Rabbi Alana Suskin recently posted an article on Huffington Post titled, “Why Religion Is Better Than Secular Ethics for Human Rights.” I attempted to post a comment on this article to address some of the claims made by Rabbi Suskin, but because Huffington Post has a horrible moderator system which only posts about half my comments and this one wasn't it apparently. So I have extended the comment to an article.
In her article, Rabbi Suskin claims that the Torah allows for Jews to question God when it comes to ethics and human rights. She writes:
"In the Torah portion that Jews read just last week, Parshat Pinchas (Numbers 25:10 - 30:1) we learn about five young women, who challenged an inheritance law in the Torah. God admitted the justice of their claim and changed the law."
My advice to the good Rabbi is to just wait until next week's Bible verse from Numbers 31:17-18. That's the verse where God orders Moses to rape and murder an entire village because those who lived there worshipped a different deity. Guess what? According to the story, they did it! How's that for Human Rights? No one apparently questioned God's order of mass rape and genicide. Fortunately, this is just a story and there is no evidence at all that the Midianites were actually raped and murdered in such a fashion. But it is still far from the shining metaphor for human rights claimed by Rabbi Suskin.
She also claims that, "Philosophers in the field of ethics have not been terribly successful at pinning down a rational basis for ethical behavior." This is not actually true. Sam Harris's latest book, “The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values,” does exactly that and he was not the first to state that there is a rational basis for ethics. Aristotle laid out such a philosophy in his book, “The Nicomachean Ethics.” I should also add that religion has not been terribly successful at pinning down a solid basis for ethical behavior either.
I also take serious issue with the Rabbi’s historical claims. Either she is ignorant of history or she is purposefully trying to re-write history to justify her already held conclusions:
“Perhaps that is why it was people of faith who led the fight for universal suffrage in the U.S., why Gandhi is revered for his nonviolent revolt against the British in India, and why the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. is a hero to people of all colors throughout the world for his stand to unionize African-Americans and support their fight for dignity and civil rights.”
I'm sorry, that is just ridiculously WRONG! Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Ernestine Rose and many other women who lead the suffrage movement were atheists and a quick flip through of the Bible is justification for why religious believers haven’t treated women very well at all. There wouldn't have been a need for a suffrage movement if the stories in the Bible didn't treat women as property in the first place.
As for the civil rights movement, atheists like W.E.B. DuBois, Hubert H. Harrison, George Schuyler, Joel A. Rogers, and many other in the 1920s were fighting for the rights of black people well before Martin Luther King Jr. and even during the 1960s, atheists like Bayard Rustin worked tirelessly behind the scenes with Dr. King. Besides, let's face facts here. Those who supported slavery definitely had the Biblical high ground.
Should I really even get into the civil rights issues of the gay community? Could Rabbi Alana Suskin seriously argue that religious believers have a better record in that fight than the secular community? That would just be laughable.
Religion’s record on ethics and human rights is appalling. It is appalling throughout history and it is appalling today.
Also check out William Hamby, the Atlanta Atheism Examiner's article: Rabbi Alana Suskin: Religion is better for human rights than secularism
Please check out the Atheism 101 series for frequently asked topics.
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