Religion For Dummies

Rabbi Marc Gellman, Monsignor Thomas Hartman

• Publisher: For Dummies
• Year: 2011
• Print ISBN: 9780764552649
• eBook ISBN: 9781118069325
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Religion

Why are we here?
How should we live?
What happens after we die?
Why does evil exist?

Religion For Dummies explains how the world's great religions answer questions that persist through generations. Authors Rabbi Marc Gellman and Monsignor Thomas Hartman are trusted religious advisors known as the God Squad. With wonderful wit and incredible wisdom, they host a daily talk show which reaches nearly 4 million homes in the New York area, and have appeared on numerous TV and radio shows.

This book is not a scholarly theological treatise; it's a lively, practical, hands-on resource that will help you better understand your own religion and others. You'll explore:

• Religion's role in the family and in the workplace
• The beliefs and practices of Christianity, Judaism, Islam, and other religions
• Religion's impact during major passages in life such as birth, death, and marriage
• How to join a religion and how to pray
• How religion can help you deal with issues in every day life such as conflict, adversity, marriage, divorce, and more
• Religious rituals and ethics

Religion for Dummies touches on lesser-known religions (such as, Zoroastrianism, Jainism, Sikhism). It explores how people of various faiths pray, celebrate life and death, and view moral issues. The book does not tell you what to believe, but rather encourages you to live as you believe and let your religion infuse every aspect of your life. It doesn't give simple answers to haunting, complex questions; it helps you find your own answers and pursue your own spiritual path!

Part I

In the Beginning: Religion Basics

In this part . . .

**IN a DROPCAP**

Part I eases you into thinking about what makes something a religion and includes a section on how religions answer the biggest questions of life. We take on many of the big questions about Ultimate Reality, including the problem of proving the existence of gods and goddesses, and defining the nature of the Divine. In addition, we expose the problems that arise when a great and good religion is perverted, distorted, and twisted into a teaching of hate.

Chapter 1

Holy Smoke! Defining Religion

In This Chapter

Looking at a broad definition of religion

Understanding the role of beliefs and theology

Discovering the power and purpose of ritual

Recognizing the universality of religious ethics

Understanding the attraction religion has for so many people

Knowing how religion differs from philosophy and spirituality

I f you travel to some remote part of earth and find a group of people who had never met anyone outside their tribe, you’d discover that these people have some type of food, shelter, and language. The group would also have some kind of religion, which is one of the basic parts of human life.

This chapter helps you understand what defines a religion; what the main components of a religion are; and how religion differs from other approaches to life—such as spirituality and philosophy—that, on the face of it, sound an awful lot like religion. Understanding religion helps you understand what it means to be human.

Religion: A (Relatively) Quick Definition

You could say that religion is a belief, except not all beliefs are religions. (Your Aunt Martha may believe that her potato salad is the best in the world.) You could narrow that definition and say religion is a belief in God. Well, that definition covers monotheistic religions (those that believe in one god), but it doesn’t cover the religions that believe in many gods (polytheistic religions) or religions that believe in a chief god and other, lesser, gods and goddesses (henotheistic religions). You could say that religion is a way of behaving—being decent to others and caring for your environment; but not all decent, responsible people are religious. You could say that religion is the belief in the truth. But what’s the truth? Different religions have different understandings of what is “true.”

Basically, the definition of religion includes all of these definitions (expect for the potato salad, maybe): A religion is a belief in divine (superhuman or spiritual) being(s) and the practices (rituals) and moral code (ethics) that result from that belief. Beliefs give religion its mind, rituals give religion its shape, and ethics give religion its heart.

Basic theology

Every religion has a belief system. Each religion teaches or expounds its own truths about the world and humanity and God (or gods) as those truths are seen by that particular faith. These beliefs also explain how a religion’s followers achieve salvation or enlightenment and why these are important goals for their spiritual journeys. From these fundamental beliefs flow the beliefs that establish authority and explain how the leaders of organized religions rightfully exercise the power of that authority.

Through these belief systems, religions teach their truths about life and death, suffering and hope, and whatever comes after death. These beliefs give meaning to the lives of the religion’s followers and sustain hope in the face of suffering and loss.

Beliefs are the ideas that make any religion what it is. Of the three elements that make something a religion (beliefs, rituals, and ethics), beliefs are the most important because they give rise to and shape the ethics and the rituals of a faith.

A religion’s theology (its religious teachings, or doctrine) and its stories connect the beliefs. A religion’s theology is its handbook of beliefs (although many theologies are not even written down). Theology is important because it puts a religion’s beliefs in an order that people can understand. Some religions, such as Christianity and Islam, have a long tradition of theologies that are complex and sophisticated. Other religions (such as Judaism and Hinduism) use stories, not systematic theologies, to convey their beliefs. For this reason, pinning down the essential beliefs of Judaism or Hinduism is much more difficult. Yet, other religions, such as Zoroastrianism and Buddhism, combine both.

Whether or not religions use theology or storytelling as the main way to teach their beliefs depend on the following:

Their history: Both Judaism and Hinduism are very ancient and developed before contact with the Greeks, who first organized beliefs into a system. In the ancient faiths, stories convey beliefs, and the impulse to yank the beliefs out of the stories and put them down in some systematic order would have been an insult to the sacred texts.

How they define membership: Tribal religions define members of the faith not by belief but by blood. Many Native American religions are like Judaism in this respect. You have to be born into the tribe or culture in order to share the faith of the tribe. If you’re born into a tribal religion, what you believe doesn’t matter very much; you’re a member whether you like it or not and whether you believe in the religion or not. (See the related sidebar titled, “Judaism: Both tribal and open” in this chapter.)

In contrast, belief-oriented (open) religions, like Islam and Christianity, seek converts. These religions need to have clear and easily identifiable theologies because people need to understand the religion’s beliefs in order to join up. A good example is the shahadah, the Islamic profession of faith: “There is no god but God, and Muhammad is his prophet.” This simple and powerful statement of belief is all you have to say to enter Islam and become a Muslim.

For more about tribal and belief-oriented religions, see the section on joining religions in Chapter 5.

The beliefs of Western religions: Islam, Judaism, and Christianity

Judaism, Christianity, and Islam are the religions that many call Western religions. People sometimes call the beliefs of these three religions the Judeo-Christian tradition, but we dislike that term because it leaves out Islam. Because all three religions trace themselves back through Abraham—considered the first patriarch (father) of the ancient Hebrew families and, from his descendents, of the followers of Islam and Chris...

Table of contents

• Title
• Contents
• Introduction
• Part I : In the Beginning: Religion Basics
• Chapter 1: Holy Smoke! Defining Religion
• Chapter 2: Four Big Mysteries and a Couple of Recent Conundrums
• Chapter 3: The God Questions: Does He Exist and What’s He Like?
• Chapter 4: When Good Religions Go Bad
• Part II : Religious Beliefs
• Chapter 5: The Foundations of Faith
• Chapter 6: The Amazing Variety of Spiritual Beings
• Part III : Religious Rituals
• Chapter 7: Rituals of Communal Worship
• Chapter 8: Rituals of Individual Devotion
• Chapter 9: Holy Days in Our Lives: Rites of Passage
• Part IV : Religious Ethics
• Chapter 10: Personal Virtues
• Chapter 11: Public Virtues
• Chapter 12: Religion and Some Really Hot Ethical Issues
• Part V : All (Other) Things Holy
• Chapter 13: Holy Books
• Chapter 14: Holy People
• Chapter 15: Holy Places
• Chapter 16: Holy Houses
• Chapter 17: Holy Days on the Calendar
• Part VI : The Part of Tens
• Chapter 18: Ten (or so) Jobs for the Devoted
• Chapter 19: Ten Tales for Your Reading Enjoyment
• Appendix: A Few Religions of the World