Religion: Proscription of Sinners or Prescription for Happiness?

(c) Richard Bolstad 2005/2026

The Two faces Of Religion

I bought a badge the other day. It says “Jesus called. He wants his religion back.” It reminded me of one day on one of my NLP trainings, when I was talking with a man who had been a cleric in a Christian church. Finally, as we discussed the extraordinary perversion of such teachings, he asked in frustration, “How did religion get so damaged?!”

Here is the expansion of some of what I said in reply. Proscription and prescription are two words which have come down to us from Roman law. A proscription was a written list of those to be executed. A prescription was a written list of rules of conduct, later referring to recommendations or remedies to promote health. Description, on the other hand, simply meant to write down or to draw. The words are so similar, maybe it’s little wonder that for thousands of years religious teachers have confused the three.

Proscriptive and prescriptive texts sit side by side in religious books such as the Christian Bible. For example, here are a couple of proscriptive quotes from there: Exodus 31.15 “Whosoever does any work on the Sabbath day shall be put to death.” Mark 16.16 “He who does not believe will be condemned to death.” And here are a couple of descriptive quotes on the same subjects: Mark 2.27: “And he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.””  John 15.07 “If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you will and it shall be done for you.” [*See Footnote]. Finally, here is a prescriptive text. John 15.10-11: “If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.”

Happiness

In recent articles, I have discussed the new science of Positive Psychology, which has been researching (modelling) the sources of happiness. Much of NLP focuses on modelling success, and this does not always lead to happiness, for a very simple reason: success means getting what you want; happiness means wanting what you get. “Positive Psychology theorists marvel at studies showing that quadriplegics, as a group, have a higher sense of well-being than lottery winners. The lottery winners, we can guess, were swept up in materialism and betrayed by it, while the quadriplegics had to adjust to their conditions and in so doing learned to appreciate the fact of being alive. More, quadriplegics must struggle daily – must work for everything they attain – while lottery winners may lay around snapping their fingers and expecting others to deliver contentment to them.” (Easterbrook, 2003, p 222).

In recent research on the strategies which generate happiness, there have been some confirmations for NLP, and some surprises. In previous articles, I have discussed the confirmations about “being at cause” and paying attention to positive results. Here, I want to present what may be some surprises. Here I want to discuss three personal qualities which research shows are strongly correlated with happiness. They are compassion, forgiveness and gratitude. The weird thing is, these are three qualities which some religious texts have been advocating for thousands of years.

Compassion “Love Your Neighbour As You Love Yourself”

“Don’t be afraid of doing good. It’s another name for happiness, for all that is dear and delightful.” says the Buddha in the Itivuttaka Sutta (Bancroft, 2001, p 175). And Barbara Frederickson, from the University of Michigan, suggests that natural selection has favoured doing good, as well as the positive emotions that go with it, such as compassion, ensuring that groups who care for each other survive longer (Frederickson, 2000).

Dr. Richard Davidson, director of the Laboratory for Affective Neuroscience at the University of Wisconsin used an fMRI machine to map the brain of over 175 people, showing that he could accurately predict their level of happiness by checking the level of activity in a specific area of the brain – the left prefrontal cortex. When he studied Buddhist monk Matthieu Ricard (Oser), with 30 years experience in “compassion meditation”, Davidson found something dramatic. Ricard’s left frontal cortex was way off the scale.Daniel Goleman explains, “While Oser was generating a state of compassion during meditation, he showed a remarkable leftward shift in this parameter of prefrontal function… In short, Oser’s brain shift during compassion seemed to reflect an extremely pleasant mood. The very act of concern for others’ well-being, it seems, creates a greater sense of well-being within oneself.” (Goleman, 2003, p.12) The same results were gained when other compassion meditators were wired up. In his non-meditative state, one geshe (abbott) from a Buddhist monastery, for example, was far off the scale of normal happiness. Davidson describes the geshe as “an outlier” on the graph – his reading was “three standard deviations to the left”, far beyond the rest of the bell curve for positive emotion.

Can the results be duplicated? A tentative answer to that last question has come from a study that Dr. Davidson did in collaboration with Dr. Jon Kabat-Zinn, founder of the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Clinic at the University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester. After 3 hours of Buddhist meditation a week, for two months, volunteers trained by Kabat-Zinn produced a dramatic shift towards brain-measured happiness. Their immune functioning was also boosted, as were their subjective reports of calmness and happiness. How do you do it? The 19th century Patrul Rinpoche suggests the following technique for compassion meditation: “Think of someone in immense torment – a person cast into the deepest dungeon awaiting execution, or an animal standing before the butcher about to be slaughtered. Feel love towards that being as if it were your own mother or child.” Patrul Rinpoche then urges that the meditator repeatedly imagine, not merely that this unfortunate person or animal has been released from suffering, but that we ourselves have released them.

Forgiveness: “Forgive Those Who Trespass Against Us”

Everett Worthington, professor of psychology at Virginia Commonwealth University has demonstrated that people who are less able to forgive are more prone to stress, have lower immune function, higher rates of clinical depression, higher rates of heart disease, and higher divorce rates.  “Research now suggests that those who take a forgiving attitude towards others not only make better friends, neighbours and co-workers – anyone would guess that – but are themselves happier, healthier people who live longer than others and know more success in life. Are they more forgiving because happiness makes them more magnanimous, or does forgiving improve their wellbeing, bringing about the happiness? Studies suggest the latter…. Even when someone wrongs you, feeling fury or experiencing hate only causes your life to descend into unhappiness and resentment. Then you are the one who suffers, not the person you are angry at. Perhaps when Buddha, Jesus, Mohammed (PBUH), Baha’ullah and other great spiritual figures taught followers to forgive those who sin against them, this wasn’t only the pronouncement of holy philosophy – they were giving practical, down-to-earth life advice.” (Easterbrook, 2003, p 229 and p 231).

Psychologist Kenneth Pargament, of Bowling Green State University, has shown that forgiveness counselling (either based on religious or on secular principles) is dramatically more effective than anger management and traditional counselling, in reducing anxiety and depression amongst those who suffer serious and “potentially traumatic” grievances. Once again, the beneficial results of forgiveness can be reached in a few short sessions.

The very first words of the central Buddhist text the Dhammapada sum this understanding up with utter clarity. “We are what we think. All that we are arises with our thoughts. With our thoughts we make the world…. Speak or act with a pure mind and happiness will follow you as your shadow, unshakable. Look how he abused me and beat me, how he threw me down and robbed me. Live with such thoughts and you live in hate. Look how he abused me and beat me, how he threw me down and robbed me. Abandon such thoughts and live in love. In this world hate never yet dispelled hate. Only love dispels hate. This is the law, ancient and inexhaustible.” (Byrom, 1993, p 1-2). In the light of research, we can see that the Buddha’s teaching is not a moralistic threat. It is itself a compassionate attempt to explain a fundamental truth which can set us free from suffering: Love alone leads to happiness. Jesus suggestion is similar in the central Christian texts:“Then Peter came to Jesus and asked “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?” Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times: but seventy seven times.”” (Common Bible, Matthew, Chapter 18, Verse 21). In a Muslim Hadith Qudsi, meaning a statement of God, but quoted by the Prophet Muhammad (‎ﷺ), the prophet explains: “My Mercy prevails over my wrath.” After the mass murder of people at the Al Noor Mosque in Christchurch, this quote was used by survivors to explain their forgiveness. In Judaism, forgiveness is a mitzvah – an individual act of kindness performed in expression of the commandments, and there is a daily prayer that says “I forgive anyone who has angered or upset me… let no one incur punishment because of me.” (Yizkim, 2020). 

Gratitude: “Let Us Give Thanks”

Return to my definition of happiness above (happiness means wanting what you get), and you’ll see that gratefulness and happiness are one and the same. Robert Emmons of the University of California at Davis has studied research on people who report being grateful in their life. He finds that grateful people tend to be well aware of life’s challenges, but choose not to focus on that. They have a strong sense of the interconnectedness of life, and are less motivated by material possessions than the general population. In life results, they tend to have more vitality, less stress, less clinical depression, and feel more optimistic.

College students asked to keep a gratitude journal begin to experience these effects quickly, reporting within a few weeks that they have more happiness, better health, more frequent exercise (a strong correlate of happiness anyway), and more optimism about the future. Emmons explains “To say we should feel grateful is not to say that everything in our lives is necessarily good. It just means that if you only think about your disappointments and unsatisfied wants, you may be prone to unhappiness. If you’re fully aware of your disappointments but at the same time thankful of the good that has happened and for your chance to live, you may show higher indices of well-being.” (quoted in Easterbrook, 2003, p 240). He restates “All this matters not as a moralising sermon but a matter of self-interest, owing to the findings of positive psychology.” (Easterbrook, 2003, p 238).

Summary

What people call religion is often a tragic mixture of proscription, prescription and description. Here I have focused on what modern research tells us descriptively about three traditional religious virtues: compassion, forgiveness and gratitude. There is good evidence that these three qualities enhance life outcomes and dramatically increase the level of happiness, as measured both subjectively and objectively. There is also good evidence that these benefits can be generated in a very short time by paying attention to:

  • Feelings of compassion for other human beings and living things.
  • Feelings of gratitude for life and the realistic good things which are available to us, whatever our circumstances
  • Feelings of forgiveness, regardless of how others seem to have “wronged” us

Richard Bolstad is an NLP trainer and teacher of Chinese chi kung. He can be contacted at learn@transformations.org.nz   

Bibliography:

  • Bancroft, A. The Pocket Buddha Reader Shamballa, Boston, 2001
  • Bolstad, R. Integration: NLP and Spirituality Transformations, Christchurch, 2005
  • Byrom, T. Dhammapada: The Sayings Of The Buddha Shambhala, Boston, 1993
  • Carroll, J. Crusade: Chronicles of an Unjust War, Henry Holt and Company, New York, 2004
  • Easterbrook, G. The Progress Paradox Random House, New York, 2003
  • Frederickson, B. “Cultivating Positive Emotions to Optimize Happiness and Wellbeing” in Prevention and Treatment (Journal of the American Psychological Association) March 2000 (Barbara)
  • Goleman, D. Destructive Emotions – How Can We Overcome Them Bantam, New York, 2003
  • Haught, J.A. Holy Horrors , Prometheus Press, Buffalo, 1990
  • Karen, R. The Forgiving Self Doubleday, New York, 2001 (Robert)
  • Lane, R. The Loss of Happiness in Market Democracies Yale University Press, New Haven, 2000
  • McCullough, M.E. et alia, “Interpersonal Forgiving in Close Relationships” in Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Autumn 1997
  • National Council of the Churches of Christ Common Bible: Revised Standard Version Collins, New York, 1973
  • Pargament, K. et alia “Forgiveness and Romantic Relationships” in Journal of Clinical Psychology, Winter 2002 (Kenneth)
  • Worthington, E. Dimensions of Forgiveness Templeton Press, Philadelphia, 1998 (Everett)
  • Yizkor, 2020, “Is there a right time to ask for forgiveness?” Shluchim Sermons https://shluchimsermons.org/7032

Footnote:

In the common mind, throughout history, religion has been associated most with proscription. Christianity evolved from its gentle, prescriptive origins in Jesus teachings, into a brutal proscriptive force, for example. Raymond of Aguilers was there to observe one of the so called “great moments” in the history of Christianity, when the great Crusade followed Pope Gregory’s instruction and conquered the city of Jerusalem, where Muslim, Jew and Christian had worshipped together in peace for centuries. The Pope insisted “Cursed be the man who holds back his sword from shedding blood.” Raymond describes the result in glowing terms. “Wonderful things were to be seen. Numbers of the Saracens were beheaded. Others were shot with arrows, or forced to jump from the towers; others were tortured for several days, then burned with flames. In the streets were seen piles of heads and hands and feet. One rode everywhere amid the corpses of men and horses. In the temple of Solomon, the horses waded in blood up to their knees, nay up to the bridle. It was a just and marvellous judgement of God, that this place should be filled with the blood of unbelievers.” (Haught, 1990, p 25-26). It is a great paradox that the nearest we have to a “Christian” (forgiving, loving, compassionate) leader in the Crusades is Salahuddin Ayyubi (Saladin), the Muslim general. When Saladin retook Jerusalem, the Christians waited for a massacre similar to the one they had inflicted. However, Salahuddin not only spared the Christians but treated them honorably, allowing those who wished to leave to do so in peace, and those who wished to stay to do so in harmony. By his restraint and peaceful treatment, Salahuddin was upholding the central tenets of Islam such as freedom of religion and protection of non-Muslims. Flash forward to the twenty-first century. Sadly, on September 17, 2001, a week after Muslims drove Christians, Jews and other Muslims leaping from the towers of New York, American President George W. Bush spoke of an ongoing religious war. “”My administration has a job to do. … We will rid the world of evil-doers…. This crusade, this war on terrorism, is going to take awhile.” (Carroll, 2004). Are we really going back to the crusades!