I present my views below to an interesting article written here on whether India must ban religious conversion. Although I have wanted to keep this blog on issues of philosophy, I make a few exceptions to show how concepts like justice and equality that are philosophical concepts also lend themselves into other spheres of existence: namely nations and political and religious life.
In my views below, we are applying these terms to the issue of free religious conversion which is a hot topic in India right now. It would be useful to read the article of Jaideep Prabhu before reading the views below. It would also be wonderful if you could read the views of Varghese John who succintly answered Jaideep in his blog post. I have mostly borrowed from Varghese to ask Jaideep to reply. He has replied to me and here I post his replies in quotes and below it, my answers
Jaideep’s reply to 1. Banning conversion is tricky. As I discussed with one reader in the comments section, I find it difficult to condone the banning of conversion though there are some unsavoury aspects of allowing it too.
Jaideep, all things are tricky (you are being cryptic now) and have an unsavoury part to it. The concept of competition itself is tricky and has unsavoury parts to it. Isn’t the whole idea of justice and law here to ensure there’s no unethical or unjust means or consequence of competition without declaring that competition itself is evil?
Jaideep’s reply to 2. It is simplistic to think that conversion is the only way out from oppression for a dalit or even that this oppression is uniform across dalit communities. If this is what Pooja was asking, she was far more cryptic! Besides, it entirely bypasses the issue of false equality between dharmic and Abrahamic faiths – unless Pooja was implying that she is okay with that.
I don’t wish to hold simplistic views about how Dalits can move out, or if it is a universal phenomenon etc. My only point is this: If ‘a’ dalit or his family wishes to move out, can they appeal to freedom of conscience and move out or not? Lets say the internal hindu council has tried to disuade them and failed and he just wants out? Can he? Do you respect his decision for his life?
Jaideeps’s reply to 3. This goes back to the notion of liberty – are a lion and a lamb both at the same level of liberty not to eat each other?
But Jaideep, you have presented a fallacy. A lion and a lamb both belong to different animal species where as Man belongs to the same species – rational animal. All the lions are at liberty to act as all lions and all the lambs are at liberty to act as lambs. So applying the same logic (with species as the middle term to sustain logic), all rational men are at liberty at acting as rational men. Are you trying to say dalits are not rational or don’t come under the species of men?
Jaideeps’s reply to 4. I reject your premise in the first part of this question. As for the second part, this is exactly the point of my article – why do Christianity and Islam insist that everyone respect their right to convert (and hence their cosmology) but are themselves unwilling to show any understanding to others?
Why do you reject my premise? You haven’t given any reason. Abrahamic faiths are unwilling to be understanding towards the belief systems of others which you put forth by your theory of false equality?
Jaideep, I think that your theory of false equality doesn’t hold steam. Nowhere do you mention in your article about ISKCON, that has proselytized and evangelized many westerners. Tell me, what do you think about ISKCON? Are they according to your definition of the indic faiths, not indic enough because they have gone ahead and done exactly what you accuse proselytistic abrahamic faiths of doing? But then again, could you say, they are not indic enough when as you mention above, the indic faith has no particular doctrine or practice, no specific scripture, no central ecclesiastical organisation and hence, ISKCON, a proselytistic variant is also perfectly acceptable?
I believe you contradict yourself and my point on ISKCON proves the same. If the indic faith holds no particular doctrine or practice, no specific scripture, no central ecclesiastical organisation, how did you come to the conclusion that the Indic faith is non-proselytizing unlike Abrahamic faiths? For surely, haven’t you selected this specific doctrine among others and made it a corner-stone? Someone else could disagree with you. As there is no scripture and ecclesiastical organization, how do you resolve this disagreement?
The IKSCON phenomenon creates a little hole in your false equality theory. If Hindus are on a rampage doing Ghar Vapasi with supposedly even more vile means (pressure, threat etc) than they accuse others religions of, I no longer believe there’s a false equality, at least not in practice. Perhaps you would say this is a reaction due to competition and animosity and lets say, I agree with you. But why don’t the propogators of ghar vapasi respect the freedom of conscience of those that now want to stay converted?
The argument given by some extremists were ‘Because they were hindus before’. By that coin, can the Jews return to Rome and ask the romans for their Jewish temple that was destroyed in 70 AD? Why don’t the jews return to Russia, Austria, Poland, Spain and all those countries asking for their lands that were taken away forcibly 500 years ago? What about Constantinople, present day Turkey? Why, it was 99% christian and today is 99% muslim. Shouldn’t the christians demand turkey to return all their church land, properties, institutions and cathedrals?
Please don’t tear your hair. I understand your point. You’re saying in the article that its not fair that the indic faith is on the losing ground as they don’t proselytize while other faiths do. But while your entire article rotates ‘we are on the losing side’ – you fail to grasp one argument. Every culture that doesn’t sustain itself is historically on the losing side. The vedic religion of worshipping the elements of nature has been on the losing side compared to the more novel version of Hinduism from the Ramayana and the Mahabarat. What can we do about it?
Santa Claus Christmas has been trumping a more traditional form of Christmas? The Santa Claus culture is hijacking the traditional christian culture, some would say. You can pass laws to ban santa claus then and stifle the freedom of people who want to celebrate Christmas as Santa claus. It is a free country. Isn’t India too a free country? My whole point is people look at christianity as the religion of the west but only until you everyone can agree with what they mean as the west. If they mean by the west as the present-day europe which which is very much the fruit of the roman empire, you could say so because Christianity spread through the Roman empire while it was still united which is more or less the present day West. But before that, Christianity was not the religion of the west before the west existed.
Today, in practice, Europe is very secularized and in a pluralistic society one can’t really claim that one relgion is the religion of the east and the west. India is a land of many religions. When you say ‘indic’ faith, I believe you are inserting a premise where no premise exists. Because the idea of India didn’t exist when the religiosity of the vedic faiths did. When the idea of India was born, it already found itself with Hinduism, Sikhism, Jainism, Islam and Christianity influencing its birth. If I find your premise flawed, I see your other arguments falling too. Because here, we’re talking about what’s the best thing for India (hence, every looks at the constitution), not the lands occupied by vedic religions. The people of India have made their choice in 1947 to the right of freely practicing, propogating any faith. Anything contrary would smack of majoritarianism which is harmful to any democracy in the world not to forget stifle the freedom of many a people include those in the majority who want out.
Simply put, relgion itself is a market like softwares without making a ‘dogma’ on lands roots and religions and one particular faith essential or permeating a land. All religions complete like products for the assent of man and his freedom. The man of the land adopts the product that he thinks best suits his conception of reality. This is one reason Islam has spread in Africa. Perhaps people there thought it made more sense to them than Christianity or Hinduism.
Jaideeps reply to 5. What do you mean by ‘equitability’? I think it’s rather silly to believe that everyone is equal – DNA proves otherwise – but sure, everyone deserves a fair trial, etc.
Jaideep, You call equitability it silly without giving any reasons. You can’t call Varghese John crypctic then, without applying the same standard to yourself. Please share your reasons as to why does everyone has a right to a fair trial? DNA is a straw man argument here because it does not lend any more intellectual thought than what already exists to the idea of equitability. The Supreme Courts and courts of laws in all countries have not changed their laws on equality after having discovered that DNA is unique to each individual. All free countries still adhere that our equitability derives from us being born as human beings. So why is it silly to believe that everyone is born equal?
6. Let’s cleave to the topic at hand [false equality and not abortion] or we’ll end up hopelessly muddled!
But Jaideep, I am cleaving to the article. You’re using this argument of ban on abortion to support your theory of false equality namely by saying the bans on abortion are ‘impositions’ of religous doctrine of ‘other lands’ on ‘our land’ wheras I tried to show you that abortion like drugs or paedophilia is an evil and while drugs and paedophilia is banned by the UN, India and many other countries, why would you call aborition a product of religious doctrine instead of a product of intellectual insight about injustice to a group of people?
I believe if you presented a theory with apparently false arguments, people have a right to subscribe to the theory only if the arguments have integrity(that’s the whole idea of elaborating on our views, right?). Otherwise, the theory itself loses integrity. I am showing that your argument on abortion is wrong because hindus and muslims and christians and atheiests of our country have a right to defend life simply by virtue of their intellect and without taking recourse to religion.
Proselytism, not conversion. Please don’t misrepresent my argument. I have not taken a position on conversion – while I see undesired social ramifications of conversion, I am also not for holding people against their conscience. Hence the ambiguity so far as trading one problem for another is no solution. In any case, I argue that allowing proselytism – NOT conversion – is no “equality.”
Jaideep, You are right. I will modify my post accordingly.