Hypocrisy, Tribute, Virtue and History

Flipping through the neatest little book called "Faith in the Age of Reason" by Jonathan Hill this weekend, I came across a discussion of Voltaire, the Enlightenment author of Candide and plenty of other things. The discussion mentioned that Voltaire was an early popularizer of the argument that Christianity (particularly Catholicism in Voltaire's view) is really bad because of all the terrible, awful things people have done in the name of Christianity throughout history. Think the Crusades, the European Wars of Religion, the forced conversion of Native Americans, etc., etc., etc.

Not that there isn't plenty of evil on the hands of those who claim the name of Christ throughout history. There's plenty of blame to go around. But I've always had a hard time understanding what's unique about Christianity in this respect. Plenty of evil has been committed in the name of pretty much every major religion, and most of the minor ones, too. And that shouldn't be surprising -- when men seek power and wealth, they tend to use powerful and effective tools to get it. Religion is one of those tools, sometimes a very powerful one in a very religious society. Is it surprising that ambitions of conquest, power and slaughter would be clothed in religion? The same thing happens with athiesm, secularism and humanism in societies where they dominate. "Hypocrisy is the tribute vice pays to virtue." --Duc de La Rouchefoucauld

So there's little if anything unique about Christianity when it comes to slaughter and wickedness. What about the hundreds of millions dead at the feet of athiestic Marxism? What about the Mongol conquest of China? Aztec human sacrifice? Japanese warlords? Tribal cannibalism in various parts of the world? Viking raids on Christian Britain?

It seems that the better view of the situation is that men are wicked, whatever their religious affiliation, and that a society's dominant religion will always be associated with its (and influence its choice of) wars, conquests and slaughters. Ironically, to single out Christianity for blame in this respect is really to maintain that Christians, as opposed to Muslims, athiests, assorted pagans and Hindus, ought to know better. Which amounts to a recognition that Christianity is somehow different, even superior in its message if not in its ability to thoroughly change everyone coming under its influence, to all those other religions. Maybe that's what Voltaire meant.


Addendum: Hill's book is part of a series of really neat little histories published by IVP. They are small (almost fit in your pocket), maybe 200 pages each, and printed on glossy paper with great collections of pictures and artwork fleshing out the content, which is excellent in every one I've sampled. As a book guy, I was slightly taken aback by the fact that these books look like paper versions of good web sites, with graphics, sidebars, etc., on EVERY page, but it really helps to have some pictures if you're reading about, for example, Faith in the Byzantine World and you haven't seen much of Byzantium yourself. Other titles in the series include The Expansion of Christianity, Jesus and His World, Augustine and His World, Luther and His World, Christianity and the Celts, Faith in the Medieval World, and Francis of Assisi and His World.

Just one more example from Hill's book to entice the would-be reader: a sidebar in the section discussing Peter the Great's reforms in Russia says that Peter outlawed the wearing of beards by men (a very strong tradition in the eastern church in Russia at that time) so the men would look more European. Apparently, the young men didn't mind, as the young ladies preferred the new style, but some older men actually cut off their beards and saved them in boxes (!) because they were afraid they could not attain heaven without them. This was the first I'd heard of the Facial Hairesy.