Daily Times

Out of 7.2 billion world’s enumeration, 85 percent of the population is a part of various religions, faiths or creeds which directly or indirectly lead them to God, Allah, Ram or Brahma. Religions preach love, harmony, coexistence, brotherhood, equality and justice. On the contrary, in most parts of the world there is chaos, inequality, suppression and persecution. What is religion? The question is as old as the history of mankind. However, the ongoing phenomenon of historical disclosures has amplified religious controversies and their impacts on the human race.

In modern history, it is thought that Karl Marx’s theory on religion accurately pointed out the reasons for social and economic injustices. However, the conclusions of his theories have generated controversies too because they ignore the spiritual aspect of the religion, such as the private link of an individual to his Creator. His famous statement that ‘religious distress is at the same time the expression of real distress and the protest against real distress.

Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of heartless world, just as it is the spirit of a spiritless situation. It is the opium of the people.’ A part of this statement, ‘religion is the sigh of oppressed’ has a significance too for it elaborates the missing link of spiritual relationship of an individual and God. The involvement of religion in state affairs dates back to first century Rome.

The Romans absorbed many cults of Greek gods where the Roman Emperor was patronising as ‘Pontifex Maximus’ meaning the Chief Priest. Polytheistic religions were the driving force. With the ascension of Christianity that posed a threat to Roman polytheistic values overhauled the empire by introducing the dissent faith articles attracting thousands.

The Roman Emperor Constantine was believed to embrace Christianity while he was on his deathbed but during his reign old pagan religions were replaced by Christianity. In the 4th century Christianity was declared the ‘state religion’ of the Roman Empire that empowered the religion to suppress and intimidate other religions of the era. Edward Gibbon in his book, The ‘Decline and fall of the Roman Empire’ believes religion was responsible for all social ills of the Roman society. After the rise of Islam in 7th century, within the period of a few centuries, the religion of peace spread from Arabian Peninsula to the elongated territories of northern India to the western Spain. The Islamic Caliphate became the largest empire controlling Jerusalem, Alexandria and Antioch, the dominant Christian territories.

The Islamic Caliphate soon became the largest empire controlling Jerusalem, Alexandria and Antioch, the dominant Christian territories by then. Over the years, there was serious conflict between Christians and Muslims on northern and southern Mediterranean. The religious divide engulfed thousands of lives in battlegrounds of Arabian as well as European territories. As a result, almost a thousand-year-old Islamic civilisation started decaying because of deviation from true Islamic doctrines

Over the years, there was serious conflict between Christians and Muslims on northern and southern Mediterranean. The religious divide engulfed thousands of lives in battlegrounds of Arabian as well as European territories. In the result, almost one thousand years Islamic civilisation started decaying because of the deviation from the true Islamic doctrines.

The divergence started with the conspiracies against the early Caliphate when the second, third and fourth Caliph were assassinated by intolerant groups from different tribes and opponents. Obviously, a reason was the incongruity of the followers of Islam and bigoted intellectuals in the 12th and 13th century. Five hundred years before a Catholic Augustinian Priest, Martin Luther along with other reformers nailed a ninety-five point’s reformation plan on the Castle Church door in Wittenberg in 1517.

He and his companions challenged the Papal authority. His departure from the Catholicism was the step toward modernising western religion that afterward led to secularism. Martin Luther was the first ever European who stood for the separation of the Church and the State. The reformists believed that the religion and state were distinctive institutions, one represented ‘spiritual kingdom’ and other ‘political kingdom’ and there is clear divide between the ecclesiastical strengths and the civil powers. The debate does not end here, The American president, Thomas Jefferson responding to a letter from Danbury Baptist Association in 1802 wrote, “make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” thus building a wall of separation between Church and State”.

Thomas Jefferson believed that the religion or faith solely between an individual and God, a person is not accountable to anyone for his faith, the state legislation could reach to actions not opinion. The idea of the religion and state separation reached to the Islamic world in the 20th century while in 1924 Reza Shah Pehlevi modernised Iran with his secularist ideas influenced by French revolution.

During the period from 1924 to 1979, Iran was evolved as a secular state with a clear division between the religion and state. Though the later Islamic revolution brought back the country to it its original Islamic colour but still a large majority of the country has great influence of the previous era of modernisation. Under the leadership of the founding father, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, Pakistan was liberated from British Raj in 1947 and obviously, Quaid-e-Azam had a blueprint of the modern liberal state. His deteriorating health helped his opponents to form a theocratic state.

Pakistan Broadcasting Corporation had recordings of Quaid speech about his narrative of a liberal modern country but was destroyed later by the corporation.

Murtza Solangi, the former Director General of Radio Pakistan tried to retrieve original copies of 11 August speech from All India Radio but failed to find the real requisite. Right from the inception of Pakistan, the orchestrated gripping narrative of radicalisation of the country nurtured by the fundamental religious forces fused the religion and state in a singular inseparable entity. The socio-economic failure of the country owe to the extremist religious dogmas against which history keeps recording the thinkers like Richard Dawkins who boldly says, “I am all for offending people’s religion.

I think it should be offending at every opportunity”. Coming back to the narrative of Marx’s statement about religion being an opiate to masses, the dominant concept of the religion is that human beings because of their beliefs travel through the unreal world of fantasy.

The hard social and economic realities are ruined by the religious taboos of misguided, misinterpreted and misunderstood essence of the spiritual realms which actually guides an individual to recognise one’s inner self. ‘Religion is a sigh of oppressed creature’ is a mockery of delusions and believers maintain their hopes of life after death where human deprivations will have no shadows. Like drug and liquor that takes its user to a world of reverie, the misconceived religious theologies too act like a drug leading the followers to the mythical world when rationale of physical pains of the real life find refuge in misguided eternity.

When physical presence of a few thousand people in Islamabad is being watched by million well-wishers through social media, and 95% majority forcibly impose culture of religion on poor minorities to face social hunger during Ramadan, with the constitutional force religious minorities are degraded as aliens in their own homeland, reluctantly, very reluctantly, the view that, “Die Religion…ist das Opium des Volkes” meaning ‘religion is opiate of the masses’ gets little justification.

The writer can be reached at kaleem.dean@mail.com

Published in Daily Times, November 27^th 2017.