Tags

, , ,

Anyone who has ever wondered about the roots of religion should read this book. It delves deeply and with scientific and philosophical rigor into the observable and testable aspects of what religion really is all about. The authors intentionally limit themselves to what can actually be observed about religion and make a valiant effort to be objective in their analysis of all religions, all the way from animistic religions through ancestor worship religions based on family coherence and on through world religions which still attempt to treat their followers as a great extended family.

The Supernatural and Natural Selection: The Evolution of Religion by Lyle B. Steadman and Craig T. Palmer, published by Paradigm in 2008, is not an easy read, but what it lacks in facile story line it more than makes up for in an attempt to understand what religion is really about. Most people, including myself, would think that the function of religion is to answer the basic questions of life – Where did we come from? Why are we here? What is the purpose of my life? Where do I go after death? Those and similar questions are not dealt with much in this book, because they can not be verified in a scientific way which requires asking questions which can be tested with proofs which can deny the validity of a claim.

Their analysis begins with the murder of an old woman in a remote and primitive place in Papua New Guinea. It happened when one of the authors was doing anthropological field work in the area whose people’s only previous contact with modern civilization was a steel ax. While he was at the village a small group of socially important and responsible men hiked all night to a not too remote village to murder a specific elderly woman while she slept. The woman was absolutely innocent of all wrong doing, and these men knew that and they knew there would be angry repercussions from their wanton murder.

The whole book is woven around that murder and why that kind of activity was so important to the creation of all religions including our modern ones. By the end of the book that hideous act, of murdering an innocent old woman asleep in her bed, is understood to be a necessary act when seen from the perspective of these sane men. They really didn’t want to murder her and they got no pleasure from doing it, but they were forced to it by their long days of thoughtful arguments and considerations of the facts. By the end of the book you will understand why for their community’s health and continued well being that woman or someone very close to her in status had to die.

It takes these authors 221 pages of carefully researched material and intelligently reasoned argument to prove what religion is really about. I can say their results as a bon mot but it won’t mean much. Read the book if you want to understand religion.

Religion is about binding a reproductive community together.