Editor in Chief: Moh. Reza Huwaida Thursday, March 28th, 2024

Religious Exploitation: A Cause of Backwardness

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Religious Exploitation: A Cause of Backwardness

The Sakhi Shrine is a holy place located in Northeast Kabul. People go to pray there, so as to obtain their worldly aspirations. They also pray for the souls of their grandparents and their kith and kin who have passed away.

Last week, I visited the Sakhi Shrine to see how people pay homage at this sacred place. It is a park and has a large campus where people can take a walk. Some families bring long flasks of tea. Apparently, they do not come to pray but to pass a day, pleasantly.

It is also a haven for lovers on a rendezvous. Fashionable girls walking with boys and taking photos there, changes the atmosphere of a shrine into a recreational area. They come here, not for any spiritual aim, but for mundane romance.

As the traditional way, I took my shoes off, and entered the building which has a central grave. I paid homage at   the tomb. An aged clergyman could be seen sitting and reciting Holy Quran. Perhaps, he was hired to read some verses of the Sacred Book for the satisfaction of the departed soul of dead people. When I approached him, he smiled thinking that I would be his second prey to pay him to pray for my departed kith and kin. But he failed to make a fool of me.  I prefer to pay to a poor beggar, rather than a man who makes a business on the Sacred Book.

I came out, put on my shoes to leave, but a vendor who was also attending to the shoes asked me for money. Everyone was making a living in one way or another. Some children, who lived in the shrine’s neighborhood was renting rugs to the pilgrims and some others were carrying brushes and bottles of wax imploring the pilgrims to get their shoes polished. But some beggars were also sitting there from dawn to dusk collecting   petty charities from the pilgrims.

This is a tragedy in our society where people have changed the Holy Book of personal practice into a book of empty prayer. In other words, a book which includes all codes of life and   has been sent to lead people into salvation and prosperity is recited only to gain a few Afghanis. The Holy Quran has been marginalized from the lives of Muslims and it is carried to the graveyard to be recited for the satisfaction of the departed souls and to alleviate the torment of the sinful people.

Indeed, the main aim of this Holy Book is on the verge of oblivion. The youngsters show no tendency to ponder over the verses or even to recite the Holy Quran. Do we know the disinclination of the younger generation towards religion?

I believe that religious exploitation is the root cause for their disinterests. For instance, when some less literate people, who pretend to be the clergy, exploit people under the aegis of religion, then people judge religion through their practices and stay far away from such faith.

Moreover, some of the clergy introduce religion in a nightmarish, radical way which turns to a frightening issue for the youngsters. They act in a Talibanic way and reprimand all the youngsters, even if a mistake   has been made by just one youngster. In their speeches, they accuse them of   gross impiety. 

Vladimir Lenin, speaking on religion in 1905, alluded to Marx’s comments saying that religion is one of the forms of spiritual oppression which everywhere weighs down heavily upon the masses of the people, over burdened by their perpetual work for others, by want and isolation. The Impotence of the exploited classes in their struggle against the exploiters, gives rise to the belief in a better life after death.  Just as impotence of the savage in his battle with nature gives rise to belief in gods, devils, miracles, and the like. Those who toil and live in want all their lives are taught by religion to be submissive and patient while here on earth, and to take comfort in the hope of a heavenly reward. But those who live by the labor of others are taught by religion to practice charity while on earth, thus offering them a very cheap way of justifying their entire existence as exploiters. Religion is the opium for the people. Religion is a sort of spiritual booze, in which the slaves of capitalism drown their human image. 

But, I believe that it is not religion which chains the people.  I disagree   with Marx who says: “religion is the opium of the people.” The truth is that religion is the lifeblood of a society.  It intends to motivate humanity towards prosperity. Moreover, what make the religion opium is the religious people who practice and preach the religion wrongly. They make effort to keep people in dark so as to exploit them. This is what history witnessed in Europe when the Catholic Church was the exploiter. Christianity was not practiced in a true way. Don’t you think it is generally the same with other religions?

This is what we are currently experiencing in our society. In our society, religion is manipulated for the benefit of other groups. For example, the religious radicals interpret it to their own advantage, scholars in their own points of view and so do the politicians. People are murdered, insulted and exploited mostly by such groups under the mask of religion. In short, religion is a selfish tool in the hand of all the groups to use however they please. It is the root cause of our backwardness.

Hujjatullah Zia is an emerging writer of Daily Outlook Afghanistan. He can be reached at zia_hujjat@yahoo.com .

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