Rational Piety or Reasoned Religiosity, Mostafa Malekian (Session One)

With greetings and courtesy to all dear brothers and sisters, in the two sessions during which I will be in the company of esteemed friends and loved ones, I will present some points that have occurred to my own deficient intellect regarding "Rational Piety" or "Reasoned Religiosity." But first, I will mention three preliminary points:

.

Rational Piety or Reasoned Religiosity – Session One

In the name of God, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful

With greetings and courtesy to all dear brothers and sisters, in the two sessions during which I will be in the company of esteemed friends and loved ones, I will present some points that have occurred to my own deficient intellect regarding "Rational Piety" or "Reasoned Religiosity." But first, I will mention three preliminary points:

First Preliminary Point Over the past five years [1], a discussion has been put forward by me under the title "Rationality and Spirituality," and the main claim of this discussion has been that the only thing we need is the combination of "Rationality" [2] and "Spirituality" [3], and all individuals, societies, and civilizations that have either sacrificed rationality for spirituality or sacrificed spirituality for rationality have, neither individually nor collectively, achieved their goal. And for both the individual to have a healthy life and for society and humankind to find proper order, there is no alternative but for us to strive for the combination of rationality and spirituality and to try, individually and collectively, not to neglect either of these two in the slightest, nor to retreat a single step in either of these two directions;

Throughout this period, naturally, the question of what rationality itself means, and what spirituality itself means, has needed to be addressed, and I have spoken many times in various places about precisely what the boundaries and limits of rationality—at least the rationality I have in mind—are, and I have also had discussions about the boundaries, limits, and components of spirituality; especially regarding spirituality, in almost the past year, I have had extensive discussions in various gatherings. Here, I have absolutely no intention of repeating any of those discussions; I only want to look at spirituality from yet another perspective, and perhaps from this new perspective, when we look at spirituality, we may rediscover some new points, or points that are more organized than the previous ones. Therefore, my endeavor is to speak about spirituality in this session, the next session, and tomorrow evening, but from the viewpoint that spirituality is nothing other than "reasoned religiosity"; the remarks I will make over these two nights are, I believe, at least not contradictory to what I have said before; but of course, they cast a new light on those remarks and may well dispel some of the ambiguities of my previous statements. However, at the same time, I make no claim to perfection or even comprehensiveness, and so I am entirely receptive to objections and criticisms from friends, and I will see if their argument has a reason, I will accept it. Second Introduction In these two sessions, as I stated, I take spirituality to mean "rational piety," "rational religiosity"—a religiosity that has become rational, or to put it better, an understanding of religion that is a rational understanding. This understanding of religion, which is a rational understanding of religion, is, in my view, both "true" and in our "best interest"; firstly, it is true because it is the most logically defensible interpretation and inference that can be made of religiosity, and it is in our best interest because modern man today can no longer accept the other narratives; all the other narratives that are proposed of religiosity, whatever name we give those narratives—for example, "fundamentalist narrative," or "traditionalist narrative," or "political religion narrative," or "ideological religion narrative," or any narrative by any other name—are not to the liking of modern man; not that we consider ourselves obliged to say something that is to the liking of modern man, no, it is not like that at all; in the first part, I stated that this interpretation is also "true," and we emphasize its truth, truth in the sense that we can reason for it and have the power to defend it, and it is logical. But at the same time, it is also in our "best interest," meaning this mentality [4], this way of thinking and attitude of modern man, is receptive to it, and "receptive to it" means both that he understands this conception of religion and can more or less accept this conception; understanding this conception of religion and the eventual acceptance of this conception of religion is easier for the digestion of modern man than understanding and accepting any of the other narratives that can be made of religion.

Third Preliminary Note Another preliminary point I should make here is that my discussion of religion is not confined to Islam alone; that is, if I were to speak about Christianity or Hinduism, I would repeat exactly the same words. Therefore, I do not mean Islam alone—it could be any religion. For this reason, my third preliminary point is that my discussion is an extra-religious one; it is not an intra-religious discussion. I have no intention whatsoever of citing the Quran or hadiths to support my claims. I have absolutely no such intention. However, if you see me refer to a Quranic verse or a hadith somewhere, I have done so not for argumentation but for corroboration. That is, my arguments are in no way dependent on these verses or hadiths, but since my audience is Muslim and many of them are such that they accept a point more readily if it is supported by the Quran, the Prophetic tradition, or non-Prophetic tradition, I may, for this reason, cite a verse or hadith. Yet my discussion is by no means an intra-religious one, and therefore all references I make to the Quran and hadiths for the audience are solely for the purpose of corroboration. It should be understood, however, that they are not for argumentation—meaning you should not consider them as included among the premises of my argument. In my view, it can be said that for "rational piety" or "reasoned religiosity," twelve characteristics can be enumerated. These characteristics are, of course, very, very general, and because they are general, you can naturally subsume more specific sub-characteristics under each of them. It is not the case that the intended characteristics are only these twelve; from each characteristic, more specific sub-characteristics also emerge and are born, and those more specific sub-characteristics may not be explicitly stated by me, although I will sometimes point out the most important of them. All these characteristics, in one broad classification, can be subsumed under twelve characteristics. I will try to present these twelve characteristics to you in a logical sequence, meaning that the understanding of a characteristic I mention should not depend on a characteristic I mention later. I will try to ensure that each characteristic I mention depends only on the previous characteristics and not on the subsequent ones, so that it is easier and more readily grasped by the audience.

۱. The rationally religious person demands a “comprehensive philosophy of life” from religion: The first characteristic that rational religiosity possesses is that a religious person who is rational demands from religion a “comprehensive philosophy of life,” an “all-encompassing philosophy of life,” a “thoroughly far-reaching philosophy of life”; that is, a person who is religious does not want their entire life to be like that of the non-religious, with only one cell among the cells of their life, one room among the rooms of their life, differing from others; the rationally religious person wants their religiosity to have permeated their entire life.In fact, non-rational religiosities are religiosities in which only one compartment, one chamber, one room, one part of the religious person's life differs from others, but the rest of the chambers, the rest of the compartments, the rest of the rooms, the rest of the parts of the religious person's life are no different from those of non-religious people; Let me give a very simple example: if my difference from those who are not religious is only that at certain times, in certain places, and in certain states and conditions, I perform actions that non-religious people do not perform, but when we disregard those times, places, and states and conditions, you see that the rest of my life is like that of non-religious people, this is a phenomenon that removes religiosity from rationality; psychologists of religion usually refer to this as Compartment, meaning considering religion apartment by apartment, considering religion compartment by compartment, that is, if you see that my difference from another person who is not religious in any way is only that at certain times, for example, at the five prayer times, or in the month of Ramadan, or during the Hajj days, or in certain places, or in certain circumstances, I perform actions, but when I come out of that specific time, place, or state and condition, the rest of my life is like that of non-religious people, meaning, for example, when I am at my workplace, I am no different from non-religious people, when I am strolling, traveling, teaching, studying, or in my work environment, or with my friends and enemies and subordinates and superiors, and in general in the rest of life's circumstances, I am no different from non-religious people, my only difference is at the five prayer times or during the month of Ramadan, if this is the case, it means that religiosity is not like oxygen that is in contact with my entire life, it is not like oxygen that deals with every single cell of every person's body, it is like food that only deals with the stomach and does not deal with other parts of the body; Reasoned religiosity is a religiosity that, like oxygen which deals with all the cells of the body, this religiosity also deals with all the cells of the person's life and is a "comprehensive philosophy of life," but this "comprehensive philosophy of life" does not mean that rational religiosity is a religiosity that has commands and prohibitions for the smallest movements and stillnesses, I do not mean this, rather I mean that reasoned religiosity is a religiosity that gives meaning even to the smallest movements, I do not mean that it has issued commands and prohibitions for the smallest movements and stillnesses, this, of course, exists in highly legalistic religions, for example, in Judaism and to some extent in Islam, where for the smallest movements and stillnesses they have said, after all, this action you did, or this action you did not do, was either obligatory, or recommended, or disliked, or forbidden, and the like; after all, there is no movement or stillness except that one of the five rulings applies to it, but this is not what I mean, I do not mean to say that a rational religion, a reasoned religion, is a religion that has calculated for all our movements and stillnesses and issued commands and prohibitions, no, but a rational religion is a religion that gives meaning to all my movements and stillnesses, meaning my entire life – in the words of that famous mystic – is one long prostration, "my entire life is one long prostration" means my entire life is aligned with one goal, not that it only and solely makes me different from non-religious people at certain times, places, and states and conditions; When I interact with my teacher, and also when I interact with my student, my colleague, my friend, or my enemy, my manner of interaction must differ from those who are not religious; if this is the case, then my entire life has a single meaning, my entire life has one philosophy, not that a small piece of my life has a specific philosophy and the other parts of my life have another philosophy or philosophies, this is one point, it is in this sense that you have seen that those who grow in religiosity, their entire life becomes more harmonious day by day, their entire life becomes more consonant, more aligned, or in mathematical terms, more convergent day by day, meaning if once their work was very different from their leisure, and their leisure was very different from their time of worship, today they see no, their work also resembles their leisure, their leisure also resembles their time of worship, as if their entire life takes on a single hue, becomes one color, In the words of the Quran: "The dye of God, and who is better than God at dyeing?" the coloring of God, as if it encompasses the entire life, the entire life becomes colored, not that only a piece of life becomes colored; this is one point, regarding the first point, I will try, when I am explaining the ninth and tenth points, I hope to return to this first point on a suitable occasion. But for now, I want to state that "religiosity is a philosه حیات کامل است»، اگر فلسفه حیات کامل نباشد، عقلانیت ندارد، چرا عقلانیت ندارد، این «چرا عقلانیت ندارد» را اِن‌شاءالله بعد خدمت شما بیان خواهم کرد.

2. Reasoned religiosity means “being a seeker of truth,” not “being a possessor of truth”:

The second characteristic of rational religiosity is that those who have a reasoned religiosity do not take their religion to mean “being a possessor of truth” but rather “being a seeker of truth”; they take religion not as ownership of the truth, but as the beginning of a quest, the beginning of a journey and wayfaring to find the truth. When a Christian is baptized, or when a Muslim recites the Shahada, this does not mean that baptism or reciting the Shahada is the same as the whole truth falling into that person’s grasp. By reciting the Shahada, the whole truth does not come into a Muslim’s hands; by being baptized, the whole truth does not come into a Christian’s hands. Truth does not fall into anyone’s grasp by uttering a sentence or performing a particular act. If truth were this easy and quick to obtain, it would not require all this striving.

When we utter the Shahada, we do not come into possession of the truth; when we undergo baptism, we do not come into possession of the truth. Rather, it is the beginning of our quest for truth. Uttering the Shahada is the beginning of our being a seeker of truth, in the sense that we have set foot on the path, not in the sense that we have reached the destination. When I utter the Shahada, it means I have set foot on the path of discovering the truth, not that I have reached the destination. And in this regard, I have often said that we must make our conception of religiosity akin to a conception of "swimming" and not akin to a conception of "traveling by ship"; there is a great difference between someone who looks at religion through the lens of swimming and someone who looks at religion through the lens of traveling by ship. When you are aboard a ship, it is very different from when you are swimming. Note the differences: Firstly, when you are aboard a ship, you are certain that you have escaped the waves, you are certain that no danger threatens you, you are certain that you will definitely reach the destination; you may arrive sooner or later, but you will definitely reach the destination. You are certain that you are not going to drown, and this certainty, when you are aboard the ship, is so firm for you that it no longer matters what you do on the ship. If you lie down on the ship, you will reach the destination; if you sit down, you will also reach the destination; if you walk around, you will reach the destination; if you stay awake, you will reach the destination; if you sleep, you will also reach the destination; if you read a newspaper, you will reach the destination; if you listen to or watch radio and television, you will reach the destination; if you talk all the time, you will reach the destination; and if you remain silent the entire time, you will still reach the destination. It does not matter at all what you do; what matters is that you have boarded something (a ship) that has guaranteed it will take you to the destination. But when you are a swimmer, the situation is not like this. Nothing is guaranteed. As long as you are swimming, and swimming well, you have escaped danger. The moment you either stop swimming or swim poorly and do not swim according to the principles of swimming, you are exposed to perdition and drowning. It is not the case that you can say, just as the ship's passengers, in whatever state or condition they are, ultimately reach the destination, I, the swimmer, in whatever state I am, will also ultimately reach the destination. No, you, the swimmer, can only and solely under specific regulations, with specific activities, and moreover with a specific manner of performing those activities, bring yourself to the shore; otherwise, if you slack off a little and do not swim according to the principles, both slacking off and not swimming according to the principles mean that you will perish. This is one major difference. But there is also a second difference, and that second difference is that when you are a passenger on a ship, you see the ship's passengers differently from those who are not aboard the ship. You say, we will certainly reach the destination, and our arrival at the destination is certain, but those who are swimming in the sea will almost certainly not reach the destination; if they do, it is an exception. But when you yourself are a swimmer, you cannot pass any judgment about other swimmers, and you will say that whichever of us swimmers swims correctly will reach the destination, and whichever does not swim correctly will not reach the destination. That is, you do not judge swimmers in general; rather, you say some swimmers, under certain conditions, will reach the destination, and others, when those conditions are absent, will not reach the destination. Now, it must be asked: which of these two is becoming religious? Is becoming religious like traveling by ship or like swimming? Becoming religious is not boarding a ship; becoming religious is swimming, and therefore, if you slack off even a little in swimming, you will not reach the destination. You have surely heard this saying—of course, it is a tradition, and I do not know how accurate this tradition is, but it has come down in our books of narrations—that one night, a companion of Imam Sajjad (peace be upon him) saw him at the Kaaba, engaged in supplication, prayer, whispered confessions, expressions of remorse, weeping, and lamentation, to the extent that the Imam lost consciousness. This companion says, I did not know who this was; when I drew closer, I saw it was Ali ibn al-Hussein (peace be upon him). I brought water and revived the Imam, and said to him, "You are—to use my expression, of course—guaranteed to be among the saved, so why do you exhaust yourself so much?"

It is narrated that the Imam replied: “خلق الله النار لمن اسائه و لو کان سیدا قریشا و خلق الله الجنه لمن اطاعه و لو کان غلاماً حبشیاً” God created Hell for the disobedient, even if that disobedient one is, like me (Imam Sajjad), a Qurayshi master—as you think I am a Qurayshi master and therefore immune and guaranteed—and on the other hand, God created Paradise for the obedient, even if that obedient one is a black Abyssinian slave; What does this mean? It means that the issue is not at all that we have entered a path of salvation where everything is guaranteed and secured. In truth, when we enter religion, we begin the quest for truth, and what comes in the Quran and the narrations, and what comes in the sacred books of various religions and denominations, is a resource given to the seeker of truth so that they may begin their work with this resource; When someone like Rumi says: ما ز قرآن مغز را برداشتیم          پوست را بهر خران بگذاشتیم this means that the Quran has a husk that is suitable for donkeys! What does that mean? Who can be made a donkey by the husk of the Quran? Someone who thinks that this thing given to them is a blessing, such that anyone who has not been given the Quran has been deprived of that blessing; and the Quran considers this view incorrect, and Rumi also deems this view incorrect; Rumi says that we took this as a resource, then we dissected it—and I will speak precisely about this dissection in the third part of the talk—we pushed aside the husks and reached the kernel, and we took the kernel, But you think that just by possessing this outward form, just by being a memorizer of the Quran, by reading the Quran with Tajwid, by being a practitioner of Quranic recitation, and by these things you have seen and we have seen. With this, you content your heart and think that this is something placed at your disposal and that others have been deprived of it; no, it is not so. This is a resource given to you. It is exactly like a father and mother giving their child provisions for a journey and saying, 'We want you to reach your destination with this—money or supplies.' Then that child just sits there, rests, and contents himself that he has money, he has supplies; we have, in fact, done the same thing. We, in truth, think this has been given to us and we have been told, 'Have this, and as long as you have it, you have no sorrow and are not in danger,' just like the amulets they used to hang on children in the old days and say, 'As long as this is hung around my child's neck, they will not be harmed.' We also think that as long as we have hung the Quran and the narrations around our necks, we are secure, and then we say, 'Woe to those who are swimmers,' meaning woe to those who do not possess this Quran and these narrations and have not hung them around their necks. This view is not a rational view, because this view, firstly, theologically contradicts Divine Justice. It contradicts Divine Justice that something be placed at your disposal and not at the disposal of others, that you be placed on a ship and the rest be left to the surging waves of the sea; And secondly, it contradicts what you yourselves say, and what everyone working in the philosophy of religion accepts, that human perfection lies solely in one's voluntary-willful actions; an involuntary-unwillful action does not bring about perfection.

That which perfects us is that which we do out of our own will and choice, the stance we adopt out of our own will and choice, not something that, without our having willed or chosen it, has simply been given to us. And in this regard, I wish to state that: All those whose conception of themselves is that they are either God's chosen people, or the divinely blessed community, or the children of God, or the friends of God—all of them harbor this same incorrect thought and conception. In truth, "chosen people" or "blessed community" is merely a self-soothing notion for those who fail entirely to grasp that human perfection depends solely on one's voluntary and willed actions. And when I say "actions," I mean it in its general sense, not that I intend only physical and bodily actions—actions performed with the body, actions performed with the mind, and actions performed with speech. It is all these voluntary and willed actions that cause me to grow. These are things that have been given to me and hung upon me. This, too, is a conception, and its meaning is that one can absolutely no longer say that my religion is superior to your religion, or that my religion is more complete than your religion. One must say that my religiosity is better or worse than your religiosity—not "religion," but "religiosity," meaning the work that I myself am doing. My religiosity may be, in comparison with your religiosity, more deficient or more complete, more comprehensive or less comprehensive. One can pass judgment on religiosity, but one cannot pass judgment on religion. Of no religion can it be said that this religion itself is more complete, that it itself is more comprehensive, that this religion itself is better or superior. There is no such thing. It is you who, however you swim, in accordance with the type and manner of your swimming, either reach the destination or do not reach the destination. Therefore, in truth, we must say, "Hossein's religiosity is more complete or more deficient, more comprehensive or less comprehensive than Hassan's, or Parviz's than Houshang's," and so on. This point—that our religion is, in fact, not a gift, not something that has been bestowed upon us while others have been forbidden from this bestowal—this is a very important point, and its meaning is that whatever claim you make about your own religion, this too is, once again, one of your own beliefs, and you must also provide a reason for this belief. If I say, "My set of beliefs, or my entire belief system, is more sound than your set of beliefs or your entire belief system," this itself is, once again, one of my beliefs. And when we add a belief to our previous beliefs, we must not consider those previous beliefs exempt from requiring proof. Many people hold this false supposition and think that if they add one belief to the totality of their beliefs, they have thereby exempted the entirety of their beliefs from providing reasons. What is this belief? It is that "the totality of my beliefs is more complete than your beliefs." They think that if they add this belief to the sum of their beliefs, they have then exempted all beliefs from the need for argumentation. Whereas, this too has now become a new belief, placed alongside your other beliefs, and this too requires a reason. In all the world's religions and denominations, we have seen human beings who, through their religiosity, have attained tranquility, hope, and joy. And then, in all the world's religions and denominations, we have also seen those who, by way of their own religion and denomination, have not attained tranquility, joy, and hope. This indicates that we cannot judge in and of itself. Only those who have reached the destination—in whatever religion or denomination they may be—it becomes clear that they have swum well, and those who have not reached it, it becomes clear that they have not swum well. The principles and rules of swimming are the same principles and rules; it is the observance or non-observance of these principles and rules that can bring us to the destination or cannot bring us to the destination, that allows us to reach the destination or does not allow us to reach the destination. This point is a very important and significant point. If you do not pay attention to this point, and suppose that our situation is, in fact, different from others, that, contrary to the rest of humanity, an exceptional, special favor has been shown to us—if you come to believe such a thing, then I submit that, firstly, this very claim itself requires a reason. Secondly, even if you yourself do not provide a reason for your claim, we can, contrary to your claim, present evidence. All those whose engagement with their religion leads to bigotry and ossification do so precisely because they think they are the "possessors of truth." They do not know that if they have any merit, it is to be "seekers of truth," not anything else.

۳. Reasoned religiosity is a religiosity accompanied by “critical thinking [5]”: when we picture the second characteristic in the way it was described, a third characteristic naturally follows, namely that if religion is to be a kind of quest for truth, then religious practice is entirely compatible with critique and the deep understanding that critique necessitates. That is, religious practice does not mean that I submit blindly, that I surrender without reason and blindly to a set of beliefs, acts of worship, rituals, ceremonies, and moral codes. In fact, I must maintain a thoroughly critical stance even within my own religion, and critique here does not mean fault-finding; rather, it means that I must examine this collection that has been handed to me under the name of religion and creed. First, I must pay attention: if I see an apparent contradiction within this collection, I must understand that there must be a deeper level at which these contradictions are resolved. And which sacred religious or denominational scripture is free of apparent contradictions? Apparent contradictions exist in all sacred religious and denominational scriptures; there is no religious or denominational book that is not full of apparent contradictions, that is, full of statements that are seemingly incompatible with one another. If you were to hold the view mentioned in the second characteristic—that is, the perception and view that you are the “possessor of truth” rather than a “seeker of truth”—you would say that all of these are correct and never ask how they can all be correct when some are incompatible with others. But if you have a critical view, you say that if all of these are indeed correct, they must be correct at a deeper level, because at this surface layer I can plainly see that they are incompatible with one another. Therefore, I must delve into the various layers and see what this deeper meaning is, and then you move from the surface meaning to a deeper meaning. Yet, even when you reach a deeper meaning, you sometimes encounter new problems that did not exist at the previous level. To resolve these new problems, you must again reach an even deeper level, and in this way, you progress from shallower levels and layers to deeper ones. All of this movement from more superficial levels to deeper, more underlying levels is aimed at making my religion rational, and its rationalization involves three things: 1- First, that there are no longer any apparent contradictions within it. I cannot bear to see incompatibility and contradiction between the beginning and the end of my sacred religious or denominational scripture. If you accept one inconsistency in your life, you have no choice but to accept any other proposition as well, just as some philosophers of logic and some philosophers of science have shown and argued [6] that if a person accepts a single contradiction in their life, they can no longer refuse to accept any belief, because accepting one contradiction leads to making you accept any and every claim. Well, we cannot accept such a thing, yet we see that in the outward aspects of our sacred scripture—whatever book it may be, whether we are Christian, Hindu, or Muslim—there is incompatibility. Therefore, we have no choice but to say that there must be a deeper level; it is quite simple. Let me give you an example: Suppose you have great trust in a professor’s academic standing at the university. Imagine there is a professor whom you truly consider expert and proficient in their field. When you go to class, you see that the professor you trust, in their speech, has said something in the third minute that is incompatible with something they said in the thirty-eighth minute. When do you not pay attention to this incompatibility? There are two occasions when you do not pay attention to this incompatibility at all. One is when you are a blind and unquestioning disciple of this professor, and because you have suspended your own reason—in fact, you have halted your reason and sacrificed it at the feet of this professor—you then say, “I simply do not understand and do not accept this claim you make that my professor contradicted themselves in their speech. There is no conflict or contradiction; whatever the professor says is correct.” That is one case. There is a second case, and that is when you are completely distrustful of this professor. When you are completely distrustful, you say: “Sir, you only noticed a contradiction in his speech at minutes 3 and 38!

All his words are contradictory; the statement at minute 3 and the one at minute 38 have no particularity; and again you do not pay attention that one must devise a plan and think of a remedy for the sentence uttered at the third minute and the sentence uttered at the thirty-eighth minute. When a person is an enemy of someone without reason, or a friend of someone without reason, a disciple of someone without reason, or an adversary of another without reason, they never pay attention to the contradictions in their speech. But when do you notice the contradiction in their speech? When you neither consider them one hundred percent right nor one hundred percent wrong; you neither say this master is the embodiment of truth, nor do you say the master is the embodiment of falsehood. And because you see them as neither the embodiment of truth nor the embodiment of falsehood, then you attend to their speech and say, let us see how this contradiction in speech can be resolved. To resolve the contradiction, you have no choice but to necessarily go to a deeper level. And when you ask the master himself, "Sir, this statement of yours was incompatible with this statement," if you pay attention, to resolve the contradiction, he draws your attention to a deeper meaning of one of the two statements or both. When you reach that deeper meaning, then you understand that there is no contradiction at play. Therefore, to resolve the contradictions among our sacred religious and denominational texts, we have no choice but this. 2- But there is a second point as well, and that is that there must also be no incompatibility between our sacred religious and denominational texts and human findings. I cannot subscribe to what, according to some historians of philosophy, Ibn Rushd subscribed to. Some Western philosophers and many historians of philosophy have attributed a theory to Ibn Rushd, although some believe that Ibn Rushd himself did not actually subscribe to this theory, but today all the Averroists of Europe subscribe to this theory, which is called the "Theory of Double Truth" [7]. The implication of the Theory of Double Truth is this: Ibn Rushd said that when a person enters religion, they must accept whatever religion says. Then, when they leave the realm of religion and enter the domain of empirical sciences, rational sciences, and philosophy, enter historical sciences, enter intuitive sciences, there too, whatever they find, they must also accept. And if these contradict each other, they should say it does not matter, double truth exists. But this view is not defensible. I cannot hold two beliefs within myself at the same time. When you have taken one belief from the sacred book, that is fine, and you have also taken your belief from other paths; the revealed data must be compatible with the human data. And if the revealed data are to be incompatible with human findings, I cannot hold two contradictory beliefs within myself at the same time. I cannot combine two contradictories. Therefore, I must do a second task, and that is that I must somehow make these revealed data compatible with human findings.

3- But I must also keep in mind a third compatibility, which is that as long as these sacred religious and sectarian texts claim that we still remain, they must be able to organize and reconcile all the developments of different times. If a sacred book said, "I am only for a specific people, for example, the people of Israel," if it said, "I am only for a period of time," perhaps it would be a different discussion. But if a religion like Christianity, Islam, and Hinduism claims eternity and universality, this eternity and universality means that it can move against all waves of knowledge, and this means that in every era, the totality of human sciences and knowledge in that era must somehow be able to show harmony and consonance. Well, in order for these three purposes to be achieved—that is, firstly, for the apparent contradictions within the sacred religious and sectarian texts themselves to be resolved; secondly, for them not to become incompatible with human sciences and knowledge; and thirdly, for them to be able to maintain their efficacy in all times, places, and various circumstances— there is no alternative but for us to refer to the depth of the sacred texts. The surface of the texts and sacred books possesses none of these three aforementioned arts, and in order to be able to refer to the depth, we must have critical thinking. This is why reasoned religiosity is a religiosity accompanied by critical thinking, and what is meant by critical thinking is neither fault-finding thinking nor fault-seeking thinking. Critical thinking is a thinking whose ultimate statement is that the degree of my commitment to any belief has a direct proportion to the strength of the evidence that supports this belief, and depends on nothing else. And someone who possesses critical thinking, in fact, says in the language of their state that if you demand commitment from me, have a strong reason in favor of your claim proportionate to the commitment you demand from me. For me, the reasoned believer, the degree of commitment to a belief always has a direct proportion to the strength of the evidence that has been presented in favor of this belief. The weaker I see this evidence, the less my attachment to that belief becomes, and conversely, the stronger I see the evidence, the greater my attachment to this belief becomes. And the meaning of this statement is that we deem a kind of critical evaluation of religion necessary. "Different readings of religion" is one of the aspects of critical thinking in religion, and it is not its only aspect. In fact, if we have critical thinking towards religion, we must of course allow all those who are sincerely and seriously engaged in religious work and religious studies to express their different readings. But even different readings of religion are just one stage of the work. Our purpose is not fulfilled merely by knowing that different readings of religion have emerged. Then, how should we evaluate these different readings? The degree of proximity and distance of these different readings themselves to the sacred texts and to the intent of those who brought the sacred texts must be evaluated. The degree of proximity and distance of the different readings to the intent of the founders of religions and sects must also be evaluated. But in any case, the upshot of the third point and characteristic is that we should not inherit religion from our parents like eye color, height, fatness and thinness, hair color, etc. Inherited religion is not rational religion. If we want to say that inherited religion is rational religion, then its necessary implication is that we must accept two things: Firstly, we must accept that whatever nonsense and absurdities any other father and mother in any corner of the world have inculcated and instilled into their children during childhood, these children have every right to remain committed to them for the rest of their lives, because we are doing the same thing. The second point is that if this is truly the case, then religion is no longer any kind of noble endeavor; religion becomes merely the taking over of customs and traditions. Just as you have taken over customs and traditions, just as you have mostly taken your physical characteristics from your parents, and inherited your mental and psychological characteristics from your parents, you have also inherited your religion in this way. And in fairness, this is indeed the case. In fairness, if all of you are Shia Muslims, is it not because your parents were Shia Muslims? And if you are Sunni Muslims, is it not because your parents were Sunni Muslims? Is it otherwise? Well, if your parents had been Christian, you would certainly be Christian now too, because have you done anything extra beyond receiving from your parents that you are now Muslim?

Furthermore, you have done nothing; well, if your parents had been Christian, rest assured that you would certainly be Christian now, and therefore you should attribute all your prayers for being a Muslim to your parents, and I must even say, go further than that; I remember a few years ago I was in a meeting, there was a gentleman who was fiercely defending the Safavids and attacking Dr. Shariati for having said "Alavid Shi'ism and Safavid Shi'ism," and he was defending the Safavids and criticizing Dr. Shariati, and his argument was that if it were not for the Safavids, would we even be Shi'a now? If it were not for the Safavids, we would all be Sunni now; I said, well, if that is the case, do something else: pray day and night for Umar, because if it were not for Umar, we would not even be Muslims, right? This is meaningless; Umar did nothing for us, the Safavids also did nothing, because both Umar and the Safavids handed something down to us as an inheritance, and an inherited thing is not valuable. Therefore, one should neither curse anyone nor praise anyone; such a thing has no value that we should curse or praise someone for it. That which we attain for ourselves through this critical thinking, that is what matters. If you do not have this third perspective, that is, if you do not adhere to the third component, then the first characteristic your religion will acquire is that it becomes a "magical religion"; why does it become "magical" [8]? Many religious psychologists have said that the majority of the world's religious masses should be considered believers in magic [9], and in their reasoning, they have said: Look, what does a magician do? The magician says "Ajee Majee La Tarajee," and none of you know what "Ajee Majee La Tarajee" means, but after the magician does this, something—for example, a cabbage, a rabbit, or a bird—appears; Most religious people also spend their entire lives saying "Ajee Majee La Tarajee," the meaning of which they themselves do not understand, but they say that something is being prepared for us in paradise; when we say "Ajee Majee La Tarajee" here, something is being prepared and built for us in the other world. Why? Because if I ask, what do these things you say in prayer mean? They say, I don't know. Why do you fast? They don't know that either; why do you go on Hajj? I don't know. So all of this is because our parents told us to; well, that means we are saying "Ajee Majee La Tarajee," but of course, its cabbage and rabbit do not appear here; its cabbage and rabbit appear in the next world; and from this perspective, you have also seen that sometimes they even verbalize it and say that there the angels are building palaces, as if they have delivered the first palace and are building the second, they are also doing the grid layout for the third palace, and so on... This religion is a magical religion, a religion in which you do not understand at all what you are uttering; well, of course, the Hindu is also saying his own "Ajee Majee La Tarajee," it makes no difference, the Christian is also saying his own "Ajee Majee La Tarajee," but ultimately, all of these are magical religion. Magical religion means a religion in which the believer has distanced themselves from the realm of understanding, and all those who distance themselves from understanding in their religion are, in fact, believers in a magical religion; Well, this type of conception, in addition to making our religion magical, also creates other characteristics; for example, it makes our religion very "emotional" [10]; it is a series of excitements and sentiments and nothing more. In all fairness, you—I do not want to cast any doubt on the honesty and pure-heartedness of people, I am discussing awareness—ask the majority of individuals who come out during the days of Ashura and Tasu'a, why do you come out? What can they say? Or those who come out on the Nights of Qadr, who come to gatherings and prayer meetings, what can they say? They cannot say anything; their sentiments and emotions have been aroused. These sentiments and emotions have, in fact, been firmly instilled by fathers and mothers through a very successful upbringing, and these emotions and sentiments remain with us until the end of our lives, but we ourselves do not really know what we are doing; there is no reasoning behind our actions; we do not understand what effects and results this has for me in the realm of the mind?what effects and consequences it has in the realm of my psyche; in my beliefs, feelings and emotions, in my wants and needs, what consequences this kind of attitude has; when one wants to apply this third characteristic I mentioned, that is, to attain a kind of deep understanding of religion, one of course encounters many issues, there are many issues that one must somehow be able to resolve for oneself, which I will not go into, I can only say in fact that among these issues, it can perhaps be said that three issues are the most important of all, and no rationally religious person can continue in their religiosity until they have somehow resolved these three issues for themselves: One is the “Problem of Evil” [11], that is, how can a God who is all-benevolent, all-knowing, and all-powerful—how, with the existence of a God who has absolute knowledge, absolute power, and absolute benevolence, does evil still exist in the world? This is a problem; a religious person, as long as they have not resolved this issue for themselves, is not a truly religious person. If you have not resolved this issue and still think you are religious, you are in fact not religious, for otherwise there is no issue clearer than this: if God does not know that evil exists in the world, then He is not all-knowing; if He knows but does not have the power to eradicate this evil, then He does not possess absolute power; and if He both knows and has the power but does not want to eradicate evil, then He is not all-benevolent. Yet we consider God to be all-knowing, all-powerful, and all-benevolent. Well, you must somehow resolve this, otherwise you are a person who is religious but not rational at all. The other issue is the “Problem of Determinism”; in a world where nothing moves except by the knowledge and will of God, how does free will remain for human beings? You must also have resolved this issue somehow [12]; but if you see that you are dealing with these issues in a haphazard and evasive manner, this means that you are either religious without rationality, or on the other side, rational without religiosity. Otherwise, how can one be both religious and rational and leave this issue unresolved?

4. The rationally pious person considers the order of the world to be a moral order and, as a result, feels secure: The fourth characteristic that exists in reasoned religiosity is that someone who possesses reasoned religiosity must necessarily consider the world to have a moral order; considering the world to have a moral order, in simple terms, means that we believe not even a particle of good or evil is lost in the world; when they say the order of the world is a moral order, it means the world is made in such a way that, firstly, it perceives whether we humans do “good” or “evil,” do “right” or “wrong,” do what we “ought” to do or what we “ought not” to do, possess “virtue” or “vice,” fulfill our “duty” or not, and attend to our “responsibility” or not—the aforementioned concepts are all moral concepts—the world is made in such a way that it perceives these matters; firstly, the world perceives these matters, and secondly, it reacts in proportion to this perception; if you hold these two claims, then they say you hold that the order of the world is a moral order, meaning it is both conscious of moral good and evil and shows a proportionate reaction to moral good and evil, this is the very expression of the Quran: “So whoever does an atom’s weight of good will see it, and whoever does an atom’s weight of evil will see it” (Zalzalah/7-8). If you do good equal to the weight of a speck of dust in the air, you will see it, and if you do evil equal to the weight of a speck of dust in the air, you will also see it; this means the order of the world is a moral order, the order of the world is a moral order in the sense that it both envisions knowledge and perception for the world and considers a will proportionate to that knowledge for it, the world understands the difference between telling the truth and lying, humility and arrogance, service and betrayal, and trustworthiness and untrustworthiness, and reacts in proportion to this understanding of its own; now, how it reacts is another discussion; does it react in this very world or in the world after death? Or does it react both here and there in the form of resurrection? Does it show its reaction in the form of reincarnation [13]? However it shows it, it shows it ultimately, “It will have [the consequence of] what it earned, and it will bear [the consequence of] what it committed” (Baqarah/286). A little good goes into your own pocket, and a little evil also goes out of your own pocket; someone who has such a picture of the order of the world, then their view of the world is such that they feel absolute security in the world, they feel secure, the more rationally we are religious, the more we feel secure, why? Because a human does not feel secure in a world that either does not see the world as knowing good and evil, or says that even if this world perceives good and evil, it does not react in proportion to that good and evil; but if we believe that the world both perceives that I have done a good deed or an evil deed, rendered service or committed betrayal, and reacts in proportion to this service and betrayal of mine, and in this showing of reaction accepts not a particle of exception and does not react a particle less or more than the proportionate amount, then in this case, one will “feel secure,” it is here that Wittgenstein said, in my opinion, the definition of religiosity is feeling secure in the world, a religious person is someone who feels secure in the world, and in another expression, a religious person is someone who is always crying out that whatever comes to pass does not harm me, “O you who have believed, upon you is [responsibility for] yourselves. Those who have gone astray will not harm you when you have been guided” (Ma’idah/105). No one can harm you; this feeling of security is a sign of a religiosity that is reasoned religiosity.

Do not confuse this “feeling of security” with another characteristic I will mention later. I will later say, among the characteristics, that “a reasoned religiosity is a religiosity in which a person lives in a state of uncertainty.” Do not confuse “uncertainty” with the “feeling of security.” A person who is religious feels security but does not feel certainty, and these are two different things, which I will elaborate on later. Therefore, whenever you can say, “O world, however you turn, I will not lose; however you turn, no harm will come to me, because I am religious”—why? Because if you have truly grasped that the order of the world is a moral order, if you find that when you perform a service, you are waiting for something in return or waiting for gratitude, then it becomes clear that you do not possess that feeling of security. The religious person, in the Quranic expression, awaits neither reward, nor gratitude, nor recompense: “We desire from you neither reward nor gratitude” (Al-Insan/9), in the expression that appears in the Quran and is apparently about Ali ibn Abi Talib (peace be upon him) and his family. One who considers the order of the world to be a moral order and says, “The guarantee that the seed I plant will bear fruit is not in my hands,” is not anxious about the result, because he is fully aware that the world is a whole, so vast and immense that he is nothing but an insignificant cog in it, and for an individual’s action to bear fruit, the entire system must cooperate, and if it does not cooperate, it will not come to fruition. Yet, at the same time, he does not lose his feeling of security, because he had to perform the action; he was not supposed to guarantee the result. And in this respect, religious people who think in a reasoned way have peace of mind, even if one of their projects does not bear fruit. They undertook all their projects, of course, assuming they would bear fruit, but once they have done them, their minds are at ease. In other words, once they have performed the action, they sever their emotional connection to the action. When you do not sever your connection to the action, the result is that your feeling of peace of mind disappears. Why? Because you are waiting for the result, and then you see that the result has fallen into whirlpools, the result has undergone ups and downs, the result has fallen into the hands of factors that seem to want to neutralize your efforts, and because you are anxious about the result, you will not have peace of mind. Since the rational person knows that the world has a moral order, he has such a characteristic that his action is without desire, but action without desire is not a sign of lacking security. These four characteristics that have been discussed so far all depend on “religious insight.” The other characteristics that will be discussed later partly depend on “religious inclination” and partly on “religious attitude,” but the common feature of the four aforementioned characteristics is that they depend on religious insight—that is, they depend on what the religious person knows about the world, they depend on the religious person’s beliefs about the world. Therefore, in reality, the rationally religious person has four “beliefs” about the world, and those four beliefs are the four items that have been discussed so far. Now, if we can—I will say in the next session that some of the characteristics I will discuss in the section on religious attitude and some of the characteristics I will discuss in the section on religious inclination may, at first glance, seem incompatible with these four characteristics I have mentioned, which I hope I can resolve this incompatibility.

.

---

.

Notes:

[1] . (The date of the lecture is Azar 1380) [2]. Rationality [3]. Spirituality [4]. Mentality [5]. Critical Thinking [6]. To become familiar with the argument presented in this regard, one can refer to the book The Logic of Scientific Discovery by Karl Popper, translated by Ahmad Aram. [7]. The Doctrine of "Double Truth" [8]. Sorceric [9]. Sorcery [10]. Sentimental [11]. The Problem of Evil [12]. The third issue was not raised by the professor. [13]. Reincarnation

.

---

.

Audio of Rational Piety or Reasoned Religiosity, Session One - Part One

.

Audio of Rational Piety or Reasoned Religiosity, Session One - Part Two

.

---

.

Lecture by Mostafa Malekian titled "Rational Piety" - Session One

18 Azar 1380 | Kanun-e Tawhid, Tehran

.

---

.

Related Content:

Rational Piety or Reasoned Religiosity, Mostafa Malekian (Session Two)

.

---

.