One of the supporters of the Zundelsite responded to yesterday's "The New Time Religion" Zgram. I welcome his response and invite others to send me their comments. I personally am convinced that there is going to be a misfit religion in gestation, and certainly the comments below ought to give our enemies as well as our friends some pause for thought:
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Konrad Schuller extols the religious aspects of the new "Place of Information" Holocaust memorial. But a religion has many facets. How well does the Holocaust or its many memorials resemble them?
Like all religions, the Holocaust must be ***believed*** without proof and in spite of all its improbabilities. It is a perfect match there.
To many, a religion's most valuable aspect is affiliation with an identifiable community of like-minded believers. The Holocaust may offer this boon to some, but since the publication of Norman Finkelstein's "The Holocaust Industry," one wonders about its value.
A religion also affords comfort at times of death -- either after bereavement or when facing one's own death -- as does Christianity's promise of resurrection or Hinduism's of reincarnation. The Holocaust fails this test. Instead of a denial of death, it is an affirmation of death.
A religion instructs its adherents in a code of morality. Here too, the Holocaust is sorely deficient, unless the cultivation of hate can be "morally uplifting".
A religion invites its followers to atone for their own sins. The Holocaust is concerned solely with the sins of outsiders.
A religion rewards its believers with hope for a better future. The Holocaust boasts "never again" but without conviction, as betrayed by its partisans' vicious reaction to dissent.
Of these six tests, the Holocaust passes only one-and-a-half. To call it a religion demeans religion. Let's call it a myth, as many are doing already.
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Thought for the Day:
"IS THERE a more contemptible poseur and windbag than Elie Wiesel? I suppose there may be. But not, surely, a poseur and windbag who receives (and takes as his due) such grotesque deference on moral questions."
(Christopher Hitchens)
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