God and my Neighbour Part 30

The Rationalist locks on with a rueful smile, and wonders. He sees nothing in any one of these religions to justify its claim to infallibility or pre-eminence. It seems to him unreasonable to a.s.sert that any theology or any saviour is indispensable. He realises that a man may be good and happy in any church, or outside any church. He cannot admit that only those who follow Jesus, or Buddha, or Mahomet, or Moses can be "saved," nor that all those who fail to believe in the divine mission of one, or all of these will be lost.

Let us consider the Christian claim. If the Christian claim be valid, men cannot be good, nor happy, cannot be saved, except through Christ.

Is this position supported by the facts?

One Christian tells me that "It is in the solemn realities of life that one gets his final evidence that Christianity is true." Another tells me that "In Christ alone is peace"; another, that "Without Christ there is neither health nor holiness."

If these statements mean anything, they mean that none but true Christians can live well, nor die well, nor bear sorrow and pain with fort.i.tude, do their whole duty manfully, nor find happiness here and bliss hereafter.

But I submit that Christianity does not make men lead better lives than others lead who are not Christians, and there are none so abjectly afraid of death as Christians are. The Pagan, the Buddhist, the Mohammedan, and the Agnostic do not fear death nearly so much as do the Christians.

The words of many of the greatest Christians are gloomy with the fears of death, of h.e.l.l, and of the wrath of G.o.d.

The Roman soldier, the Spartan soldier, the Mohammedan soldier did not fear death. The Greek, the Buddhist, the Moslem, the Viking went to death as to a reward, or as to the arms of a bride. Compare the writings of Marcus Aurelius and of Jeremy Taylor, of Epictetus and John Bunyan, and then ask yourself whether the Christian religion makes it easier for men to die.

There are millions of Europeans--not to speak of Buddhists and Jews--there are millions of men and women to-day who are not Christians.

Do they live worse or die worse, or bear trouble worse, than those who accept the Christian faith?

Some of us have come through "the solemn realities of life," and have _not_ realised that Christianity is true. We do not believe the Bible; we do not believe in the divinity of Christ; we do not pray, nor feel the need of prayer; we do not fear G.o.d, nor h.e.l.l, nor death. We are as happy as our even Christian; we are as good as our even Christian; we are as benevolent as our even Christian: what has Christianity to offer us?

There are in the world some four hundred and fifty millions of Buddhists. How do they bear themselves in "the solemn realities of life"?

I suggest that consolation, and fort.i.tude, and cheerfulness, and loving-kindness are not in the exclusive gift of the Christian religion, but may be found by good men in _all_ religions.

As to the effects of Christianity on life. Did Buddha, and King Asoka, and Socrates, and Aristides lead happy, and pure, and useful lives? Were there no virtuous, nor happy, nor n.o.ble men and women during all the millions of years before the Crucifixion? Was there neither love, nor honour, nor wisdom, nor valour, nor peace in the world until Paul turned Christian? History tells us no such gloomy story.

Are there no good, nor happy, nor worthy men and women to-day outside the pale of the Christian churches? Amongst the eight hundred millions of human beings who do not know or do not follow Christ, are there none as happy and as worthy as any who follow Him?

Are we Rationalists so wicked, so miserable, so useless in the world, so terrified of the shadow of death? I beg to say we are nothing of the kind. We are quite easy and contented. There is no despair in our hearts. We are not afraid of bogeys, nor do we dread the silence and the dark.

Friend Christian, you are deceived in this matter. When you say that Christ is the _only_ true teacher, that He is the _only_ hope of mankind, that He is the _only_ Saviour, I must answer sharply that I do not believe that, and I do not think you believe it deep down in your heart. For if Christ is the only Saviour, then thousands of millions of Buddhists have died unsaved, and you know you do not believe that.

Jeremy Taylor believed that; but you know better.

Do you not _know_, as a matter of fact, that it is as well in this world, and shall be as well hereafter, with a good Buddhist, or Jew, or Agnostic, as with a good Christian?

Do you deny that? If you deny it, tell me what punishment you think will be inflicted, here or hereafter on a good man who does not accept Christianity.

If you do not deny it, then on what grounds do you claim that Christ is _the_ Saviour of all mankind, and that "only in Christ we are made whole"?

You speak of the spiritual value of your religion. What can it give you more than Socrates or Buddha possessed? These men had wisdom, courage, morality, fort.i.tude, love, mercy. Can you find in all the world to-day two men as wise, as good, as gentle, as happy? Yet these men died centuries before Christ was born.

If you believe that none but Christians can be happy or good; or if you believe that none but Christians can escape extinction or punishment, then there is some logic in your belief that Christ is our only Saviour.

But that is to believe that there never was a good man before Christ died, and that Socrates and Buddha, and many thousands of millions of men, and women, and children, before Christ and after, have been _lost_.

Such a belief is monstrous and absurd.

But I see no escape from the dilemma it places us in. If only Christ can save, about twelve hundred millions of our fellow-creatures will be lost.

If men can be saved without Christ, then Christ is not our only Saviour.

Christianity seems to be a composite religion, made up of fragments of religions of far greater antiquity. It is alleged to have originated some two thousand years ago. It has never been the religion of more than one-third of the human race, and of those professing it only ten per cent at any time have thoroughly understood, or sincerely followed, its teachings. It was not indispensable to the human race during the thousands (I say millions) of years before its advent. It is not now indispensable to some eight hundred millions of human beings. It had no place in the ancient civilisations of Egypt, a.s.syria, and Greece. It was unknown to Socrates, to Epicurus, to Aristides, to Marcus Aurelius, to King Asoka, and to Buddha. It has opposed science and liberty almost from the first. It has committed the most awful crimes and atrocities.

It has upheld the grossest errors and the most fiendish theories as the special revelations of G.o.d. It has been defeated in argument and confounded by facts over and over again, and has been steadily driven back and back, abandoning one essential position after another, until there is hardly anything left of its original pretensions. It is losing more and more every day its hold upon the obedience and confidence of the ma.s.ses, and has only retained the suffrages of a minority of educated minds by accepting as truths the very theories which in the past it punished as deadly sins. Are these the signs of a triumphant and indispensable religion? One would think, to read the Christian apologists, that before the advent of Christianity the world had neither virtue nor wisdom. But the world very old. Civilisation is very old. The Christian religion is but a new thing, is a mere episode in the history of human development, and has pa.s.sed the zenith of its power.

SPIRITUAL DISCERNMENT

Christians say that only those who are naturally religious can understand religion, or, as Archdeacon Wilson puts it, "Spiritual truths must be spiritually discerned." This seems to amount to a claim that religious people possess an extra sense or faculty.

When a man talks about "spiritual discernment," he makes a tacit a.s.sertion which ought not to be allowed to pa.s.s unchallenged. What is that a.s.sertion or implication? It is the implication that there is a spiritual discernment which is distinct from mental discernment. What does that mean? It means that man has other means of understanding besides his reason.

This spiritual discernment is a metaphysical myth.

Man feels, sees, and reasons with his brain. His brain may be more emotional or less emotional, more acute or less acute; but to invent a faculty of reason distinct from reason, or to suggest that man can feel or think otherwise than with his brain, is to darken counsel with a mult.i.tude of words.

There is no ground for the a.s.sertion that a spiritual faculty exists apart from the reason. But the Christian first invents this faculty, and then tells us that by this faculty religion is to be judged.

Spiritual truths are to be spiritually discerned. What is a "spiritual truth"? It is neither more nor less than a mental idea. It is an idea originating in the brain, and it can only be "discerned," or judged, or understood, by an act of reason performed by the brain.

The word "spiritual," as used in this connection, is a mere affectation.

It implies that the idea (which Archdeacon Wilson calmly dubs a "truth") is so exalted, or so refined, that the reason is too gross to appreciate it.

John says: "I know that my Redeemer liveth." Thomas asks: "How do you know?" John says: "Because I _feel_ it." Thomas answers: "But that is only a rhapsodical expression of a woman's reason: 'I know because I _know_.' You say your religion is true because you feel it is true. I might as well say it is not true because I feel that it is not true."

Then John becomes mystical. He says: "Spiritual truths must be spiritually discerned." Thomas, who believes that _all_ truths, and all errors, must be tried by the reason, shrugs his shoulders irreverently, and departs.

Now, this mystical jargon has always been a favourite weapon of theologians, and it is a very effective weapon against weak-minded, or ignorant, or superst.i.tious, or very emotional men.

We must deal with this deception sternly. We must deny that the human reason, which we know to be a fact, is inferior to a postulated "spiritual" faculty which has no existence. We must insist that to make the brain the slave of a brain-created idea is as foolish as to subordinate the substance to the shadow.

John declares that "G.o.d is love." Thomas asks him how he _knows_. John replies that it is a "spiritual truth," which must be "spiritually discerned." Thomas says: "It is not spiritual, and it is not true. It is a mere figment of the brain." John replies: "You are incapable of judging: you are spiritually blind." Thomas says: "My friend, you are incapable of reasoning: you are mentally halt and lame." John says Thomas is a "fellow of no delicacy."

I think there is much to be said in excuse for Thomas. I think it is rather cool of John to invent a faculty of "spiritual discernment," and then to tell Thomas that he (Thomas) does not possess that faculty.

That is how Archdeacon Wilson uses me. In a sermon at Rochdale he is reported to have spoken as follows:

As regards the first axiom, the archdeacon reaffirmed his declaration as to Mr. Blatchford's disqualification for such a controversy... Whether Mr. Blatchford recognised the fact or not, it was true that there was a faculty among men which, in its developed state, was as distinct, as unequally distributed, as mysterious in its origin and in its distribution, as was the faculty for pure mathematics, for music, for metaphysics, or for research. They might call it the devotional or religious faculty. Just as there were men whose faculties of insight amounted to genius in other regions of mental activity, so there were spiritual geniuses, geniuses in the region in which man holds communion with G.o.d, and from this region these who had never developed the faculty were debarred. One who was not devotional, not humble, not gentle in his treatment of the beliefs of others, one who could lightly ridicule the elementary forms of belief which had corresponded to the lower stages of culture, past and present, was not likely to do good in a religious controversy.

Here is the tyranny of language, indeed! Here is a farrago of myths and symbols. "There is a faculty--we may call it the devotional or religious faculty--there are geniuses in the region in which man holds communion with G.o.d"!

Why the good archdeacon talks of the "region in which man holds communion with G.o.d" as if he were talking of the telephone exchange.

He talks of G.o.d as if he were talking of the Postmaster-General. He postulates a G.o.d, and he postulates a region, and he postulates a communication, and then talks about all these postulates as if they were facts. I protest against this mystical, transcendental rhetoric. It is not argument.

Who has seen G.o.d? Who has entered that "region"? Who has communicated with G.o.d?

There is in most men a desire, in some men a pa.s.sion, for what is good.