Chapter 6 Key Issue 4

Why do territorial conflicts arise among religious groups?

  • 1900s had a lot of global conflict
    • two world wars
    • Cold War
  • local conflicts have increased in areas of cultural diversity
    • attempt by adherents of one religion to organize Earth’s surface may conflict with other religions and the nonreligious

fundamentalism: literal interpretation and strict adherence to basic principles of a religion (or a religious branch, denomination, or sect)

  • most important way in which a group can maintain a distinctive cultural identity
  • however, people conviced their religious view is the correct one may intrude upon territory controlled by other religious groups

Religion vs. Government Policies

  • religious groups may oppose government policies seen as promoting social change and conflicting with traditional religious views
  • role of religion has waned in some societies due to political and economic change

Religion vs. Social Change

  • in LDCs, participation in global economy and culture exposes them to MDC values and beliefs
  • MDCs may not view economic development as incompatible with religious values, but adherents in LDCs of religions other than Christianity do

Taliban vs. Western Values

  • Afghans welcomed Taliban, preferring them to the corrupt and brutal warlords who had been running the country prior
    • US + Western officials welcomed them as strong defenders against a possible new invasion by Russia
  • Taliban had run Islamic Knowledge Movement services since the 600s
  • Taliban imposed very strict laws as Taliban interpreted Islamic values
    • “western, non-Islamic” leisure activities banned
    • playing music
    • flying kites
    • watching TV
    • surfing the Internet
    • soccer stadiums → settings for executions and floggings
    • men beaten for shaving beards
    • women stoned for committing adultery
    • homosexuals buried alive
    • prostitutes hanged in front of audiences
    • thieves’ hands were cut off
    • women wearing nail polish had their fingers cut off
  • ancient Buddhist statues destroyed
  • Islamic scholars criticize Taliban as poorly educated in Islamic law and history and for misreading the Quran
  • US overthrew the Taliban and replaced it with a democractically elected government
  • Taliban regrouped and resumed its fight for control of Afghanistan and Pakistan

Hinduism vs. Social Equality

caste: the class or distinct hereditary order into which a Hindu is assigned, according to religious law

  • originated when Aryans invaded India
  • divided into 4 castes
    • Brahmans
    • priests
    • top administrators
    • Kshatriyas
    • warriors
    • Vaisyas
    • merchants
    • Shudras
    • agricultural workers
    • artisans
    • below the 4 castes are the Dalits
    • outcasts
    • untouchables
    • did work considered too dirty for other castes
  • untouchables were descended from the indigenous people who lived in india prior to the Aryan conquest
  • social relations among castes were limited, and rights of non-Brahmans were restricted
  • British administrators + Christian missionaries point out shortcomings of the system
    • ex. neglect of untouchables’ health and economic problems
  • type of Hinduism practiced depends on the caste
    • high caste
    • based on knowledge of relatively obscure historial texts
    • low caste
    • illiterate
    • in a rural viallge
    • perform rituals without a highly developed set of written explanations for them
  • the caste system has been relaxed
  • however, discrimination still occurs

Religion vs. Communism

Christianity + Islam vs. The Former Soviet Union

  • Czar Peter the Great made the Russian Orthodox Church part of the Russian government
  • patriarch of the Church replaced by a 12-member committee (Holy Synod), nominated by the czar
  • after the Bolshevik Revolution, the Soviet Union pursued antireligious programs
    • Karl Marx had called the religion “the opium of the people”, a view shared by V. I. Lenin and early Communist leaders
    • Marxism became the official doctrine of the USSR
  • Soviet Union eliminated official church-state connection
    • church buildings and property were nationalized and could be used only with local government permission
  • Orthodox retained adherents with the elderly, but the lack of contact with the younger generations caused religion to dwindle in daily life
  • end of Communist rule allowed a religious revival, especially where Roman Catholicism is the most prevalent branch of Christianity
    • Czech Republic, Croatia, Hungary, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia
  • in the “stan”’s in Central Asia, most people are Muslims
    • struggled to determine the extent to which laws should be rewritten to conform to Islamic custom

Buddhism vs. Southeast Asian Countries

  • Buddhists hurt by the Vietnam War
    • French + Americans vs. Communist groups
  • air raids and vandalism damaged Buddhist shrines
  • Buddhist immolated (burned) themselves to protest policies of South Vietnamese government
  • Communist governments discouraged religious activites and permitted monuments to decay

Religion vs. Religion

Religious Wars in Ireland

  • Republic of Ireland
    • 87% Roman Catholic
  • northern UK part
    • 46% Protestant
    • 40% Roman Catholic
  • island had been an English colony
  • poor economic conditions + famines → mass emigration → agitation for independence from the British
  • Ireland became a self-governing dominion within the UK, and later completely independent
    • 6 northern counties voted to remain in the UK
    • Protestants preferred to be with the Protestant majority UK than join the Roman Catholic majority in Ireland
  • Roman Catholics in Northern Ireland have been victimized by discriminatory practices
    • demonstrations protested discrimination
    • 3000 people have been killed
  • a few Roman Catholics joined the Irish Republican Army (IRA)
    • militant organization dedicated to achieving Irish national unity by whatever means available
  • Protestans created the Ulster Defense Force (UDF) to fight the IRA
  • majority of Roman Catholics and Protestants are willing to live peacefully, but extremists disrupt daily life and do well in elections

Religious Wars in the Middle East

  • conflict in the Middle East has occured because Jews, Christians, and Muslims have fought to control the same land
  • some hostility stems from their similar herritage
  • trace origins to Abraham, but diverged into different stories
  • Judaism
    • makes a claim to the Promised Land
    • major events in the development of Judaism took place there
    • after Romans gained control of the area, they called it Palestine, and dispersed the Jews from there
  • Islam
    • became the most widely practiced religion in Palestine after the Muslim army conquered it
    • regarded Jerusalem as their third holiest city
    • Muhammad is thought to have ascended to heaven
  • Christianity
    • considers Palestine the Holy Land and Jerusalem the Holy City
    • major events in Jesus’s life occured there
    • Palestine accepted Christianity after it was adopted by the Roman Empire, prior to the Muslim conquest

Crusades

  • Arabs/Muslims captured most of the Middle East
    • diffused the Arabic language and converted people from Christianity to Islam
  • invaded Europe
    • initially halted by the Franks
    • continued later and controlled even more area
    • Franks ensured Christanity would be the dominant religion
  • Ottoman Turks captured Constantinople and advanced to Europe
  • European Christians launched a series of military compaigns (Crusades) to recapture the Holy Land from Muslim conquerors
    • captured Jerusalem
    • lost Jerusalem
    • regained Jerusalem
    • lost Jerusalem

Partition of Palestine

  • Ottomans controlled Palestine, but lost it to the UK after WWI
  • British allowed some Jews back to Palestine, but immigration was restricted in reponse to intense pressure by Arabs
  • violence between Jewish and Muslim escalated after WWII
  • British announced their intention to withdraw from Palestine
  • UN voted to parition Palestine into two independent states
    • one Jewish
    • one Muslim
  • Jerusalem was to be an international city

Wars between Israel and Neighbors

  • Jews declared an independent state of Israel
  • Israel fought wars with its neighbors
    • Independence War
    • Arab Muslims declared war after Israel declared independence
    • survived the attack
    • Israel’s boundaries extended
      • gained western suburbs of Jerusalem
    • Suez War
    • Egypt seized the Suez Canal
    • Egypt blockaded international waterways near its shores that Israeli ships were using
    • Israel, France, and UK attacked Egypt and reopened the waterways, though it retained control of the Suez Canal
    • Six-Day War
    • Israel’s neighbors blocked Israeli ships from using international waterways
    • Israel launched a surprise attack, destroying the coalition’s air forces
    • gained the Old City of Jerusalem and the West Bank, the Golan Heights, the Gaza Strip and Sinai Peninsula
    • Yom Kippur War
    • suprise attack on Israel by its neighbors occured on the holiest day of the year for Jews
    • war ended without changes in boundaries
    • Peace Treaty
    • Egypt’s president and Israel’s prime minister signed a peace treaty
    • Egypt’s president was assassinated but his successor finished the treaty

Conflicting Perspectives of the Holy Land

  • Palestinians emerged as Israel’s principal opponent
    • see themselves as the legitimate rulers of Israel

Israeli Perspectives

  • Israel is a very small country, and its people live extremely close to international borders, making them vulnerable to attack
  • Palestine is divided into three narrow, roughly parallel physical regions
  • Jordan and Syria used hills as staging areas to attack Israeli settlements
  • Israel captured those highlands to stop attacks
  • Israeli Jews were divided between those who wished to retain occupied territories and those who wished to make compromises with the Palestinians
  • in recent years, the majority supported the construction of a barrier to deter Palestinian attacks

Palestinian Perspectives

  • five groups of people consider themselves Palestinians
  • fight against Israel was coordinated by the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), under the leadership of Yassir Arafat
  • Israel permitted organization of a limited form of government, called the Palestinian Authority, but they are not satisfied
  • divided between the Fatah and Hamas parties
  • people with the Fatah Party recognize the state of Israel in exchange for return of all territory taken by Israel
  • people with the Hamas Party, do not recognize the right of Israel to exist and want to keep fighting
  • Palestinians see immigration of Jewish settlers to the West Bank as a hostile act

Jerusalem: Contested Geography

  • Jews, Muslims, and Christians will not be satisfied with control over Jerusalem until only one religion holds control
  • the most sacred space for Muslims is literally built upon the most sacred space for Jews

Judaism’s Jerusalem

  • Jerusalem is the Temple, their center of worship in ancient times
  • First Temple was destroyed by Babylonians
  • after the Persian Empire, Jews built a Second Temple
  • Romans destroyed the Second Temple, but the Western Wall of the Temple survives
  • Western Wall is called the Wailing Wall because Jews were allowed to visit it only once a year to lament the destruction
  • after Israel captured Jerusalem, it removed barriers that prevented Jews from visiting it

Islam’s Jerusalem

  • most important Muslim structure in Jerusalem is the Dome of the Rock
    • believe the large rock beneath the dome is the place from which Muhammad ascended to heaven, as well as the altar on which Abraham prepared to sacrifice his son
  • south of the Dome of the Rock is the al-Aqsa Mosque, built on the ruins of the Jewish Second Temple
  • Israel allows Muslims unlimited access to its holy structures and some control over them
  • since the spaces are on top of each other, it’s impossible to divide it by a line on a map