The first time I was faced with the term “Moral Zeitgeist” was when reading Richard Dawkins’ The God Delusion, and, according to Wikipedia, the term was indeed coined by him. “Zeitgeist” is a German word that means “the spirit of the times”, and, therefore, the Moral Zeitgeist refers to the evolution of society’ views on morality.
Dawkins himself provides a perfect example of how the Moral Zeitgeist has changed throughout history (which I’ve again stolen from Wikipedia):
Slavery, which was taken for granted in the Bible and throughout most of history, was abolished in civilized countries in the nineteenth century. All civilized nations now accept what was widely denied up to the 1920s, that a woman’s vote, in an election or on a jury, is the equal of a man’s. In today’s enlightened societies (a category that manifestly does not include, for example, Saudi Arabia), women are no longer regarded as property, as they clearly were in biblical times. Any modern legal system would have prosecuted Abraham for child abuse.
In TGD, Dawkins also provides quotes from people who were, in their time, seen as progressive liberals, such as Thomas Huxley or Abraham Lincoln, but which nowadays make one cringe and gasp in shock because of their racism or sexism. This all shows one thing: our perceptions have changed. What was accepted, even seen as highly moral, many years ago, is now seen as abusive and immoral. This does not happen instantly (though it’s more quick than it may appear, especially in recent years, with mass communication and, now, the Internet), nor to the same degree in all places, of course. And changes are not always for the better (e.g. political correctness, which often prevents people from calling things what they are). But, in general, they are. Things do become better. Societies are far from perfect, but people today have more empathy than they used to have, centuries or even decades ago. Racism and sexism are condemned, have been erased from law books, and those who are still racists or sexists are seen as the bigots they are by educated people. We understand, more than we used to in the past, that life is precious, and that the suffering of other people is as real as ours, even if they look different or have different customs.
Note that I am not saying that morality itself is subjective. Slavery didn’t “become” wrong only in the 19th century, it was always a cruel, brutal suppression of basic human rights. What I’m saying is that the general public’s views on morality have changed, and will continue to change — mostly for the better. One consequence of this is that people might be excused for supporting slavery 500 years ago, but nowadays there’s absolutely no excuse, because they ought to know better.
Of course, the very fact that the Moral Zeitgeist changes and evolves with time proves one thing clearly: that most religious believers don’t get their morality from religion. (Those that do, in the western world, usually have “Phelps” somewhere in their name.) The morality in, say, the Christian Bible is nothing special for its time; not more enlightened, not more advanced or progressive (do believers really think that, before the 10 Commandments, everyone thought that murder was a pretty neat idea?), not “radical” in any way. Jesus himself might sound different, but what he was preaching was mostly an apocalyptic cult whose believers expected the end of the world in their lifetimes; it was Paul that turned Christianity into a religion, with — much like other contemporary religions such as Judaism — all the sexism and support of slavery that was the norm at the time.
While most believers today don’t get their morality from religion or the Bible at all (which is a good thing, too), many still think that they do. But, in fact, their morality mostly fits in with the current moral Zeitgeist. Beliefs such as “God is love”, “God loves everyone” and “God wants us to be happy and free” have no Biblical basis at all; they were made up by believers when society came to appreciate those ideas.
Of course, there are some who do cling, to a degree, to parts of Biblical morality. That is why, for example, churches before the American Civil War opposed emancipation; after all, weren’t people of color the descendents of Ham, condemned to slavery in Genesis? Wasn’t slavery Biblical? Didn’t Paul command slaves to obey their masters?
What about sexism? Well, the Bible clearly states — both in the OT and the NT — that women are the property of men. Who are we to change God’s law? Women should stay at home, not speak in church, and never have authority over men. Guess who opposed equal rights the most.
And don’t get me started on gay marriage.
Of course, eventually even the churches relent, when society has advanced so much that they risk becoming irrelevant. The Mormon church used to forbid black priests; that changed… and, according to them, it was due to a “new revelation”. Christian churches now want to take credit for the end of slavery (because “God loves everyone”, of course), when they were its biggest supporters back then. Churches these days don’t prevent black people from entering, or women from speaking. But all that happened later than with the rest of society. Religion based on scripture, revelation and authority is by nature conservative, and only evolves when forced to, when they are so displaced from society that they face possible obsoleteness or even extinction. One could say that religion, in general, is always behind the Moral Zeitgeist, because it is religion that is always the last to change. And that’s in the west; note how Islam resists change and clings to 13th century morality. They do it through force, fear, and isolation; the more people know, the more they question. The imams know perfectly well how Christianity lost many of its privileges in the west, and want to avoid a similar fate at all costs.
Now, if religion has to follow the rest of society or become irrelevant, if more and more of its original morality is nowadays obsolete and ignored… if society’s views on morality are always in front of religion in terms of progress, and religion has to play catch up… if you realize that in 10 or 20 years the Moral Zeitgeist will have shifted even more, and will be even more different from religion’s original tenets, forcing it to keep adapting… why not dismiss religion as a source of morality altogether?
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