Religion and Identity

I’m reading a book for my Ethnic Studies class called In the Name of Identity by Amin Maalouf. It’s pretty much a discussion of Maalouf’s thoughts on identity—what makes identity, the social consequences of identity, why identity is important, etc. In the reading I did for my next class there was a lot of discussion about the role of religion in a person’s identity, which relates to discussions we’ve had in class.

First, in a discussion about how the time period we live in influences our identity, he brought up how religions change over time. “We may call ourselves Christians—or Muslims, Jews, Buddhists or Hindus—but our vision of both this world and the next no longer bears much resemblance to that of our “co-religionists” who lived 500 years ago”. Maalouf was making a point about how the time period we live in is more influential to our beliefs than our religion, but I think this is an important idea when considering how religions evolve over time. As we discussed in class after watching “Happy Feet”, there are many things that influence religion and bring about change: science, knowledge, social change, globalization, etc. It’s interesting to think about how many of our religious beliefs today are more a product of our current society than of the original beliefs of our ancestors. Maalouf goes on to say that if we lived among our co-religionists of the past keeping our contemporary beliefs and behaviors, “we would have been stoned in the street, thrown into prison or burned at the stake for impiety, debauchery, heresy or witchcraft”. I agree with Maalouf that the major religions of the world have come a long way from the beliefs and lifestyles that they were founded on. While some are still very traditional and maintain many of the original beliefs and customs of their predecessors, many other religions have evolved to become almost completely new religions compared to the religions practiced by their ancestors. Reform Judaism for example, while its follows call themselves Jewish, their beliefs and lifestyles are hardly Jewish at all compared to many Jews of the past millennium.
Maalouf also talks about two roles that religion plays in people's lives today. First, religion fills one's need for spirituality; religion provides people with an explanation and a meaning to attach to life, as the Geertz definition says, providing people with a general order of existence. The other purpose, Maalouf says, that religion fulfills is the role of community. Maalouf then makes the argument that those two roles should be separated and that there is no place for religion in defining a person's identity. He claims the ideal world is "a world in which a man, while remaining attached to his beliefs, to a faith, or to moral values that may or may not be inspired by scripture, will no longer feel the need to enroll himself among his co-religionists...what has to do with religion must be kept apart from what has to do with identity". This is where I disagree with Maalouf, although I understand where he's coming from. Maalouf's argument is based on the consideration of religious radicals and terrorists who join forces with religious organizations for the sake of community and belonging and cause destruction "in the name of religion". While I agree that religion as a whole may be safer if spirituality and identity were separate, I don't think you can deny the value of religious identity in peaceful circumstances. Religious community can be used for good just as much as for evil. Think about religious groups that go on mission trip to build houses or hospitals in under-developed countries. I think Maalouf is a little hasty in writing-off religious identity, perhaps because he is from a country where that identity is often abused. From a more balanced point of view, however, I think it must be recognized that religious identity is neither a good nor bad thing, it just depends on how it is used.