Re: Constructed Religions

Nik Taylor wrote:

> Perhaps a non-religious species might
> fight over the best way to crack an egg.  :-)
You may laugh, but that is exactly what happened in Johnathan Swift's_Gul=
liver's Travels_,
which is, after all, one long satire about the follies
of mankind.

A previous Emperor of Lilliput (one before Gulliver's arrival) had a son
whose finger got cut when he tried to open an egg on the big-end (or litt=
le
end, can't remember which).  He therefore decreed that all his subjects
should not crack their eggs on that end, but rather must do it on the
other.  Some of his subjects found this inestimable to them, and
so they rebelled and formed their own miniempire.  The war that ensued
was waged for generations until with the help of Gulliver, the Big-Enders
were defeated.  Gulliver became disenchanted when the Emperor of
the Little-enders thereafter thought it was best to finish the job by
massacring the entire Big-Ender population.

I just love Juvenalian satire! :)

> In deed, without
> religion, perhaps they might just cling to philosophies or governmental
> systems that much more strongly, think of the Cold War, the epic battle
> between Communism and Capitalism, religion didn't play into it, except
> in so far as they spoke of "Godless Commies".
Right -- struggles in history have always used ideologies (whether politi=
calor religious)
as the front for the deeper underlying reasons for conflict,
namely power structures.

While the participants may actually believe what they are doing is right
to some extent (and hey, most of the Nazis thought the imprisonment
of the Jews, Gypsies, et al., was for their own good), this has more to
do with the psychological law which states that people's actions generall=
y
come _first_, and only thereafter do they come up with some reason to
justify (this applies for everything -- even small actions are governed b=
y this);
it doesn't really tell much about the ideology itself (not that I think a=
ny more
of National Socialism because of this -- quite the contrary).

> > Finally, those beautiful temples
> > and a large organized clergy tend to bleed off a lot of resources (of
> > course the amount varies from culture to culture) that might be used
> > for other purposes.
>
> No more so, IMO, than a large organized aristocracy with large beautifu=
l
> palaces and castles.
Here's a list of entirely nonreligious wastes of money by governments:

 - Does K=F6nig Ludwig von Bayern remind anyone of anything? He bankrupte=
d
his kingdom building Neuschwanstein (after which the Disney castle is pat=
terned),
Linderhof and Hohenschwangau -- and was mysteriously found dead, floating
in the lake behind Neuschwanstein.
- It is also said that when Louis the Sun King was building Versailles, i=
t took up
something like 30 to 40 percent of the national tax income.
- The Byzantine Emperor Justinian's attempts to reorganize the whole
establishment of the Empire involved both military and religious changes:
across the empire, he tried to consolidate his power by persecuting those=
 who
didn't subscribe to his orthodox faith by burnings and the regular routin=
e for
despots of his sort, and he built lots of churches including the Hagia So=
phia.
But it wasn't these that drained the budget -- it was his military campai=
gns
in the west to reunite the Empire for the last time; these campaigns to
bring Italy, Spain and North Africa back into the Imperial fold essential=
ly
bled the provinces dry. How many new churches they now had was not
really a problem for them.

I think when you actually look at the history of such events, you see tha=
t
it's not so much _religion_ per se that was the waste of resources, but i=
t
was rather the abuse of power by unscrupulous rulers that, generally,
was only legitimized in their own minds by the religious aspect.  Remembe=
r:
actions come first, and are only later rationalized, as a general law of
human actions.


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Tom Wier <twier@...>
ICQ#: 4315704   AIM: Deuterotom
Website: <http://www.angelfire.com/tx/eclectorium/>
"Cogito ergo sum, sed credo ergo ero."

"S=F4=F0 is gecy=FEed / =FE=E6t mihtig God manna
cynes / w=EAold w=EEde-ferh=F0."
 _Beowulf_, ll. 700-702
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