Religious Extremism : An Unnatural State of Mind

By Catherine Leas

This book compares the history of the two largest world religions, Christianity and Islam, by focusing on how both began as purely voluntary and peaceful spiritual practices but were later co-opted by the urge to dominate others, to obtain wealth, and to create an empire in the name of the religion. Both religious empires eventually developed near totalitarian control over their subjects, in part by manipulating the subjects into believing that they were required to fight a proxy war on behalf of God against Satan, represented by all non-believers of their particular religion. The extent to which extremism still exists today in both religions can be traced to the mix of the power and controls necessary to conquer and rule an empire. Recent scientific discoveries about our brains and in particular about the connections between our cranial brains and our much smaller, but quite powerful cardiac brains, support the belief that we are designed to be compassionate and cooperative beings who must be manipulated and indoctrinated into believing that God wants us to commit violence, to kill others, and especially to conquer the entire world on his behalf. We are therefore the best proof against the validity of any religious beliefs that support conquering others in the name of God.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0692844562
• ISBN13: 9780692844564
• Release Date: April 2017
• Publisher: Leas, Catherine