Monotheïsme

Net nu we dachten zeker te zijn dat als er dan toch goden moeten zijn, dan liever meer dan minder, dit toch ook wel sterke argument voor  het monotheïsme.

If one were obliged to list the contributions Judaism had made to the advancement of civilization, it’s likely that an early entry on the list would have addressed the astonishing drive to abandon the worldview that assigned each realm of human events its own deity and replace it with one God—face unseen, will unknown—in whose image all were created and to whose service all are called. The consequences of such a move, naturally, are immense; at the very least, it advocates a form of communitarian life, in which disagreements are encouraged and debate is lively but the overall loyalty is awarded to the laws that bind us all.

Such a worldview, sadly, has fallen into disrepair among our thinking classes. We’ve surrounded the Enlightenment’s blessed championing of individual rights with bulwarks of divergence: Whether we read a novel or attempt to understand a distant conflict or study the ways in which humans intertwine, we do so mainly to mine that which sets us apart. What ensues isn’t debate; it’s a battle of particularities, each struggling to carve its difference into—or, better yet, out of—the collective whole.

Uit: Liel Leibovitz, 'The Real Problem With Academia', Tablet, 21.03.2014 (hier)

Wat dan mogelijk de zaak weer iets makkelijker maakt voor ongelovigen: het maakt vermoedelijk niet uit of je nu niet gelooft in één god of niet in meerdere goden. (Maar zeker weet je dat niet, voegt de agnost er aarzelend aan toe.)