Evan Osnos Quotes
The Beijing government avidly asserts its control over matters of reincarnation as a way of securing the loyalty and political complexion of influential Tibetan figures.
Osnos, Evan. "The Next Incarnation." The New Yorker, Condé Nast, 4 Oct. 2010.
Spinoza’s ideas were considered so radical and dangerous that he was the only man in history who was excommunicated by the Catholics, the Jews and the Muslims. This quotation, in the 17th century outraged almost every cleric. This is one of the strongest and unequivocal statements about the desirability of separation of church and state. Interestingly, as early as this statement was, Spinoza believed that harm extended to both religion and government.
The religious people in Saudi Arabia are very powerful and don't allow anyone to step on their toes.
Criticize them in the press.
While the American Civil War was raging, Pinyin Hong Xiuquan started a quasi Christian religion (he claimed to be the brother of Jesus Christ) in China which initiated a war of extermination with the Manchus and other religions. More than 20 million Chinese were killed in a religious war that proportionately killed more Chinese than the Nazis killed in Europeans. Though hardly noticed in America and Europe, the religious war of extermination had been so traumatic that dissident religions are the most feared problem by Chinese modern leaders—more so than Capitalists, Taiwan or any of the modern ‘enemies’. It is the Falun Gong and the Tibetan Buddhists who the leadership fear might grow into another Yellow Turban movement—the worst Trauma of Chinese History—even worse than the Japanese WWII invasion. Hence the irrational view of the Chinese leadership towards religions they cannot control. See {612649} and {612649}. In Western terms as Wiesel put it, the Chinese leadership suppression of Tibet makes little or no sense, but current Chinese leadership is paranoid as a result of its history.
This quotation is one of the most powerful indictments of religion in the political sphere. Historically, religions have supported the status quo in political society even. However, individual clerics have been in the forefront of many if not most of the movements toward freedom and democracy. For example, American religious institutions general supported slavery and legal discrimination thereafter, yet clerics were major abolutionists and major contributors to the Civil Rights Movement. Even today, American churches are the most racially segregated institutions left in America. See {620780} for his view on Christianity in particular.
Pippin had the opportunity of expanding his empire by conquering the Lombards whose cavalry he could use if and when the Saracen Muslims would invade again. But he would be seizing another Christian country, contrary to the Pope’s edicts, thus losing the blessings of the Pope. Hence the question. He decided to go for the cavalry. Later, Joseph Stalin asked the same question in much different context. See {627524}. Some historians question whether Pippen actually uttered the quotation or just considered it.
Evan Lionel Richard Osnos is an American journalist and author. He has been a staff writer at The New Yorker since 2008, best known for his coverage of politics and foreign affairs, in the United States and China. His 2014 book, Age of Ambition: Chasing Fortune, Truth, and Faith in the New China, won the National Book Award for nonfiction. In October 2020, he published a biography of Joe Biden, entitled Joe Biden: The Life, the Run, and What Matters Now.
