John Locke’s A Letter Concerning Toleration: Lessons for the Nigerian Religious Environment

Abstract

Religious convictions are a source of bitter confrontations between especially the Muslims and Christians ofNigeria.The problem is so endemic that there are conspicuous spillovers into the political and social spheres of everyday living in the country.This reality threatens the already fragile unity and social health of the country and hence becomes one that needs special attention.The need to proffer solution to this cankerworm demands that we take a historical survey of similar or near-similar situations in the human civilization and excavate ideas that were given as a way forward.It is in this bid that the ideas of John Locke in his book A Letter Concerning Toleration become very useful.Locke argued for a secular state with a clear dichotomy between government activities, which belong to the public domain and hence involve every citizen and matters of faith which are private and devoid of any form of coercion.Such differentiation is meant to remove the force of compulsion from religion and the practice thereof as well as keep the government "undefiled" when the need for adjudication in matters that pertain to religion eventually arises.Locke's ideas in the book were aimed at forging peace and decorum in an English society that was virtually turned asunder by the demon of religious intolerance.This scenario exactly qualifies present-day Nigeria, hence there is much need to x-ray these ideas and apply same in our desire to nip the menace of religious bigotry in the bud.The nature of this work made it necessary to apply the method of text analysis and evaluation to enable us to get an adequate appreciation of Locke's intentions and how these can serve our purpose in present-day Nigeria.

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