Beliefs Have Consequences: Human Sacrifice on the Altar of Lies
In the Garhwal and Kumaon communities of the Uttarakhand region of northeastern India, there is a commonly-held belief that all illness, misfortune, and harm are caused by demons, and that demons live in the trees. Over the past several decades, in order to get rid of the demons and free people from hardship and affliction, villagers have eradicated forests throughout the region so the demons would be forced to move elsewhere. As you might imagine, the results have been disastrous.
Extensive deforestation has led to water shortages, soil erosion, decreased water quality, and difficulty growing crops. Not only is there a shortage of water and food, but there is also a dangerous scarcity of firewood to keep warm in these cold, mountain regions where natural warmth is hard to come by and central heating is unknown. The disruptions in the microclimate and ecosystem caused by false beliefs are sure to have perilous ramifications for generations to come.
While these communities struggle to stay warm, find food, and survive, they are not likely to receive any help from their fellow Hindu countrymen. That's because Hinduism teaches that any adversity a person experiences in this life is the direct result of their actions in a previous life. If a person is starving, disabled, doesn't have access to education, or is born to a poor community, they are reaping the consequences of their own bad deeds in a past life and must pay for those deeds by suffering in this one. If they suffer well and do no wrong, so the belief goes, they will have an opportunity to come back to this world in a better position in their next life, but for now they must pay their dues.
Wherever I go on this large, diverse planet - which to date has included over 25 countries on five continents - I can't seem to escape the ubiquitous reality that beliefs have consequences. Beliefs inevitably drive perspectives, policies, and actions, and when those beliefs are wrong - when they don't line up with reality - people suffer.
That's why it always amazes me whenever someone hears about my work in Christian ministry and responds with, "Why can't you just give people what they need - you know, like food, water, and medicine - and just leave it at that? Why do you have to try to make them think like you do? Why would you try to change their beliefs?"
The answer, of course, is that beliefs have consequences. Truth matters. And the reality is, most people know this intuitively. After all, no one questions why we try to change beliefs about health and sanitation when people in poverty-stricken communities are defecating in their drinking water supply. No one challenges the wisdom behind teaching people in AIDS-affected regions of Africa that, in contrast to local folklore, having sex with a virgin does not cure HIV/AIDS, and that HIV+ men must stop raping little girls if the disease is ever to be contained.
People do, however, become quite concerned when they hear that we are challenging people's spiritual beliefs. But this, too, is based on a false belief that needs to be challenged; namely, that spiritual beliefs don't really matter. On the contrary, false spiritual beliefs are infinitely more detrimental, for they not only have critical implications far beyond this life, but they also carry significance for the body and the mind in this life now. We need only consider Uttarakhand, India to see that.
Unfortunately, Uttarakhand is far from an anomalous peculiarity. In fact, nowhere is this principle more evident than in the Muslim world, where I have spent more time and invested more in relationships than in any other culture besides my own.
Over the years, I’ve spent time getting to know and love Muslims in war-torn Afghanistan, volatile Egypt, secularized Jordan, poverty-stricken Burundi, rural Uganda, refugee-infused Greece, and in the refugee-resettlement community of Clarkston, Georgia in the USA. I’ve left a piece of my heart in each of these places, and in some cases spent years of my life foregoing income and personal wellness to love Muslims well and offer whatever I can to make their lives better. I’ve been able to give food, water, medical care, education, counseling, driving lessons, and deep, abiding friendship, but through these experiences I’ve come to know many of the false religious beliefs that keep Muslims imprisoned and oppressed. I’ve also seen that until their beliefs change to more accurately reflect truth and reality, any other efforts to provide help will always be mere band-aid solutions.
For example, the Qur’an teaches that women are a man's tilth (his farmland, acreage, patch of land for sowing seed) for his use as he desires. Men are permitted to have three or four wives as long as they treat them all equally, but Muhammad himself, who is the supreme example of how to live, had at least nine wives at one time. When he was in his fifties, Muhammad married his favorite wife, Aisha, when she was just six years old, and he consummated the marriage when she was nine years old.
Additionally, Muhammad taught that women are deficient of mind, untrustworthy, ungrateful, lacking in common sense, and half as valuable as a man. Accordingly, he taught that most of the people in hell will be women. He also instructed that men who fear any disobedience or rebellion from their wives should scourge them, and he modeled this behavior, striking his favorite wife Aisha when he suspected she was being deceptive. It is not surprising, therefore, that Aisha claimed no women ever suffered as much as Muslim women. This is still the case today.
According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, 11 out of the 12 countries with the highest levels of discrimination against women are Muslims-majority countries. The Islamic Hadith also tell of Muhammad's capture of women and girls as sex slaves, his torture and murder of anyone who made fun of him, his induction of legalized prostitution, and his efforts to violently subjugate the entire world under a single Islamic leader. These practices were carried out in obedience to the direct commands of Allah Himself by the man who the Qur’an teaches is the supreme example of behavior for Muslims to follow.
Do any of these behaviors sound familiar to you - marriages of middle-aged men to prepubescent girls, polygamy, the kidnapping and training of child soldiers, the oppression of women, the killing of girls who have been raped in order to restore the family honor, the kidnapping of “infidel” girls to serve as sex slaves, the mass murder of non-Muslims in the name of Allah, the murder of those who poke fun at or disagree with Muhammad, ongoing attempts to violently subjugate the entire world under Islam? If not, you haven't been paying attention to international news because these behaviors occur every single day in the Muslim world.
Prior to my time in Afghanistan, I was barely aware of these problems, and to the extent that I was, the girls were just numbers, unknowns, foreigners in a strange land. They were “those people” who do “those things” on the other side of the world. But after I came to know and love several Muslim women during my time in Afghanistan - after I heard their stories, cried with them, hugged them, danced with them, and spent hours huddled in dark, cold rooms with them sharing our lives, our hearts, and our dreams - they became sisters to me. But there was very little I could do to help them because all of this is the result of false beliefs given by a false prophet and adopted by entire nations as the only acceptable law of the land under penalty of death.
If people’s beliefs never amounted to anything more than mere beliefs, I wouldn't spend two minutes writing about them, much less trying to change them. Nor do I believe that all Muslims hold to these beliefs; fortunately, many do not understand their scriptures, which are notoriously difficult and only to be read in classical Arabic (the natural language of nobody on earth today). But the reality is that many Muslims do hold these beliefs, and beliefs have consequences. They have consequences now, and they have consequences for eternity.
Muslims and Hindus, of course, are not the only ones who hold to false beliefs. We all do. And the further our culture strays from the truth, the more we need to intentionally and continuously evaluate our ideas and measure them against God’s revealed truth. Likewise, when we see others believing lies and half-truths, it is incumbent upon us as neighbors on this earth to tell people the truth.
If we keep the truth to ourselves out of some misguided understanding of respect or tolerance, or out of fear of what others might think of us, people we love will eventually suffer the consequences. Like cutting down all the trees to get rid of sickness and suffering, or raping little girls to cure AIDS or to satisfy one’s own perceived entitlements, erroneous solutions to misunderstood problems do not work, and people are sacrificed on the altar of lies.
Christianity, on the other hand, tells us the truth about our world, and therefore works best within our world. That doesn't mean everything will be easy or smooth for the Christian; in fact, in a world mired by sin, life often becomes harder when we join the ranks of the most persecuted religion on earth. But through it all, we have a critical advantage in that reality is on our side. The truth is with us. So for the good of those we love, and for the glory of the One who is most glorious, may His truth keep marching on!
