Faith and belief, similarities and differences

We use the words "faith" and "belief" interchangeably as if they mean the same, they do have similar meanings but I think there are subtle differences. Whenever we these words, we imply that we trust something without knowing everything or even anything about that thing. Trust is a very valuable emotion to confer, when we trust something we not only offer our allegiance and stand by it, but also try to convince others that the thing we trust is good for them also. So, what are the subtle differences between faith and belief?

The major difference between faith and belief is that faith is inherently blind, we don't need any information or rational logic to have faith in anything. For example, most of us inherit the religion of our parents and we have full faith in it, we grow up watching love stories and have faith in relationships and love. Mostly, this faith remains unshaken unless something dramatic and pivotal happens in our lives. It's hard if not impossible to explain why we have faith in anything without sounding illogical. One of the important characteristics of faith is that it's unmovable, no matter what happens, or what data you produce, people who have faith in something do not change it, rather they find reasons to defend their faith and question the evidence or even deny the legitimacy of the data that challenges their faith without providing any evidence for their statements.

However, belief needs to have some basis and rationale, not direct evidence, but some circumstantial evidence, there is something beyond plain conviction. Also, beliefs are subject to change as new evidence or data may prove them wrong, but as I mentioned, faith seldom changes no matter what evidence or what data is produced. We have not seen atoms or electrons with our own eyes but we believe that they exist, the same way many of us have not seen the south pole or north pole but believe that they exist, but we don't have faith in these things. We don't feel hurt or angry if anyone challenges or proposes alternatives to these things with equally compelling data or other evidence. Beliefs do change, our understanding of our solar system is a very good example of this, it has changed over time as telescopes and satellites have become more powerful. 

Faith and belief demand our trust based on some or no evidence, be careful when you defend them, don't confuse faith and belief. There is no shame in accepting faith as it is, many of us need to have faith in something, that's a psychological need that can be fulfilled by religion or something else, just be clear about it, that's all.

Thank you for reading and please share your opinion about this topic. 

We need to understand, analyze and evaluate all traditions and rituals

I was born and brought up in a conservative Hindu family. There were many rituals and traditions that were followed in our family for generations, and as a child, I used to participate in them or observe them with a lot of curiosity and interest. One thing that always surprised me was that no one around me actually knew the real reason or logic behind why we follow certain traditions or perform certain rituals. They just did it because it was a practice followed by their ancestors. If anyone raised any question, then the standard answer was, "This is what our ancestors did, there must be some reason behind it and therefore we need to continue doing this." While this answer was enough to snub a curious child, it is not a rational and logical explanation to quench the thirst of an inquisitive mind. There were many questions that remained unanswered for a long time, A few of them were: why fast only on a particular day? Why not eat meat during some religious festivals? If meat is that bad, then why do people eat it at all? How come it's good to eat it on a particular day but not good on any of those so-called auspicious occasions? Why women are not allowed to worship during their menstrual cycle? Why feed rice only to crows among all birds to pacify souls of dead people? There were many questions like this and I tried to find answers to many of them on my own. Actually, it is not that difficult to search for answers to many of these questions, mostly it is a matter of applying some common sense. But, the first necessary step is to ask a question, if your faith stops you from asking these questions, then you may never be able to find any answers related to any of your doubts.

Many of these traditions were the result of some sort of social needs of that era. Sometimes it was a combination of medical, hygiene, and economic reasons. It makes lots of sense if we analyze these things with respect to that time, but things don't look that rational and logical when we do the same things today without even evaluating if we need to practice these things today or not. Without the availability of personal hygiene products, menstruation can be a difficult thing to handle, maybe at that time it made sense to quarantine menstruating women and force them to rest. Occasional fasting can be good for our health, so it made sense to fast a few days of the year. Rice was an easy and cheap agricultural product and a crow was one of the abundant bird species that never attained the status of being a pet bird, so maybe it was a great idea to have some ritual where everyone could feed this ignored bird so that they also survive. Meat is a very tasty food, people eating meat might get addicted to its taste and consume it to threaten the existence of those animals, that's why they might have restricted consumption of meat on some particular days. Understanding and analyzing these things is very necessary and we all should do it. We can go on like this, finding some kind of explanation or reasoning for each ritual and tradition, but this is not at all the reason to practice these things blindly in today's world.

It doesn't make sense to restrict women from worshiping during menstruation when proper means are available to deal with personal hygiene. A healthy diet is important, with so much medical advice available, what and how much food one should eat should be a personal choice. Like this, we can rebut most of these outdated practices to which people tend to cling just because it is part of their culture. Cultural heritage is undoubtedly something we should study and preserve for the reference of our future generations, but we should not get trapped in it and stop moving forward. So, please try to understand and analyze each and every tradition or ritual, try to find logic and reasoning behind it, if they are outdated then don't hesitate to discard them, if they need any change then change them, but please don't get stuck in the web of cultural dogma. This heritage and knowledge should act as a launching pad for future discoveries and progress not a stinking trap to get stuck in the past.

Thanks for reading and please share your views on this topic.

[Copyright: Vinay Thakur. Please contact the author for re-posting or publishing]

Problems associated with "blind faith"

"Faith" has been always a very interesting subject for me. Mostly, "faith" in a general sense is used to describe religious beleifs of a person or group. People can have faith in anything without verifying the truthfulness of that thing. Faith is an emotion and like other emotions and can manifest in various forms and it can play a major role in developing the personality of many of us. For many people, their 'faith' is an integral part of the day to day life. It helps them in many ways and for many it has become a necessary thing for their survival, it offers them the reasons for their existence. Like many other emotions faith also is being heavily commercialized emotion and there are various products in the market of faith to fulfill various needs of people who are interested in faith and its related aspects. Religion is one of the oldest and the most popular product which is ruling the market of faith for the longest time. Faith helps people to get over many difficult situations and offers some answers to many of their questions. Whether these answers are true or false, logical or illogical is not a matter of concern for all those who put all their faith in those answers. So it seems that this phenomenon called 'faith' can do wonders in some cases. We can see many people doing admirable social work or philanthropic work inspired by their faith. This is all good and desirable side of faith, but at the same time we can also see people killing innocents in the name of their faith. This is another extreme where people are so blinded by their faith that they don't hesitate to engage in heinous and gruesome acts.

Why do people react so differently while following the same faith? Why some are extremely kind and some extremely violent, but they both claim to have faith in the same ideology? What makes some perform extreme noble acts and some take the path of gruesome violence while claiming to follow the same faith? One can only say that maybe the problem lies in the inherent blindness associated with faith. Any product used without knowing about all its effects and side effects is bound to produce undesirable side effects. Some of its side effects can be bad or even fatal and this is the main reason why blind faith in holy books or religions produces such an extreme response exposing the good as well as bad side of the human behavior. Someone might argue that faith is always blind, as whenever people put their faith in something they generally don't question it. Maybe this was true in the past but in today's world we are trained to question everything, and we should question as many things as possible, including our faith. Questioning is the only way to move forward, inquiry is the first step in the direction of solving any puzzle or problem, no matter how complicated it is. If any faith or discipline forbids questioning beyond a certain point, then it means that it doesn't have answers to those questions, and the worst part is, it doesn't even want to seek answers to those questions. This attitude is the main reason for the inherent blindness associated with faith. Any discipline or religion that can allow questioning can cultivate what I call a 'rational or logical faith,' which is exactly the opposite of 'blind faith.' The difference between 'rational faith' and 'blind faith' is that in one case people believe in something by recognizing the fact that their beliefs can be questioned, and challenged and there can be some problems associated with that which they should try to resolve. This system is much less dangerous than the system which commands 'blind faith' in anything.

I don't have to go into more detail to describe the problems we are facing today because of blind faith in today's world, issue of terrorism is just one of them. Many of these problems can be resolved or at least their impact can be minimized if people from the same 'faith system' take the initiative to reform their faith to stop such a blatant misuse of their faith. Emotions like faith are here to stay, as humans we cannot get rid of these things as they play the role of support system for many, but we all can definitely work to make these things better and I think the time has come where we all need to challenge the system of 'blind faith,' no matter which discipline or which religion. We need to challenge it as misuse of this system has the potential to harm entire humanity.

Thanks for reading and please share your views on this topic.

[Copyright: Vinay Thakur. Please contact the author for re-posting or publishing]

Does Religion Divide or Unite People?

This is a very complex and challenging topic and includes many layers. What makes me ask this question? Why religion was created? What is its situation today? Is there any need for religion in today’s world? These are very relevant and important questions.

Many centuries ago we didn't have a proper understanding about things like nature, life and its complexities, and many other things. People at that time needed some system that could help them to solve these mysteries and religion was born to explain these things. It tried to do the same thing that science does for us today, that is to offer some explanation about questions and concerns of society. Religion did it without much experimentation or empirical evidence on which today's science is based. Another important question is if God/truth is one then why do we have so many religions in the world? Before the beginning of the modern era modes of communication were not that well developed, knowledge or information generated was difficult to communicate and transfer, so people living in different regions developed their own way of understanding nature and its functioning. This gave birth to so many religions which we see around us today. They are very different in their approach but all try to explain the world through some superpower that they think created and controls this universe. Religion is nothing but a belief system that was created to help people understand the mysteries of the universe. It helped to satisfy people's curiosity about uncertainty and unpredictability in life. People who believe in a certain set of ideas about the creation of the universe and its creator associate themselves with a certain type of religion.

Now let’s try to understand why every religion claims that their way or method is correct/better than others and is their claim right. Suppose we assume that number 4 is the ultimate truth (or God). Someone who discovers 2+2=4 will think he/she found the secret of the ultimate truth and that’s the way to go, in a way he/she is right. However, if he/she thinks (as most religious groups who believe in their scriptures blindly think) that’s the only way to reach 4 then they are definitely wrong, 1+3=4, 5-1=4, 10-6=4 and like that there are so many ways to reach that ultimate target and each of them is unique and correct in their own way. By this logic, I think that every person is entitled to have his/her own religion. What most of us do is stick with one method that we like or feel is correct and say all other methods are wrong. All religions agree that god is one but then again fight on ways to reach or please that god. This simple math example shows that there are many ways to reach the same destination.

When I came across different faiths and tried to understand them I didn’t find anything fundamentally different in any of them, rather it amazed me that there are so many ways to teach basically the same philosophy. The presence of many religions should make humans happy. If someone doesn’t like one particular religion just choose another, pretty simple. Either everyone is right or all are wrong, when we understand this then there won’t be any problem in understanding each other's faiths and beliefs. The world will be a beautiful place with no hatred no fight based on religion, and there will be at least one less reason to kill each other. Hinduism is often criticized for its idol worship and having many Gods-demigods, or seeing god in everything (tree, fire, air, stones, etc.). It's written in Vedas that the creator of the universe is a formless, imageless, and genderless entity. However, if you assume there is some creator or god then what’s wrong in having some image of that god using our imagination and giving it some name. Already we created religion, so what’s wrong in creating God, and then why not have many forms of it. It’s like having a vending machine from which one can choose whichever God he/she likes. If they are different forms of the same thing then what’s the problem? If you like, nothing wrong in worshiping God as a formless entity and also nothing wrong in worshiping it in some form, everyone is entitled to have their own God, it's a personal thing. If we agree all religions lead to the same ultimate truth then why to question others' methods. In science, there are different branches, and all try to look for scientific facts. However, chemist doesn't ridicule physicist or try to convert them to chemist. This is because they both know that even though their ways are different they are leading to the same destination. If everyone is heading to the same destination but just taking a different path then what's the problem? 

Why don’t humans wonder if religion was created to unite us, and make us more civilized and tolerant towards each other why are we doing exactly the opposite.  Today religion divides more than uniting people, and we have to blame ourselves for this situation. This is why I asked in the beginning, do we even need religion anymore. We converted religion in exclusive societies, where people believing certain sets of principles are welcomed but not others. Let’s stop this division and hatred based on religion and live like civilized humans are supposed to live. Humanity is the only religion everybody is born with, let's not try to divide more.

Thanks for reading and please share your views and questions on this topic.

Related links for further reading:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_religions_and_spiritual_traditions

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_religion

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolutionary_origin_of_religions

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religious_persecution

(Copyright: Vinay Thakur. Please contact the author for re-posting or publishing)