11 May
Is Religion Necessary for Morality?
Today’s topic is one of the great questions philosophers have asked for millennia: Is religion essential for morality? One could certainly argue like the rationalistic philosophers that humankind does not require supernatural reasons in order to make people act kindly toward one’s neighbor. Certainly, the current existing realities of social and political evils arise because people tend to be given over to feelings of hatred, envy, and fear.
Apologists for religion often contend that a belief in God is necessary in order for people to act morally, but an examination of rabbinic texts suggest that the early rabbinic teachers acknowledged that had the Torah never been given to Israel-or by extension, to human kind-primitive man would have had to learn morality from the animal world.
The Sages appear to have understood this truth as well, for they candidly said, “If the Torah had not been given we could have learnt modesty from the cat, honesty from the ant, chastity from the dove, and good manners from the cock who first coaxes and then mates”(BT Eruvin 100b).
While the Talmud delineates the positive traits humankind could have learned from nature, it goes without saying that our ancestors could just as easily have learned many negative character traits from nature, e.g., from the ant we would have derived the principles of totalitarianism; from the cat we would have developed certain predatory traits showing no mercy toward the weak and defenseless such as a male lion’s tendency to destroy his offspring; from the chicken, our ancestors might have learned how to be scavengers who prefer to live in filthy habitats, and so on.
Biologist Lyall Watson sees a mutual affinity between human and animal behavior. Watson once observed a group of young penguins standing on the edge of an ice floe, learning how to swim. Fearful that there might be a leopard seal lurking in the murky waters, the penguins stood their ground and refused to go into the water. As thousands of penguins crowded on the floe, some pushing occurred from the back of the ranks until one of the penguins slipped into the water. After the lone penguin entered the water, a leopard-seal suddenly appeared and ate the small creature.
Reticent, the other penguins backed off until eventually, the group pushed another one of its members into the water. Sure enough, the leopard-seal reappeared and swallowed the second penguin as well. The same process occurred again, and by the fourth time, apparently, the leopard-seal had eaten enough and the fourth penguin was left safe and sound. Afterwards, the entire penguin group jumped in and enjoyed the swimming as if they hadn’t a care in the world. From this incident, Watson deduced that selfishness and cowardice are not just human traits; there are many other species of animals that share these qualities as well.
Yes, nature seems to have a sense of morality that is not much different from our own, but unlike the other denizens of nature, human beings have the ability to reprogram their mental and spiritual orientation toward the existence of other beings. Religion can facilitate this process of ethical transformation, but it is not necessarily a given. Living the religious lifestyle does not guarantee moral development. Continue Reading
