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  The battle over interpretation is still being fought in our own times, as religious ideologies again contest for the minds even of the educated West. One of the glorious things about Russell’s lecture is the clarity with which he took up one position on the battleground. Anyone taking a different position has to meet 8 See especially Ludwig Wittgenstein, Lectures and Conversations on Aesthetics, Psychology and Religious Belief, edited by Cyril Barrett, Oxford: Blackwell, 1966.

  9 Or perhaps tried to do so. Virginia Woolf, for one, consistently scoffed at Eliot’s Anglo-Catholic posturings.

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  him head on, which will require better arguments than Eliot managed to muster.

  Simon Blackburn

  University of Cambridge, 2003

  EDITOR’S INTRODUCTION

  Bertrand Russell has been a prolific writer all his life and some of his best work is contained in little pamphlets and in articles contributed to various periodicals. This is especially true of his discussions of religion, many of which are little known outside certain Rationalist circles. In the present volume I have collected a number of these essays on religion as well as some other pieces like the articles on ‘Freedom and the Colleges’ and ‘Our Sexual Ethics’ which are still of great topical interest.

  Although he is most honoured for his contributions to such purely abstract subjects as logic and the theory of knowledge, it is a fair guess that Russell will be equally remembered in years to come as one of the great heretics in morals and religion. He has never been a purely technical philosopher. He has always been deeply concerned with the fundamental questions to which religions have given their respective answers—questions about man’s place in the universe and the nature of the good life. He has brought to his treatment of these questions the same incisiveness, wit and eloquence and he has expressed himself in

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  the same sparkling prose for which his other works are famous.

  These qualities make the essays included in this book perhaps the most moving and the most graceful presentation of the Freethinker’s position since the days of Hume and Voltaire.

  A book by Bertrand Russell on religion would be worth publishing at any time. At present, when we are witnessing a campaign for the revival of religion which is carried on with all the slickness of modern advertising techniques, a restatement of the unbeliever’s case seems particularly desirable. From every corner and on every level, high, low, and middle-brow, we have for several years been bombarded with theological propaganda. Life magazine assures us editorially that ‘except for dogmatic materialists and fundamentalists’, the war between evolution and Christian belief ‘has been over for many years’ and that ‘science itself . . . discourages the notion that the universe, or life, or man could have evolved by pure chance’. Professor Toynbee, one of the more dignified apologists, tells us that we ‘cannot meet the Communist challenge on a secular ground’. Norman Vincent Peale, Monsignor Sheen and other professors of religious psych-iatry extol the blessings of faith in columns read by millions, in best-selling books and over nation-wide weekly radio and televi-sion programmes. Politicians of all parties, many of whom were not at all noted for piety before they began to compete for public office, make sure that they are known as dutiful churchgoers and never fail to bring God into their learned discourses. Outside the classrooms of the better colleges the negative side of this question is hardly ever presented.

  A book such as this, with its uncompromising affirmation of the secularist viewpoint, is all the more called for today because the religious offensive has not been restricted to propaganda on a grand scale. In the United States it has also assumed the shape of numerous attempts, many of them successful, to undermine the separation of Church and State as provided in the Constitution. These attempts are too many to be detailed here;

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  but perhaps two or three illustrations will sufficiently indicate this disturbing trend which if it remains unchecked will make those who are opposed to traditional religion into second-class citizens. A few months ago, for instance, a sub-committee of the House of Representatives included in a Concurrent Resolution the amazing proposition that ‘loyalty to God’ is an essential qualification for the best government service. ‘Service of any person in any capacity in or under the government,’ the legislators officially asserted, ‘should be characterised by devotion to God.’

  This resolution is not yet law but may soon become so if it is not vigorously opposed. Another resolution making ‘In God We Trust’ the national motto of the United States has been passed by both Houses and is now the law of the land. Professor George Axtelle, of New York University, one of the few outspoken critics of these and similar moves, appropriately referred to them, in testimony before a Senate committee, as ‘tiny but significant erosions’ of the principle of church–state separation.

  The attempts to inject religion, where the Constitution expressly prohibits it, are by no means confined to Federal legislation. Thus in New York City, to take just one particularly glar-ing example, the Board of Superintendents of the Board of Education prepared in 1955 a ‘Guiding Statement for Super-visors and Teachers’ which bluntly stated that ‘the public schools encouraged the belief in God, recognising the simple fact that ours is a religious nation’, and furthermore that the public schools ‘identify God as the ultimate source of natural and moral law’. If this statement had been adopted hardly a subject in the New York City school curriculum would have remained free from theological intrusion. Even such apparently secular studies as science and mathematics were to be taught with religious overtones. ‘Scientists and mathematicians,’ the statement declared, ‘conceive of the universe as a logical, orderly, predict-able place. Their consideration of the vastness and the splendour of the heavens, the marvels of the human body and mind, the

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  beauty of nature, the mystery of photosynthesis, the mathematical structure of the universe or the notion of infinity cannot do other than lead to humbleness before God’s handiwork. One can only say “When I consider the Heavens the work of Thy

  Hands”.’ So innocent a subject as ‘Industrial Arts’ was not left alone. ‘In industrial arts,’ the philosophers of the Board of Superintendents asserted, ‘the observation of the wonders of the composition of metals, the grain and the beauty of woods, the ways of electricity and the characteristic properties of the materials used invariably gives rise to speculation about the planning and the orderliness of the natural world and the marvellous working of a Supreme Power.’ This report was greeted with such an outburst of indignation from civic and several of the more liberal religious groups that adoption of it by the Board of Education became impossible. A modified version, with the most objectionable passages struck out, was subsequently adopted. Even the revised version, however, contains enough theological language to make a secularist wince, and it is to be hoped that its constitutionality will be challenged in the courts.

  There has been amazingly little opposition to most of the encroachments of ecclesiastical interests. One reason for this seems to be the widespread belief that religion is nowadays mild and tolerant and that persecutions are a thing of the past. This is a dangerous illusion. While many religious leaders are undoubtedly genuine friends of freedom and toleration and are furthermore confirmed believers in the separation of Church and State, there are unfortunately many others who would still persecute if they could and who do persecute when they can.

  In Great Britain the situation is somewhat different. There are established churches and religious instruction is legally sanctioned in all state schools. Nevertheless, the temper of the country is much more tolerant and men in public life have less hesitation to be openly known as unbelievers. In Great Britain, too, however, vulgar pro-religious propaganda is rampant and

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  the more aggressive religious groups are doing their best to prevent Freethinkers from stating their case. The recent Beveridge Report for instance, recommended that the B.B.C.

  should give a hearing to representatives of rationalist opinion.

  The B.B.C. officially accepted this recommendation but has done next to nothing to implement it. The talks by Margaret Knight on

  ‘Morals without Religion’ were one of the very few attempts to present the position of unbelievers on an important topic.

  Mrs Knight’s talks provoked furious outbursts of indignation on the part of assorted bigots which appear to have frightened the B.B.C. into its former subservience to religious interests.

  To help dispel complacency on this subject I have added, as an appendix to this book, a very full account of how Bertrand Russell was prevented from becoming Professor of Philosophy at the College of the City of New York. The facts of this case deserve to be more widely known, if only to show the incredible distortions and abuses of power which fanatics are willing to employ when they are out to vanquish an enemy. Those people who succeeded in nullifying Russell’s appointment are the same who now would destroy the secular character of the United States.

  They and their British counterparts are on the whole more powerful today than they were in 1940.

  The City College case should be written up in detail also in simple fairness to Bertrand Russell himself, who was viciously maligned at the time both by the judge who heard the petition and in large sections of the press. Russell’s views and actions were the subject of unbridled misrepresentation and people unfamiliar with his books must have received a completely erroneous impression of what he stood for. I hope that the story as here recounted, together with the reproduction of some of Russell’s actual discussions of the ‘offending’ topics, will help to set the record straight.

  Several of the essays included in this volume are reprinted with the kind permission of their original publishers. In this

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  connection I should like to thank Messrs Watts and Co. who are the publishers of Why I am not a Christian and Has Religion Made Useful Contributions to Civilisation? , Messrs Routledge and Kegan Paul who published What I Believe, Messrs Hutchinson and Co. who published Do we Survive Death? , Messrs Nicholson and Watson who are the original publishers of The Fate of Thomas Paine, and the American Mercury in whose pages ‘Our Sexual Ethics’ and ‘Freedom and the Colleges’ first appeared. I also wish to thank my friends Professor Antony Flew, Ruth Hoffman, Sheila Meyer, and my students Marilyn Charney, Sara Kilian, and John Viscide, who helped me in many ways in the preparation of this book.

  Finally, I wish to express my gratitude to Bertrand Russell himself who blessed this project from the beginning and whose keen interest all the way was a major source of inspiration.

  Paul Edwards

  New York City, October 1956

  PREFACE

  Professor Edwards’s republication of various essays of mine concerned with theological subjects is a cause of gratitude to me, especially in view of his admirable prefatory observations. I am particularly glad that this opportunity has occurred for reaffirm-ing my convictions on the subjects with which the various essays deal.

  There has been a rumour in recent years to the effect that I have become less opposed to religious orthodoxy than I formerly was. This rumour is totally without foundation. I think all the great religions of the world—Buddhism, Hinduism, Christianity, Islam, and Communism—both untrue and harmful. It is evident as a matter of logic that, since they disagree, not more than one of them can be true. With very few exceptions, the religion which a man accepts is that of the community in which he lives, which makes it obvious that the influence of environment is what has led him to accept the religion in question. It is true that Scholastics invented what professed to be logical arguments proving the existence of God, and that these

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  arguments, or others of a similar tenor, have been accepted by many eminent philosophers, but the logic to which these traditional arguments appealed is of an antiquated Aristotelian sort which is now rejected by practically all logicians except such as are Catholics. There is one of these arguments which is not purely logical. I mean the argument from design. This argument, however, was destroyed by Darwin; and, in any case could only be made logically respectable at the cost of abandoning God’s omnipotence. Apart from logical cogency, there is to me something a little odd about the ethical valuations of those who think that an omnipotent, omniscient, and benevolent Deity, after preparing the ground by many millions of years of lifeless neb-ulae, would consider Himself adequately rewarded by the final emergence of Hitler and Stalin and the H-bomb.

  The question of the truth of a religion is one thing, but the question of its usefulness is another. I am as firmly convinced that religions do harm as I am that they are untrue.

  The harm that is done by a religion is of two sorts, the one depending on the kind of belief which it is thought ought to be given to it, and the other upon the particular tenets believed. As regards the kind of belief: it is thought virtuous to have faith—

  that is to say, to have a conviction which cannot be shaken by contrary evidence. Or, if contrary evidence might induce doubt, it is held that contrary evidence must be suppressed. On such grounds the young are not allowed to hear arguments, in Russia, in favour of Capitalism, or, in America, in favour of Communism. This keeps the faith of both intact and ready for internecine war. The conviction that it is important to believe this or that, even if a free inquiry would not support the belief, is one which is common to almost all religions and which inspires all systems of state education. The consequence is that the minds of the young are stunted and are filled with fanatical hostility both to those who have other fanaticisms, and, even more virulently, to those who object to all fanaticisms. A habit of basing convictions

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  upon evidence, and of giving to them only that degree of certainty which the evidence warrants, would, if it became general, cure most of the ills from which the world is suffering. But at present, in most countries, education aims at preventing the growth of such a habit, and men who refuse to profess belief in some system of unfounded dogmas are not considered suitable as teachers of the young.

  The above evils are independent of the particular creed in question and exist equally in all creeds which are held dogmatically. But there are also, in most religions, specific ethical tenets which do definite harm. The Catholic condemnation of birth-control, if it could prevail, would make the mitigation of poverty and the abolition of war impossible. The Hindu beliefs that the cow is a sacred animal and that it is wicked for widows to remarry cause quite needless suffering. The Communist belief in the dictatorship of a minority of True Believers has produced a whole crop of abominations.

  We are sometimes told that only fanaticism can make a social group effective. I think this is totally contrary to the lessons of history. But, in any case, only those who slavishly worship success can think that effectiveness is admirable without regard to what is effected. For my part, I think it better to do a little good than to do much harm. The world that I should wish to see would be one freed from the virulence of group hostilities and capable of realising that happiness for all is to be derived rather from co-operation than from strife. I should wish to see a world in which education aimed at mental freedom rather than at imprisoning the minds of the young in a rigid armour of dogma calculated to protect them through life against the shafts of impartial evidence. The world needs open hearts and open minds, and it is not through rigid systems, whether old or new, that these can be derived.

  Bertrand Russell

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  WHY I AM NOT A CHRISTIAN

  This lecture was delivered on March 6, 1927, at Battersea Town Hall, under the auspices of the South L
ondon Branch of the National Secular Society.

  As your Chairman has told you, the subject about which I am going to speak to you tonight is ‘Why I am not a Christian’.

  Perhaps it would be as well, first of all, to try to make out what one means by the word ‘Christian’. It is used these days in a very loose sense by a great many people. Some people mean no more by it than a person who attempts to live a good life. In that sense I suppose there would be Christians in all sects and creeds; but I do not think that that is the proper sense of the word, if only because it would imply that all the people who are not Christians—all the Buddhists, Confucians, Mohammedans, and so on—are not trying to live a good life. I do not mean by a Christian any person who tries to live decently according to his lights. I think that you must have a certain amount of definite belief before you have a right to call yourself a Christian. The word does not have quite such a full-blooded meaning now as it

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  w h y i a m n o t a c h r i s t i a n

  had in the times of St Augustine and St Thomas Aquinas. In those days, if a man said that he was a Christian it was known what he meant. You accepted a whole collection of creeds which were set out with great precision, and every single syllable of those creeds you believed with the whole strength of your convictions.

  WHAT IS A CHRISTIAN?

  Nowadays it is not quite that. We have to be a little more vague in our meaning of Christianity. I think, however, that there are two different items which are quite essential to anybody calling himself a Christian. The first is one of a dogmatic nature—namely, that you must believe in God and immortality. If you do not believe in those two things, I do not think that you can properly call yourself a Christian. Then, further than that, as the name implies, you must have some kind of belief about Christ. The Mohammedans, for instance, also believe in God and in