Opinion - News Analysis

Living with difference

By Pratap Bhanu Mehta

In its judgment on the NCERT curriculum issue, the Supreme Court has made the curious assertion that teaching the doctrine that all religions are fundamentally the same even though their practices differ, is not only consistent with secularism; it, in some way, exemplifies it.

The claim that all religions are fundamentally the same even though their practices differ is the sort of fuzzy thinking that compromises both secularism and good pedagogical practice. This claim is very debatable. It serves no intellectual purpose to take it as a given. By whose authority do we know that all religions are fundamentally the same? Indeed, such thinking prevents the emergence of a critical intelligence. It takes the answer to a question that properly should be left up to individuals to decide, as given. The claim that all religions are in essence one, is a misplaced gesture. It is thought that this is a way of respecting the adherents of various faiths. We are saying to them: we are fundamentally on the same path.

But in a deeper sense it is an act of disrespect to tell anyone whether or not they are really like you. It is up to each one of us, individually, to decide whether or not we think we are engaged in the same quest. What right does anyone have to pronounce on my behalf whether or not my religion is really like their own? This claim can be tenable only if I am asked to revise my perception about my religion in light of someone else's perception of what my religion essentially involves. It takes away from me the right to define my sameness or difference and is, therefore, in a deeper sense disrespectful. It puts someone else in charge of defining my beliefs.

There is a misplaced sense that toleration requires that citizens respect each other's religions. This stems from confusion. What citizens in a liberal democracy need to respect are each other's right to believe and practise their faiths in a manner compatible with such rights for all. What a liberal democracy cannot do is require or teach to its citizens what they should think of other faiths. I may be of the view that Islam or Judaism or Hinduism are different from each other. I am certainly not obliged to think well of any of them. It makes no intellectual sense to teach children that these faiths are all one. There is something dangerous about thinking that a tolerant society requires respect for people's faiths. Toleration requires a respect for their rights. The test of whether you respect other's rights comes only when you think that they might be up to something fundamentally different or strange. What sort of shallow tolerance are we engaged in if we think that the reason we tolerate other faiths is because those faiths are fundamentally like ours?

The idea that children should be obliged to believe that all faiths are one is a denial of our liberties to think of other faiths as we please. Acknowledging other people's rights is real toleration; not some assimilationist claim that we all really are thinking the same thing. If you want to promote tolerance make our rights our religion. If you want to promote tolerance, inculcate in people the capacity to tolerate opinions critical of them, even when those opinions originate in other religions. Do not encourage people to hide behind propositions that very few could sincerely believe, such as all religions are one. This will breed more pious hypocrisy than toleration.

The claim that all religions are one is a denial of the history of all religious traditions, including our own. Part of the intellectual vitality of our tradition comes from the fact that some people thought they were up to something new. The intellectual sophistication of our philosophical traditions is in part due to the fact that Buddhists and Hindus constantly argued over such things as what ultimate liberation is like, what the nature of Being is and so on. To brush all of that debate aside as some kind of monumental mistake is anti-intellectualism of the highest order. In the long run it will be as damaging as saffronisation.

Finally, we have to admit that the view that ``all religions are fundamentally the same'' is acknowledged only by particular sects or religions. It is a partisan description of religious experience, and should not be seen as neutral amongst religions. This interpretation is often then mobilised to attack those who deny that all religions are essentially one or equal. I would feel safer living in a society where someone could think my religion was an intellectual or moral disaster so long as my freedom to reciprocate this thought, if I wished, were protected by my rights.

That society would be safer than for liberty than a society in which schools and courts told me what I should think about other religions. True toleration requires living with difference.

© Copyright 2000 - 2009 The Hindu