Religion and Violence

RELIGION AND VIOLENCE
The Old Testament shows that Israel was established by the sword --setting a bad example for Islam and Christianity both of which resorted to the sword to maintain themselves and take over various parts of the world. The Buddhists seemed a little different but they too have used the sword when they had state power. Today in Burma we seem them committing genocide against the Islamic minority in that country. Hinduism and its caste system was also the result of conquest and the sword. Religions are, of course, the expression of the unconscious spirit of humanity objectifying itself in different cultural milieux and when unchecked by reason and science they allow our original animal nature too many opportunities to express itself -- all acts of violence, war, capital punishment, all killing of man or beast are demonstrations of the beast within which none of the great religions have been able to tame. Philosophy and science, as higher expressions of the spirit, have also been unable to accomplish that goal but what other way is there? Religious belief is a step backward as would be expecting our aesthetic creations to accomplish this task as both are imaginative not rational expressions of our nature -- tr.