Apostasy

The term apostasy has several definitions, depending on the context. In the religious context it is used to describe the formal renunciation of one's religion, and as such, it generally has a negative connotation. One who commits apostasy is called an apostate, or one who apostatises. Many religious faiths consider apostasy to be a vice or sin. In some religious faiths an apostate can be excommunicated. In some Middle Eastern countries, apostasy is punishable by death. Apostates commonly are shunned by the members of their former religious group.

When used by sociologists this term does not have the pejorative connotations that is usually associated with the religious contest. It refers to the renunciation and/or criticism of, or opposition to one's former religion. but without any negative implication.

Few former believers would call themselves "apostates" because this phrase is generally used in a perjorative sense. Possible reasons for one's reunciation of his or her religious faith is loss of faith, for whatever reasons.

The difference between apostasy and heresy is that the latter refers to rejection or corruption of specific religious doctrines. It is not the complete abandonment of one's religious faith. Heretics claim to still be following their religious faith but call themselves the "true followers", whereas apostates reject the faith outright.

Apostasy is also used to refer to the renunciation of belief in a cause other than a particular religous faith, particularly in the area of politics. Some atheists and agnostics use the term "deconversion" instead of "apostasy" to describe the loss of faith in a religion. Those who view either traditional religion or new age religoius movements in a negative way see this change as in a positive way. It means that someone has seen the error of their prior beliefs and has regained their rationality.

Asostasy has now acquired a protected legal status in international law by the United Nations.

Apostasy As Defined By The Major Religious Faiths And New Religious Movements

In Judaism

In the Hebrew Bible the term apostasy is defined as the rebellion against God, His law and the loss of faith of the Israelites. Although the penalty for apostasy in Deuteronomy 13:1-10 is death, it was not always enforced.

Deuteronomy 13:1-10:

"Every command that I enjoin on you, you shall be careful to observe, neither adding to it nor subtracting from it. "If there arises among you a prophet or a dreamer who promises you a sign or wonder, urging you to follow other gods, whom you have not known, and to serve them: even though the sign or wonder he has foretold you comes to pass, pay no attention to the words of that prophet or that dreamer; for the Lord, your God, is testing you to learn whether you really love him with all your heart and with all your soul.The Lord, your God, shall you follow, and him shall you fear; his commandment shall you observe, and his voice shall you heed, serving him and holding fast to him alone. But that prophet or that dreamer shall be put to death, because, in order to lead you astray from the way which the Lord, your God, has directed you to take, he has preached apostasy from the Lord, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt and ransomed you from that place of slavery. Thus shall you purge the evil from your midst. "If your own full brother, or your son or daughter, or your beloved wife, or your intimate friend, entices you secretly to serve other gods, whom you and your fathers have not known, gods of any other nations, near at hand or far away, from one end of the earth to the other: do not yield to him or listen to him, nor look with pity upon him, to spare or shield him, but kill him. Your hand shall be the first raised to slay him; the rest of the people shall join in with you. You shall stone him to death, because he sought to lead you astray from the Lord, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that place of slavery."

There are Old Testament passages that show defections from the Jewish faith: e.g., Isaiah 1:2-4 or Jeremiah 2:19, as do the writings of the prophet Ezekiel (e.g., Ezekiel 16 or 18). Israelite kings were often guilty of apostasy. Examples include Ahab (I Kings 16:30-33), Ahaziah (I Kings 22:51-53), Jehoram (2 Chronicles 21:6,10), Ahaz (2 Chronicles 28:1-4), and Amon (2 Chronicles 33:21-23). (Amon's father Manasseh was also apostate for many years of his long reign, although towards the end of his life he renounced his apostasy. Cf. 2 Chronicles 33:1-19).

There are several examples in the Old Testament where strict punishment was metted out to those who caused the Israelites to renounce their faith. Perhaps the most remembered one is the story of Jezebel, (Kings I and II), the wife of King Ahab, who ruled the kingdom of Israel, who was responsible for widespread apostasy. Jezebel was not an Israelite. She was from the coastal Phoenician cities of Tyre and Sidon, modern day Lebanon. When Jezebel married Ahab (ruled c. 874–c. 853), she persuaded him to introduce Bael worship, a nature god. As the wife of King Ahab, she was responsible for the death of many believers of Yahweh that were opposed to Bael worship. These deaths eventually provoked the wrath of Elijah. According to I Kings 17, Elijah correctly prophesied the onset of a severe drought as divine retribution. Some time later Elijah had the Baal priests slain after they had lost a contest with him to see which god would heed prayers to ignite a bull offering, Baal or Yahweh. A few years later Ahab perished in battle with the Syrians. Jezebel lived on for approximately another ten years. Elijah's successor, Elisha the prophet, was equally determined to end Baal worship. He had a military commander named Jehu anointed as king of Israel, an act that provoked civil war, for Jezebel's son Jehoram (Joram) then ruled. Jehu killed Jehoram and then went to Jezebel's palace. Jehu ordered her eunuchs to throw her out the window. Later, when he commanded that she be properly buried as a king's daughter, it was discovered that dogs had eaten most of her body.

During the Spanish inquisition, and the ascendancy of Islam, the systematic forced conversion of Jews to Christianity and Islam made apostasy take on a different meaning. Forcing Jews to renounce their religion under threat of death made the issue of what qualifies as "apostasy" in Judaism a very complicated issue. Many rabbis generally considered the behavior of a Jew to be the determining factor in whether or not one is considered a true Jew or an apostate.

Abraham Isaac Kook (1864-1935), the first Chief Rabbi of the Jewish community in the British Mandate for Palestine, held that atheists were not actually denying God: rather, they were denying one of man's many images of God. Since any man-made image of God can be considered an idol, Kook held that, in practice, one could consider atheists as helping true religion burn away false images of god, thus in the end serving the purpose of true monotheism.

In Christianity

Apostasy only became an issue in Christianity when the Christian church separated itself from Jewish and Gnostic forms of Christianity. In the early centuries apostasy was a problem that was solved when orthodox Christianity separated itself from heretical and schismatic movements. But with the conversion of Constantine apostasy became a civil offense punishable by law. For more than a thousand years there was the mutual cooperation between Church and State. The State used the power of the sword to protect the Church against apostasy and the Church used the power of the scripture to protect the State against insurrection. Apostates were deprived of their civil as well as their religious rights. Torture was freely employed to extract confessions and to encourage recantations. Apostates and schismatics were excommunicated from the Church and persecuted by the State.

Apostasy on a grand scale took place many times. The “Great Schism” between Eastern Orthodoxy and Western Catholicism in the 8th century was the first great division within Christendom, resulting in mutual excommunication. The Protestant Reformation in the 16th century further divided Christian against Christian. Each sectarian group claimed to have recovered the authentic faith and practice of the New Testament Church, thereby relegating rival versions of Christianity to the status of apostasy.

Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) believe that a great apostasy took place with the death of the early apostles. and continued into the early nineteenth century. Mormons believe that the "priesthood" (the authority to act in God's name) was lost, and that the church as it existed in the days of Christ needed to be restored to its original condition. They believe the "restoration" was performed by Joseph Smith.

Regarding apostasy on an individual level, some denominations quote Jude and Titus 3:10 saying that an apostate or heretic needs to be "rejected after the first and second admonition." Hebrews 6:4-6 notes the impossibility of those who have fallen away "to be brought back to repentance."

The Roman Catholic Church holds that in certain circumstances apostasy can cause one to be excommunicated.

In Islam

Islam imposes harsh penalties for apostasy. The Quran has many passages that are critical of apostasy, but is silent on the proper punishment. The Hadith, on the other hand, the words of Muhammad, the death penalty is very explicit.

Today apostasy is punishable by death in Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Iran, Sudan, Afghanistan, Mauritania, the Comoros and, most likely, Iraq.[11][12] Similarly, blasphemy is punishable by death in Pakistan. In Qatar apostasy is a capital offense, but no executions have been reported for it.[13]

A few examples of passages in the Qur'an on apostasy:

Qur'an, [Qur'an 2.256] Let there be no compulsion in the religion: Clearly the Right Path (i.e. Islam) is distinct from the crooked path.

Qur'an, [Qur'an 3:090] But those who reject faith after they accepted it, and then go on adding to their defiance of faith, never will their repentance be accepted; for they are those who have (of set purpose) gone astray.

Qur'an, [Qur'an 4;137] Those who believe, then reject faith, then believe (again) and (again) reject faith, and go on increasing in unbelief,- Allah will not forgive them nor guide them on the way.

The Hadith, the body of quotes attributed to Muhammad, mandate the death penalty for apostasy:

Sahih Bukhari 9:84:57 Kill whoever changes his religion.

Sahih Bukhari 9:83:17 The blood of a Muslim who confesses that none has the right to be worshipped but Allah and that I am His Apostle, cannot be shed except in three cases: In Qisas for murder, a married person who commits illegal sexual intercourse and the one who reverts from Islam (apostate) and leaves the Muslims.

Some scholars have tried to donwplay these statements in the Hadith. For instance, Javed Ahmad Ghamidi, a Pakistani Islamic scholar, writes that these statements were valid only for the particular time period in which they were written and are no longer valid.[15]. Hasan al-Turabi argues that the passages in the Hadith that calls for death should be taken to apply only to political betrayal of the Muslim community, rather than to apostasy in general.[10] These scholars argue for the freedom to convert to and from Islam without a legal penalty, and consider the Hadith quotes as insufficient confirmation of the extremely harsh punishment. They regard apostasy as a serious crime, but undeserving of the death penalty. These scholars point out that it is important to understand that the Hadith must be put in its proper historical context. It was written at a time when the nascient Muslim community in Medina was fighting for its very life, and there were many tactics by which the enemies of Islam used to entice rebellion and discord within the community.[14] Any defection would have had serious consequences for the Muslims, so the passages in the Hadith may have been more about treason rather than religious apostasy.

But the majority of scholars believe that if a Muslim consciously and without coercion declares his rejection of Islam, and does not change his mind, then the penalty for male apostates is death and for women it is life imprisonment.

In New Religious Movements

Many apostates of new religious movements may make a number of allegations against their former group and its leaders. This list includes one or more of the following: unkept promises, sexual abuse by the leader, false, irrational and contradictory teachings, deception, financial exploitation, demonizing of the outside world, abuse of power and hypocrisy of the leadership, unnecessary secrecy, teaching platitudes, discouragement of critical thinking, brainwashing, mind control, exclusivism, pedophilia, and a leadership that does not admit any mistakes.

The roles these people play in the opposition to new religious movements are controversial subjects among scholars of religion, sociologists and psychologists. One noted study, by Bromley and Shupe, proposes that these stories are likely to paint a caricature of the group, shaped by the apostate's current role rather than his experience in the group, and question's their motives and rationale. Lewis Carter and David G. Bromley claim in some studies that the onus of pathology experienced by former members of new religions movements should be shifted from these groups to the coercive activities of the anti-cult movement.

There have been several studies on New Religious movements by various academics. See below.

Other uses of the term

In popular usage, religious terminology like "apostasy" is often appropriated for use within other public spheres characterized by strongly-held beliefs, like politics. Such usage typically carries a much less negative connotation than the religious usage does, and sometimes people will even describe themselves as apostates. Authors Kevin Phillips (political commentator)|Kevin Phillips (a former United States Republican Party|Republican strategist turned harsh critic of the George W. Bush|Bush administration) and Christopher Hitchens (a former left-wing commentator turned enthusiastic supporter of the Iraq War) are examples of people who are often described as political apostates.

Sociological definitions

The American sociologist Lewis A. Coser (following the German philosopher and sociologist Max Scheler) holds an apostate to be not just a person who experienced a dramatic change in conviction but “a man who, even in his new state of belief, is spiritually living not primarily in the content of that faith, in the pursuit of goals appropriate to it, but only in the struggle against the old faith and for the sake of its negation."

The American sociologist David G. Bromley defined the apostate role as follows and distinguished it from the defection|defector and whistleblower roles.

• Apostate role: defined as one that occurs in a highly polarized situation in which an organization member undertakes a total change of loyalties by allying with one or more elements of an oppositional coalition without the consent or control of the organization. The narrative is one which documents the quintessentially evil essence of the apostate's former organization chronicled through the apostate's personal experience of capture and ultimate escape/rescue.
• Defector role: an organizational participant negotiates exit primarily with organizational authorities, who grant permission for role relinquishment, control the exit process, and facilitate role transmission. The jointly constructed narrative assigns primary moral responsibility for role performance problems to the departing member and interprets organizational permission as commitment to extraordinary moral standards and preservation of public trust.
• Whistleblower role: defined here as one in which an organization member forms an alliance with an external regulatory unit through offering personal testimony concerning specific, contested organizational practices that is then used to sanction the organization. The narrative constructed jointly by the whistleblower and regulatory agency is one which depicts the whistleblower as motivated by personal conscience and the organization by defense of public interest.

Stuart A. Wright, an American sociologist and author, asserts that apostasy is a unique phenomenon and a distinct type of religious defection, in which the apostate is a defector "who is aligned with an oppositional coalition in an effort to broaden the dispute, and embraces public claimsmaking activities to attack his or her former group."

In international law

The United Nations Commission on Human Rights, considers the recanting of a person's religion a human right legally protected by the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights: "The Committee observes that the freedom to 'have or to adopt' a religion or belief necessarily entails the freedom to choose a religion or belief, including the right to replace one's current religion or belief with another or to adopt atheistic views [...] Article 18.2 bars coercion that would impair the right to have or adopt a religion or belief, including the use of threat of physical force or penal sanctions to compel believers or non-believers to adhere to their religious beliefs and congregations, to recant their religion or belief or to convert."

External Links

• Dunlop, Mark, The culture of Cults, 2001 [1]
• [Massimo Introvigne|Introvigne, Massimo Defectors, Ordinary Leavetakers and Apostates: A Quantitative Study of Former Members of New Acropolis in France - paper delivered at the 1997 Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Religion, San Francisco, November 23, 1997 [2]
• The Jewish Encyclopedia (1906). The Kopelman Foundation. [3]
• Lucas, Phillip Charles, The Odyssey of a New Religion: The Holy Order of MANS from New Age to Orthodoxy Indiana University press;
• Lucas, Phillip Charles, Shifting Millennial Visions in New Religious Movements: The case of the Holy Order of MANS in The year 2000: Essays on the End edited by Charles B. Strozier, New York University Press 1997;
• Lucas, Phillip Charles, The Eleventh Commandment Fellowship: A New Religious Movement Confronts the Ecological Crisis, Journal of Contemporary Religion 10:3, 1995:229-41;
• Lucas, Phillip Charles, Social factors in the Failure of New Religious Movements: A Case Study Using Stark's Success Model SYZYGY: Journal of Alternative Religion and Culture 1:1, Winter 1992:39-53
• Zablocki, Benjamin et al., Research on NRMs in the Post-9/11 World, in Lucas, Phillip Charles et al. (ed.), NRMs in the 21st Century: legal, political, and social challenges in global perspective, 2004, ISBN 0-415-96577-2
• This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.
• Apostates of Islam, why Islam should be avoided [4]
• http://www.nccbuscc.org/nab/bible/deuteronomy/deuteronomy13.htm

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• Babinski, Edward (editor), Leaving the Fold: Testimonies of Former Fundamentalists. Prometheus Books, 2003. ISBN-10: 1591022177; ISBN-13: 978-1591022176
• Dubreuil, J. P. 1994 L'Église de Scientology. Facile d'y entrer, difficile d'en sortir. Sherbrooke: private edition (ex-Church of Scientology)
• Huguenin, T. 1995 Le 54^e Paris Fixot (ex-Ordre du Temple Solaire who would be the 54th victim)
• Kaufmann, Inside Scientology/Dianetics: How I Joined Dianetics/Scientology and Became Superhuman, 1995 [5]
• Lavallée, G. 1994 L'alliance de la brebis. Rescapée de la secte de Moïse, Montréal: Club Québec Loisirs (ex-Roch Theriault)
• Pignotti, Monica, My nine lives in Scientology, 1989, [6]
• Wakefield, Margery, Testimony, 1996 [7]
• Lawrence Woodcraft, Astra Woodcraft, Zoe Woodcraft, The Woodcraft Family, Video Interviews [8]

• Bromley, David G. (Ed.) The Politics of Religious Apostasy|The Politics of Religious Apostasy: The Role of Apostates in the Transformation of Religious Movements CT, Praeger Publishers, 1998. ISBN 0-275-95508-7
• Carter, Lewis, F. Lewis, Carriers of Tales: On Assessing Credibility of Apostate and Other Outsider Accounts of Religious Practices published in the book The Politics of Religious Apostasy: The Role of Apostates in the Transformation of Religious Movements edited by David G. Bromley Westport, CT, Praeger Publishers, 1998. ISBN 0-275-95508-7
• Elwell, Walter A. (Ed.) Baker Encyclopedia of the Bible, Volume 1 A-I, Baker Book House, 1988, pages 130-131, "Apostasy." ISBN 0801034477
• Malinoski, Peter, Thoughts on Conducting Research with Former Cult Members , Cultic Studies Review, Vol. 1, No. 1, 2001 [9]
• Palmer, Susan J. Apostates and their Role in the Construction of Grievance Claims against the Northeast Kingdom/Messianic Communities [10]
• Wilson, S.G., Leaving the Fold: Apostates and Defectors in Antiquity. Augsburg Fortress Publishers, 2004. ISBN-10: 0800636759; ISBN-13: 978-0800636753
• Wright, Stuart. Post-Involvement Attitudes of Voluntary Defectors from Controversial New Religious Movements. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 23 (1984): pp. 172-82