Asceticism Religion And Biological Evolution

Author(s): Johannes Bronkhorst
Publisher: Johannes Bronkhorst

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JOHANNES BRONKHORST
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ASCETICISM, RELIGION, AND BIOLOGICAL EVOLUTION
is often assigned to him is the creation of the world, or of the living beings. Occasionally he is not even considered creator of the world and its inhabitants. Omniscience is an almost universally attested feature of the highest being. It is not usually understood to mean that the highest being knows literally everything. He knows what people do, even in secret. This kind of all-knowing is, of course, primarily a characteristic of human soul', also of an inactive soul', and it can cause no surprise that it was transferred to the highest being. An obvious extension of the idea of an all-knowing highest being is that of the highest being as a moral agent who may even punish where necessary.
6. The 'ascetic instinct: On the role of a counter-productive universal
The examples offered in the preceding section suggest that there is indeed a shared theme in a large variety of practices and beliefs that do not otherwise have much in common. The present section will therefore start from the assumption that there is a universal, a shared predisposition, that makes itself noticeable through these cases and, it may be added, has a role to play in accounting for at least an important part of those practices commonly termed ascetic and religious. For the sake of brevity, and following the now current, hypothesized "language instinct, I will use the equally unsatisfactory expression 'ascetic instinct'. The question as to how to account for the presence of such a shared predisposition is unavoidable and will be addressed in this section.
The parallel between the language instinct and the hypothesized ascetic instinct goes beyond both having a somewhat inappropriate name. Both are confined to human beings, and both regulate (if that is the word to use the interaction between individual humans and pre-existing cultural complexes-language and religion respectively. Both individual languages and individual religions evolve, and in doing so will adapt to the predispositions of their users. Both are therefore likely to evolve common features, something like UG in the case of language, something like the features described in the preceding sections in the case of religion. In both cases, it is to be kept in
mind that neither individual languages nor individual religions have to conform to the so-called universal features identified in a number of them. There is statistical probability that these features make their appearance as a result of a long process of cultural) evolution in which other factors play a role, too.
There is another factor that puts our proposed ascetic instinct on a par with the language instinct and in a different category from an instinct like sexuality. The features that we have united under the designation 'ascetic instinct-primarily asceticism and the inclination to see the self as not involved in activity by nature--are not accompanied by strong emotions, much like language and, notably, unlike sexuality. This is not to say that religion cannot be accompanied by strong emotions. Indeed, the central role of fear in the transmission of many if not most forms of religions is well known (e.g., Burkert 1996: 29; Michaels 1997; Durking-Meistererst 2000), as is the role of love and devotion. However, the features that constitute our proposed ascetic instinct are different. The ascetic and the martyr are not driven by fear, they defy and overcome it. "O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?," St. Paul wrote (1 Cor 15.55); there can be no doubt that his words have inspired countless martyrs and ascetics. Knowledge about the true (inactive) nature of the self is not accompanied by fear either. It is, on the contrary, the definitive way to separate oneself from fear and other emotions.
Language and religion are not in all respects parallel to each other and there are important differences between them. New religions may suddenly arise, where no such thing normally happens in the case of languages. People may be forced to abandon their religion in favor of another one; comparable replacements of one language by another, imposed by economic or political necessity, may as a rule be less abrupt. It is possible, even likely, that religions interact more strongly than languages with other ambient social and cultural developments. All this does not change the fact that, by and large, language and religion, being cultural complexes that individuals normally inherit from their elders and that, in doing so, adapt over the generations to the predispositions of their users, behave in roughly parallel fashion.
Since cultural complexes, such as language and religion, are subject to evolution in a way that is not dissimilar to genetic evolution, sometimes the notion of 'memes' (corresponding to genes in biological evolution) is used to designate the cultural units that are passed on
Attestations of this characteristic have been collected by Raffaele Pettazzoni in a number of publications (eg, 1931, 1956).