Protestant literalism paid for symbolic power with obedience to the written word

Evidence

The institutional culture of Independent Fundamental Baptists represented the more authoritarian tendencies of conservative evangelicalism, but it existed as part of a larger evangelical culture that celebrated patriarchal authority—a culture that dictated the values and directed the actions of “good people” in ways that could displace compassion and justice with blind obedience to authority. For a community that believed in the existence of sin, conservative evangelicals were curiously nonchalant about the dangers of unchecked power when that power was placed in the hands of a patriarch. — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne, 653 (#expands, via linked claim)

Bacon was right that Avicenna rejected the more literalist interpretations of the sensual pleasures the Koran ascribes to paradise; he is wrong in thinking that this led Avicenna and other “Saracen” philosophers to reject Islam and seek a better law, any more than Bacon’s embrace of science (which was subsequently to put him in prison) entailed a rejection of Christianity. It is tempting to think that, as he sat in his Franciscan prison cell, Bacon felt a certain solidarity with Avicenna (as he imagined him): both rejecting the certainties of their contemporaries in search of higher truths, both misunderstood and persecuted by an ignorant cadre of clerical purists. — John V. Tolan, Saracens, 1157 (#complicates, via linked claim)

It must be emphasized that the power of this racio-religious mythology is unaffected by the personal piety or lack of personal piety of those who accept it or exploit it. As the cases of Plavsic and many of her former secularist and communist colleagues show, the abuse of religious symbolism is not dependent upon self-conscious beliefs or personal sincerity; rather it operates on the levels of the subconscious and mass psychology. — Michael A. Sells, The Bridge Betrayed, 29 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Evangelical patriarchal culture prioritized obedience to authority over compassion and justice — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne: How White…, 653; Rejecting literal readings of scripture did not entail rejecting religion in medieval thought — John V. Tolan, Saracens, 1157; Religious symbolism functions independently of sincere belief — Michael A. Sells, The Bridge Betrayed: Religion and…, 29 (+1 more)

Broader Connections

• Evangelical patriarchal culture prioritized obedience to authority over compassion and justice #expands (0.82) — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne, 653
• Rejecting literal readings of scripture did not entail rejecting religion in medieval thought #complicates (0.75) — John V. Tolan, Saracens, 1157
• Religious symbolism functions independently of sincere belief #expands (0.72) — Michael A. Sells, The Bridge Betrayed, 29