The A-Z of Believing: H is for Heresy

Written and presented by Dr Ed Kessler MBE, founder director of the Cambridge-based Woolf Institute, this compelling guide to religious belief and scepticism is a must-read for believers and non-believers alike.

Founded in 1998 to explore the relationship between religion and society, the Woolf Institute uses research and education to foster understanding between people of all beliefs with the aim of reducing prejudice and intolerance.

Says Dr Kessler: “Latest surveys suggest that 85 per cent of the world’s population identify themselves as belonging to a specific religion, and in many parts of the world the most powerful actors in civil society are religious. Understanding religion and belief, the role they play and their impact on behaviour and decision-making is, therefore, vital.”

Dr Kessler – who was awarded an MBE for services to interfaith relations in 2011 – is an affiliated lecturer with the Faculty of Divinity at Cambridge University, a principal of the Cambridge Theological Federation and additionally teaches at the Cambridge Muslim College.

He says: “This A-Z of Believing aims to show how the encounter between religions has influenced and been influenced by the evolution of civilisation and culture, both for good and for ill. I hope that a better understanding of believing will lead people to realise that while each religion is separate, they are also profoundly connected.”

H is for… Heresy

Where two principles really do meet which cannot be reconciled with one another, then each man declares the other a fool and a heretic – Ludwig Wittgenstein

There is no orthodoxy that was not a heresy when it started. Christianity was accused by Jews of being a heresy for proclaiming Jesus as divine. Muhammad was criticised as a heretic by his polytheistic Arab contemporaries for preaching monotheism. And, I suspect among the names Pharaoh hurled at Moses, the former Egyptian prince, “heretic!” would have been one that came to mind. From this perspective, one might suggest that heresy is the best indicator of vitality, even authenticity.

Unfortunately, that has not been the reality, even though the term “heresy” (from the Greek hereisis) simply meant “choice” or “thing chosen” and the “heresies” referred to in old translations of the New Testament are merely differences of opinion. This meant that early Christian communities almost believed what they wanted, and worshipped as they chose, because there were no central authorities, no set rituals, no agreed canon of scripture, no Church hierarchy, and no established body of doctrine. The natural consequence of this state of affairs was that ideas and practices in different communities diverged.

However, towards the end of the second century, Irenaeus, bishop of Lyons, saw the dangers of numerous opinions developing and attempted to establish an orthodox body of teaching. His work Against the Heresies, argued in favour of only one church, outside of which there could be no salvation. Other Christians were heretics and should be expelled, and if possible destroyed. The first Christian emperor agreed. And it was Irenaeus who compiled a canon of the New Testament, which helped fix the boundaries of Christianity, or at least, Christian scripture.

Later religious groups, such as the Dominicans in 1216, were founded with the aim of identifying and removing heresy and were the prime movers behind the most famous Christian institution fighting heresy: the inquisition, established in 1233 by Pope Gregory IX, and lasting on and off until the 19th century. During the medieval period, apostasy was held to be a greater sin than unbelief, according to Thomas Aquinas and other medieval theologians.

Soon the Roman Catholic church established censors who had to certify that books contained nothing objectionable before they could be copied or printed. Words, phrases and even whole passages were blacked out. Complete books were placed on the Index Librorum Prohibitorum and banned from circulation. Following inquisitorial condemnation of the Talmud in 1242, the Dominicans burnt 24 wagonloads of rabbinic commentaries in Paris. The publication of Jewish books was tightly controlled for centuries by religious and secular authorities, both in Tsarist and Soviet Russia but the most spectacular act of censorship was the Nazis’ public burning of books “infected by the Jewish spirit” on 10 May 1933.

Heresy was also a major concern for Jews and Muslims and the Christian doctrine of Trinity – belief in one God, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit – was seen as a heretical teaching and the cause of profound mistrust between Christians on the one hand, and Jews and Muslims on the other. Yet for Christians, the Trinity measured what Judaism and Islam were missing: above all, recognition that the Second Person of God is incarnate in Jesus.

Such was the level of Jewish concern that the rabbis inserted a curse against apostates and heretics in the liturgy, called Birkat HaMinim – the curse of heretics. This may have been a reaction to the rise of Christianity. After the time of Emperor Constantine in the fourth century, conversion to Christianity was considered by Jews to be an act of apostasy. In turn, the Christian emperors and church councils deemed Christian converts to Judaism as apostates, and laws were enacted and punishments dispensed to prevent such conversions.

More recently, within Judaism, arguments about Zionism sometimes involved accusations of heresy, centred around the question of whether Zionism is an integral part of being Jewish, as the vast majority of Jews now maintain, or is intrinsically incompatible with Judaism, as some ultra-Orthodox Jews adamantly insist. Jewish religious opposition to Zionism derives from a firm belief that return and restoration can only come about under divine auspices and that any human attempt to “hasten the end” through political means is heretical.

In Iran, the Baha’i are considered a heresy; and to 17th century Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb, Sikhs were heretics; and the 16th century Ottoman sultan, Selim the Grim, regarded the Shia as heretics. Shia, in general, have often been accused by Sunnis of being heretics and this accusation is regularly directed the other way, as the Iraq civil war in the past two decades has tragically demonstrated.

Apostasy (the Arabic word – riddah – means to “turn back”) refers to reverting from Islam to kufr (unbelief), whether intentionally or by implication. Once a person becomes a Muslim by his or her free choice, there is no way by which he or she can change religion and Roman Catholic teaching is similar.

Accusations of apostasy within Islam have grown in recent decades. For example, the Ahmadiyya in Pakistan moved from being considered an Islamic religious minority to being declared in 1974 by the government of Prime Minister Bhutto as non-Muslims. Ten years later, under Zia-ul-Haq’s regime, the Ahmadiyya were punished with up to three years imprisonment for any members of the community who used the Muslim call for payer, or identified him or herself as a Muslim.

In some countries, heresy remains an offence, sometimes punishable by death, such as the 1989 fatwa issued by Ayatollah Khomeini, who offered a substantial reward for anyone who succeeded in the assassination of Salman Rushdie, whose writings were declared as heretical. This late 20th century edict demonstrates the relevance of Voltaire’s warning more than 200 years earlier: “It is dangerous to be right in matters on which the established authorities are wrong.”

Next week: I is for Incarnation

Listen to each episode of An A-Z of Believing: from Atheism to Zealotry on the Woolf Institute podcast site or wherever you get your podcasts