God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything

Much of God Is Not Great is focused on major Western religions, especially Christianity. In Chapter 14, Hitchens explores the tendency for Western non-believers to turn to Eastern religion, which they often see as a better, less corrupted alternative. He begins with the story of the guru Bhagwan Sri Rajneesh, whose ashram Hitchens visited while on assignment in India for the BBC. Rajneesh was a popular guru among Western visitors to India in the 1970s and 1980s, and his followers later established an ashram in Oregon. Hitchens reports that while many of the practices at the ashram seemed innocuous, he was unsettled by the sign at the entrance that read “Shoes and minds must be left at the gate” (196). He viewed the guru’s followers as somewhat brainwashed, and points out that they were required to give all their material possessions to the ashram. To Hitchens, the Rajneesh followers are clearly a cult, and he writes, “I would say that the people of Antelope, Oregon missed being as famous as Jonestown by a fairly narrow margin” (198)—a reference to the mass suicide undertaken in Jonestown under the sway of a charismatic cult leader.

Hitchens also disputes the claim that Eastern faiths are less violent or less dogmatic than those in the West. He gives the island of Sri Lanka as an example of a place ruined by violence between various Eastern religions. The island is home to both Buddhist and Hindu populations, who have fought each other on many occasions throughout history. This violence became especially extreme in the post-colonial period. Buddhist extremists carry out suicide bombings against Hindu Tamils, and the first elected president of the country, a Hindu man, was assassinated by a Buddhist priest.

Hitchens continues his dismantling of the myth of peaceful Buddhists with examples from Tibet and Japan. He explains that the Dalai Lama, the leader of Tibet, is a feudalist Monarch who believes in freedom only for his own followers. In Japan, he paints the situation as even worse. The superiority of Japanese Buddhism, even over other Buddhist sects, has been used to justify the long history of imperial rule within the country. Most recently, Buddhist beliefs were used to justify Japan’s alignment with the Nazis in World War II and Buddhist leaders were recruited to train kamikaze fighters, convincing them that they were fighting for the Buddhist cause and that dying was not to be feared because Buddhism views life and death as the same.

This chapter outlines four specific doctrines that Hitchens argues show religion to be immoral, not just morally neutral. Each doctrine, blood sacrifice, atonement, eternal reward/punishment, and impossible tasks and rules, is outlined with an example. Hitchens adds to this the false picture of the world’s origins that most religions adhere to, but he explains that this concept has already been covered in previous chapters.

Hitchens believes that blood sacrifice is an ancient concept that could be found in religions worldwide before the major monotheistic faiths originated. This concept began with human sacrifice, which in the modern world has largely given over to animal sacrifice. He relays a story of an agreement between pious Jewish leaders in Israel and a Christian farmer in Nebraska, who hope to raise a “perfect” red angus as well as a perfect sinless child. Eventually, the child will sacrifice the angus on Temple Mount and bring about the end of times. Hitchens writes that blood sacrifice can be found throughout Judeo-Christian lore, most famously in the Biblical story of Abraham, who was commanded to sacrifice his son Isaac. Although the boy was saved at the last minute, Hitchens believes that this story, and those like it, inspire much of the religiously-motivated violence found in Israel today.

Atonement, according to Hitchens, is another immoral concept found in most religions. In many faiths, this involves personal martyrdom, which Hitchens sees as a gruesome choice, but at least a choice that the martyr makes for themselves. He is particularly concerned by the Christian principle of vicarious atonement, in which Jesus was tortured and killed to forgive the sins of all future generations. To Hitchens, this story in itself proves the nonsensical nature of Christian belief. Believers are asked to admit that, by being sinners, they are responsible for Jesus’s death over 2,000 years ago. At the same time, they are told that the death was inevitable, as the sins of Adam ensured that all humans would be sinners. If they reject responsibility and the corresponding atonement, they will be subjected to eternal punishment themselves.

Hitchens writes that the doctrines of eternal punishment and impossible rules combine to create an inescapable fate of damnation for those who take religious laws literally. Rules banning sinful thoughts and phrases like “love thy neighbor as thyself” are, to Hitchens, impossible for any inherently self-centered human being to follow. Since the rules are so harsh, many religions have invented ways to circumvent them, such as the early Catholic church selling indulgences and some Muslim sects offering temporary marriages to men who want to hire prostitutes. Hitchens sees these concepts as laughable; if God is the totalitarian leader portrayed in many religious texts, he likely would not allow sin to be avoided on a technicality. Hitchens argues that philosophical arguments like that of Blaise Pascal, who wrote that belief in God was like a wager with eternal glory on one side and eternal torment on the other, are similarly ridiculous—if belief in God can be boiled down to essentially a bet, there is no purpose for that question to exist.

This chapter returns to the question of whether religion is inherently good or bad, this time focusing on its effect on children. Hitchens argues that children are negatively affected by religious indoctrination in many ways, both mental and physical.

He begins with the concept of hell and its effect on young believers. Focusing primarily on Catholicism, Hitchens details the process by which children are scared into belief by terrifying depictions of hell conveyed by priests and other leaders. He shares an anecdote from author Mary McCarthy, who describes her horror at learning from a Catholic priest that her Protestant grandfather was in hell since he was not baptized in the correct church.

After a short digression about religious beliefs surrounding abortion, Hitchens explores the various types of sexual trauma inflicted on youth by many churches. He begins with circumcision. He is particularly concerned with this practice as applied to women, who in some religions experience genital mutilation for the purpose of dulling sexual impulses. According to Hitchens, this brutal practice is limited to some versions of Islam and some animist traditions. He also views male circumcision as immoral and is horrified at its widespread acceptance within Jewish and Christian societies. He spends several paragraphs detailing the unhygienic nature of traditional Jewish circumcision ceremonies, the lack of consent inherent in circumcisions performed on babies, and the repression of sexual pleasure that many religions hope to achieve through circumcision. He refutes contemporary claims that circumcision leads to better health and hygiene. Additionally, he argues that if an all-powerful deity required men to be circumcised, that being would have created them without a foreskin in the first place.

Masturbation taboos are another common religious tenant that Hitchens views as abusive. He details the history of religious myths around the subject, which have taught children that self-pleasure can lead to everything from blindness to mental illness. Hitchens believes that these myths and taboos have contributed to countless sex crimes, including many perpetrated by religious leaders. He writes, “[H]ow shall we reckon the harm done by dirty old men and hysterical spinsters, appointed as clerical guardians to supervise the innocent in orphanages and schools?” (227).