Don't mess with the missionary man
In stories told by missionaries the natives tell them that Christianity brought them out of the darkness and into the light. This is probably true, although not exactly in the sense that the modern man understands it. For the modern man, the comfort of religion is in its ontological declaration that settles the disturbing uncertainty and vagueness. For the natives, it was in the liberation from the horror-filled superstition of tribal religions. Animism was a form of psychological warfare that witch doctors systematically used to scare people to make them do what they were told. It is difficult for the modern man to realize how efficient this was in the eternal information void of tribal societies. On the other hand, the Western sense of justice that was part of Christianity tended to smooth the roughest features of tribal life.
The perception of missionaries as neurotic fanatics who ruined the happy lives of primitives is absolutely wrong. Life in a primitive tribe is not free, but quite the opposite: according to anthropologists, the more primitive the tribe, the more rules and taboos, and the more brutal means of enforcing them. "Injustice" is a mild term to describe a society where the ruling person or clique can arbitrarily terrorize all people below them. The very worst hell, or at least one of the very worst, were the islands of the Southern seas that were so idealized by the 18th century Europeans. In these islands, nature provided almost optimal surroundings for life, so population growth was hindered with human sacrifice and cannibalism. Wars were always extremely bloody and the typical way of settling things was to slaughter the whole opposition after the battle. Of course, the political prostitution that was practiced in Pacific appealed to explorers, who had gone several months without getting any, so much that for a few centuries the whole area had a totally undeserved reputation of being a paradise.
The minimal core of Christianity, "believe in Jesus and you are saved", can be easily adopted by anybody. If you break rules, simply apologize to Jesus and your sins are forgiven. Compared to its closest competitors, Judaism and Islam (let alone others that were even more primitive), Christianity was free of rites, complex legal systems and painful exercises of repentance. The practice of Christianity stretched according to the needs of the current situation, so ultimately it became the religion that ended all religions. The reasonable thinking based on natural sciences could not have emerged anywhere else than in the Christian world that frowned upon superstition and trickery. Of course the Church tried to harass scientists and strengthen the power of priests, but in other cultures this change would have been far more radical and bloody, since Christianity
- emphasized individual responsibility in both religious and secular issues
- frowned upon magic tricks and supernatural spells, which seriously limited the ways that the priestly class was able to control people
Other religions are often discussed in a romantic fashion for the reason that opponents of "Western rationality" (= natural sciences) do not get much support from the mainstream religion. This is why they embrace the rites that amuse with their exotic nature and the tactic of scaring and flattery that is familiar from animism, which they use to convert the weaker-willed people to their side to accept wiccan sacrifice, oriental medicine and many other types of nonsense. The goal is to cripple the realistic scientific worldview in as many people as possible so that it can be replaced by an irrationalistic doctrine that is politically more useful. Just take a look at who believes in horoscopes, feng shui and homeopathy, and who doesn't. The connection between a belief in astrology or zone therapy and people who work in the public sector is interesting to examine, and by doing so you can see many things from a new vantage point.
Comments