Home
 History
 About Us
 Faculty
 Courses
 Chaplaincy Program
 Muslim World Journal
 Online Articles
 Islam FAQ's
 Links
 Contact Us
 Site Map


Other Seminary Sites

Hartford Seminary

Hartford Institute
for Religion Research

Center for Faith in Practice

Seminary Library

Hartford Seminary

 ONLINE ARTICLES

 

Religious Tolerance

by Jane I. Smith

“Intolerance is the most persistent and the most insidious of all sources of hatred. It is perhaps foremost among the obstacles to civilization, the instruments of barbarism,” says Jay Newman in his 1982 work entitled Foundations of Religious Tolerance.’ Such an extreme condemnation of intolerance makes one wonder if its opposite, tolerance, is therefore the epitome of virtues. And indeed the pervasiveness of religious intolerance during most periods of world religious history certainly persuades the observer that a more charitable and non-judgmental attitude toward the other would have been a happier alternative. Nonetheless, many theologians and others who have reflected in recent times on the meaning of tolerance have found themselves considerably more tentative about its full merit, at least in a version that seems to them bloodless and unchallenging.

What, then, are some of the meanings proposed for religious tolerance? Some definitions are fairly passive, and have to do with tolerance as a state policy for dealing with religious diversity. “By tolerance,” says Gustav Mensching, “we mean — formally speaking — religious freedom granted the individual to choose and to practice as he wishes.”2 Thus formal tolerance simply means not interfering with the faith of another, or allowing different faiths to exist alongside one another and to carry out their beliefs and practices freely. It is this kind of tolerance that is intended by the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights, especially articles 2 and I 8.~ In this sense tolerance may be seen to be reasonably neutral, requiring little in the way of individual effort.

Others, however, have highlighted what they understand to be the more difficult aspects of tolerance. They identify the word etymologically as coming from the Latin, meaning “to bear,” “to suffer,” to “endure.”4 The theme of “bearing a burden” is elaborated by Louis Hammann, who says that we should keep in mind our expectation that God in effect tolerates us by bearing us up, as is implied in the Latin derivation of tolerating as picking up and carrying.5 Tolerance as suffering or enduring is not a quality of passivity or indifference, but entails an active and sometimes difficult response. Archbishop of York George Carey, for example, in his essay “Toleration” in Dan Cohn Sherbok’s Many Mansions. Interfaith and Religious Intolerance, argues that the dictionary definitions of tolerance as meaning “to put up with” or “to permit” do not get us very far, and fail to suggest what he sees as the connection between tolerance and pain. Perhaps when the medical profession speaks of a high or low tolerance for pain it offers a helpful way for us to think about religious tolerance as often involving a degree of suffering. Carey stresses that toleration is not indifference, and cannot be insofar as indifference suggests lack of conviction. The greater the degree of personal (or faith) commitment, he says, the more painful will be the act of tolerance. He quotes Ogden Nash: “Sometimes with secret pride I sigh, To think how tolerant am I; Then wonder which is really mine: Tolerance or a rubber spine?”6 “To like” and “to tolerate” are mutually exclusive, and tolerance means that you must have an opinion yourself. The stronger you feel the greater the pain.

It may be helpful to attempt to distinguish between “tolerance” and “toleration.” Newman, for example, says that toleration has the more broad application, referring to any kind of openness, in this case religious, and suggesting a kind of passivity. Tolerance, however, he sees as a behavioral term, suggesting a response of activity in the concrete actions in which such openness is demonstrated. Jeremy Goring agrees that this distinction connotes the basic difference between passive and active responses to the other, but takes it farther. Observing that religious toleration is no longer a live issue in the United States [I suspect that many Muslims, Hindus, Jews and others might beg to differ], he sees toleration as a problem only for those countries ruled by authoritarian dictatorships. However one might want to argue that issue, his point is that there is an essential passivity to toleration. But tolerance, he says, is a difficult and painful business.7

In terms of western history it is perhaps the case that the earliest concrete attempts to understand the meaning of tolerance came in the 16th century with the rise of the Reformation. The term was used in Germany and the Low Countries, and also in France, to mean permission or concession in relation to religious freedom.8 The main issue came to be whether more than one religion could be tolerated in the Christian state, with toleration actually meaning “permission.” The theologians agreed, of course, that permission need not mean approval.9 In the 16th century it is clear that tolerance was understood strictly as a theological concept, far different from its connotations in the anti-clerical atmosphere of the age of Enlightenment. Even politics was “theology-minded,” as the discussion ranged over the extent to which the state could be involved in matters of religion.

However, there also were influences from movements of Christian humanism and spiritualizing mysticism.’0 Joseph Lecler in Toleration and the Reformation make this interesting observation:

In spite of the stiffening attitude of the various denominations which became so pronounced after 1560, the Christian humanists still hoped to bring about religious unity. Unfortunately, they followed a dangerous road. In their wish to overcome the divisions of Christendom and to keep it open for increasingly radical sects, they reduced the dogmatic requirements to less and less. This, as experience showed, led to a gradual frittering away of the substance of Christian belief....11

This possibility of “frittering away,” of course, is still the deep concern of many people today who fear that tolerance may lead inexorably to the abandonment of deeply held beliefs and the ultimate dissolution of faith. For many this is manifested in their deep concern about the possible encroachment of ”syncretism,” a topic that has engaged the WCC on more than one occasion.  Some Muslims today are calling for an end to the term “interfaith,” on the grounds that it will inevitably blur the lines of distinction between faiths, and propose instead the adoption of “multi-faith” as a category for religious engagement with the other.

Religious discord was often the order of the day in the 17th century, and the struggles over religion were generally replete with political overtones and consequences. It was not unusual that those who advocated toleration when struggling against persons in power refused to practice it when they themselves came to power. Tolerance during and after the Reformation was especially difficult insofar as it suggested a loss of consensus over matters of ideological and theological “truth.” The arguments in its favor, therefore, were generally couched in practical, even secular terms, emphasizing the necessity of openness to otherness in order to achieve political stability and economic prosperity.

By the late 17th century specific theories of toleration were being developed even in theological/philosophical terms, particularly by those who were strong advocates of Christian reunion. These theories laid the basis for the more secular and intellectual views of toleration that were developed during the period of the Enlightenment. Thus John Locke’s famous “Letter Concerning Toleration” was conceived as a response to state intolerance: a diagnosis of what he saw to be the prevailing social ills of England and Europe in his time, and his own remedy for them. Some have termed it the theoretical counterpart of the Toleration Act of 1689.12 Unfortunately, the broader philosophical significance of Locke’s letter as a treatise on universal principles of toleration came to be ignored by the next century, when the immediate circumstances that had generated it no longer applied. Nonetheless it continues to be regarded as an important philosophical defense of a reasonable and open approach to questions of religion and politics, albeit one in which toleration takes a passive rather than active posture. It should also be noted that while Locke includes a few fleeting references to tolerating those who are not Christian, he is primarily concerned with toleration among the different groups of Christians.13  “Since you are pleased to enquire what are my thoughts about the mutual Toleration of Christians in their different Professions of Religion,” he wrote, “I must needs answer you freely, that I esteem toleration to be the chief Characteristical Mark of the True Church.” 14  During the 17th and 18th centuries, theologians, politicians and others writing about the benefits of tolerance were almost entirely in agreement that its limits need not extend to include atheists and those without religion (meaning, of course, without Christian religion).15

Archbishop Carey provides a brief but useful summary of what he sees as the three main phases in the history of religious toleration,16 using the term interchangeably with tolerance. He cites first the emergence of individualism during the Reformation, in which justification by faith and personal response to God took the place of total reliance on the church. Second, after the Reformation, came the creation of separate religious states with the cujus regio ejus religio theme of each region having its own religion. This, he notes, was tolerance for governments rather than for individuals, who still needed to conform to the state religion. Third he acknowledges the development of co-existence and the belief that because religion is so important it cannot be imposed either by one individual on another, or by the state on any individual. Observing that the 18th and 19th centuries were times of co-existence rather than genuine tolerance (the experience of the Pilgrim fathers was scarcely an example of religious tolerance!), he concludes that genuine tolerance is a quite recent phenomenon.

Among the many lessons of these past centuries, three seem to me to be particularly important for our contemporary reflections: (1) Ecclesiastical tolerance should not mean doctrinal compromise, particularly when such compromise is seen to signal the collapse of practical morality. (2) Theological openness is often the plea of the powerless, and is harder to espouse by those in positions of power, whether that is political or religious. (3) The complete separation of church and state, advocated by some in the name of religious tolerance, can lead to state secularization and thus a general atmosphere of national secular-ism, with the kinds of possible consequences so concerning to many religious people today. (This discussion, of course, has extremely serious implications for current conversations about the institution of Islamic Shari’a law.)

Let us turn, then, to some of the kinds of issues that have been raised recently with regard to religious tolerance. We have already noted that for some thinkers, it is essential to stress the active rather than the passive qualities of tolerance, and that this may involve no small degree of distress and even pain. The issue of relativism in relation to tolerance is also raised. (This has particular relevance in light of much post-modernist thinking.) Put simply, the relativist may hold that what is often seen to be objective truth is actually determined by one’s points of reference, including background, influences, culture, place in history, etc. Newman argues that in one way the relativist is actually a critic of tolerance rather than a defender, insofar as that person by definition sees religious tolerance as a vestige of an absolutist understanding of religion. There is no reason not to be open to the beliefs of others when it is arguable that no one belief is substantially more true than that of another.17  If one subscribes to this argument, it would mean that those who hold a theologically “pluralist” position (setting aside the substantial arguments against the still popular tripartite categorization of theological positions vis-à-vis pluralism), seemingly more tolerant than the proposed “exclusivists” or “inclusivists,” are actually not demonstrating tolerance at all!

Various attempts have been made to locate tolerance on a kind of scale that goes from complete rejection of the other to adoption of the views of the other. A student in a recent Doctor of Ministry class that I taught at Hartford Seminary found the varieties of negative responses so discouraging to contemplate in light of the history of hatred and violence in his native Philippines that he wanted only to consider the positive. These, he says, range from tolerance to respect to appreciation, no mean achievement for his country. Tolerance for him is only the first step in the movement from negation to acceptance.

A much more elaborate continuum has been proposed by Paul Mojzes,18 which it may be helpful to reproduce here. He suggests seven basic categories, ranging from negative to positive. These in progression are (1) war, (2) antagonism, (3) indifference, (4) negotiation, (5) dialogue, (6) cooperation, and (7) synthesis. He considers antagonism to be a milder form of war, and the most common kind of inter-religious response. Intolerance is clearly located in categories 1 and 2, but he sees the possibility of finding seeds of tolerance in 3. The movement from negative to positive begins in negotiation, although it is often based on self-interest rather than on genuine openness. In dialogue, Mojzes says, comes a fundamental shift in the perception of the other, with tolerance either implicit or explicit, and the granting to the other of the fundamental right to be different. Cooperation may be of a narrow kind, in which there is movement toward something that will bring both individual and mutual benefit, in which tolerance is limited and may contain the germs of confrontation. Or it may be based on a broader and deeper notion of tolerance, and move toward deeper understanding beyond simple common cause. Mojzes notes that the picture may get more complicated as different groups or factions find commonality with ideologically similar groups or factions of the “other” and seek common cause with them. Synthesis, or union, he describes as the result of the gravitating of two entities toward each other so powerfully that they end up as a single entity.

I find this model intriguing, if only insofar as it suggests the subtle complexities of determining how to move in the direction of a more positive stance, and where in that movement warning bells might begin to sound. Naturally one can tinker endlessly with such a structure. I can imagine, for example, 7 being split into two, with “merger” a possible intermediate step between cooperation and synthesis, or that a category of “painful tolerance” might go between indifference and negotiation. One might also argue that dialogue and cooperation could be inverted, depending on the nature of what is proposed for the dialogical encounter. If one accepts his assumption that it is in the category of indifference that the initial seeds of tolerance are to be found, it then becomes important to see how the notion of tolerance is broadened and expanded in the movement along the scale, and (as he himself does not) to note where there is actually a move beyond tolerance to some kind of identification. It might also be interesting to ask the question, for those religious traditions with an apparent mandate for “outreach” or “mission” or “call,” at what points on the continuum the carrying out of such a mandate is called for and where it is either inappropriate or unnecessary. Does tolerance tolerate movement of “evangelization”

A number of persons who have put their minds to an understanding of tolerance have pointed to the importance of making a distinction between tolerance of those persons who adhere to another faith tradition, and the tradition itself. That is, one can be tolerant of a Confucian, or a native practitioner, without needing necessarily to be tolerant of what we call Confucian-ism or Shaman-ism. Another student of mine, writing about recent movements within the Roman Catholic Church, commented: “I believe that with regard to interfaith dialogue, we cannot come to the experience of tolerance and then stop. We are obligated, by the precepts of our respective faiths, to move vigorously towards full acceptance, not of the faith traditions of another religion, but of each other as human beings — each one of, no more or less, than the other.” Mormon practitioner Robert Paul argues that in light of his commitment to the necessary relationship of human beings to God, and the love of God for all of God’s spiritual offspring, there is no moral or spiritual justification for not expressing genuine tolerance for those of another (or no) faith, even if one may not accept the tenets of that faith. Returning to the theme of tolerance as involving an element of pain or endurance, Jay Newman says that “Tolerating a religious belief, then, does not involve a half-hearted acceptance or endurance of the belief in itself, but rather it involves acceptance or endurance of someone’s holding [a] belief... .that one considers to be significantly inferior to one’s own alternative belief.”19 We may want to ask whether this distinction between the personal and the faith/tradition as the object of tolerance perhaps a bit simplistic. 

Jewish thinker Stanley N. Rosenbaum, in describing what he calls “circles that include and circles that exclude,” comes at the issue of tolerance by stressing the importance of making a distinction between “rightness” and “righteousness.” He cites TB Sanhedrin 55-60, “The righteous of all nations have a place in the world to come,” as affirmation that obtaining salvation depends not on theological “rightness” but in personal “righteousness.” (One might note here the increasing importance paid by many Muslims involved in inter-religious conversations to the repeated Qur’anic insistence that what God expects is a kind of competition among all people of faith in the doing of deeds of righteousness.) In this perspective tolerance of a religious tradition in and of itself seems to be of less importance than appreciation of the efforts of individual adherents to live according to their understanding of God’s intentions for them. Or to put it a bit differently, it means a focus not on belief but on action. This sounds nice on one level, but seems to me to be rather an easy way out that does not challenge us to consider either the potential for or the limits of tolerance.

Much of what has been said above suggests the point with which I would like to conclude these brief reflections, namely: “When and where should/does religious tolerance end?” Jeremy Goring in his essay entitled “The Meaning of Tolerance” argues that it is ignorance that is the root of the problem, and that the more knowledge we have of the other the greater will be the likelihood of tolerance. Other disagree, believing that toleration (or tolerance) is actually easiest when it is a response made out of ignorance. (The argument that tolerance requires a degree of pain might mitigate against calling this kind of response tolerance at all.) One may profess great openness to that about which he or she knows very little, indicating a broadness of spirit that does not have to encumbered with detail. When, however, such a person actually comes into direct contact with those who hold a position with which he or she seriously may not agree, such tolerance is on shaky ground indeed. I recall, for example, an introductory class on Islam that I taught years ago at Penn State University. Among the students were two young men from the Gulf States, and another from a half-way program at the local state penitentiary who professed himself a member of the Nation of Islam. My Gulfie Muslims were delighted that Islam had reached the shores of America until they heard about the NOI doctrines of the divinity of W.D. Fard and the supposed Prophet-like status of Elijah Muhammad. Tolerance ended immediately!

Jay Newman argues that religious minorities often are tolerated only so long as their actions and beliefs do not come into conflict with the major institutions of the dominant societal group. Realistically, he says, it is incumbent on those minorities to be constantly mindful that their tolerant neighbors or hosts will tolerate only so much. This, of course, raises extremely interesting questions for western societies today that are finding themselves increasingly home to new religious traditions arriving in the person of immigrants from eastern and other societies. Traditionally “liberal” nations that from a nationalist-secularist perspective have advocated tolerance and openness toward persons of other faiths are finding their tolerance sorely tested as their cultures are being redefined by the presence of new religions and ethnicities.

According to Hammamm, if the limits of religious tolerance are coextensive with our humanity, then certainly they are indeed narrow and we are caught in a web of our own devising. But if, on the other hand, we set limits that are beyond our own powers of imagination, how shall we know what they are? “Hypnotized by that paradox, stunned by that irony,” he asks, “what can we do?” Interestingly, he asks if the limits of religious tolerance are drawn indelibly for the monotheist and obliterated for the atheist! His conclusion, rather unsatisfying, is that we must set the limits perilously close to the borders of our own egos, leaving the reader to ponder whether the question of the limits of religious tolerance is indeed a theological or rather a psychological one.20

Theological liberals may find this a particularly vexing question. Should we tolerate what we basically disagree with? Here the answer that we exert tolerance in terms of the individual but disregard the belief itself, or the larger unit it represents, also seems unsatisfying and even somewhat of a coward’s way out. One of the common arguments engaged in by my “liberal” students and colleagues at Iliff School of Theology in Denver was whether our traditional openness should be extended to those who themselves are not “open” -- those who insist, for example, that women should not be given equal opportunities with men or that gays and lesbians are not to be welcomed into the Christian community or that in no way should God be envisioned as feminine. How tolerant are we called on to be? they ask. Obviously for many the answer must be that tolerance is misplaced when it seems to sanction those beliefs and practices that one is absolutely convinced are unproductive, misguided, or ill-intended. At that point, they say, one must call it as s/he sees it, and say Wrong. No More.

The somewhat “theoretical” nature of these comments is not meant to ignore the very deep concern we all share for the apparent rise of religious intolerance in many parts of the world. Careful consideration of the kinds of conflicts that are either smoldering or ablaze in areas such as the Middle East, Africa, Southeast Asia, the former Yugoslavia and many others underscores the deep complexity of trying to understand what religious tolerance really means. Should tolerance, for example, be expected on the part of an oppressed minority in relation to those who have been the oppressors? What is the relationship of tolerance to economic realities? Does the fact that economics may either bring together people of different and often conflicting religious identities (i.e. cooperation is essential for mutual financial well-being) or pull them apart (e.g. the Chinese Christians and the Muslims in Malaysia and Indonesia) have any bearing on how to think about religious tolerance? Does tolerance have a different meaning when parties are working for a common cause against a perceived common enemy? One may think here about the current kinds of religious understanding exercised between Palestinian Muslims and Christians as they struggle for statehood, and wonder if it will continue once that is achieved. Is tolerance for a common end truly tolerance? What about “internal” intolerance, as when members of one religious group deeply oppose certain actions of some of their co-religionists? What role does tolerance have in looking for a common solution to an “intolerable” situation, as in Nigeria where some Christians are actually supporting the institution of Islamic law as an alternative to the rampant vice, corruption and immorality they see in their society? One might even muse about whether women are more tolerant than men, or more willing to work together for inter-religious communication and cooperation as can be illustrated in some West African countries.

Clearly the topic of religious tolerance is both crucial as we try to understand and address conflicts throughout the world, and extremely complex in its boundaries, definitions, and implications. Let me suggest a few of the kinds of concerns and questions that the WCC might bring to the table in thinking together about these issues with our colleagues of other faith traditions:

1.  It is important to determine who is being tolerant in relation to whom. (a) The subject could be a person, a group (e.g. a denomination or religious tradition), or a political unit such as the state. (b) The object could be a person or a group (e.g. a denomination or religious tradition). Tolerance in the abstract is devoid of content.

2.  Can we distinguish clearly between what has been termed painless/passive (even neutral) toleration and painful/active (opinionated?) toleration? Is there a place for both? 

3.  Is there an essential difference between tolerance as the policy of a state (implied separation of church and state, or religion and state) and what we might want to advocate for our church members in relation to other Christians? Members of other faith traditions? 

4.  Where does the danger lie as we move along the continuum of war to synthesis (or that proposed by some other model)? Or is there any danger? Is theological compromise (a) to be avoided absolutely for fear of frittering away the substance of Christian belief, or (b) a challenging and even to-be-hoped for possibility that can be interpreted as gain rather than loss (as, perhaps in John Cobb’s “transformationist” theology)?

5. Is it our responsibility to try to impose whatever interpretations of tolerance we might agree with on our partners in interfaith conversation? Or, can we be tolerant of what seems to us to be intolerance on the part of others?

6. Is an “everything goes” kind of tolerance what we want to espouse? How (individually and communally) do we determine the limits of tolerance and in what ways can we make those limits known?

Endnotes

1.  Newman, p. 3.
2 . Mensching, p. 3.
3.  Mojzes, p. 21-24.
4.  Goring, p.4.
5.  Hammann, p.2.
6.  Carey, pp. 4-5.
7.  Goring, pp. 6-7
8.  This, of course, has been subject to particular kinds of interpretation. The Count of Clermont-Tonnerre is said to have commented during the French Revolution in relation to Jews that: “Jews should be denied everything as a nation but granted everything as individuals. It is intolerable that they should become a separate political formation or class Within the country: every one of them must individually become a citizen.” Francoise Champion, “The Diversity of Religious Pluralism” in MOST Journal on Multicultural Societies 1:2 (1999): 2.
9.  Lecler, pp. viii-x.
10. Lecler, p. 476.
11. Lecler, p. 480.
12. Romanell, p. 5.
13. Horton and Mendus, pp. 1-3.
14. Carey, p. 7.
15. It should be noted, however, that consideration of non-Christians was not entirely absent from discussions of tolerance. During the Reformation Roman Catholic theologians revived St. Thomas’ work in the Summa Theologica, looking specifically at the question of tolerance toward those known as “infidels.”
16 Carey, pp. 5-9.
17. Newman, p. 22.
18. Mojzes, pp. 1-24.
19. Newman, pp. 8, 10.
20. Hammam, pp. 4-5.

 

Bibliography 

Carey, George, “Toleration,” in Dan Cohn Sherbok, ed., Many Mansions. Interfaith and Religious Intolerance. London: Bellew Publishing, 1992, pp. 3-17.

Goring, Jeremy, The Meaning of Tolerance. The Lindsey Press, n.d.

Hammann, Louis J., “The Limits of Tolerance,” in Louis J. Hammann and Harry M. Buck, eds., Religious Traditions and the Limits of Tolerance. Anima Books, 1988, pp. 1-79.

Horton, John and Susan Mendus. John Locke. A Letter Concerning Toleration in Focus. London: Routledge, 1991.

Lecler, Joseph, S.J. Toleration and the Reformation. New Yorki: Association Press, 1960. Mensching, Gustav. Tolerance and Truth in Religion. The University of Alabama Press, 1955.

Mojzes, Paul. “Types of Encounter Between Religions,” in Leonard Swidler and Paul Mojzes, eds., Attitudes of Religions and Ideologies Toward the Outsider. Lewiston: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1990, pp. 1-24.

Morman, Paul J. Noel Aubert de Verse. A Study in the Concept of Toleration. Lewiston: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1987.

Newman, Jay. Foundations of Religious Tolerance. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1982. Paul, Robert. “Nonacceptance if Not Intolerance,” in Hammann and Buck, Religious Traditions.

Ronianell, Patrick. “Introduction,” John Locke, A Letter Concerning Toleration. Indianapolis IN: Bobbs-Merrill Education Publishing, 1955.

Rosenbaum, Stanley N. “Monotheism and the Roots of Intolerance,” in Hammann and Buck, Religious Traditions.