Do All Religions Teach Their Way Is The Only Right Way?

[Sgt. Pepper]

Nothing is a 100% certainty, you of all people know this very well.

Sometimes, I imagine a world without religion and wonder if it would be more peaceful without any kind of religious belief. This has been on my mind for the past few years, with the alarming rise of MAGA Christians, who I believe have turned into dangerous religious cult-like followers of Donald Trump.

 

[dybmh]

There’s several theories about how religion first started.

Elaborate?

 

[Tamino]

Sometimes, I imagine a world without religion and wonder if it would be more peaceful without any kind of religious belief. This has been on my mind for the past few years, with the alarming rise of MAGA Christians, who I believe have turned into dangerous religious cult-like followers of Donald Trump.

Me too, but I don't think so, unfortunately.
If it's not religion, people will just find a different ideology to justify their hate and violence. Any type of narrative that allows you to separate the world in "us" versus "them" will work just fine.

 

[Viker]

Not all religions.

I prefer to approach this matter with, "You go your way and I'll go mine. Maybe we'll meet again, later."

 

[sun rise]

Me too, but I don't think so, unfortunately.
If it's not religion, people will just find a different ideology to justify their hate and violence. Any type of narrative that allows you to separate the world in "us" versus "them" will work just fine.

Yes. Most people don't know what their religion is all about or even reject the core teachings. We had a recent example https://www.reddit.com/r/Christianity/comments/15mt9gq but there are many others.

 

[The Hammer]

Me too, but I don't think so, unfortunately.
If it's not religion, people will just find a different ideology to justify their hate and violence. Any type of narrative that allows you to separate the world in "us" versus "them" will work just fine.

This is exactly it.

 

[sun rise]

Not all religions.

I prefer to approach this matter with, "You go your way and I'll go mine. Maybe we'll meet again, later."

My approach is a bit different: We all have separate paths up the mountain but we'll meet at the top.

 

[Link]

The path of ascension is straight which makes all other paths head away from God in my view. However, the religion is not what people say it is, it's rather the leader and guide of time that is the religion.

You have to distinguish between the living religion and path, and what people claim it is due to written and said words. God's religion is beyond words, it's unseen and to be lived.

 

[sun rise]

The path of ascension is straight which makes all other paths head away from God in my view. However, the religion is not what people say it is, it's rather the leader and guide of time that is the religion.

You have to distinguish between the living religion and path, and what people claim it is due to written and said words. God's religion is beyond words, it's unseen and to be lived.

I think I've mentioned this before, but if not - I view Islam through the lens of Islamic sufism with its multiple levels of understanding starting with shariah, then tariqat (batini), then maarifat (irfan) and finally haqiqat (anniliation in al-Haqq and qudrat (will of Allah). My comment about Khizr earier was based on him being at the level of haqiqat though I did not think to mention it at the time.

 

[Augustus]

The Romans respected the "Gods of the Place" in foreign lands and the Roman Empire fostered an inclusive and multicultural approach to religion that sparked a number of syncretic cults

Using terms like multicultural and inclusive seems like a pretty anachronistic way to describe Roman religion.

Their acceptance was often to do with the degree to which the gods of the 'other' could be mapped on to the Roman gods and the degree to which they were seen as ancient (religio) or modern (superstitio). This is why you see 'modern' cults like Mithras being mapped on to the ancient Mithra to 'fake' legitimacy. Adopting and integrating 'foreign' gods from among those that you had conquered (and thus were no longer a threat) is also different to being tolerant in general and is a form of assimilation rater than multiculturalism.

You are right that there wasn’t the need for the exclusivist approach of monotheisms, and so they were significantly less intolerant than monotheists, but that doesn’t make them multicultural and inclusive in the modern sense. Paganisms generally had a significantly wider 'latitude of acceptance' than montheisms, but this latitude had limits.

They persecuted various pagans, Manichaeans, Jews, Christians, astrologers, etc at times. They burned people at the stake and destroyed their places of worship and burned their religious texts.

Less intolerant, is probably more accurate than inclusive and multicultural.

You should not only worship the divine everywhere and in every way in accordance with our ancestral traditions, but also force all others to honour it. Those who attempt to distort our religion with strange rites you should hate and punish, not only for the sake of the gods … but also because such people, by bringing in new divinities, persuade many folks to adopt foreign practices, which lead to conspiracies, revolts, and factions, which are entirely unsuitable for monarch.” Dio Cassius - History of Rome

 

[Madsaac]

I suspect in a world without religion even more people would have died.

Yeah right....................in a world without religion would have less children been abused?

The report estimates that 216,000 children were abused by Catholic priests between 1950 and 2020, and that accounting for abuse by other Catholic church employees increases the total number to around 330,000. Around 80% of the victims were boys. Wikipedia

 

[The Hammer]

Yeah right....................in a world without religion would have less children been abused?

The report estimates that 216,000 children were abused by Catholic priests between 1950 and 2020, and that accounting for abuse by other Catholic church employees increases the total number to around 330,000. Around 80% of the victims were boys. Wikipedia

While sad. I wouldn't blame the religion for it.

 

[King Phenomenon]

Yeah right....................in a world without religion would have less children been abused?

The report estimates that 216,000 children were abused by Catholic priests between 1950 and 2020, and that accounting for abuse by other Catholic church employees increases the total number to around 330,000. Around 80% of the victims were boys. Wikipedia

Probably

 

[Saint Frankenstein]

Yeah right....................in a world without religion would have less children been abused?

Probably not as it's something that's widespread throughout society. It's common where people have authority over children. Honestly, sexual abuse is very very common in society.

 

[Heyo]

They persecuted various pagans, Manichaeans, Jews, Christians, astrologers, etc at times. They burned people at the stake and destroyed their places of worship and burned their religious texts.

Less intolerant, is probably more accurate than inclusive and multicultural.

Adding to this, the Roman approach to other religions was mostly pragmatic. Roman paganism was a state religion, with state funded temples, which were a source of income (donations flowed back into the system). "Atheists" were thus tax evaders. Refusal to accept the Roman gods (and donate to them) was the real reason for the persecution. Religions that could be integrated into the system were no threat.

“Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful.”
- attributed to Seneca the Younger

 

[Augustus]

Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful.”
- attributed to Seneca the Younger

It was Edward Gibbon who said that in “Decline and fall…” (written in the 18th C)

Adding to this, the Roman approach to other religions was mostly pragmatic. Roman paganism was a state religion, with state funded temples, which were a source of income (donations flowed back into the system). "Atheists" were thus tax evaders. Refusal to accept the Roman gods (and donate to them) was the real reason for the persecution. Religions that could be integrated into the system were no threat.

There was a degree of pragmatism to it, although I would guess it was perhaps more in the sense of public order than public income.

Foreign cults we’re sporadically oppressed if they were seen as a “corrupting” influence.

There were likely a variety of socio-cultural reasons for the persecutions given they happened in different times and different circumstances though rather than a single reason.

As there was no real concept of a "secular" and a "religious" it's hard to conceptualise an idea of "religious tolerance" when you simply had compatible and incompatible phenomenon in relation to the ruling regime and its ideology, needs and desires.

I just feel many people greatly overstate the degree of tolerance, and that it is not really a helpful framing of the issue of religion in classical antiquity.

 

[Madsaac]

While sad. I wouldn't blame the religion for it.

However, when working out what religion is the 'right way'(if any) isn't this type of thing important?

Especially when priest, in this instance are such an integral part of Catholicism.

 

[IndigoChild5559]

I know Christians say the only way to God is through Jesus and Muslims say that everybody is born a Muslim and other religions are wrong. Are there any other religions that believe their way is the only right way?

No. I think it is only Chrsitianity and Islam that have that teaching.

Judaism does not claim to be the one true religion. We Jews are perfectly fine with others worshiping God in their own way. No one NEEDS to become a Jew.

 

[PearlSeeker]

No. I think it is only Chrsitianity and Islam that have that teaching.

Judaism does not claim to be the one true religion. We Jews are perfectly fine with others worshiping God in their own way. No one NEEDS to become a Jew.

What is the fate of non-Jews in the world to come (according to Judaism)?

 

[PearlSeeker]

Yeah right....................in a world without religion would have less children been abused?

The report estimates that 216,000 children were abused by Catholic priests between 1950 and 2020, and that accounting for abuse by other Catholic church employees increases the total number to around 330,000. Around 80% of the victims were boys. Wikipedia

Hard to say. Many people would be more depressed without religion and many would be happier...

The same child abusers would do the same thing but in other institutions - families, summer camps, sport teams, internet blackmailing...