The voice of god

ACCORDING to the Talmud, Rabbi Eliezier disagreed with some other rabbis about a point of law and, unable to convince them, said, "If the law is as I think it is, then this tree shall let us know." Immediately, the tree jumped a hundred yards, but the other rabbis said, "One does not prove anything from a tree." Rabbi Eliezier then appealed to a brook, which immediately began to flow upstream, but his colleagues replied, "One cannot prove anything from a brook." Rabbi Eliezier said, "If the law is as I think, then the walls of this house will tell." And the walls began to fall. At that point Rabbi Joshua reprimanded the walls, "If scholars argue a point of law, what business have you to fall?"

So the walls stopped midway. To show their respect for Rabbi Joshua, they did not fall further; and in deference to Rabbi Eliezier, they did not straighten up. Then Rabbi Eliezier appealed to heaven, and a voice from above said, "What have you got against Rabbi Eliezier? The law is as he says." To this Rabbi Jirmijahu replied, "The Torah has been given on Mount Sinai, so we no longer pay attention to voices."

Some time after this dispute, Rabbi Nathan met Elijah the prophet and asked him what the Holy One, blessed be His Name, had done in that hour. And Elijah replied, "God smiled and said: 'My children have won against me, my children have won.'" (Excerpted from Walter Kaufmann's Critique of Religion and Philosophy. The author notes in this connection that "No appeal to miracles is tolerated, and decisions must be based on arguments - but these arguments must be based on citations and interpretations of an absolutely authoritative text, and no critical questions about the text are allowed any more than an appeal to other books or independent observation.")

One of the remarkable things about the "voice of god" is the way that it is so often used to incite people to violence; the way it is twisted around to make people believe that it is only through violent, vicious, attacks on others, that they, an "intrinsically peaceful people", can "defend" their own religion.

Things that one simply cannot get oneself to do in cold blood are cold-bloodedly built up to by working oneself into a frenzied moral outrage - selectively marshalling the required evidence, or evoking provocative stereotypes. If necessary, going back many decades or centuries to do so.

This kind of thing occurs in a wide variety of "holy war" situations, not all of which relate to religion.

Revolutions of the "red-rivers-of-blood-will-flow" variety, are an obvious example. So is Separatism; as in the case of the struggle to "free" the Jaffna peninsula or Kashmir; or, for that matter, in the case of the effort to sculpt the Hindu nation from the Indian countryside, so as to restore it to its "rightful" status; whatever that might mean.

Holy wars, of course, are all incited by the "voice of god"; or by some person or persons claiming to speak on His behalf. Another thing they have in common is the striving to free "oneself" from one's oppressors, so that one can "realise" oneself (in other words, so that one can strive to become the "real" Me, who does not exist, and in most cases never will). This longing is then used to legitimate the things that we do here and now; mean and vicious things which, in calmer moments, one would shudder at the thought of being associated with.

One particularly chilling example comes to mind.

In response to Kierkegaard's statement that if a man proposed, like Abraham, to slaughter his son because "God had ordered him to do so", he, Kierkegaard, would "saddle (his) horse and ride with him", someone wanted to know whether it was "impossible after all that

God might give the command to kill his son not to an Abraham who loves his son but to an Abraham who hates his son ?"

SUDHANSHU RANADE

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