Doesn’t religion promote tribalism?
Religion (at least organized religion) has been a force against tribalism, if by tribalism we mean loyalty to a particular tribe or ethnic group. Islam had to fight its way against tribal divisions in the Arabian Peninsula, and through word and sword, united millions of people of different ethnicities and languages from Europe to Africa to India. Similarly, Christianity spread in the Roman Empire by uniting different ethnic and linguistic groups. The trouble starts when with the new religion comes new boundaries, setting one religious group against another. Therefore, whether religion is a constructive or destructive force to people, entirely depends on whether a person is inside or outside of a given moral community. Religion is a source of social cohesion for those on the inside, but at the same time it may be a source of social division for those on the outside. Religion’s power to divide is especially problematic for religiously diverse societies.
