Sunday, August 08, 2004

This is a response to this post. It was too long so I put it here.

Asemoon aziz,

This is a very interesting subject. If I want to summarize my answer I would tell you that the God centered religions (Islam, Christianity, and Judism) are based on fear from God. Everything is based on a reward-punishment base and thus no moral value actually gets internalized. There is this quote from one of Imams (1st one) that is truly descriptive of people who practice these religions. He says (meaning wise)

There are three types of people praying God; first there are the ones who pray because they are afraid of Hell. Their prayers are prayers of slaves. The second group prays to get the heaven. They are merchants. The last group is the one who pray just for their own peace and these are who are gifted with freedom.

Personally I have seen so many non religious people who are from the last group and not a single religious person who is from them. The question is that if you do need a religion in the first place. What purpose religion serves you? I personally think that I am not a Muslim and I don't believe in having a religion at all. Human beings share certain common moral values regardless of their religion, race, country or anything that we might think of. It is this common sense of morality that gives legitimacy to any religion or any other moral ideology. Confining your brain to any religion, in my opinion, is a betrayal to your wisdom as human being. Why would you want to confine yourself when you can actually listen to everyone and pick the best and actually change it and improve it as you grow up?
What I think is that as one grows up he or she has to go through all the values that are internalized in childhood and analyze them. One should ask self if this value actually serves any purpose or am I keeping it just because it’s a cliché that everyone is doing or maybe I am just afraid to throw it out although it doesn't really make sense.

specifically for drinking I would like to borrow a word from Paulo Coehlo(meaning wise): It's not what goes inside that matters. It's what comes out of your mouth that matters.

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