The A-Z of Believing: X is for Xenophobia

What is the cause of xenophobia, especially the religious variety? It arises from fanaticism, shaped by dogmatism, grounded in fundamentalism.

Namely, the unshakeable conviction that, in your sacred text, whether Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Sikh and even Buddhist; or in the secular world, the economic theories of Karl Marx or Milton Friedman, the political ideologies of communism, socialism and capitalism; you possess the whole truth and nothing but the truth, with the reassuring consequence that your side is always right and the opposing side invariably and inevitably wrong.

And what are the symptoms? Self-righteousness and arrogance; intransigence and refusal to compromise; a tendency to lecture rather than to listen; to brandish slogans rather than engage in thought; to distrust the democratic process of rational persuasion; or to demonise those who dare to disagree with you and ridicule them as heretics; a readiness to resort to verbal abuse and physical aggression and more generally that prideful obduracy, which the Bible calls the “hardening of the heart”.

The evidence is everywhere: the disenfranchisement of 65 million refugees – the same size as the population of the UK; the subjugation of Palestinians in Israel and exploitation of foreign workers in the Gulf; the persecution of Rohingya in Myanmar; in the recurring cycle of oppression and insurgency in the subcontinent; the continuing horrors of war in Syria; the bloody feuds of Iraq; in the land of liberté, égalité and fraternité, where 10 million votes were cast for the extreme right-wing party of Marine Le Pen 2017; the 13 per cent who voted similarly in the German elections; and don’t get me started about the “land of the free”, where a US president wilfully pursues a policy of division and discrimination.

But we need not look beyond the shores of the UK to discover suspicion, antagonism and xenophobia. Since the EU referendum was announced our own country has provided deplorable demonstrations of the same general tendency, as adversaries have been locked in deadly combat, each convinced they are wholly right and that the other is not merely wrong but villainous and must be ignominiously defeated.

We watch with dismay as the dispute about Brexit has dragged on week after dreary week, becoming ever more bitter and acrimonious. And we hear the cacophony of xenophobic noise, sensing people’s anger, driving them to deeds of brutality.

Here I must confess that, unlike 65 million of my fellow citizens, I am no expert on the EU. Consequently, I have no idea who or what is most to blame, and I have no solution to propose. But I do know one or two things. I know that intimidation, even merely verbal intimidation, and violence are to be condemned, utterly; that the rule of law must be upheld, decisively. “The law of the land is the law”, said the rabbis and similarly in the Hadith: “It is necessary upon a Muslim to listen to and obey the ruler, as long as one is not ordered to carry out a sin.”

Recent years have seen an alarming increase in bigotry and authoritarianism, stridency and militancy, polarisation and confrontation in our national life generally, in the political and also in the religious spheres. All of this feeds xenophobia and, in this dismal development, religious people must confess our shame that we are far from having constituted an honourable exception.

What then is to be done? Clearly the first step is to become fully alert to the magnitude of the danger we face; but the question remains how to counter it. The most important thing is to begin with ourselves. There is an aggressive tendency in all of us; so we had better make sure that we don’t succumb to the disease. It thrives on two deficiencies.

One is a lack of humility. For it is only when we are full of spiritual pride, only when we are quite sure that we know all the answers, that we have the presumption to impose our truth, our beliefs, on others.

The other deficiency on which xenophobia thrives is a lack of love for fellow human beings. It is a failure to respect the integrity and to appreciate the good of one another, to see in them the image of God. It is to say it, a hardening of the heart, a coronary sclerosis, spiritually speaking.

I’m sorry if this week’s offering is rather depressing but I have been depressed of late, and there is no time to lose. But the good news is, it is not too late. We should remember to judge society, not chiefly by its economic wealth, but by justice and compassion.

Prophets from different religions offer our stricken times the solace, the strength and the faith to see ourselves as horizontally bound together as brothers and sisters, vertically linked with the generations before and after us; reminding us that we are not only created in the image of our maker but that we need to live in that image.

“Seek the Lord while he may be found,” said the prophet Isaiah, “call upon him while he is near.”

Next week: Y is for Year

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

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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.”