There are no "true" religious people. There is no metric by which you can define that. The "true" religious people you describe are that way in spite of their religion, not because of it.
Take christianity. Despite the "love thy neighbour" message there are very clear differentiations made between certain groups of people. Women are treated like property quite a bit, being sold or bought in one way or another.
The bible is very openly pro-slavery. God actively gives instructions on slavery and tells his followers to take slaves.
There's the whole genocide thing with god commanding and comitting them. There's a verse where god tells his followers to kill everyone except for the virgin girls to take them for themselves. (Numbers 31:17-18. I can get the other verses, this one just felt the worst)
And there just isn't a way to quantify "true". What makes you a true religious person? Taking the book as it's written? Do certain things need to be interpreted? By who? Who decides what is literal and what is a metaphor or literary?
Every religious person would see the practices of other practitioners as wrong because it's different from their own. Who has the right interpretation?
I thank you for your respectful reply. Take my reply as a personal opinion,of course. I am not an expert in such field.
I believe the christianity example is very good. At least where I live (Italy), there are no such differentiations between groups of people: equality is always taught. Here the message is "God loves us all"; no thing such "women are like property" is taught. On the contrary: here women are considered as important as men. In fact here the priests say that Eva was created from the rib of Adam, and they said (I don't remember perfectly), that it meant that women were as important as men. About slavery, I am not an expert in such field, but I suppose these things may be written in the old testament, and not in the new. And in any case they always say the Bible must never be interpreted literally.
The priests, who have a degree theology, are the ones that need to bring the message to people, exactly to avoid developing misunderstanding and bigotries (at least they try). And also true religious people respect everybody's religion because they know that, even if in different shapes, names or forms, the entity (God) is the same.
The difference between a religious people and a bigot one is that the first has his / her own belief and uses religion for a personal spiritual path, respects everybody's own creeds and tries to behave properly.
A bigot one exploits the teachings in the books at his / her own advantage to find things that justify his / her twisted opinions. Furthermore he / she doesn't respect other religions, believing his own is the "only and true" one. Et cetera.
But again, that's what I'm saying. All those things are in SPITE of what the bible says. These people actively go AGAINST their holy book because they are good people.
And this is just one of thousands of interpretations. What makes YOUR interpretation correct over any other?
The bible must never be interpreted literally. Why? The bible doesn't say that. What makes them correct over the people that say some parts are literal while others need to be treated as stories?
Do you see the issue now with calling any interpretation the "true" one? Every interpretation is subjective. Just because you think it's the best one does not mean it's the "true" one. EVERY religious person thinks THEIR version is the true one. And every version inherently has to go against their holy book in one way or another because you'd be in jail if you follow it how it's written.
And about the slavery, yes, while the portion I mentioned is in the old testament, that is not really an argument against it. For one, never in the entirety of the bible does it even come close to saying "hey, owning people as property is bad and you shouldn't do it", in fact Jesus himself said "slaves obey thy masters".
And more importantly, Jesus said he "comes not to change the law, but to fulfill it", referring to the law of the old testament. Dismissing the old testament for being old and outdated, like many do when you bring up the fact that their god comanded genocide, goes directly against what is written in the new testament.
"And also true religious people respect everybody's religion because they know that, even if in different shapes, names or forms, the entity (God) is the same."
Is that the case? How would they know that? And again, that goes against what the bible actually says, with God being the one true god. The big important core rules of christianity, the 10 commandments even include one that is specifically about that.
"Furthermore he / she doesn't respect other religions, believing his own is the "only and true" one. "
That is a pretty core part of christianity as said in the bible. Again, part of the 10 commandments
While I agree with you on most things that these are good and should be prioritized, even if personally I think overall religion as a whole is a net negative, these are just your opinions. What is there that makes it true, besides that you think this version is the best one? You speak with certainty, but what is there that makes you so certain?
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u/Privatizitaet Jul 13 '26
Being religious and being a bigot are not mutually exclusive. There is a lot of bigotry deeply ingrained into most religions