The End of Faith

Humanist, May-June, 2005 by David A. Niose

The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason by Sam Harris (New York, NY: Norton, 2004); 325 pp.; $24.95 cloth.

THE END OF FAITH, the not-so-subtle title of Sam Harris' first book, is heating up the debate in Humanist circles over just how tolerant of religion secularists should be. Harris opines that religion has become so outdated and dangerous that those inclined toward reason-based beliefs and values should make a concerted effort to toss all faith-based religious thinking--not just fundamentalist but moderate religion as well--into the trash heap of history.

This kind of talk is controversial even within the secular community, where many believe that nontheists should stand together with moderate religionists to confront fundamentalism. To add to the provocation, Harris is brash and unapologetic not just in his central thesis--that traditional religion has outlived its usefulness--but also in his ancillary arguments, where his targets include much more than religionists.

Harris has no room for the commingling of reason and religion by so-called moderate religionists. Moderates within the religious community are a major part of the overall problem, he argues. By structuring their beliefs around unfounded myths and creeds, moderate religionists are simply perpetuating the acceptability of irrationality as a foundation of society. It should be no surprise, he says, that, with irrationality so firmly imbedded in the social fabric and with religious belief uniquely immune from any test of reasonableness, dangerous fundamentalism thrives in the modern world.

To Harris, the moderate's attempt to accommodate modern rationalism with ancient myth and dogma is, well, almost sacrilegious:

The benignity of most religious moderates does not suggest that religious faith is anything more sublime than a desperate marriage of hope and ignorance, nor does it guarantee that there is not a terrible price to be paid for limiting the scope of reason in our dealings with other human beings.

Harris faults religious moderates for creating a social environment that places religious belief beyond the scrutiny of reason, saying moderates

   do not want anything too critical said
   about people who really believe in the
   God of their fathers, because tolerance,
   perhaps above all else, is sacred. To
   speak plainly and truthfully about the
   state of the world--to say, for instance,
   that the Bible and Koran both contain
   mountains of life-destroying gibberish--is
   antithetical to tolerance as moderates
   currently conceive it. But we can no
   longer afford the luxury of such political
   correctness.

Unfortunately, Harris' passion sometimes rises to the level of obsession, leaving him with arguments that seem too pointedly directed at religion alone, to the exclusion of other targets. While certainly religious faith has a long track record of perpetuating ignorance, stunting scientific inquiry, and affirmatively causing unimaginable pain and horror, Harris seems to suggest that religion is just about the only cause of such misfortunes.

In his rant against religion, Harris almost completely ignores other forces--imperialism, colonialism, nationalism, militarism, economics, politics, as well as social and psychological factors--in bringing about the ills of the world. As such, many of his arguments smack of oversimplification and imbalance. To Harris, religion is rarely a symptom of a larger problem, or even one important factor in a complex web of causation; rather, it simply is the problem.

Of course, there is an argument (and, to be sure, Harris makes it) that religion truly is the main problem--that, but for the enormous price that the world pays for its continuing, indefensible infatuation with irrationality, desirable ends such as peace, social justice, prosperity, and maybe even enlightenment would be much more commonplace. To those within the Humanist community who agree with such a position, Harris' diatribe will be an affirmation.

Indeed, The End of Faith is a call to arms: an energetic and persuasive argument in favor of assertively fighting irrationality. For those who believe, or at least hope, that an Age of Reason is nearing, Harris' arguments could provide much inspiration and, to a lesser extent, some direction. Harris hits the nail on the head, for example, when he suggests that Humanists must learn to reframe the debate, to make it acceptable to publicly question traditional religion's truth claims. The challenge for the community of reason isn't winning the debate; rather, the problem is simply getting a debate started, getting average people thinking and talking about what is true.

If Harris is trying to give secularists something that could inspire them to think big, he succeeds. While others ponder how to win the next church-state battle, Harris is contemplating the downfall of traditional religion. He doesn't even try to convince the reader that this glorious day is imminent, but he does make it seem that such a goal is worth thinking about, even necessary.