Galaxy and the Sun

The 21 cm long radio wave radiation emitted from the hydrogen gas within the dense dust and gas clouds of the arms of the galaxy enables us to know about the structure of the galaxy. This information led us to conclude that our galaxy is indeed not a solid object and displays a circular motion of 250 km per second. The Solar system is estimated to complete one revolution around the galaxy in approximately 200 million years. At this point the critical question that comes to mind is how a solar system orbit is maintained and protected during these journeys where the solar system bypasses the gravitation and effects of strong heavenly bodies without causing disruption and collisions. The Earth just won’t become a habitable place only by considering planetary solutions. We may have to consider measures regarding our solar system and other galaxies, since the solar system has a very sensitive relation with the other heavenly systems in our galaxy.

The Sun’s position in the Milky Way

Trillions of comets in the Milky Way galaxy fill the outer space and encompass the solar system in a globular fashion. One of the comet groups orbiting the solar system is called Oort or Opic-Oort cloud. A hundred billion comets is estimated to exist in the Oort cloud.

These comets follow the designated orbits until they deorbit with gravity of another strong heavenly body other that the sun. Stars and masses of the Milky Way constitute a globular center with spiral arms where these arms extend out of the center in the same galactic plane. There are a limited number of systems located in the space between these spiral galactic arms. In fact, this is where our solar system exists. In other words, it deserves attention that the sun does not reside in the dense centric part of the galactic arm Orion (Hunter) but exists in the nearby sparsely populated galactic mid space. The solar system that has been placed in the most appropriate position within the Milky Way also needs to be protected from possible dangers it may encounter (like crossing paths with dense spiral arms) during its journey around center of the Milky Way.

Scientist who study the place of our solar system in galactic maps particularly point out that we are far away and safe from the devastating effects of cosmic storms.

If the solar system did exist in the arm where stars are densely populated and near each other, gravitational forces could result in changes in planetary orbits. For instance, in the spiral arms of the galaxy, comets would easily deorbit and bombard the earth momentarily under the strong gravitational force of these arms. Yet remarkable measures have been taken to protect against this as well! One of them is the velocity value of the Sun. For example, in order to provide an effective communication, a satellite positioned in the earth orbit is given a speed equal to the one earth has for rotating around its axis. Our sun is given a suitable velocity to move with almost the same speed of galactic arms without intercepting each other, thus providing a safe passage. However this is not the case in 95% of the stars and the spiral arms in our galaxy unlike the one determined for our solar system. This is something to reflect and think about. Another measure that prevents the sun from intersecting with the spiral arms is that it has a circular orbit rather than in the form of an ellipse like stars of the same age. Also in this regard, we observe that our sun is given a special movement allowing Earth to become a habitable place for life. The All-Wise and All-Mighty Creator works the galaxies just like a giant machinery wheel with his established laws.

The stars in the spiral arms may in time get sucked into the inner parts of the structure, not being able to hold on to their position for a long period of time. This is also applicable for the sun. Divine measures also intervene here and leave the sun in the protective zone. The sun is located in the “galactic common rotational radius” where strong spiral arm effects do not exist. Furthermore, when Supernova explosions take place, giant star debris can reach a couple thousand light years away, enabling the sun not to be negatively affected from these explosions since it exists in the outer regions of the arms.

Cosmic dangers in the galactic center

The solar system is 28,000 light years away from galaxy center. If our galaxy is considered to be 200 thousand light years wide, one can say that we are relatively close to the center.

This location in the galaxy is distant enough to be protected from the negative effects that could arise from the galaxy center. What would happen if the solar system was closer?

In this case we would constantly be exposed to dangerous gamma, X-ray, and cosmic radiations, therefore no life on Earth! Not to mention the black hole in the galaxy center which has a mass 3 million times as much as the sun. If the sun were to exist near the black hole, life on earth would again be negatively affected from the strong gravity of it. The extraordinary measures that have been taken for our solar system, the sensitive adjustments that are put in place, and the maintenance of such balance and complexity all displays a perfect science and a Divine power in the background. All these events demonstrate clearly that no single event of randomness and chaos exists in the universe. The most complicated and sensitive tasks are resolved in the best possible way, therefore revealing a perfect organization. We see this perfect organization between the Milky Way, the solar system and the earth!

Reference

Mishurov, Y.N. and L.A. Zenina. 1999. Yes, The Sun is Located Near the Corotation Circle. Astronomy & Astrophsica 341: s. 81–85.

Many have described Louis Massignon’s voice as “prophetic” and his own intense religious faith and commitment as “mystical.” Some have called him an “Islamized Christian” due to his passionate desire “to know,” to understand Islam and the experience of his Muslim friends and colleagues from the inside out. His relationship with the Muslim world began in his early twenties when he was introduced to the 10th century Persian Sufi saint and mystic known as Husayn Ibn Mansur al-Hallaj. Hallaj was born into an Arabic speaking family in a small town in Iran in 858 CE and became a renowned teacher and outspoken lover of Allah with many followers. A threat to the religious establishment, he was subjected to a long imprisonment in Baghdad before being put to death in 922 CE. Massignon was intrigued by this story and began his research on the life and legend of al-Hallaj, initially for his University dissertation.

While on an archeological mission for the French government in Baghdad in 1908 and simultaneously researching his thesis on al-Hallaj, Massignon experienced an intense encounter with the Divine that he later described as “the Visitation of a Stranger” breaking into his life and throwing him to his knees in a moment of supplication that caused him to cry out in Arabic, “God, help my weakness.” He was 25 years old. At that time Massignon had been immersed in his study of Arabic, Arab culture, and Islam and his unusual conversion experience in the midst of the Muslim world brought him back to his Roman Catholic roots. He was sure that his religious conversion was due in part to the intercession of the 10th century Muslim saint, al-Hallaj along with the prayers of his Muslim friends.

It is to some aspects of Massignon’s extensive legacy as a pioneer of our current understanding of interreligious dialogue that I wish to focus this tribute to Louis Massignon on the 50th anniversary of his death.

The Badaliya

In Damietta, Egypt in 1934 Massignon and an Egyptian Melkite Christian woman, Mary Kahil founded a prayer movement that they called the “Badaliya,” or “substitution.” The prayer of offering one’s life for the sake of others was a profoundly mystical interpretation of Christianity for followers of Jesus Christ, the One who offered his life for the salvation of all of humanity. The Badaliya was established in the Middle East to encourage what Louis Massignon saw as the “vocation” of the Christians who have lived there since the time of Jesus to be witnesses of Christ’s love for all people. Massignon envisioned that those Christians who are living in the Middle East are called to “cross over” to their Muslim neighbors, to pray for them that God’s will be done in them, to befriend them, work with them and come to love them as Christ loves us, even to the point of offering ones lives for them if necessary. That is how much God loves us all so we must love one another in the same way. Many small groups around the world along with individuals, both religious and lay persons joined the monthly Badaliya gatherings in person or in spirit. Inspired by the hermit Priest, Charles de Foucauld who lived amidst the Muslim Tuareg people in the Algerian Sahara and others, including the Indian guru Mahatma Gandhi, they were dedicated to fasting and praying for non-violent resolution of conflicts throughout the world especially in the Middle East. The group in Paris dissolved when Massignon died in 1962 but Mary Kahil continued in Cairo until she died at the age of 90 in 1979.

On December 8th, 2002, following the attacks on the World Trade Center in NYC, the Pentagon in Washington DC and in Pennsylvania on September 11, 2001, a small group gathered in Boston, Massachusetts to re-create the Badaliya prayer in the spirit of Louis Massignon and Mary Kahil. They are dedicated to peace and reconciliation for all three Abrahamic faith traditions, especially in the Middle East, and to learning about Islam and the Muslim world by befriending the Muslim community in our own neighborhoods. Use of the internet has broadened our membership in spirit to more than 120 members worldwide. Reflecting on Massignon’s writings before, during and after the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 with his vision of peaceful coexistence and the sharing of life by all three Abrahamic faith traditions in the Holy Land has become a central concern for our prayer. Members of the Badaliya encouraged the community at St. Paul’s Catholic Church in Cambridge, Massachusetts to establish a Partner Parish in Beit Sahour, Palestine with the help of the Holy Land Christian Ecumenical Foundation in Bethesda, Maryland and Bethlehem, Palestine. Following in the spirit of Massignon’s own many spiritual pilgrimages to the Holy Land and his writings on Jerusalem and Nazareth our Holy Land pilgrimages have rewarded us all with new friendships across faith traditions, a new experience of our Christian faith tradition and first hand experience of the painful reality of life for our brothers and sisters, the “Living Stones” who guard our traditions in the Holy Land.

The inspiration of the Badaliya and its invitation to reflect deeply on the meaning of substitutionary prayer for believers today has led to the foundation of many communities dedicated to its vision of interfaith relations.

The Al-Khalil Community at the Monastery of Deir Mar Musa, Nebek, Syria

In 1984 a young Italian Jesuit Priest, Fr. Paolo Dall’Oglio, discovered an abandoned ancient 11th century Monastery that had originally been established in honor of a 6th century Ethiopian hermit named Saint Moses in the Syrian desert 80 kilometers North of Damascus. With the help of the Syrian government, the local church and volunteers from Syria and Europe the ancient frescoes have been restored and a contemplative community dedicated to interfaith relations has been established. The spirit of Louis Massignon’s Badaliya has been the foundation of the spirituality encouraged at Deir Mar Musa, from the daily rhythm of prayers in Arabic to welcoming the stranger and inviting the involvement of the local Muslim villagers who share in the daily life of the community. The title of one of Fr. Paolo’s books, Amoureux de l’Islam, Croyant en Jésus (Lover of Islam, Believer in Jesus) speaks for itself of the true witness to the spirit of Badaliya and the legacy of Louis Massignon alive in the world today.

Christian de Chergé and the Monks of Tibhirine

There is a list of many Christian souls who have been called to share life with their Muslim brothers and sisters and some, like the monks of Tibhirine whose story can be experienced in the recent film, “Of Gods and Men,” who have offered their lives. Christian de Chergé has been described as a Trappist monk whose Christian faith was enhanced and “converted” by his engagement with Islam. In a book dedicated to the spiritual writings of the Prior of the Monastery at Tibhirine (Ray, C. Christian de Chergé: une biographie spirituelle du prieur de Tibhinrine. Éditions Albin Michel, 2010). There is the true story of how Christian de Chergé came to understand the deepest meaning of Massignon’s substitutionary prayer, of Badaliya.

In 1959 while serving his obligatory service as an officer in the French military during the Algerian War for Independence from France, Christian was assigned to a rural Algerian community. There he became friends with an Algerian peasant and father of ten. Mohamad was a devout Muslim and the young Christian was profoundly moved by observing his friend’s response to the call to prayer five times a day. Despite their very different experiences of the colonial occupation in Algeria, they both recognized that they belonged to the same human family in the eyes of God. Mohamad’s loyalty to his friendship with Christian de Chergé caused him to step in to protect his friend when he was attacked by members of a local militia and to try to prevent further dispute. The next day Mohamad was found assassinated beside a well. It took many years for Christian de Chergé to process this experience but it became a foundational one for the rest of his spiritual life. Only in 1972, in front of his brothers in Tibhirine, was Christian finally able to tell the story of Mohamad’s sacrifice for him. “Through the blood of this friend, assassinated for having not wished to make a pact with hatred, I knew that my call to follow Christ must find a way to live itself out, sooner or later, in the same country where I had been given this proof of the greatest love” (p. 71).

From then on there was no doubt in Christian’s mind that Mohamad had mysteriously entered into the communion of saints that knows no religious boundaries. He wrote:

“I know at least one beloved brother, a committed Muslim, who gave his life out of love for another, concretely through the spilling of his blood. An unimpeachable testimony that I welcome as an extraordinary opportunity.” (p.71)

The Qur’an says: “The one who saves one single person is considered as if he had saved everyone.” (5:32)

Christan de Chergé was dedicated to the Muslim community among whom he lived and served for many years. At the moment of the abduction of seven of the monks from the Monastery in Algeria there was a group from a Muslim Sufi Order on their annual visit to an interfaith gathering to share life and pray with the brothers.

Christian de Chergé was a true follower of the spiritual legacies of both Charles de Foucauld and Louis Massignon and lived the call to Badaliya, substitutionary prayer, all the way to the ultimate sacrifice of his own life.

The Seven Sleepers: Muslim and Christian shared pilgrimage

In 1954 Louis Massignon discovered a chapel in the small hamlet of Vieux Marché, Brittany in France, dedicated to Seven Christian Saints called La Chapelle des Sept Dormants. When he realized that the ancient Breton story of the seven saints corresponded directly to the 18th Sura of this same story of resurrection in the Qur’an and to the site of the seven sleepers tomb in Ephesus, Turkey, he approached the local Bishop with the request to expand the already existing annual pilgrimage in Vieux Marché to include both Muslims and Christians and prayers from both traditions. This Annual pilgrimage continues to take place every summer in July near to the Feast of Mary Magdalene, the first to witness to the Resurrection of Our Lord, Jesus Christ and attracts pilgrims from all over the world.

It is clear from Louis Massignon’s letters to members of the Badaliya from 1947 to 1962 that delving ever deeper into the meaning of substitutionary prayer led Massignon himself to greater and greater involvement with the social justice issues of his time, to volunteering in the French prisons to educate Algerian freedom fighters during the Algerian war for Independence in the late 1950’s and into the 1960’s, to speaking publically and standing on the side of the disenfranchised, the refugees and displaced, especially the Palestinians during and after the establishment of the current State of Israel, while remaining faithful to his friendships with his Jewish and Israeli colleagues. The legacy of Louis Massignon continues to lead many seekers of the Divine toward greater love of others of all ethnic and faith traditions. His life and work point us always in the direction of the Holy in all traditions and his lifetime of research and revision of his four volume Opus Magnus, The Passion of al-Hallaj remains a shining example of this devout Christian’s dedication to the eternal message of a great Muslim lover of the Divine.

A member of the Board of Directors of L’Association des Amis de Louis Massignon in Paris, Dorothy C. Buck is a licensed mental health practitioner and Pastoral Counselor in Somerville, MA she continues to give lectures and publish articles and books on spirituality and interreligious dialogue.

According to truth-seeking scholars, ihsan (perfect goodness) is an action of the heart that involves thinking according to the standards of truth; forming the intention to do good, useful things and then doing them; and performing acts of worship as best as possible and in the consciousness that God sees them. To attain perfect goodness, an initiate must establish his or her thoughts, feelings, and concepts on a firm belief, and then deepen that belief by practicing the essentials of the religion and training his or her heart to receive Divine gifts and be illuminated by the light of His manifestations. Only one who has attained such a degree of perfect goodness can really do good to others just for the sake of God, without expecting anything in return.

According to a Prophetic saying, perfect goodness is that you worship God as if you were seeing Him; for even if you do not see Him, He certainly sees you. The most comprehensive and precise meaning of perfect goodness is that there is no fault in an initiate’s action, and that he or she is always conscious that God is always watching. An initiate must concentrate on his or her actions with all of his or her will, feelings, awareness, and outer and inner senses. An initiate who is aware of God’s supervision to this degree, and who therefore strives to act in the best way possible, cannot help but do good to others. Doing good to others then becomes an essential attribute of his or her nature, and radiates as light radiates from the sun.

Ihsan, in the sense of doing good to others, is summed up in the Prophet’s principle of desiring for one’s fellow believer whatever one desires for oneself. Its universal dimension is defined in the following Prophetic Tradition:

Surely, God has decreed that you excel in whatever you do. When you lawfully punish someone by killing, do it kindly; when you slaughter an animal, slaughter it kindly. Let him who will slaughter it sharpen his knife and avoid giving the animal much pain.

Consciousness of goodness is like a mysterious key that opens the door of a virtuous circle. An initiate who opens that door and steps into that illuminated corridor enters the “spiral” of a mysterious ascension, as if stepping onto an escalator. In addition to being endowed with this virtue, the correct use of one’s free will to do good and refrain from evil will result in an advance of two steps for each step taken: Is the reward of excellence other than excellence? (55:60). As we read in commentaries on the Qur’an or books of the Prophetic Traditions:

Once God’s Messenger, upon him be peace and blessings, he who was truthful and confirmed, asked his Companions about the verse: Do you know what Your Lord means by this verse? The Companions answered: God and His Messenger know better. He explained: The reward of the one upon whom I conferred belief in Divine Unity is nothing but Paradise.

When the consciousness of goodness invades one’s heart like clouds of rain, Divine favors begin to pour down. The possessor of such a heart, addressed by the verse: For those who do good is the greatest good, and even more (10:26), feels the profound pleasure of having been created as a human being.

In addition to the blessings of Divine grace in return for good actions, Divine gifts issue from God’s Graciousness and Kindness in return for a heart’s sincere intention. We are unable to conceive of or describe such gifts.

A sound heart leads one straight to God without any deviation, and goodness is the heart’s greatest and most rewarding action. Goodness is the safest way to ascend the slopes of sincerity, the most secure means to reach the peaks of being approved by God, and the consciousness of self-possession before the Eternal Witness. Of the many people equipped with belief, as well as deep fear and reverence for Him, who have taken the wings of good action and set out toward Him, only a few succeed in reaching the peak. May those who have not yet reached it try their utmost to do so. Those who have reached the peak feel deeply the ugliness of whatever God dislikes and are immune to it, while they are ready to do whatever He likes and to adopt such as their second nature.

O God! Favor us with a good, happy end in all our affairs, and save us from humiliation in the world and punishment in the Hereafter. Assign for us from awe of You such amount that it may intervene between us and any disobedience to You. And bestow blessings and peace on Muhammad, our master and the master of those distinguished with perfect goodness, and on his Family and Companions, all of them.

Come and see them in their graves.

Only a large shirt is their share

And even those, without sleeves

Dignitaries they had been

With servants standing before them

Now come and see, you can’t tell,

The late masters from their men

What does sustainability mean? According to the definition by the World Commission on Environment and Development, sustainability means meeting the current needs without compromising the ability of future generations to do the same. Sustainability embraces more than just the environmental concerns; it also includes both social and economic factors. Thus it provides a holistic and inclusive foundation from which to operate.

Why care about sustainability anyway? It is because our very own life depends on clean air, drinkable water, arable land, other species and one another to exist. After all, if we are not breathing air, drinking water and eating plants or animals, we are not living. We are all part of a system, whether on a local or global scale. In order to make choices that will help us to improve our quality of life, we must first understand sustainability and the environmental issues present in our daily lives and how our actions are related to those issues. Once we understand our contribution to the problem, we can then begin to make decisions that will help, not harm, our planet, our future generations and ourselves (Worksbook, p.10).

As Pope John Paul II stated “Modern society will find no solution to the ecological problem unless it takes a serious look at its life styles.” If we categorize our life style in a way that helps us analyze the environmental impact of our choices, we might end up having three main categories: Water, Energy, and Waste. This article focuses on the problems related with those categories and the solutions that can be done on a personal level.

Water

“By means of water, we give life to everything.” (Al-Anbiya, 21:30)

Water is very precious, yet it is very scarce. Even though water covers two thirds of the surface of our planet, the freshwater in rivers, lakes, and streams represent only 0.02% of the earth’s total water (United States Geological Survey). According to an estimate from the United Nations, by the year 2025, around 2 million people will be living in regions with absolute water scarcity, and two out of three people on earth could be living under conditions of water stress if nothing is done. So, what can you do about it? According to the Sustainability Primer Works Book, the things you can do include finding and fixing the leaks around your home; because leaking faucets and toilets can account for as much as 20 gallons of water lost per person per day (Treehugger team, 2006). You can also install water saving devices, because high efficiency toilets and showerheads can save the average household about 30 gallons of water each day (Walsh, 2009). A low flow high efficiency showerhead uses 2.5 gallons of water or less per minute, whereas traditional showerheads use 5 gallons or more per minute. The top priority is changing your behavior. Simply turning off the water while shaving or brushing teeth could save more than 5 gallons (19 liters) of water per day. Keeping a bucket or large pitcher in the bathroom or kitchen to capture the excess water while you are waiting for the hot water to make it to the faucet can get you enough water, which can be used for your pets, plants, to wash produce etc.

Energy

“To warn of the dangers is not to despair of the solutions.” Al Gore

Much of the world’s current energy production is unsustainable. The burning of fossil fuels such as coal and oil to produce electricity depletes non-renewable resources, and releases pollutants that contribute to smog, acid rain and other types of air pollution. Electricity production is indeed the leading cause for industrial air pollution. Replacing your incandescent bulbs with more energy efficient Compact Fluorescent Bulbs (CFLs) or Light Emitting Diodes (LEDs) can be a good start to go green for energy around your house. Lighting accounts for up to 25% of home electricity use (California Energy Commission). CFLs use one-fourth the energy of standard incandescent bulbs to give out the same amount of light, and they last ten times longer. LEDs may even last 50 to100 times longer than the standard light bulbs. According to the US department of Energy: “If every home in America replaced just one incandescent light bulb with an ENERGY STAR qualified CFL, it would save enough energy to light more than 3 million homes and prevent greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to those of more than 800,000 cars annually.”

You can also pay attention to heating and cooling in your home.

Basic things like changing the filter, putting on a sweater instead of turning on the heater, and setting the thermostat appropriately might save up to 10% off your electricity bill. Think about buying energy saving appliances when you need to buy new ones, simply look for the signs like ENERGY STAR. Also, shut off appliances whenever possible. The U.S. Department of Energy recommends using “standby-mode” when our computers will be idle for more than 20 minutes. It also points out that 75% of electricity used to power home electronics is consumed when these appliances are “turned off.” You can use a power strip to turn everything completely off when finished for the day.

Waste

“Waste not want not!” Benjamin Franklin

World economies operate on a take, make, waste model, which is a one-way linear production system in a finite world. The problem with this system is that it operates as though everything were in infinite supply. But this is not the case for our limited resources. Our current practices for waste generation create significant environmental, economic, and public health problems. Generally, the public is unaware where our trash ends-up, and what it causes there. Landfill, also known as a dump, is a site for disposal of the wastes by burial. A large number of adverse impacts may occur from landfill operations. One is serious pollution of the local environment such as contamination of groundwater and/or aquifers by leakage and residual soil contamination during landfill usage. Another is after landfill closure; the generation of methane by organic waste decay (methane is a greenhouse gas many times more potent than carbon dioxide, and can itself be a danger to inhabitants of an area.) Then there are simple nuisance problems such as dust, odor, vermin, and noise pollution.

The problem is not only what we do with waste but also what we waste. According to United States Department of Agriculture, over a quarter of the country’s food that is approximately 25.9 million tons, gets thrown away every year. On the other hand, the number of cell phones Americans tossed out in 2008 is 130 million (Larry Greenemeler, 2009). Recycling them would have saved enough energy to power 194,000 homes for a year. The current U.S. recycling average for the so-called e-waste, including unwanted cell phones, televisions, PCs, computer peripherals, computer mouses, keyboards and many others, is in the order of 10 to 13%. Sustainability Primer points out the things you can do about waste issues. These include but are not limited to reducing how much you consume and to reuse items whenever possible, to bring your own reusable bag, and reuse paper and plastic bags. Reuse paper and envelopes at home or in the office. Recycle office supplies like printer cartridges, toner etc. At home, recycle everything you can or collect for hazardous household waste. You can also give away or donate things that you don’t use. Like the “good old times,” repair instead of discard, purchase well designed quality items that last longer. Try to recreate the old-good habit of borrowing and sharing the resources among neighbors and family. It may take some effort but start composting your food waste. In addition to all above, the best thing you can do is “close the loop” by purchasing products made from recycled materials.

All things considered, does it seem like you need to suffer at all to go green?

If we want to change the way things are going, we should listen to what Gandhi said, “I must be the change I wish to see in the world around me”. Living in balance with nature requires understanding the value of the bounties we take for granted. Because “In the end, we will conserve only what we love. We will love only what we understand and we will understand only what we are taught” Baba Dioum.

References

• Sustainability Primer Works Book, Worksbook, Community Partners/Sustainable works, Los Angeles, 2009-2010 Update, SMVersion 9.0.
• Treehugger Blog, “How to green your water,” December 03, 2006. www.treehugger.com
• Walsh, B. “Getting real about the high price of cheap food,” Time Magazine, Aug 21, 2009.
• California Energy Commision, http://www.energy.ca.gov/efficiency/lighting/
• Division of Information Technology, UW- Madison “Turn off your monitor to save energy? Do it.” December 29, 2005 http://www.doit.wisc.edu/news/story.asp?filename=598
• Greenemeler L. Scientific American blog, comment on Trashed Tech: Where Do Old Cell Phones, TVs and PCs Go to Die?, November 29,2009 http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=trash-tech-pc-tv-waste

Robots that “care” are no longer merely science fiction …

Producing machines that look and behave like people seems to be a human project with a long history. Mention of a Jewish Rabbi producing an instance of the legendary golem (a creature understood to possess an active human-like body, while lacking a soul) appeared as early as the 4th century CE. The celebrated 13th-century Muslim engineer Ibn al-Razzaz al-Jazari undoubtedly designed, and may have constructed, what has been described in present-day terms as “the first programmable human-like robotic device” – a spectacular artifact featuring four robotic musicians performing on a floating boat (Nicks 2010). Inspired by animated life-like figures reportedly created by an ancient Greek named Ctesibus, Leonardo da Vinci – around the time in the 1400s at which he began painting his famous Last Supper – also designed a human-like robot resembling a knight in armor. Fascination with the idea of crafting convincing imitations of people appears to have been part of human history for millennia.

In more recent times, though, modern computers – and with them, research introducing so-called “artificial intelligence” (AI) – have begun to give this long-standing fascination some significant new dimensions. Perhaps the most widely recognized contemporary human-like (or, nowadays, “humanoid”) robot is a product of Japanese science and technology named “ASIMO.” Resembling a short (4 ft 3 in) astronaut wearing a backpack, ASIMO represents the fruit of several decades of research and development conducted by the Honda Motor Company. Videos on the company’s official web site show ASIMO climbing stairs, jogging, balancing on one foot, visually recognizing people by name, and serving a tray of beverages to restaurant patrons. Similar examples of this impressive humanoid robot technology exist in other countries as well – e.g., Turkey (Today’s Zaman 2010), United Arab Emirates (Fahad Inc. 2008), and South Korea (Impactlab.net 2008).

Investment by business enterprises in the significant cost and engineering effort required to design and build these curiously humanoid machines constitutes one of the “new dimensions” previously mentioned. Historical figures such as Al-Jazari and da Vinci, after all, were not responding to global marketing prospects with their robotic creations. In contrast, a current Honda Motor Company web site tells us that ASIMO was intended to be more than an attention-catching novelty from the beginning; in fact, it was “created solely to perform tasks to assist people, especially those lacking full mobility” (Honda Robotics 2011). Similarly, the president of a Robotic Industries Association reports that South Korea is “taking the lead in promoting the use of robots for service applications such as elder care” (Burnstein 2009). A former GM of the Microsoft Robotics Group has identified such assistive care as the market that “intrigues” him the most, citing approaching increases in senior populations – and, consequently, heavier burdens upon healthcare systems – as factors that may “present the ‘killer app’ for personal robots” (Foley 2009). A 2009 online report titled “Robot Nurses to Care for Japanese Elderly within Five Years” reports that Warwick University, in England, has undertaken a “three year 2.7 million dollar project to develop a robot nurse,” predicting that “nurses could be delegating tasks to robotic colleagues by 2020” (Zygbotics 2009).

It is important to note that such robotic “colleagues” of human nurses commonly are intended to be suited for fairly intimate kinds of social interactions with people. One finds, for instance, references to robotic assistance in recreation and with feeding, grooming, walking, bathing, etc. (Babyboomercaretaker.com 2007). Accordingly, we encounter another new dimension. Robotic arms have welded and painted in our automobile factories for decades, but the repetitive activities of these familiar industrial robots are profoundly different from interaction with a humanoid machine that helps one’s aging grandmother eat her dinner and take her medicine (perhaps even chatting and playing a card game with her). Moreover, the latter type of robot no longer is mere science fiction; design and construction of machines to perform these kinds of personal human-robot interactions are taking place now.

… and these robots that “care” invite some questions

Considered only as machines meant to assist overburdened nurses with their care of older people, the types of humanoid robots just described might initially be categorized simply as useful new tools. We have reasons to wonder, though, how long those who will be interacting regularly with these life-like robots can be expected to perceive them merely as tools. So-called “animaloid” robots, such as the robotic dog AIBO that was marketed in recent years by the Sony Corporation, admittedly represent a somewhat different class of robotic artifact than the more complex contemporary humanoids such as ASIMO. Nevertheless, empirical studies of human-robot interaction even with AIBO have uncovered some relevant thought-provoking surprises. Not long ago, for example, numerous online postings by owners of AIBO began appearing on Internet forums. One study of these postings noted the following confession by an AIBO owner:

The other day I proved to myself that I do indeed treat him as if he were alive, because I was getting changed to go out, and [AIBO] was in the room, but before I got changed I stuck him in a corner so he didn’t see me! (Friedman, Kahn, and Hagman 2003, 278)

Regardless of whether this posted confession was altogether truthful, its expressed thought of needing modesty in this case clearly alerts us to the potential psychological potency of human interaction with such machines. Abrahamic religions, through their shared accounts of the Garden of Eden, have long recognized appropriateness of modesty between even the primordial man and woman – but application of that sentiment to our dealings with a battery-operated dog suggests how plastic human notions of personhood might be!

For that matter, professional testimony of such plasticity for the specific case of humanoid robots is available in a frequently-quoted set of observations by Professor Sherry Turkle, Director of the MIT Initiative on Technology and Self, at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. One of her MIT colleagues, widely-recognized roboticist Rodney Brooks, is among the many people who have cited Turkle’s report of her first encounter with his experimental humanoid robot, Cog; note carefully Sherry’s candid description of the experience:

Cog “noticed” me soon after I entered its room. Its head turned to follow me and I was embarrassed to note that this made me happy. I found myself competing with another visitor for its attention. At one point, I felt sure that Cog’s eyes had “caught” my own. My visit left me shaken – not by anything that Cog was able to accomplish but by my own reaction to “him.” For years whenever I had heard Rodney Brooks speak about his robotic “creatures,” I had always been careful to mentally put quotation marks around the word. But now, with Cog, I had found the quotation marks had disappeared. Despite myself and despite my continuing skepticism about this research project, I had behaved as though in the presence of another being. (Brooks 2003, 149)

Professor Turkle’s testimony is consistent with an entire literature of contemporary research in human-robot interaction that suggests a deep human predisposition progressively to accept as peers various machines that convincingly mimic human appearance and autonomous behavior. Her reference to discovering herself behaving as though she were “in the presence of another being” points, in turn, toward some questions that invite our reflection.

First, one might inquire whether (and why) it could matter that humans seem so inclined to regard convincingly humanoid machines as peers. For some people, it apparently does not matter. From his perspective as a practicing Zen Buddhist, for example, robotics engineer Masahiro Mori has argued against insisting upon any profound distinction between persons and robots, noting that there “must also be buddha-nature in the machines and robots that my colleagues and I make” (Mori 1999, 174). In contrast, though, a pilot study has suggested that Abrahamic theistic belief in creation of individual human souls by a personal deity may be related to disapproval of human-robot interaction “with life-like personal robots that requires human acceptance of the robots at intimate levels” (Metzler and Lewis 2008, 22). This finding resonates with a respected voice in modern Christian theology. Paul Tillich, in Volume Three of his monumental Systematic Theology, addresses “objects that are produced by the technical act,” warning that “by virtue of producing and directing mere things” one can lose one’s “character as an independent self” and “become a thing” (74). Again, Jewish theologian and philosopher Martin Buber, widely remembered for his distinction between “I – Thou” and “I – It” relations, issues a similar warning in I and Thou:

And in all the seriousness of truth, hear this: without It man cannot live.

But he who lives with It alone is not a man. (34)

Apparently, we have reasons to expect that individuals belonging to Abrahamic religious traditions may especially feel troubled when they find themselves treating humanoid machines as though they were peers.

Within the Abrahamic religious family, after all, human beings historically have been regarded as spiritually special, and understood as belonging to a category fundamentally different from any technological artifacts that they might construct for amusement, or as tools. Anglican priest (and physicist) John Polkinghorne has emphasized significance of “the mystery of the human person,” which involves “our embodied nature, embedded in the physical world but transcending a merely reductive physicality” (Polkinghorne 1998, 80). Both the mystery and the transcendence that Polkinghorne mentions are punctuated clearly, as well, in the Holy Qur’an: And they will ask thee of the Spirit. SAY: The Spirit proceedeth at my Lord’s command: but of knowledge, only a little to you is given (The Night Journey – Sura 17:85). The theistic perspective of this family of religions tends to link the human person, as a free moral agent, with a spiritual level of reality that is not completely expressible in terms of everyday (macro-level) entities such as rocks and trees – and machines.

It may be pertinent at this point to inquire whether the spiritual level of reality envisioned by these religious faiths might arguably be represented even in current science. To be sure, the robotic and AI technologies upon which we have focused in this essay are discussed almost entirely nowadays with so-called “macro-level” accounts of discrete, individualized entities. Computer scientists typically view all “information processing” executed by contemporary computers as reducible to operations of the celebrated Turing Machine formalism, which imagines an abstract machine successively “reading” well-defined symbols (0 or 1) on an external tape, comparing them with its current internal “state,” and then implementing clearly prescribed (albeit possibly null) changes on the tape and its own internal state. Physicists working with quantum mechanics, however, have discovered a quite different level of reality that requires a so-called “quantum-level” description. The description is expressed mathematically in terms of complex numbers (incorporating an imaginary unit equal to the square root of negative one) and it explores a reality in which individualized entities of the macro-level (this table, that book, etc.) simply are no longer present. An atom may be understood to contain four electrons, but – in principle – one cannot select and track, say, the changing locations over time of a specific individual electron among the four. Pondering this strange new reality, mathematical physicist Roger Penrose has argued (via his Shadows of the Mind) that human consciousness cannot be modeled in terms of the Turing Machine formalism, requiring, instead, the resources of an advanced quantum physics. If the emerging technology of “quantum computers” eventually could yield a machine consistent with Roger Penrose’s understanding of how the human brain operates when we experience consciousness, future robots incorporating such computers might open possibilities for exciting new dialogue between religion and science.

Under present circumstances, though, we can discern the outlines of potential difficulties in the not-so-distant future. Specifically, elderly members of the Abrahamic faiths may find themselves increasingly conflicted in responding to robotic “caregivers.” On one hand, following natural predispositions, they will be inclined to accept the machines as caregivers (dropping the skeptical quotation marks, as Professor Turkle did during her encounter with Cog). At the same time, they may retain their religious worldviews and resist accepting the machines as persons. Will they feel authentically comforted, then, by machines programmed to display “artificial empathy”? Will they discover resolution of their conflict in the following conjecture by noted roboticist Hans Moravec?

So, it may be appropriate to say “God” has granted a soul to a machine when the machine is accepted as a real person by a wide human community. (Moravec 1999, 77)

Indeed, in perhaps the next ten years or so, how will people be using quotation marks to distinguish what they consider authentic from mere “make-believe”? Will they be describing new robot nurses as persons – or as “persons”? Will they decide that the machines care for people – or “care” for people? Will the artifacts be considered capable of moral behavior – or “moral” behavior? Will some older people still understand the granting of souls to be determined by God – or by “God”?

For some of us, these already are important questions.

Theodore Albert Metzler is the Director of Darrell W. Hughes Program for Religion and Science Dialogue, Oklahoma City University.

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• within-five-year/ .

In 1989, in his classic book The World’s Religions, the late Scots writer and teacher Ninian Smart gave us a landmark framework to help us compare and contrast the world’s great religious beliefs. Smart identified what he called the ‘seven dimensions’ of religion:

1. The practical and ritual dimension
2. The experiential and emotional dimension
3. The narrative or mythic dimension
4. The ethical and legal dimension
5. The social and institutional dimension
6. The material dimension

This framework has helped two generations of scholars and believers to identify what their beliefs have in common with other belief traditions and what the significant differences are.

In countries like Australia, where religious groups and institutions enjoy tax exemptions in relation to property and works of charity, courts have been asked to rule on what is or is not a ‘religion’. So, in Australia, the High Court determined in 1983 that to be considered as a ‘religion’ rather than a ‘philosophy’ a group must pass a twofold test:

– belief in a supernatural Being, Thing or Principle; and

– acceptance and observance of canons of conduct in order to give effect to that belief.(154 CLR 120 at 132, 137)

(A strict application of the first principle would rule out Buddhism as a religion, yet results from successive Australian censuses show Buddhism to be the fastest-growing religion in Australia. It is hard to be consistent! )

Some scholars looking for another, and perhaps simpler, way of comparing and contrasting religious movements, institutions and traditions may find help in the pioneer work of the English sociologist Grace Davie.

In 1994, Davie launched the study of religion into a new dimension with her challenging book, Religion in Britain since 1945: Believing without Belonging. The study was based on interviews with several thousand people outside shopping centres in various parts of Britain. She posed her conclusions in a series of questions. The first is:

Believing without Belonging

Why is it, for example, that the majority of British people – in common with many other Europeans – persist in believing (if only in an ordinary God), but see no need to participate with even minimal regularity in their religious institutions? Indeed most people in this country – whatever their denominational allegiance – express their religious sentiments by staying away from, rather than going to, their places of worship. On the other hand, relatively few British people have opted out of religion altogether: out-and-out atheists are rare. ( Davie, p2)

Five years after Davie’s significant book was published, another English sociologist, Robin Gill, added a third B, Behaving, although he did tend to equate ‘behaving’ with churchgoing, arguing that it is churchgoing which fosters and sustains a distinctive culture of beliefs and values (p. 64).

In the same year, Grace Davie published another of her many books; this one based on a study of religion in Europe. This led her to conclude that Europe is what she calls ‘the exceptional case’ – many Europeans, particularly in the Scandinavian countries of northern Europe, belong to the majority national church without any belief in their teachings, or even in the existence of a god. She is now preparing revised editions of both her books.

The three Bs have become almost a cliché – so, just two of many examples, the Anglican bishop Tom Frame uses the three Bs to frame part of his critique of the Anglican church in Australia and Richard Rice uses them to combat ‘the ideology of individualism’ and construct a theology of the church for Seventh Day Adventists in the United States.

Grace Davie herself has recently moved on from examining the state of Christianity in Britain and Europe to consider issues arising from Muslim migration to the West, and what she calls the shift from religious obligation to religious consumption.

Now some scholars are talking about a fourth Becoming. Most religious traditions teach that believing religious truth, and belonging to a religious community, should not only modify your behaviour, for the better, of course, but should change your nature, so that you become a new and better person. King’s College London has become a centre of transformation theology, Transformation is a well-established international journal of holistic mission studies and the United Methodist Church of the United States includes ‘becoming’ in the title of a new manual to help congregations incorporate new members.

In the great eastern religions, ‘becoming’ is a key part of their anthropology, with rebirth or reincarnation being the reward or the punishment in the next life for the quality of behaving in this life.

So we now have the ‘four Bs’ of religion, Believing, Belonging, Behaving and Becoming. At a time when the patterns of religious adherence in Australia are changing, due both to immigration and conversion, it is more important than ever for us to understand what other Australians believe. The Four Bs give us a new formal structure for discussing religious belief and practice intelligently, just as there are formal structures which help us make sense of physics or chemistry or biology or economics or sociology, or any of the natural or social sciences.

It may even result in a new and simpler way of comparing and contrasting established religions, on the basis of what the adherents of a particular religion believe and do, alongside Ninian Smart’s ‘seven dimensions’ of religion. So we can consider such issues as:

1. Which of the four Bs is most important to a particular religion?
2. What are the key beliefs of the major world religions represented in Australia?
3. How are the four Bs linked, in the Scriptures and the teachings of each faith?
4. Do all people of faith believe in the same God? If not, is there more than one God?
5. Is belonging about belonging to God or to the community of faith, or both?
6. How do these faith traditions expect their believers to behave – what is commanded, what is allowed and what is forbidden? and
7. How do believers become changed people, spiritually and even bodily? What is at the heart of the anthropology of each faith? What do they teach about the body and the soul, about resurrection and reincarnation?

In a sense it is all about the one big B, believing; what does a particular faith community believe about believing, about belonging, about behaving and about becoming? Over the past few months, I have recorded interviews with leaders and scholars of the five major religions represented in Australia and studied the books and pamphlets which they recommended. All of them claimed that their basic beliefs were based on their Scriptures, but the statements of faith which emerged suggested that some of them had put their Scriptures through a blender, as it were, to come up with statements which summarise the beliefs and practices and understandings which are common to most of the denominations or sects within each faith community.

JUDAISM

So the first article of the Jewish faith is the shema, the message given by Moses, or in the name of Moses:

The shema

Hear, O Israel: the Lord is our God, the Lord is one. – Deuteronomy 6.4

Yet the Jewish Scriptures record the growth of an understanding of God from the anthropomorphism of the book of Genesis through transcendentalism and panentheism, henotheism and particularism to true monotheism, belief in the one God who is the one true God of all peoples, even of those who do not accept him.

The second article of faith relates to humankind, which is said to have been created in the image of God, and is bound to God in a covenant relationship. The Hebrew Scriptures speak of a number of signs of the covenant, including the gift of the Sabbath at the time of creation, the rainbow after the great flood, and, most important, the circumcision of all males on the eighth day after birth, as part of the Abrahamic covenant.

This covenant is stated in chapter 12 of the book of Genesis, restated in Chapter 15 and sealed in Chapter 17, when Abraham agrees that the sign of the covenant will appear on the bodies of all his male descendants through circumcision.

The covenant with Abraham

Now the LORD said to Abram, ‘Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing …and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.’

– Genesis 12.1-3

God said to Abraham, ‘As for you, you shall keep my covenant, you and your offspring after you throughout their generations. This is my covenant, which you shall keep, between me and you and your offspring after you: Every male among you shall be circumcised. You shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you. – – Genesis 17.9-11

Many Jews call the ceremony of circumcision berit, which means ‘covenant’. The covenant was reaffirmed in the so-called Mosaic covenant at Mt Sinai, which the whole people of Israel are said to have confirmed, answering Moses as one, Everything that the Lord has spoken we will do. (Exodus 19.8)

The third article of faith is that the Torah is divinely-inspired. ‘Torah’ can mean the totality of the law of Moses, or all the law on a particular subject, or the first five books of the Scriptures, the Pentateuch, as distinct from the Prophets and the Writings.

Two other significant beliefs, which are seen differently by different Jewish communities, relate to the Messiah and to the land of Israel.

Belief in the Messiah developed after the Second Temple period, giving new meaning to the Messianic oracles in the writings of the prophets. The rabbis taught that the Messiah would be a descendent of David, and thus his coming would bring about the climax of human history and the direct rule of God on earth.

The land of Israel, Eretz Israel, was part of the Abrahamic covenant, but not all Jewish believers accept the modern state of Israel, because it was a secular foundation, not established by YHWH. Some Orthodox Jews say that the true Israel will be established only with the coming of the Messiah.

ISLAM

Most Australian Muslims will tell you that belief comes first, without the core beliefs there is no Islam. But the word Islam means submission, so some Muslims believe that behaving comes first, to be a Muslim one must submit absolutely and completely to the will of God. Many men and women were Muslims before the time of the Prophet. Two verses in the Qur’an are almost identical in proclaiming this:

Submission to God
Surely, those who believe,
whether they are Jews or Christians, or those of some other faith;
anyone who believes in GOD, and
believes in the Last Day, and leads a righteous life,
will receive their recompense from their Lord;
they have nothing to fear, nor will they grieve. – Qur’an 2:62, 5:69

The core Islamic belief is belief in the one, unique, incomparable God, the God who has no son or partner; none has the right to be worshipped but Him alone. Al’lah is the true God, and every other deity is false. He has the most magnificent names and sublime perfect attributes. No one shares His divinity, nor His attributes. The shahada, the confession of faith, the so-called first pillar of Islam La ilaha illa’Llah, ‘there is no god but God’ begins with a negative, to deny the false notions of God in the polytheism of Muhammad’s time and in the beliefs of the Jews and Christians whom Muhammad had encountered.

All other key beliefs in Islam relate to this core belief

– the angels are heavenly beings who worship God alone, obey Him, and act only by His command

– the Revealed Books have been revealed by God to his messengers as proof of His existence and as a guide to their belief and behaviour . The latest and greatest of these books is the Quran, which God revealed to the Prophet Muhammad , and guaranteed to protect it from any corruption or distortion.

– the Prophets and Messengers of God, from Adam to Muhammad, and including Noah, Abraham, Ishmael, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, and Jesus were all sent to reveal the same message, but God’s final message to humankind, the supreme reconfirmation of the eternal message, was revealed to the Prophet Muhammad. God has made prophecy the central reality of history, the Qur’an says that God has sent a messenger to every people in every age (Q. 10.48) – one of the ahadith says a total of 124 000 prophets in all.

– the Day of Judgment, the Day of Reckoning, the Day of Resurrection, is the day when God will resurrect, reward and punish every one for their beliefs and deeds. Some scholars have counted more than 115 references in the Qur’an to the Day of Judgment, more than on any other topic in the Qur’an, except Al’lah, and that number does not include verses with graphic details of the after-life, of heaven and hell. Surah No 81, which is said to date from the early years of Islam, before Muhammad left Mecca for Medina,

The Day of Judgment
When the sun is folded up,
when the stars fall, losing their lustre;
when the mountains vanish (like a mirage);
When the she-camels, ten months with young, are left unattended;
when the wild beasts are herded together;
When the oceans boil over with a swell;
When the souls are sorted out (joined like with like);
When the female (infant) buried alive is questioned for what crime she was killed;
When the Scrolls are laid open;
when the world on high is unveiled;
when the Blazing Fire(of hell) is kindled to fierce heat,
and when the Garden (of Bliss) is brought near –
Then shall each soul know its Destiny. – Qur’an 81. 1.14

CHRISTIANITY

In the early centuries of Christianity, when its beliefs were being defined, the central issue in the debates was the nature of the person and work of Jesus which later grew into distinct areas of theology, Christology and soteriology: What is the relation between Jesus and God?

Christians maintain that God was clearly acting and speaking in and through Jesus; the writer of the Gospel according to John could quote Jesus as saying, the Father and I are One (John 10.30) yet Jesus is recorded, in the same gospel and elsewhere, as praying to God and speaking of God as a separate person. As well, God is shown as being present at key points in the life of Jesus, at his birth, and his baptism, and key moments during his mission, in ways traditionally associated with the spirit, or the breath, of God.

The outcome was a Christian redefinition of the inner nature of the Godhead, as a mystical union of three persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit – distinct, yet co-equal and co-eternal. Today, some Christians see these terms as anthropological and prefer to speak of the persons of the Trinity in terms of their roles or activities, as Creator, Redeemer and Spirit.

So the historic creeds have more to say about Jesus than of the other persons of the Trinity. The so-called Nicene Creed speaks of Jesus as the one who lived and died and rose again ‘for our salvation’, but does not say how and from what, So a spectrum of different accounts or theories has emerged – from the legalistic substitutionary theory, that Christ took the place of each and every person on the cross, to the moral or exemplary theory, that the death of Christ revealed the extent of the love of God which Christians are called to emulate. Generally, the theories coalesce around the idea that Jesus’ death dealt with the reality of sin in a way which humanity could not have done for itself.

For many Christians the death of Christ was the seal of a new covenant between believers and God, replacing the old covenant with the Jewish people. The unknown writer of the Letter to the Hebrews elaborates the doctrine at length in typological fashion, stressing that the new covenant secures the perfect forgiveness of sins for all believers.

The new covenant

For if the blood of goats and bulls, with the sprinkling of the ashes of a heifer, sanctifies those who have been defiled so that their flesh is purified, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to worship the living God! – Hebrews 9.13-14

The creeds also include belief in the church, the return of Christ in glory, and the promise of the resurrection of the dead, or of the body. The Nicene Creed also speaks of the sacrament of baptism, but not of the eucharist, or of any other sacrament of the church. The debates on these came later.

From the first generation, many Christians have believed that the Holy Spirit would empower them with special gifts, as described in a letter of Paul to the church in Corinth:

The gifts of the Spirit

To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. To one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the discernment of spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. – 1 Corinthians 12.7-10

These gifts were seen as theirs as disciples of Christ and sharers in his gifts. But few mainstream Christians would claim these gifts today. Many Christian traditions maintain a healing ministry but no longer claim, as Augustine did, that all diseases of Christians are to be ascribed to demons and that these can be driven out with prayer and fasting.

HINDUISM

The traditions of Indian religion which most people collectively call ‘Hinduism’ have evolved over many centuries, without a single founder or a single collection of scripture. They include many and varied beliefs, so that believing is not as significant as belonging or behaving or becoming.

Many Hinduisms have largely merged into one. Ninian Smart says, like the trunk of a single tree which rises from a tangle of the most divergent roots. Most of these traditions have become monotheistic, but in a variety of ways – for some believers the 330 million or so deities in the pantheon are manifestations or expressions of the one divinity, as in some passages of the Rig Veda. For others, one god, Shiva or Vishnu, is the supreme god, and other gods are lesser gods or demigods.

Other groups recognise a trinity: Brahma, the creator, Vishnu the preserver and Shiva the destroyer. Together they represent the forces which are evident in the natural world and in human beings at all times. To indicate that these three processes are one and the same the three gods may be combined in the one form of Lord Dattatreya, who has the faces of Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva.

In the pre-classical period, dominant beliefs were expressed in or developed from the four Vedas. The Rig Veda, the oldest of the Vedas, was composed about 1500 BCE and redacted about 600 B.C. The Sama Veda, the Yajur Veda and the Atharva Veda came later. All contain hymns, incantations, and rituals by which man can relate to the gods. The chief gods of the Veda are Indra, the great warrior; Varuna, the lord of the heaven, and Agni, the god of fire.

Sometime around 500 BCE, new traditions developed, including belief in samsara, the cycle of rebirth, and karma, the impact of past actions on the present and the future. The earlier traditions were focused on the priestly class, the Brahmans; now they came to include all classes, so Brahman came to mean the holy power which informs and animates the whole of reality. Sometimes Brahman is identified with Atman, the inner essence of the human being

The new traditions are expressed in the 200 or so Upanishads, the texts which are said to complete the message of the Vedas. In the Upanishads, ritual action and self-control converge in the search for personal liberation from samsara through unity with the Holy One or at least close communion with the holy.

The Upanishads express the unity of all things in many ways, as in these verses from the Isha Upanishad:

The Divine unity
When a man sees all beings
within his very self,
and his self within all beings.
it will not seek to hide from him.
– Isha Upanishad 4.6

In classical Hinduism, which emerged in the second and third centuries BCE, the community of the local temple became more significant, with its fervent sharing in the life of the chosen manifestation of the divine, known as bhakti . Bhakti is the essence of the epic poem the Bhagavad-gita , which was composed around 300BCE to 200 BCE and became the major work of Hindu Scripture, largely supplanting the Vedas and the Upanishads.

In the Bhagavad-Gita the Lord KRSNA presents the mature Hindu understanding of the one God:

The nature of God
My nature is divided eight-fold …
my higher nature know:
It is the Life (soul), great-armed one,
by which this world is maintained. …
Of the whole world I am
the origin and the dissolution too.
– Bhagavad-gita, chapter

The diversity of Hindu beliefs is also seen in the growth of devotion to the Goddess, under various names, such as Durga, Kali and Parvati, each of whom represent different aspects of the goddess – Durga is the unapproachable; Kali the ferocious devourer of time; Parvati the beautiful, the benign, the wife of Siva, whose devoted service to her husband is the model of how man should serve his god.

BUDDHISM

Belief is not as important in Buddhism as in other faiths; Buddhist teachers say that Buddhism is not a religion but a a way of life; Buddhism is pragmatic … as it moves from its heartland it assimilates beliefs and practices from local cultures. So right believing is not as important as right becoming, securing a good rebirth, or escaping from the cycle of birth, death and rebirth by reaching Nirvana, or even as belonging, living as a member of the Buddhist community.

However, to be a Buddhist means believing that Buddha actually lived, and that his teachings are true wisdom; and that all things are impermanent and interdependent. The Buddha’s teachings are known collectively as dharma. They speak of

1. AThe Four Noble Truths
2. The Triple Jewels
3. The Four Reliances and
4. The Four States of Mind for Studying the Dharma

Buddhist teaching aims to enlighten us about ourselves, to respect ourselves and to affirm ourselves. It is humanistic, not theistic – Buddhist teaching speaks of devas or gods, as well as maras or evil spirits, which are evil influences which stand in the way of Buddhist practice and ultimate liberation. The devas inhabit the heavens above the human realm, but are still unenlightened, bound to samsara, the endless cycle of birth and death. Mainstream Buddhism has no concept of the creation of the world, or of a divine Creator. Like all things, the world is subject to the cycle of birth and death.

Religious teachings on belonging, behaving and becoming all stem from the basic beliefs and the Scriptures of each faith.

BELONGING

Judaism sees belonging in at least three ways – firstly, the people belong to God in a covenant relationship; but they also belong to each other on the grounds of race, the sense of a common ancestry, of belonging to a people with a common history, including centuries of communal suffering, and, thirdly, they belong in a local community in one of the varied streams of Judaism -Orthodox, Reform, Conservative, Progressive, Reconstructionist, Hasidim or Liberal.

Islam, submission, is a community obligation as well as an individual one. Believers form the one community, although they may be from many nations and tribes. Just as God sent prophets and messengers as witnesses to the Jews and the Christians and then to the Muslims, so the Muslim nation must witness to other nations.

The Greek kuriakios, from which Christians derive the word ‘church’, means ‘belonging to the Lord’, so ‘belonging’ means belonging in the church – the local congregation, and/or a particular denomination or tradition, and/or the ‘one holy, catholic and apostolic church’, as the Nicene Creed puts it. For the early Christians, the church was a spiritual society, the ‘new Israel’, which replaced the Jews as the people of God; all Christians were one in Christ, regardless of race, background or gender; the church was the repository of Christian truth; and nourished its members to enable them to grow in faith and holiness.

In the Hindu traditions ‘belonging’ relates primarily to one’s place in Indian society – the words Hindu, India and the Indus are cognate words – essentially, Hindus are the people of the Indus valley. They belong to the community because they are born into it. Belonging is expressed through the family’s association with a particular temple, or with a particular religious teacher; by their dress, their participation in religious ceremonies and festivals, and by their moral codes and behavioural expectations.

One of the three jewels of Buddhism is the sangha, the Buddhist community. In Chinese Buddhism the sangha is a community of monks and/or nuns, who are the exemplars of the faith. In other traditions the sangha may include lay men and/or women. Whether the sangha is monastic or lay, or a combination of both, belonging means accepting the principles of harmony in truth and harmony of action. The six principles of the sangha: doctrinal harmony, moral harmony, economic harmony, spiritual harmony, verbal harmony and physical harmony.

BEHAVING

A large part of the Jewish Torah is taken up with instructions on how the people should behave towards one another, particularly towards the poorer members of the community, as in the holiness code in Leviticus chapter 19. Behaving is linked with belonging – You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy. (Lev. 19.1). The Torah records the commandments of the Covenant, including the 10 commandments, which are recorded twice, in slightly different forms, and the 613 mitzvot, the lesser commandments and ritual duties and good deeds which are scattered through the text.

For Muslims, ‘behaving’ means following the rules prescribed for the community. Belonging controls behaving. In turn, believing controls belonging. Right behaviour is modelled on the life of Muhammad and his Companions, in the sunnah, the early Muslim community, as recorded in the ahadith, the authentic traditions of Islam. The Qur’an regularly links believing and behaving, as in this passage about the outcome of the Day of Judgment: Surely for those who believe and do righteous deeds, their welcome is Gardens of the highest level of Paradise. Therein will they abide, without desiring any change therefrom. (Qur’an 18: 107-108)

Christians are expected to behave in accordance with their belief that Christ is ‘the way, the truth and the life’ (John 14.6). Christians need to study and model their own lives on what Georgia Harkness calls the way of life exemplified and taught by Jesus, applied to the manifold problems and decisions of human existence. (Christian Ethics, 1957 – from web). But Christians are also required to behave in accordance with their belonging, to behave in accordance with the teachings of their church. The issue of conscience versus command has been controversial throughout Christian history.

Many Hindus call their faith sanatana dharma, everlasting dharma. They see Hinduism as a personal map of appropriate behaviour -behaviour which will eliminate mental impurities like greed and egoism and achieve good karma , behaviour which corresponds to the cosmic order in which natural law is grounded. The basic Vedic virtues include truthfulness, nonviolence, austerity, self-control, tranquillity, study and teaching, sincere worship, universal brotherhood and wisdom. These apply to all human beings, but particular behaviours may be required of the five castes and at each of the four stages of life.

The precepts or rules of Buddhism are largely negative, urging restraint from the desires which lead to suffering. So Buddhist teaching on behaving focuses on training to avoid and overcome these desires. A mind that is trained avoids actions that are likely to cause suffering or remorse. The Buddhist text, the Perfection of Wisdom in 8,000 Lines lists ‘the six perfections of a Bodhisattva’ – the perfection of giving, the perfection of morality, the perfection of patience, the perfection of persistence, the perfection of concentration and the perfection of wisdom.

BECOMING

In traditional Judaism, ‘becoming’ is about becoming a better person in this life, not about the next life. The next life is best left in God’s hands. The reward of good behaving is a longer and better life, rather than the promise of an after-life But, by the Rabbinic period, the resurrection of the dead had become central tenet of Judaism, even if, for many traditional Jews, personal transformation in this life through repentance and commitment to the will of God remained the foundation of the Jewish faith.

In Islam, believing, belonging and behaving become a transformational experience. The self is made fit for paradise, the ultimate reward for those who believe. Three key passages in the Qur’an outline the successive stages. The nafs, the self, which is naturally prone to evil (Q. 12.53), becomes self-accusing (Q. 75.2); in this second stage the self becomes conscious of evil and resists it, asks Al’lah for pardon and reaches for salvation. In the third stage, the soul asks no more than to be at rest in Al’lah (Q. 89.27).

Christians believe that, in some way, their belief in Christ and in his mission as the bearer of salvation transform them into a new person, in mind and spirit, if not in body. The key Scripture is in the Gospel according to John, which quotes Jesus as telling a Jewish teacher that the people of God are not identified by their race, but by their commitment to God – ‘Very truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being reborn of water and Spirit. What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit. (John 3.5-6)

In the traditions of Indian religion, rebirth after death is a fundamental teaching, and the desire to achieve a good rebirth, based on good karma in this life, is the reason for following the prescribed rituals and patterns of behaviour. So behaving determines becoming. Rebirth may be in many forms, including those of animals, and in many heavens and hells. Rebirth as a human is rare, and marks release from samsara, the eternal cycle of birth, death and rebirth.

Two core teachings of Buddhism come together in its doctrine of rebirth – the reality of impermanence and the law of cause and effect. All human beings are caught up in samsara, transmigration, the continuous process of birth, death and rebirth. If they fail to practice the dharma in this life, on or after death they will be reborn in one of the six realms of existence – the realm of hell beings or the realm of hungry ghosts, or the realm of animals (the three unfortunate realms), or perhaps in the realm of human beings, the realm of the demigods or the realm of the gods.

CONCLUSION

The Four Bs does appear to provide a new framework for comparing and contrasting the main traditions of institutional religion, perhaps of all religious traditions. They appear to have major differences in two Bs, believing and becoming, but a good deal in common in belonging and behaving. The more I read and speak with teachers of the major faiths, the more the differences become significant. Yet the beliefs and behaviours of religious people generally are so different from dominant secular beliefs and values that people of faith might be seen as forming a sub-culture within globalising world culture. The Melbourne scholar Ken Gelder argues that

‘subcultures are social, with their own shared conventions, values and rituals, but they can also seem “immersed” or self-absorbed; a feature that distinguishes them from countercultures’.

– Ken Gelder Subcultures: cultural histories and social practice 2007 p2.

Simply by believing in the numinous in any form, and belonging to a religious group, and behaving in accordance with religious teaching and becoming a better person as a result may make what believers have in common much more significant than anything that separates them. Already there are signs that religious believers, whatever their faith allegiance, are willing to stand together, both against the excesses of a dominantly secular society and the excesses of religious fundamentalism.

Dr Douglas Golding is a post-doctoral research scholar of the sociology of religion living in Sydney, Australia. He has taken part in many inter-faith discussions and given papers at a number of international conferences – in Oxford, Tokyo, Stockholm, Manila, Auckland and Tehran as well as in Sydney. He is currently teaching adult education classes in religion and history at two universities and working on his book on the ‘Four Bs’.

In the mechanics of engineering, the force of inertia depends on the acceleration of a moving object along with its mass. Therefore, the force of inertia on an object is equal to the mass times acceleration. Accordingly, the faster an object gains speed, the greater will be the force of inertia. However, this brings along many problems in practice. In machines with pistons (compressors, pumps etc.) which are accelerating and slowing down speedily, a great force of inertia is applied to the machine’s elements. This gives way to a significant amount of resistance and abrasion problems. In addition there are other such troubles inside an engine’s cylinder during the four strokes (induction, compression, expansion, and exhaust). A greater force is required for brake mechanisms at the motion of elevators, banded conveyors, and automobiles. This is why brake linings wear out in a short time.

According to the principles of thermodynamics, where a piston-cylinder system is concerned and the compression or expansion of gases is slower, minimum energy is required during compression and maximum energy is obtained during expansion. On the other hand, if this process of compression and expansion is realized quickly, then the energy consumption is maximum during compression and minimum during expansion. Turning the tap too quickly to stop the flow of water causes a greater force of inertia inside, and if this continues to occur frequently, the faucet may need repair.

Things done too quickly present similar consequences. A person becomes rich as a result of working for long years has a better chance to appreciate his conditions in comparison to someone who becomes rich by winning a lottery. Decisions made in haste without consulting with others mostly yield negative results, which happens rarely in those made after consultation, since the risk of mistakes is reduced.

Living things and gradualness

For living things, adaptation to hot or cold environments is also a gradual process. If adaptation is not realized slowly, they cannot survive. For example, if a man starts by taking showers with hot water, then gradually with warmer water, and in the end with cold water, his body can develop endurance to cold water, even freezing water in winter. Some mothers wrap up their children too well even in good weather, and thereby do not let them adapt to changing weather conditions; such children catch cold easier than others.

Principle of gradualness has an obvious relation with being steadfast and patient, as in the cases of hatching chicks and silkworms in their cocoon. Human intervention to accelerate these processes will naturally have some negative effects. If the wing of a chick is forced to separate from the egg before the due time, it might hurt the animal seriously.

According to dieticians, stomach problems are more commonly found in those who eat quickly than who eat without haste. In addition, it is also known that meals cooked in low heat are more delicious and have higher nutritional value. It is essential for food quality to cool the foods gradually before they undergo freezing. Similarly, before cooking frozen food, it is advised to thaw out the food, gradually bringing it to values near room temperature.

A frog’s nervous system is sensitive to sudden changes, not gradual ones. For this reason, when it is thrown in hot water, it jumps back right away. But if the water is heated gradually, the frog will show no reaction, it will even enjoy it. Despite the increasing heat, the animal feels numb more and more, to such a degree that it fails to escape before it is too late. Even though there may be no obstacle to jumping out, the frog pays a heavy price for the heedless life it led. So, it is very significant to be able to observe the gradual changes and take measures accordingly.

Human life reflects this principle in many ways. From biological development to learning new subjects, different kinds of progress depend on a gradual process. Nevertheless, human beings are too impatient to follow gradual patterns. You may have heard from people who want to learn a new subject-such as a foreign language-express how they wish there were some pills or other quick ways to realize their aim all at once.

Indeed, mankind is ever hasty. Success and joy, however, rest with patience and being in the right tune with gradualness.

Margaret Johnson is taking us to Mina, the tent city where Muslim pilgrims stay during the Hajj. Her memoirs is a personal one, as every memoir is, but one in which millions of pilgrims will pleasantly remember the many life-changing moments from their own experience of transformation, revival, meaning, companionship, servanthood, and mercy in the face of physical difficulties that come along with travel and camping with a large family of several million faithful.

As science unfolds many unknowns to us, we witness a universe that is intricately united across seemingly unrelated phenomena. This fact is so vividly displayed in the articles “The Sun and Its Distinctive Position” and “Why Is Cancer a Complex System” that one cannot help but be filled with awe and appreciation for all the blessings-a great majority of which we are unaware of-that make our lives possible.

Dorothy C. Buck celebrates the legacy of a pioneer in interfaith dialogue: Louis Massignon. The renowned French Catholic scholar of Islam and the Islamic world, Massignon died fifty years ago on October 31. Buck’s biographical essay narrates the story of a courageous man who dedicated his life and research to interfaith dialogue and particularly to the relationship of the three Abrahamic faith traditions, Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

Believing, Belonging, Behaving and Becoming are the four B’s of religion according to Douglas Golding, for whom these B’s give “a new formal structure for discussing religious belief and practice intelligently, just as there are formal structures which help us make sense of physics or chemistry or biology or economics or sociology, or any of the natural or social sciences.” Golding further says, “At a time when the patterns of religious adherence are changing, due both to immigration and conversion, it is more important than ever for us to understand what other people believe.”

We had a successful conference titled “Peacebuilding through Education” in New York in September. We are now moving on to our next event in Lahore, Pakistan: “Ideal Human and Ideal Society in the Thoughts of M. Fethullah Gülen,” a conference which will take place on November 21, at the University of the Punjab. Academics from different countries will join their Pakistani colleagues to discuss on their encounter with Fethullah Gülen’s thought and action in their respective countries and how the education movement he inspired is helping shape their future generations.

What are complex systems?

If there are multiple elements (variables/factors) interacting with each other in the creation of an event or a being, this structure is called a “Complex System.” For example, in the air system, air and water molecules are a factor. Plants and animals in an ecosystem can also be considered as a factor. These are interconnected to one another in a way hard to imagine and have impacts on each other. Systems with these specifications display complex situations throughout time. For example in the medical field, a disease is described multi-factorial if many factors (causes) take part in its development. However in the past, these laws, specifications, and progress-dependent patterns of the multifactor diseases had to be overlooked due to the lack of a suitable paradigm to study with. But today, with the complex system paradigm, we have a greater access to the inner dynamics of these multi-factor diseases.

Multi-factor systems in terms of structure and function exhibit complex features during the process. Thus, complicated features of a complex system have been found to be dependent on the “Force Law” when investigated with the complex system paradigm. They also establish the basis for principles and laws that are occurring coincidentally. According to the Force Law, in all complex systems, small scale changes occur in greater numbers, and larger scale changes happen less often. This state corresponds to the same direct line, when plotted on the x-y plane logarithmically with scale of changes versus chances of events being created. This indeed results in the stability of the system in the macroscale and yet reveals the variability and instability of the microscale. In other words, the state of the macrosystem is put forth momentarily by selection among many micro incidents, which, for believers, is an indication of an ultimate Divine will in possession of infinite power. The information level, energy and interaction strength of such events or beings plays a great role in the possible selection of micro incidents in the grand scheme of causes.

Complex systems that become visible via space-time river also enters a dynamic cycle which is composed of sub-critical, critical, and super critical states. In this way, events and existence become subjected to newer manifestations or degrees of glory, as for believers, life and existence are artworks of God and His Divine attributes in the visible universe, which resembles a drawing board. Living things display an adaptive and dynamic character along with being a complex system. Healthy processes in the human body display adaptive dynamic complex system properties yet exhibit complex behaviors that bring system down like cancer as well. The medical world in recent years have been referring to cancer more so than before because of undetermined factors in its development, hardships encountered during diagnosis and treatment; as cancer is a multi-factored disease, it is necessary to look at cancer with the complexity lens.

The science of complex systems which studies multidimensional and multifactor relations states that in each complex system there are common features, and that these features can also be observed in cancer just like in all other scientific fields and in all scales. The following will focus on the subject since cancer makes a good metaphor in understanding complex systems of behavior.

In complex systems, a whole system means more than the total value of its factors. This principle emphasizes that properties of events and beings that are the sum of many separate factors do not exist in separate units or tend to disappearas each part is handled more individually. The deduction-reduction examples of a peacock coming out of an egg, a tree growing from a seed, and water that consists of various elements are used as metaphors to explain matters that pertain to belief and bear complex system properties. There are many genetic, epigenetic, metabolic, internal and external factors in ontogeny of cancer, however it only develops with the interaction of these elements and differentiates from regular cells. According to widely accepted views, in order for a cell to become cancerous, it is not enough for it to undergo many genetic mutations on its own. The few mutations that take place in a specific order alongside other epigenetic factors could lead to a tumor and cause a “system death” which means much more than the total value of components. That is why death occurs systematically in humans-cell death, tissue death, organ death, system death (excretion and transport) and death of organism.

All complex systems not only have a specific perimeter but they also remain a part of this boundary. This feature brings attention to the fact that there is even a relation between the Sun and and eye of a mosquito. Cancer starts out with a single cell made up of specific inner parameters, in a particular placement within a tissue. It is not possible for a cancerous cell to proliferate for a long time and cause the death of an individual all by itself. It can cause death as a result of communication with surrounding cells, conversion of these into cancerous types, and dispersion through blood vessels into other organs.

Inhibition or the delay of these stages makes up the most significant strategic approaches of the therapy. Because of this, while a cancerous cell is programmed to change its surrounding it also begins utilizing the nutrient sources of surrounding live cells for itself, as if trying to resolve an optimization problem, and causes disruption in the system by displacing other cells with an uncontrolled proliferation potential. This incident points out that there is no such thing as a “minor” in complex systems.

In complex systems, the more diversity exists within a system, the more powerful the system becomes. This principle brings attention to maintenance contingency and sustainability of the system and the conditions that pertain to it, for the lifespan of complex systems correlates directly with the abundance and diversity encompassed in it. This viewpoint could be observed in the case of a normal cell turning malignant. A mature tumor is a group of differentiated cell types that can provide interaction with neighboring cells through intra- and inter-cellular structures (matrix). That is why one of the characteristics of cancer is progress-dependent heterogenity at a cellular level. Because of this reason, although there is only one cancerous cell at the beginning, it can divide into different populations in time. Each population can be considered as an independent (sub-population) population since each has a specific genetic composition. This diversity is one of the major sources of problems in cancer treatment.

A continued relationship of factors with each other in a complex system has critical importance regarding system survival. Metastasis of a tumor not only depends on relations with surrounding cells but at the same time relies on the stimulation of blood vessel synthesis factors (angiogenesis). Two events are required for the dispersal of cancer cells freely; the first is the reduced interaction with other cancer cells. This can be possible with regulation of cell-to-cell connection molecules (adhesion). Second is the formation of new blood vessels via stimulation to connect with the bloodstream from the vicinity of the tumor. Finally, cancer cells that have reached their target of joining the blood stream should be able to leave the circulation, penetrate the new tissue, and manage to grow again. Metastasis is a situation for cancer cells to regulate limiting factors according to their new conditions to survive.

Behaviors in complex systems which display more features (emergent situation) that are not present in the units or even in the total value of constituents are plentiful and complicated, yet principles as causes behind these rich motifs are simple and determine the function of the system. Cancer disease arises from the execution of three simple basic principles of interaction, proliferation, and dispersion in cancerous cells. Interaction, proliferation, and dispersion do result in a healthy cell if it happens properly in the correct place, time, and dosage; otherwise it results in a cancerous cell. These three principles can cause cancer as a complex system disease or a healthy life which also displays characters of a complex system. Critical factors that control the management of these principles are location, position, timing, and dosage.

In complex systems, minor scale changes in initial conditions can lead to major effects after a certain amount of time, like a small snowball getting bigger as it rolls. Metaphorically, this situation is called the “butterfly effect” which assumes the possibility of a hurricane in one part of the world resulting from a complex chain of events starting with the strokes of a butterfly in another far corner of the world. Most of the adaptive complex systems are called “self-organized systems” in the scientific jargon, however these may exhibit such behaviors that are hard to overlook and believers would attribute to Divine guidance rather than to their so-called self-organization capacity. These systems organized with Divine guidance reach a “critical state” at the end. One of the models that were developed to explain this critical state is called the “sand pile model.” The system is named sub-critical when sand particles start to pile up on a surface, since at this stage the system is not affected from the fall of the next sand particle. As sand particles pile up, they reach a critical state in which every new particle added to the pile can lead to one of the following: 1. Nothing will happen; this is called the super-critical state. Particle can stay on top or roll down to the bottom of the pile. 2. Particles that hit the top of the pile affect other particles and can cause a small avalanche. 3. Sand pieces hit the top and cause some displacement of other particles. These displaced particles successively can cause a bigger avalanche.

This bigger avalanche again restores the system back into a sub-critical level. All complex systems arrive at these stations of sub-critical, critical, super-critical and again sub-critical successively in the flow of time. At each station they are dressed with a form of existence corresponding to a different macroscopic situation. So the outcome of the next situation is contingent on the mean average of microstates and thus points to a manipulator, who wills it to be that way. As a result, a minor event can lead to a “point of no return,” a stage called catastrophe, a super-critical state. These stages result in the continuum of the universe as it transforms and renews itself. A cancer cell also stops by the above mentioned stations and step by step, like a snowball turning into an avalanche, it can impact the whole body after reaching the super-critical stage, and lead to death. That is why early diagnosis (made during sub-critical or critical level) increases the chances of treatment, yet late diagnosis (at super-critical level) decreases therapy outcomes.

There is no hierarchical chain of command or control of causes on each other in complex systems. In other words, not only is there not a single factor in control of the system, but also a great number of factors function in a nonlinear mode of interaction. The development and progression of cancer as a complex system is controlled through interaction of internal and external factors, genetic, epigenetic, physical and metaphysical, tangible and intangible elements. Initial conditions that prepare the basis for cancer progress does exist in human genome, for genes that play a role whether in development, suppression, or regulation of cancer are built in the human genomic library from the beginning. Embryonic development is maintained with proper activation of these regulatory genes in the correct time and place during pregnancy. However, same genes may initiate cancer if not properly expressed in the right time, place, and level after birth. Moreover, all the factors that the zygote is left exposed to during its interaction with the surroundings leave a mark (memory) on the system. This is called “system exposition.”

Exposition forms microstates that will lead to positive/negative development of the organism through interaction with genetic and epigenetic memory of the system. That is why programmed cell death is put in place to eliminate damaged and dysfunctional cells that form in the system.

Cancer, as a consequence of progress-dependent corresponding interaction of genome and system exposition, is a system that can display chaotic behavior. Because of this, spiritual factors as well as physical ones may cause a “butterfly effect” in development of cancer and there is no single center of command that is designed to control each of these in the causation chain. This being the case, one cannot help but wonder how causes can comply with the force law of all complex systems and that they share common features without a hierarchical command on each other.

Each complex system is composed of holographic sub-systems. The human body is an ecosystem of various systems placed within each other. The well-being of the ecosystem depends on proper interaction and health of these sub-systems. A tumor can be considered as a local ecosystem (sub-system) where various species and clones exist in a human ecosystem. While each tumor grows, there are living and dead clone populations in it. One billion elements exist in a tumor as small as 1 cm3 (1 gr). If we omit cell death, this corresponds to the 35th generation of an abnormal cell. Ten more generations later this reaches one trillion cells. This way, a population that started out with a single cell exceeds the total number of humans ever lived throughout history. So, human death with cancer starts with the disruption of one single cell. Once reached a super critical stage, system death occurs when the cancer branches out via blood circulation and disperses into various organs, leading to disconnection between them.

Cancerous cell reminds us that there are no minor events in the universe and points out that the health of our social and spiritual world takes shape according to the rules of complex systems. As a side thought, we may easily infer from cancer that underestimating any seemingly minor misbehavior or a sin and failure of immediate action to make up for it may lead to undesired consequences in our social and spiritual lives. It is also significant to be aware that we do not have an absolute control over our future and we cannot determine whether we will attain healing or not; however we can and we should try with science to elucidate some of the tangible causes of the disease and can point out some possible ways of treatment.