[Serious] The Humanities

[LadyForCamus]

what values has religion bestowed upon society with its overarching command? I notice obedience, fear of the unknown, discouragement of intellectual curiosity and questioning of authority, self hatred, and sexual shame to name a few.

This is interesting to me. I suppose it's taken for granted on a forum like this that these are the essential characteristics of any religion, and that this is what religious people get from their beliefs.

As far as I can tell, those are the values Christianity attempts to instill into its followers, and I think there is ample evidential support for that assertion. That being said, I understand that not everyone gets the same things out of their religion; not everyone interprets those values identically. That could be a topic of its own, IMO. 

This contrasts, I think, with what you write after:

Or, is truly good art the expression of an intimate and nuanced understanding of values we innately possess? Perhaps, simply the shared human experience, for better or worse, drives those things?

Is Christianity “truly good art”? Meh. It’s a pretty good con job. I don’t know if I’d call it art in the sense that it deserves reverence.

I don't think we just know what a shared human experience is like. So I agree with you that at least one of art's functions is to allow us to feel this. In fact I think we are fairly unaware of a lot of things that are going on in ourselves, much less in other people, and that art brings these things to light, or gives them "a local habitation and a name," so that we can think more clearly about them.

Well, if we’re speaking about values, artists are inspired by what matters to them. They must have some sense of what they care about, and a desire to express that ardor, before it can be expressed in the form of an artistic work. 

And one of the things that has been part of human experience is the positive value of religious experience.

Is there any way to quantify this? How do we know that the relationship between people and religion is a net positive one? Should we disqualify those who worship out of fear, or who spend their days in guilt and turmoil for being a sinner? Or, people who live in anger and bitterness; who hate their god for taking away their loved one? 

Though you and I may lack this, it has clearly been important for vast numbers of people. (I suspect that there will be people on this forum willing to pipe up and say that it has always been fake, or the result of fear, but I think we can take people's accounts as accurate, and not dismiss them based on mind reading.)

Sure. I won’t dispute that religious belief has been comforting for many, many people. 

I was raised without religion, but I have been fortunate to get some sense of a shared religious experience through the arts. Have you read I Promessi Sposi by Manzoni? Truly a great novel about the varieties of religious experience -- good and bad -- in the 17th century. Every Italian person knows it, so I don't know why it's not famous here. I know of no other book about what it is like to live in a society completely soaked in the Catholic religion. The results of religion in this book are not entirely like the list you describe.

I’ve not heard of it, no. And, I’m 50% Sicilian! Shame on me! 

Dante describes the achievement of merging with bliss, and the enormous sense of peace that derives from his religion. He is famous for saying, "all my thoughts turn toward love," which, given the Platonic and otherworldly origins of love that he believes in, is entirely a religious feeling. Blake lived every day in a religious ecstasy which he used to develop a beautiful Christian worldview, anticipating Kant and Jung, among others. 

Whether "good art imitates life" or not is an ongoing debate. I guess it depends on what we mean by "imitate." Zeuxis couldn't find a living model beautiful enough to pose for his Aphrodite, so he looked at a few dozen and chose the best features from each. Is this imitation? Surely it's not ONLY imitation. 

I wonder about your experiences with art... Have you been in the presence of something extremely beautiful and thought, "Oh, this is what religious people are talking about."

Sure, listening to certain music or reading a fine poem I have thought, “if there was a god, it would feel like this. But, I didn’t need a god to feel it. I was simply moved. When people
create art, they’re trying to connect with people. They’re trying to communicate something that is important, of value to them. They’re wanting to move you by crafting something out of what is moving them. I think you have to care about something first, before you make art about it. Not the other way around. 

 There's a temple in Kyoto that I go to every time I'm in the neighborhood, with a gigantic gilded statue of Amida Nyorai, and the most wonderful otherworldly atmosphere. If it's quiet and there aren't any squalling school groups, this gives a sense of what real believers must experience, I think. For them, it is more than an aesthetic surge. I don't believe in Amida Nyorai, but this experience allows me to share something with people who do.

If the statue wasn’t based on a religious figure, would you be as powerfully moved by it? Would the art alone be enough, or does imagining what it must feel like for a believer to experience that statue add something unique to your own experience of it?