de Robien’s exhortation in the Redeker affair, Most Muslim organizations in Western Europe have de- much as the Dutch parliament indignantly rejected Donner’s clared publicly that they condemn violence and support free- proposal after the murder of Van Gogh. dom of speech. But this does not protect critics of Islam from Another answer to the question of how one should counter murderous threats by Islamists. The most recent case is that religiously motivated threats by Islamists was given just prior of the French philosopher and pamphleteer Robert Redeker, to the Redeker affair—by Pope Benedict XVI, in his speech at who, in a September 19, 2006, article in Le Figaro, compared the University of Regensburg, Germany, on September 12, the ideological pressure Islam exerts upon Europe with the 2006. Benedict argued as a real theologian that only reason pressure once exerted by totalitarian communism. He critical- and not violence can properly support religious beliefs in the ly contrasted the belligerent example of Muhammad in com- monotheist god, because it is God’s nature to be reason or parison with the nonviolent model of Christ, calling logos, as is said in the first line of the Gospel of John. As a con- Muhammad a “master of hate” and Christ a “master of love.” sequence, using death threats and other forms of violence in The next day, the moderate sheikh Youssef al-Qaradawi, who support of a monotheistic religion not only disregards elemen- presides over the European Council of Fatwas in London, tary principles of law and morality; it is also a deep theologi- denounced Redeker as the “Islamophobe of the day” in a cal mistake, because it perverts God’s very nature. broadcast over Al-Jazeera. The day after that, Redeker re- My aim in this essay is to examine the present pope’s views ceived death threats from Muslims. He has not been able to on reason and religion. Will Benedict be able to persuade work as a high-school teacher in Saint-Orens-de-Gameville European secularists, Protestants, and Muslims that reason (near Toulouse) since, and, as I write this (on December 12, supports religion in general and Catholicism in particular? 2006), he still lives under police protection. Will the pope succeed in making Catholicism relevant in Eur- ope again, in spite of the steep decline of institutionalized reli- ronically, Robert Redeker never explicitly answered the ques- gion? And what about the Vatican’s apparent view that it is Ition that figured as the title of his essay in Le Figaro: “What possible to appease Muslims by conducting an interreligious Should the Free World Do against Intimidations by Islamists?” dialogue under the banner of reason? Rather than venturing Perhaps the very act of writing the article was meant to be his sociological predictions of the pope’s chances of success, I reply: just go on exercising the freedom of speech without being shall analyze his views and arguments from a philosophical intimidated and do not succumb to the temptation of self-cen- point of view. But let us listen to the pope first. sorship. That this answer does not suffice, although it is the only honorable policy for individuals, is demonstrated by Redeker’s n his ingenious Regensburg speech, Benedict XVI discussed subsequent fate. It is also shown by the hesitations of the edi- Ifour ways of betraying the nature of God as logos. The first tors of Le Figaro to publish his piece (a fact not widely known) is the idea, central to Islam and also defended by voluntarist and by the reaction of the French minister of education, Gilles Christian theologians in the fourteenth century, that God is so de Robien, to the death threats against Redeker. The minister sublime that he absolutely transcends human reason. Hence, affirmed his solidarity with Redeker but also stressed that believers should not try to understand God or to reason with “state functionaries (such as teachers in France) should or about him but rather obey him and submit to him uncondi- express themselves cautiously and moderately in all circum- tionally. (“Islam” means submission.) This alleged first betray- stances.” Can one still be a philosopher and obey this order? al of God’s real nature easily leads to the use of violence in After the Van Gogh murder in 2004, the dour Protestant Piet support of religion, as the Byzantine emperor Manuel II Hein Donner, then the Dutch Minister of Justice, went even fur- Palaeologos explained in a dialogue written while Muslim ther. Instead of defending freedom of speech, he tried to revive armies were besieging Constantinople in 1394–1402. Benedict’s an old article of the Dutch penal code, which had not been quote from this dialogue, in which it is said that all novelties applied by the courts for decades, that penalizes people who that Muhammad introduced into monotheism were bad and offend religious believers.