Not Even Not Zen 415: Biomythography - Note 130: Rationalizer Movements

Rationalizer Movements

In the late 1800s, my relatives in the Pond and Light families of Pennsylvania fell for evangelical movements. They believed the world would come to an end in 1869, 1872, 1874, and 1881.  The world kept not ending. They kept believing. Some of them sold off their possessions to fund their local movements. In the early 1900s, they refused to fly in planes because flying was "unnatural" and "against God." They refused telephones as "tools of the devil."

Every religion waxes and wanes with popular movements. None of our families are exempt.

In re-growth cycles, religious leaders often choose scripture passages, even changing them to emphasize popular points. These are winning methods to increase their numbers of followers. Rationalization of old views is a way of keeping religions relevant. It is also, to its critics, morally reprehensible as it involves cherry-picking from established religious tenets. Modern Christianity is already tremendously different from its beginnings as a cult in the Roman Empire. Popular trends accentuate the differences. 

Currently, there is a Christian view of when life begins as stated in the Bible, which is after three breaths. The Biblical view of life beginning with breath seems clear, as it is reinforced in repeated passages in the texts. Even the Book of Genesis highlights the breath of life. It's not a popular view with modern churches because life beginning with breath seems antiquated. To some church leaders, this means there needs to be a movement to rationalize the scriptures in order to remain both socially relevant and popular. 

The current rationalization movement may seem odd because its leaders don't reference the words attributed to their Christ but those words aren't what their modernization is about. Instead, this social movement seems, like all religious rationalizations, to be about reinventing the past and reinterpreting scriptures to suit what's popular. 

Leaders rationalize texts in every religion. All of them must keep up with the times, even when they say they are returning to tradition ('returning to tradition' is another cyclically popular movement). Religions can't help following social trends because, if they don't, they fade away. 

The rationalizer view, as always, involves ignoring unpopular parts of religious texts and finding passages that best suit a modern purpose. The act of picking and choosing becomes the central issue. As seen from the outside, this hardly looks like much of a religious debate but, from within, it is usually a furious one. After all, each argument is about how people should live their lives. The Theravāda, Mahāyāna, and Vajrayāna schools of Buddhism split over points of emphasis, not original teachings. So did the Orthodox and Catholic faiths.  

Even now, the Islamic world faces movements to rationalize parts of their holy texts to accommodate believers who don't live in warm, desert climates and can't always follow an unadjusted lunar calendar. The Buddhist world rationalizes texts saying followers can take no life, not even to eat, because we now understand how plants, mushrooms, and other non-animals are alive and, in some cases, how they demonstrably think and learn. The Buddhist rationalization to 'cause no unnecessary suffering,' seems to me a good adjustment because it's in keeping with the original spirit - but of course not everyone agrees. 

These religious changes are natural and inevitable. The act of reading scripture, itself, lends itself to the act of interpretation. Different portions of text jump out to different readers as people seek confirmation for their views (a part of the process we could do without, maybe, although we're not going to escape it). Insights come differently to each person because we are all individuals with our own unique backgrounds. Reading the same text ends up with different results for everyone. 

It's too bad for my relatives who have fallen for such movements. It's inconvenient for me when I get caught up in our current ones. Rationalization movements, however, are a constant part of human history. They will continue adjusting our religious beliefs for the foreseeable future - for as long as humanity is in need of social consensus.