As I watched for information from the Iranian protests, I listened to a young woman who commented that “We’re not Islamic – We’re Zoroastrians.” It got me remembering that the foundation of religion is generally revelation . . . ideally divine revelation – but as I look at history there’s been a whole lot of conflicting revelations.
I’m kind of qualified to comment on revelations. In the Summer of 2009, I had a revelation. A coyote explained to me that I would survive cancer, and that when I (as is inevitable) depart this world, I will return as a raven. So far the coyote has been correct – I survived the cancer. Can’t tell you about returning as a raven – but I keep watching them in the skies, and I can think of worse fates. The thing is, when I went in for surgery, I had been setting up a lesson for my Indians of North America class – dealing with creation myths. And when the coyote came by, I was in intensive care, with a tool that gave me another shot of morphine whenever I pressed the button. The revelation, the visit with the coyote, still feels absolutely real – but I know the intensive care nurse would have reported the coyote had it been on her ward, and I don’t trust anyone’s judgement when he’s dosed out on a narcotic. If a man can’t believe his own revelation, whose revelation can he believe?
As a much younger man, I read through the texts of several religions – and never found anything more comfortable than the Methodist Sunday school teachings of my youth. The Buddha made sense with the observation that life consists of suffering – but that seemed to be more rational observation than divine revelation. Never could figure out why any self-respecting deity should need me to face Mecca and pray five times a day, so Islam was pretty much out – though I really do like the teaching style in most of the Sufi documents I’ve read. It was a heck of a shock to learn that Genesis was written in the Babylonian captivity and came long after the Moses stories. Learning more about King James’ reasons for his version didn’t increase my faith – but as a scientist, I am more a trained sceptic.
I note that two-thirds of the mosques in Iran are not functioning – which suggests to me that, after nearly half a century of an Islamic government, faith in Islam has declined. It makes sense – every time we see a government screw-up (and I am ready to hypothesize theirs, like our own, are due to government midwits doing the best job they can) our trust in governmental competence declines. If the government is also the religion, religious faith will go downhill along with trust in government. Up ’til now, I had never thought of the separation between church and state protecting the religion.
Don’t get me wrong – if a deity decides to reveal the secrets of the universe to me, I’ll take it. But its kind of like seeing Bigfoot – I won’t be telling the story.
Trego's Mountain Ear 