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Which religion is best? Putting the Comparative back in Comparative Religion
March 15, 2004
When people find out I studied religion they usually ask, in a gingerly fashion as if inquiring about an embarrassing mental illness, so are you religious or what? Then they want to know what my opinion is of this or that religion.
Problem is, the only thing they really make sure you learn in grad school is that it's impossible to have any opinion about, well, anything at all, really, but especially about religion. You walk in the door on the first day of grad school and right away--bam!--your epistemology is problematized. We don't even know what religion is, they tell you, or if it actually exists. Can't hardly no one agree on a definition, you see, so how do we even know we're talking about the same thing? That's the kind of thing you're supposed to get worked up about in grad school.
But if I were to put aside all that burdensome complexity (for which I will be paying monthly installments for the next ten years or so), and give my true opinion about the major religions, one bar stool to the next, it would go something like this:
Buddhism: For my money, the Buddhists have nailed it better than anyone else except maybe Freud. Suffering is caused by attachment to stuff, which by its nature doesn't last. You really can't argue with that. Here's the thing though: When you cut to the crux of the matter like the Buddhists do, without any bells and whistles, what you have is one boring-ass religion. Later on in the tradition, when they were having trouble selling the whole monastic austerity thing to the masses, they brought in bodhisattvas and incense and good luck charms and all kinds of other crap--even, when they really wanted to dumb it down, heaven. (What are you going to do though? People like theater and need to be comforted in sickness and death.) In summary, Buddhism = tediously indisputable truth with a bunch of special effects layered on top.
Judaism: You have to like this religion, or at least I do, because it's all about talking. Check out the Talmud sometime: First Rabbi Hillel says something about the fellow with the lost ox in the twenty second chapter of Deuteronomy, then Rabbi Yehudah says, yeah, sure, but if the ox is about to die or is sick, or if the guy who lost the ox owes you money, then it's a whole 'nother matter. Rabbi Meir then weighs in saying, my good friend Rabbi Yehudah is sadly missing the main point which is it depends on where you find the lost ox, and furthermore he should wipe that mustard off his cheek. This kind of lively argument goes on goes on from one century to the next, a noisy, congenial weighing of ethics and scripture. The point isn't to reach definitive, goyim-style conclusions, it's all about community, and an infinite patience for minutiae. God is in the details.
Islam: Islam is simple. Simple like an avalanche, as someone once said of Vin Diesel. No wonder it's such a success. If monotheism is your thing, this is the straight, 180-proof shit. No Mother of God, or Son of God, or any semidivine beings running around gumming up the works. There's you and there's God. Your job is to submit and say your prayers and keep your ass clean. God's job is, well, let's just say Islam puts the complete in complete and utter badass. There's a lot to be said for this clarity--maybe it's what enabled Arabs to invent algebra, create those abstract tile patterns, and all that other incredible shit they did back in the day. Don't forget that the Muslims preserved the shining beacon of civilization when the Europeans were living in shit. Some of them have been in an incredibly bad mood since the fall of the Ottoman Empire, though.
Christianity: This is my favorite, and I won't try to hide it. The reason is this: You've got the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and the whole thing doesn't make any fucking sense. But, and here's the crucial part, it almost makes sense. The gap between these two things has allowed a magical flowering of the imagination in Western culture, from St. Augustine to Anne Sexton, who wrote this (prefacing it with the quote "God is not mocked except by believers"):
Jesus slept as still as a toy
and in His dream
He desired Mary.
His penis sang like a dog,
but He turned sharply away from that play
like a door slamming.
That door broke His heart
for He had a sore need.
With His penis like a chisel
He carved out the Pietà.
At this death it was important to have only one desire.
He carved this death.
He was persistent.
He died over and over again.
He swam up and up a pipe toward it,
breathing water through His gills.
He swam through stone.
He swam through the godhead
and because He had not known Mary
they were united at his death,
the cross to the woman,
in a final embrace,
poised forever
like a centerpiece.
See, it's not just horrible people like Mel Gibson who are Christians (please, please, please read Christopher Hitchens' piece on The Passion). A shrill, virulent strain of anti-intellectual Protestantism, because its adherents own all those TV stations, stands for all of Christianity in many people's minds. But all the Christians with simple minds, ugly hearts, and bulletproof hair ignore the beautiful complexity built into their own tradition. It all starts with the Man himself, riddlemeister Jesus "the Kingdom of Heaven is like a mustard seed" Christ. The crucifixion is a paradox--innocence and guilt, punishment and salvation, weakness and strength all trade places in a kind of perfect non-Euclidean morality.
Don't get me wrong, I think it's creepy as hell, but for drama and imagination, Christianity is the king of religions in my book. Salvation by paradox, how can you beat that?
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Fabulous book cover of the month
