Talk:Religious labels

Some modifications

In part from an article from the Sikh Review The Labels that Defines us by I.J. Singh e: [email protected]

A friend and I, talking about our respective religions, wondered how religions are named — some religions are identified by the names of their founders, while others are not.

Christianity clearly evokes the title of Messiah that Jesus acquired. Christ was not his name; it is a title that comes from the Greek word Christos meaning "Messiah" or savior. His name was Jesus. (Note: his name only became Jesus with the writing of the King James Bible) . In many Indic languages, he is called Yasu Massih.

Islam is named not for its founder, Mohammed, but for an underpinning of its belief – peace or submission; I have seen this religion also referred to as Mohammedanism; most Muslims, though, do not prefer such a designation. (For Muslims this is as distasteful as calling Sikhi- Gobindism) . The Bahai faith obviously gets its name from Baha’Ullah, the founder. Although thought of as an offshoot of Islam, most Shia and Sunni Muslims see it as a heretical sect as the Qur'an teaches that Mohammed was the 'seal' of the prophets-i.e. Allah would have no discourse with anyone after Mohammed.

Judaism gets its name from Judah, the preeminent patriarch of one of the twelve tribes of Israel. Judah was Abraham’s great-grandson (i.e., Abraham — Isaac — Jacob — Judah). King David, a descendant of the tribe of Judah, founded a dynasty that ultimately went by the name of his tribe.

The religious texts of Judaism hold that the Jews were the chosen people of God. But the two religions that arose from the Judaic tradition (Christianity and Islam) tout the belief that those who were not of their faith are condemned, but usually in direct correlation to those who have doubts about the veracity of their beliefs, the more one touts his or her religion as the only, superior or best path to God is like a tell in poker- that tells you just how empty their hand is) . Sometimes I wonder at what these two off shoots of Judaism — Christianity and Islam – have wrought. In true western psychoanalytic tradition the most strident believers of the two siblings seem to hate the parent. Extremist Christians often blamed the Jews for the death of Jesus and Muslims see the Jews as preached by their Prophet as Monkeys and Apes who have lost their covenant with the One God because they forgot how to properly pray to God and refused to pay obiesance to Him as their 'final person to whom God said he would ever speak to' i.e. (the seal of the Prophets) taught his followers in the Qur'an. While the Qur'an teaches Muslims to respect the teachings of the Bible and the Talmud (the books on which the Qur'an is said to be the final installment of) there is little evidence of many Muslims following those particular surahs. The two offspring of Judaism evidence a long record of anti-Semitic practices. As the the Bahai faith and many other religions were 'birthed' after the 'last Prophet of God, many Muslims down through history have shown even less tolerance for them than those of the 'Book' which seldom are tolerated even though the Muslim Holy Book commends its followers to do so (if the Jiziya is paid.)

What we first-generation immigrants often admire about American culture and society is its spirit of tolerance, as well as its emphasis on human rights and gender and ethnic equality (the latter only recently won in the previous century) — matters that we generally lump together under the heading of "liberal tradition". While the founding of the United States as a land of freedom (with separation of Church and State) the Jews with their long tradition of the importance of education have led to the Jewish community's participation in the struggle for civil rights and for women’s’ equality as well as their involvement movement against the Vietnam War. Their sensitivity and commitment to these issues is sometimes attributed to their experience as a long-suffering minority during the Jewish diaspora. One must remember that it was their efforts to overthrow the Czar in Russia and introduce communism into Europe (as well as their work in the early unions of American labor and their importance in publishing and the film and TV arenas. Today in Israel many Jews still live and work in self contained communal village unit called a kibutz where all members share in the tasks of the unit. Even during the recent (2008) war in Gaza the Israeli newspaper Haaretz often gives a voice to articles which champion the side of the Palestinians and criticize the IDF. You will have to look long and hard to find any Newspaper in a Muslim country which speakes well od anything having to do with Jews, when today (2008) the leading religious leader of the Muslim world is being ridiculed for shaking the hand of a Jew.

One must also, when talking of the contributions of Jews, not forget to mention the many Jews who have achieved fame in the Arts, science and philanthrophy, who are taught like many children in India, whether Hindu, Sikh and even some sects of Islam that books and the knowledge they hold (not just the religious texts of each religion) are valuable hard won things, things to be respected even as the Taliban of the Swat valley (that once thrived under Sikh dominion) today is witnessing the destruction of any book (other than the Qur'an), video tapes and both secular schools for boys and especially any built for girls.

• Sikhi has many common strands and points of convergence between its philosophy and the Semitic worldview that came to us through Islam, but more of that another time.

• Buddhism, that offers us a rich philosophy, is obviously named for its founder Gautam Buddha, a prince who chose to walk away from his regal trappings after encountering suffering and poverty outside his father's palace.

• Hindu a word which is said to be from the inability of semetic tribes to pronounce the letter S of the Indian River Sindhu (the name which later was corrupted to Indus). The people of the Indus valley came to be known as Hindus, while the country became India. A celebrated scholar of the history of religion, W. Cantwell Smith, suggested that the religious practices of the Hindus and their traditions are so variegated, distinct and diverse, that to group them under the rubric of a single faith – Hinduism – is neither correct nor fair. Another noted Western historian, Hew McLeod seems to agree.

The idea that Hinduism is less a distinct religion and more a label for people of the Indus valley has its defenders. For example, the eminent Sikh scholar, Kapur Singh, reasons similarly. In his opinion, all people of north India, whether Sikhs, Buddhists, Christians or Muslims etc., are Hindu, but not by religion; it seems to me like more of an ethnic or anthropologic designation. I have a couple of Hindu Punjabi friends who also believe that though they are Hindus, their religion is Sikh.

The Indian thinker S. Radhakrishnan, who taught philosophy at Oxford, and later became India’s President, opined similarly. He recommended that in view of the many diverse and even contradictory traditions of the Hindus, the belief system should be classified not as a religion, but as a way of life.