Studies in Divine Economics:Issues of Measuring Religiosity
Alamost all religions of the world and especially the divine religions believe in coming of a reformer who will change the world in a way that it will become a paradise-like place. In christianty, there is a concept of ‘Kingdom of God’ ..the state of the world in which God\'s will shall be fulfilled. That is expected to be materialized at the end of time or when Jesus Christ returns. The celeberate Advent that anticipates second coming Jesus Christ on earth. Some faiths have already celebrated as if the one who was anticipated to come, has come (For example ‘Bab’). Human emergence into a new world of spiritual and moral refinement is belived in non divine religions too. For example ‘Paryushana Parva’ is a Jain 8 day festival based on Jain sacred writing. In some Jews, the ‘messianic age’ was believed to be a time of perfection of human institutions or time of radical new beginnings to the extent that they term it as emergence of a new heaven and earth. The concept of "Messiah" also exists in Islam (e.g. Quran 3.45). In Islam, there also exists the concept of ‘Mahdi’ (Arabic word that means ‘the guided one’ or the ‘divinely guided’).
There is a complete debate as well as a discipline of knowledge known as eschatology , that is about last or ‘end of time’. It refers to expected happenings "last times" defined as ‘study of the ultimate destiny or purpose of humankind and the world, how and when the end will occur, what the end or last period of history or existence will be like’ (See Wikipedia).
The above discussion indicates that both divine an non-divine religions have a concept of future with a series of predictions concerning some good or bad days, some disasters, and some global changes. One can conclude that regardless of the question whether the predictions about future as given by religions, is right, partially right or totally wrong, no one can deny that these predictions may systematically influence the human perceptions, deeds and soci-economic behaviours .
The Muslim world stretches from Morocco to Malaysia. More than 50 countries in three continents are Muslim countries. Muslim countries have more than one billion population. Mostly Muslim countries are classified as low income, low middle income and middle income countries. An innovative
research and thinking process needs to be started that may evaluate such predictions in the light of Islamic teachings which categorically state that the erth shall not end without a golden rule of Islam under the leadership of
Imam Mahdi. The concepts relating to this belief fall under the doctrine of Mahdism.
Kennedy, Northcott and Kinzel (1978) discuss some of the methodological difficulties that arise in the evaluation of well-being due to its subjective nature. They discuss (1) specific, domain, and global measures; (2) objective states and subjective perceptions; (3) micro and macro units of analysis; and (4) the problem of cultural relativism. They conclude that ‘it is not yet possible to delineate a simple set of social indicators for use by policy-makers and social planners. Accurate assessment of social well-being currently requires the study of demographic and objective states together with cognitive and evaluational responses and also requires assessment not only at the global general satisfaction level but also at more specific levels of analysis’. (see http://www.springerlink.com/content/ uq3xjh24432u7643/).
Cornwall, Albrecht, Cunningham, and Pitcher (1986), in their paper “The Dimensions of Religiosity: A Conceptual Model with an Empirical Test, developed and tests a conceptual model of religiosity and its measurement. The model is adaptable to the study of religiosity within other denominations and groups. ‘Six dimensions are theoretically derived by a cross-classification of three general components: religious belief, commitment, and behavior; and two modes of religiosity: personal and institutional’. They have performed an empirical test of the model also that is reported in the study. There are other studies that describe the confirmation and validation of a multidimensional measure of religious involvement.
But the available research on measuring religiosity for empirical studies on Mahdism is very limited. Whatever literature available is scattered. There do not exist formal theories and models of individual’s behavior regarding the Mahdism doctrine.
What to do ?
Keeping in view of the importance of Mahdism doctrine and its possible relationship with human behavior, there is a need to;
understand different phenomenon of the world
study what is happening around; Events, Situations, Expressions or concepts.
understand impact and relationship of the doctrine of Mahdism with other aspects of life
Try to remove gaps in true understanding
Prepare material for awareness of all types of audience belonging to variety of thoughts and cultural backgrounds
How we can know deepen Peopole’s perception of Mahdism?
There may be many ways to deepen the real concept of Mahdism for larger interest of global community bu the following specific actions may help in this regard;
Through provision authentic literature
Through empirical research studies (based on facts and figures)
Identifying key variables e.g well being, honesty, justices, equity, prosperity, happiness, peace of mind etc.
It has been established earlier that by Hamdani (2006) that Mahdism has notable relationship with economics, social and other behaviour through the level of religiosity and its types. For example, the belief in Mahdi’s appearance may affect human behavior In following ways;
Affects emotions
Controls actions
Determines allocation (time and money to causes)
Adds strength in behavior
Adds depth in sincerity of purpose
Provides psycho-force to the decision maker
Creates ties among families and communities
Keeping in view the above and other possible roles that the concept of Mahdism can play, there is a need to extend the Divine Economics Framework which could focus on exploring questions such as;
Do more religious and least religious people have same/similar views about future of the globe?
Why (and of what type of) people allocate more resources and voluntary time for Mahdviat related causes?
Do religious associations which have clearer concept of Mahdism behave differently than others ?
If Mahdiviat is actually important in a future world, would globalization take religion and science hand in hand in view of the predicted future of the globe?
Does contemporary curriculum in world universities in general and in Islamic universities in particular incorporate the concept of ‘future of the globe’?
A model of Economic Behavior with Mahdivism Cognizance
The individual is likely to display a systematically different behavior if has or has not any knowledge and belief of appearance of Imam Mahdi (along with the coming of Jesus Christ). The problem of individual under divine economics would be to:
choose:{the amounts of time devoted to market activities, personal care and rest, societal activities and religious activities }
to maximize: the current and afterlife expected utility from production and/or consumption of material and non-material (spiritual) commodities}
given: {income and total time-budget constraint}
Data Issues
To empirically test the model given above, one some conventional and some non-conventional data. The most crucial aspect of such type of studies is the construction of religiosity scales that may be used for analyzing the human behavior in Mahdviat perspective. At least the following aspects need attention;
i) Basic beliefs dimension of religiosity
ii) Rituals dimension of religiosity
ii) Social dealing and tolerance dimension
iii) Altruism and sacrifice dimension
iv) Futuristic vision and perception of individual
v) Mahdvi perspective
Hence, more specifically, one would need the following type of data to carry out empirical studies in Mahdvi perspective;
Demographic data
Conventional economic indicators (income, assets, expenditure, saving pattern)
Routine of daily activities (time allocated by individual for M, L, H, V, R)
Data on religiosity; beliefs, rates of participation, worship practices, social and business dealings, moral conduct, charitable donations, voluntary behavior etc.
Data of cultures, regions, sects, groups
Data on reading, listening, and delivering habits
Data on Mahdviat-related indexes (see below)
The author has compiled a detailed list of religiosity indicators derived from Qur’an, Hadith and other religious sources. A questionnaire has been prepared recently that applied the Divine Economics Model on post-disaster rehabilitation analysis. That questionnaire includes, for the first time in the history of empirical economics, some questions relating to Mahdiviate in addition to questions on other religiosity indicators. The questionnaire can be obtained from the author on demands.
The Mahdviat Index?
The Mahdviat indexes can be prepared on the basis of characteristics of individuals. Since religion and sect requires from its followers to follow the religious prescriptions, an individual shall be considered more religious if he scores higher on scales indicating various dimensions of Mahdvi-related religiosity, such as
Knowledge (both general to life and specific to Mahdviate)
Skills to aquire knowledge
Practices
Dynamism
Characteristics of hoseholds
Overall socio-economic and cultural environment
Religiosity Indices
To judge the religiosity level of the respondents, different questions were asked from the respondents and their responses were coded. Construction of religiosity indexes, if not impossible, is, at least, very difficult due to large subjectivism involved in the treatment of different religious activities. Hence allocating correct weights to every response to formulate a representative index is not well defined in literature yet. However to formulate a representative index simple weights are used. Here we have made different indices of religiosity and a then a cumulative index of religiosity is made using these sub indices.
