Introduction: The Price of Forgetting
The most radical idea of the Enlightenment was simple: one law for all. It was the end of trials by ordeal, the end of church courts with their secret verdicts, the end of justice by bloodline or faith. The law became blind and public. This was humanity’s great equaliser.
But great ideas can be forgotten. Today, across the world, we see renewed attempts to smuggle religion back into the courtroom. Not as personal belief, but as a parallel system of justice. In the name of tolerance, we are asked to allow it. And many do.
“Tolerance of intolerance is cowardice.” – Karl Popper
This is not tolerance. It is surrender. And it risks undoing centuries of hard-won progress.
Why One Law Matters
Law is the backbone of citizenship. It tells us what we may do, what we may not do, and what happens if we cross the line. The whole concept works only because the law is the same for everyone. A millionaire and a beggar are meant to stand equal before the court.
The moment parallel systems appear, that equality starts to rot. A person born into a devout community can suddenly find themselves facing a tribunal not of the state but of the sect. Family disputes, inheritance battles, even criminal accusations get settled according to doctrine rather than evidence.
“Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.” – Voltaire
This is not freedom. It is pressure disguised as piety. And it leaves citizens divided into those who are truly free under public law and those who are privately judged.
Historical Lessons We Should Not Ignore
History is clear on what happens when faith and law merge. Europe’s own past was a cautionary tale of ecclesiastical courts, inquisitions, and heresy trials. Women accused of witchcraft were hanged or burned not by mobs, but under duly recognised religious law.
The Enlightenment thinkers who fought to separate church and state knew exactly what they were dismantling. Voltaire, Diderot, and others risked prison to insist that reason, not revelation, must be the arbiter of justice.
And yet, in the twenty-first century, we are invited to forget all this and allow faith-based arbitration back into civil life. It is an extraordinary case of historical amnesia.
The Multicultural Temptation
Supporters of parallel legal systems often frame them as multiculturalism. But pluralism does not mean separate law codes. It means many beliefs coexisting under one law.
When the state defers to religious law, it is not respecting culture. It is outsourcing justice. And that almost always hurts the weakest: women denied equal inheritance, children placed under clerical guardianship, dissenters punished for apostasy.
“Culture is not your friend.” – Terence McKenna
Culture can inspire, but it can also oppress. The role of law is to protect the individual even from their own tribe.
Case Studies: Where Parallel Justice Fails
Consider family courts where “voluntary” arbitration under religious law is offered. In theory, people can walk away. In reality, social pressure makes refusal almost impossible. A woman challenging an unfair divorce settlement risks not just losing property, but losing her place in her community.
Consider countries where blasphemy laws are still enforced. The accusation alone is enough to destroy lives, regardless of evidence. When belief and law merge, free speech becomes the first casualty.
“Freedom is the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.” – George Orwell
Secularism Is the Shield, Not the Sword
Secularism is not an attack on faith. It is the guarantee that no faith can dominate the rest. It is the principle that allows belief to flourish peacefully because it stops any one religion from claiming the machinery of the state.
It protects the devout just as much as the atheist. A Christian in a Muslim-majority country, a Muslim in a Hindu-majority country, a nonbeliever anywhere — all have the same stake in one neutral, secular law.
The Test of True Tolerance
True tolerance is not the warm feeling of letting everyone “do their own thing.” True tolerance means protecting the right of individuals to step outside the codes of their birth. It means insisting that there is always one, and only one, path to legal redress: the public court.
It is easy to be tolerant when nothing is at stake. The real test comes when belief collides with equality, when a religious rule says one thing and the civil law another. At that moment, a society must choose which wins.
If we choose the religious rule, we are no longer a secular democracy.
Holding the Line
The door must stay open to worship, prayer, fasting, and conscience. But it must stay firmly shut to any rival legal system, however softly introduced.
“The law of the land is not a suggestion.”
This is not anti-religion. It is pro-equality. And it is the only way to prevent the slow creep of sectarian law from undoing centuries of progress.
Conclusion: No Special Pleadings
The secular settlement is fragile. We forget its origins at our peril. Tolerance must never mean capitulation. The law of the land must remain one, indivisible, and supreme.
The next time a faith asks for special legal treatment, the answer must be polite but firm: No. The law is for everyone. It cannot be shared.