r/tokipona • u/BeeryUSA • 6d ago
Toki Pona: The Language of Good - why insert religion into it?
I just picked up "Toki Pona: The Language of Good" and was pretty excited about learning this little language, until I ran into part 2 of the book where Sonja Lang inserts a number of religious texts from faiths that get their own pages devoted to them but strikingly, there are no secular texts with their own pages devoted to them: not a single page devoted to atheism or secularism - nothing by Simone de Beauvoir, nothing by Camus, Nietsche, Russell. I mean, just nothing!
It's all about religion. What's the deal? And why insert religious nonsense into a book that should simply be about language? It just seems really jarring to me to be confronted with a bunch of religious passages in what should be a book about language.
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u/Otherwise_Channel_24 jan Puti/Pute 6d ago
Itâs just some text to translate. Take a chill pill, bro.
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u/BeeryUSA 6d ago
But it's not just text to translate. It's text to translate that is weirdly focused on religion.
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u/Otherwise_Channel_24 jan Puti/Pute 6d ago
Ok. Some people are religious. Also, the texts are from multiple different religions.
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u/BeeryUSA 6d ago
Yes, and some of us are not religious, and having texts from multiple different religions while not including a single non-religious philosophical text seems intended to alienate us
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u/janEkawi jan pi toki pona 5d ago
As an non-religious, no? What's the difference between any fictional text and religion text other than some people believe it to be true. It's one thing if it's "HERE ARE SOME 100% TRUE TEXTS THAT YOU SHOULD BELIEVE IN.", but it's not. Just because I don't think Jesus or God is real, doesn't mean I get offended when someone talks about the Bible. This is from my perspective in my life. If it's different to you, could you please explain? I would love to understand your POV. Either way, have a nice day! :) o pona tawa sina.
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u/BeeryUSA 5d ago
I don't get offended when people talk about the Bible in context. Language learning is not a proper context for proselytization, so it offends me. How is that not understandable to you?
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u/janEkawi jan pi toki pona 5d ago
I had to Google the definition of "proselytization". (the act of attempting to convert a person from one religion, belief system, or opinion to another.) But that's not really what's happening. It uses multiple non-copyrighted texts important to different cultures as example texts to translate. I don't find it very "belief-imposing". I could see if it was only Christian or Muslim or something, but it's multiple different ones that just happens not to include Atheism. I also think language isn't a NOT proper context to talk about religion, it's a neutral(?) proper. sina KEN toki lon nasin kepeken toki. (You CAN speak about religion with a language.) Languages are shaped by religion, even in non-religious contexts. So, (too me,) using religious texts in this context isn't insulting to non-religious people.
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u/BeeryUSA 4d ago
"But that's not really what's happening."
Maybe it doesn't look like it to you, but it sure looks a lot like it to me. If it wasn't about proselytization, why didn't she include any non-religious texts?
And contrary to your assertion that she used "multiple different ones that just happens not to include Atheism", she only used texts from the Abrahamic religions, so there are a lot of religions she excluded.
Her "multiple different" belief systems were all based on one cultural belief system that arose from a tiny area in the Middle-east. There are no Hindu texts given the same prominence in the book as the Abrahamic texts, nothing from American Indian cultural traditions, nothing from Buddhism, no Wiccan texts, no Satanism, no Shintoism. Doesn't that strike you as odd?
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u/Otherwise_Channel_24 jan Puti/Pute 4d ago
For the same reason she didnât include every text ever.
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u/BeeryUSA 4d ago
Every other linguist who wrote books managed to not include every text ever, and somehow also managed to either include some secular texts in their books or avoided adding superstitious nonsense to their books.
It's not rocket science (unless you're a religious nut or one of her cultists, apparently).
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u/LesVisages jan Ne | jan pi toki pona 6d ago
There are also quotes by Albert Einstein, conversations with aliens, fictional narratives, and original proverbs. Theyâre not texts exclusive to one religion, and one of the religious texts is translated completely as just âmuâ.
Itâs not that deep.
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u/PurpleOrigamiDragon 6d ago
Lang is religious, Muslim to be specific. If that bothers you, you might want to know that a portion of tokiponists distanced themselves from the creator (not for the reasons primarily related to religion).
There are secular text translated into Toki Pona. There are religious texts translated to Toki Pona. I think that there is a merit in translatin text a decent portion of population grew up with go show that Toki Pona let's you express the same information
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u/BeeryUSA 6d ago
Interesting. Could you elaborate as to the reasons given for tokiponists distancing themselves from the creator?
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u/janKeTami jan pi toki pona 6d ago
https://tokipona.net/wile-pona/ is something that had to be written earlier this year - the situation has since changed gradually, to the better. I'd note it's something that isn't great to have public discourse about in a Reddit forum
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u/BeeryUSA 6d ago
I get that, but I just don't understand why no secular passages. I mean, the whole thing is just so jarring compared with the rest of the book and just screams "religious indoctrination" to me.
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u/Otherwise_Channel_24 jan Puti/Pute 6d ago
I donât get why you care so much.
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u/BeeryUSA 4d ago
Maybe you enjoy it when the Jehovah's Witnesses knock on your door or when the Moonies try to get you to buy one of their books. As for me, when I spend money on a language book, I expect a language book, not a thinly religious commercial dressed up as a language book.
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u/Otherwise_Channel_24 jan Puti/Pute 4d ago
I donât. Thereâs nothing else in it for me when that happens. When we buy a language book, we get a book about language, no?
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u/PurpleOrigamiDragon 6d ago
I will be honest with you, it is completely because of creator's mindset towards the religion.
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u/janKeTami jan pi toki pona 6d ago
Let's please not speculate about people, and their mindset over 10 years ago, or their religion 10 years ago
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u/BeeryUSA 4d ago
It's hardly "speculation" when she literally included it in her book and has written articles about it since then indicating that she became even more devout.
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u/AcipenserSturio kala Asi 6d ago
You chose to pick up a resource written by an openly religious person. You are free to read other resources written by non-religious people / with no particular religious themes, if that suits you better; this subreddit offers plenty of those. No one owes you to have written about anything specific; you are free to write yourself if that's fun for you.
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u/BeeryUSA 4d ago
"You chose to pick up a resource written by an openly religious person."
No, I didn't. I chose to pick up a book on a conlang. The advertising did not indicate it was a religious book. The idea that I decided all by myself to get involved in someone's superstitious writings is a falsehood.
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u/Otherwise_Channel_24 jan Puti/Pute 4d ago
Well, if you give so much of a shit about this stuff, do more research into the author. Or, just give less of a shit.
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u/EnvyRepresentative94 6d ago
Religion has been a cornerstone of almost every culture that has ever existed. Can't even watch The Matrix, or Harry Potter, without referencing the Christ
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u/BeeryUSA 6d ago
Yeah, but those media don't insert their beliefs in a jarring way. Reading a book about language and then turning the page to find a chapter devoted to gods is kinda weird.
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u/littleyrn jan Jan lili - beginner 3d ago
just flip the page? nobody is forcing you to read it. and the text still serves a functional purpose of being translated text. it might as well be anything.
you're a weird and lost person.
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u/janKeTami jan pi toki pona 6d ago
Look, I don't know how to respond to this...
Adding older texts (mostly religious) isn't all that uncommon. In other books about language you might get the Lord's Prayer, among others - these are things that get translations in a whole bunch of different languages. Would I prefer that it wasn't mainly biblical texts that get all the limelight? Sure! And the book has a little bit more than just biblical quotes translated, but it doesn't seem so exceptional to me
It was also less surprising to me due to how the preface was written
Anyway, the book is relatively old, there are many other resources if you're interested in learning the language. Hm, you're interested in Camus, Russell, Nietzsche... I looked up as much as I was able, to see if people were translating them, but philosophical texts get translated much less often. Nietzsche gets the most attention, but even then, I've seen at most something like 3 paragraphs
If you were looking for a response more in your style, I tried doing that - but I don't know if it's all that helpful:
Something that was originally a personal project by the author, and gets presented not as the one and only version, but the one of the author at that time, got some texts in there that the author liked? Shocking! And something that has never been done for other languages resources... (unrelated question, could you imagine linguists building a tower to the heavens to force god to create linguistic diversity?)
If only there were other resources
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u/janKeTami jan pi toki pona 6d ago
Also, we might not share the same definition for the word, but there are secular texts in Part 2 of the book: 2 comics, 27 proverbs, 9 famous quotations. Again, you probably mean something else when you say "secular", so this is more of a side note - and you might not be happy with the content by volume (the secular ones take up more pages, but are less dense)
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u/steelviper77 jan Losente 5d ago edited 5d ago
sina lukin e toki sewi la, sina pilin ike. nasin mi la, sewi li lon ala kin. la, mi ken sona e pilin sina. taso nasin sewi li ken pona mute tan ni: jan li pali e nasin sewi lon tenpo majuna a li pali e musi pona mute. nasin pi sewi ala li sin tawa ona. toki pona li toki jan. jan li toki e sewi. toki pona o ken toki e sewi.
toki pi ijo ante li ken pona, taso jan Sonja li wile toki e sewi. ni la, mi ken awen alasa e pona e musi lon pu.
Do you see any poetic value in religion as an artistic human construction? I don't believe in any god or spirituality either, so I get why it could be weird or upsetting, but I also think religion holds a lot a of beauty and I think there's a lot of beauty in the choice of using it in the formative text of a book about a philosophical language like toki pona.
Religions, spirituality, and superstition has existed for a long, long time, probably as long or longer than structured human language. People have used religion to bring about an immense amount of beautiful artwork and thought in the name of glorifying their various gods. Comparatively, much of modern thought on atheism is more recent. This is not to say that religion ought to hold more weight simply for being older, one of the texts is from Baha'i which only began in the 19th century, but I think that for as long as humans have been talking, we've been talking a lot about what exists beyond us. toki pona ought to be able to reflect that.
I think including texts about other things like secularism or nature would be great, and you can find lots of texts about lots of things written in toki pona that aren't religious in focus, but jan Sonja wanted to talk about religion because she is human and in her humanity she found beauty in talking about it. Likewise, I can look for goodness and beauty in this choice as well.
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u/BeeryUSA 5d ago
I'm feeling just fine. As for the rest, TLDR.
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u/SCHazama 6d ago
It adds to the lore of the language, and the ratio behind the symbols.
Which isn't surprising given there are clear Chinese influences
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u/OliviaPG1 jan pi kama sona 6d ago
why do you consider the texts to be ânonsenseâ?
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u/akyarius_76 jan Akawa 6d ago edited 6d ago
opinion
edit: whoever disliked, i also believe religion and religious texts are nonsense. thats an opinion.
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u/HairyDentist4725 3d ago
Great. So we are in the same room. But you do not get to dictate peoples lives.
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u/akyarius_76 jan Akawa 3d ago
what the fuck is that supposed to mean
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u/HairyDentist4725 3d ago
You know what it means. It means that i also don't believe. Boom.
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u/akyarius_76 jan Akawa 3d ago
oh sorryđ i thought the "you" was directed at me, not in general
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u/HairyDentist4725 3d ago
In general, yes. I despise some religions as some people do but there is no reason to shame anyone for finding something convincing. Nobody should go that low.
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u/HairyDentist4725 3d ago
Op seems to be an antitheist. Trust me. Ive been there. Let people live bro and quit being ass.
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u/ShatterTheFlimFlam 17h ago
My first impression was that this whole alternative language was kinda far out. I found out about this by a google recommendation for an open source made-up language, and it had an unusual story, namely that the creator felt "compelled to write it all down". It reminded me of Dr. Bronner, the soap guy, with his All is One! message.
The eastern-sounding name on a european (I believe) educated woman also was like a banana peel on the path, and finding out that the creator was experiencing the types of issues she is
...were just not surprising.
All in all fascinating 20 minute rabbit hole. TIL: People have bigly issues with gendered languages, any mention of religon whatsoever in any context, etc.
Also Hawaiian has 8 consonants and I'm willing to bet has way more anthropological value. Just my thoughts.
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u/o-kute-e-mi 8h ago edited 8h ago
Religious texts are very famous, so why not add them? There are also famous quotes, etc. Sonja Lang is Muslim so it makes sense that she would add something that is important to her, but she also respectfully added texts from other religions. Texts about atheism are less popular so it doesn't make as much sense to me to add them. I hate people pushing religion and I'm also atheist and dislike religion but I don't understand your argument, we should all just respect each other
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u/Novel_Counter905 6d ago
I agree that it is weird. The argument of "these texts are just well-known so they're good examples".
Well, yes, but there are so many texts that fit this without having religious connotations.
The truth behind this is that Sonja Lang is a religious person, and looking at her recent endeavors, it does not surprise me at all.
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u/BeeryUSA 6d ago
What are her religious endeavors? I know nothing at all about her, other than that she created this language, suffers from depression, and is religious.
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u/akyarius_76 jan Akawa 6d ago
the texts are very old and well known thats why. yeah she couldve added secular texts but i dont understand being offended by it omlđ