Philosophy

Anatomy of   Religious Violence The history of religion has been a seriously blood-bathed one. It reveals the intense power, weight, and depth of religion within the human heart. No wonder, the word “religion” itself comes from the Latin religare meaning “to bind”. Religion binds the adherent to its belief, authority, and community. It holds an intense power over the individual. Of course, there are several instances of religious faith opening itself to philosophical dialogues and investigations in the past. However, it is a fact undeniable that much of religious faith is a matter of faith alone and not rational discussion. Therefore, they have the potential to invite physical opposition by not submitting to any force of logic. That is why in some cases words are silenced by blows – with the sanction of some religious authority. Religious violence may be defined as violence committed in the name of religion. It is both intra-religious violence and inter-religious violence; i.e. violen

Thy Kingdom come... Night dragged on clumsily as the disciples snuggled miserably against their drowsy companions. From a distance, the painful cries of their Master fell heavily on their dull ears. One silently observed in the moonlit darkness, the thickness of the Master’s sweat-drops in prayer falling like drops of blood to the ground. In agony, the Lord cried ‘Father, if it’s possible, let this cup pass from me….’ Darkness gloomed terribly, as if with incisors ready to devour patience, before the Lord steadily continued ‘nevertheless not as I will, but as You will it.’ Matthew tells us that Jesus repeated the same words not once, but thrice before He was arrested in Gethsemane that Passover evening of April, 32 AD (Matt. 26: 44). Indubitably, those words sum up the whole struggle of spirit against flesh from the creation till the end of the world. While disobedient Adam and the adamic race lost the battle and fell into the voracious jaws of death, Jesus Christ submitted to the will

Paper submitted to ACTS Academy of Higher Education, Bangalore. 2006. The twentieth century has also witnessed the same kind of interaction between theology and philosophy as in the early church age. On one side are those who with Tertullian (c.160-230) would ask ‘What is there in common between Athens and Jerusalem? What between the Academy and the Church?’ [1] In other words, Christianity and philosophy are two poles apart. On the other hand, there are those who feel that philosophy can be a great tool in elucidating and establishing theology. One must understand that though philosophy is not recognized to be the ultimate source of theology, yet philosophical categories such as substance, ousia, etc have found a significant place in Western theology. A study of the history of Christian theology shows how St. Augustine was influenced in his theology by Platonic philosophy while St. Thomas Aquinas was influenced by Aristotle in formulating his systematic theology. In the modern period

The word secularism comes from the Latin saeculum, meaning ‘a generation or this age,’ and corresponds to the Greek aeon. Its meaning extends on to connote also this ‘wordly;’ thus, its Lower Latin form saecularis means ‘worldly.’ Basically, secularism is the ideology that facilitates practice without reference to religion of any kind. When applied to politics, it is the state policy of being indifferent to political theologies, the policy of keeping politics free from religious interferences. In his book, The Secular City, Harvey Cox differentiates secularization from secularism. According to Cox, secularization ‘implies a historical process, almost certainly irreversible, in which society and culture are delivered from tutelage to religious control and closed metaphysical world views.’ Quoting the German theologian Friedrich Gogarten, Cox announces secularization as the legitimate consequence of the impact of biblical faith on history. It is not untrue that biblical faith has ha