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Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado & Nepal
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Dec 12, 2018 - 08:32am PT
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Catholic apologist Ross Douthat has an interesting column in the New York Times today titled "The Return of Paganism". In it, he claims that America is not headed for post Christian secularism but rather, Paganism. He defines Paganism as a belief system that sees the Divine as immanent in nature, whereas the Judeo Christian tradition sees God as an external creative force. By this definition Buddhism and Taoism belong more with Paganism than do the Abrahamic religions and also Hinduism.
Ross further divides the new Pagans between the intellectually oriented ones like Sam Harris and the practicing ones like the Druids. He faults the intellectual contingent for failing to provide rituals, rites of passage, and community, which in fact the practicing Pagans have. Much to my surprise, he actually can see the good in post Christian Paganism (perhaps resigned to it is more accurate), in that it promotes a respect for the natural world in the midst of climate change and mass extinctions.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/12/opinion/christianity-paganism-america.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Dec 12, 2018 - 08:40am PT
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I'll read it, but maybe if Ross Douthat had even just one science bone in his entire body he'd be more qualified to adjudicate religious critics, science types or where the whole enterprise is heading? Past writings of his are an embarrassment.
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Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado & Nepal
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Dec 12, 2018 - 05:43pm PT
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I said he was a Catholic apologist, a very traditional one at that, so his stance is even more surprising. As for who is entitled to criticize ideas, I wasn't aware that only scientists qualified?
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Dec 13, 2018 - 07:22am PT
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As for who is entitled to criticize ideas, I wasn't aware that only scientists qualified?
:)
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WBraun
climber
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Dec 13, 2018 - 08:10am PT
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This thread is basically devoid of any real God consciousness and basically 100% mental speculators postulating their own bullsh!t as so called science and religion.
Typical st00pid horsh!t by brainwashed gross materialists masquerading as learned academics ....
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Don Paul
Social climber
Washington DC
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Dec 13, 2018 - 08:16am PT
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What arrogance, to act like you're speaking for God when you're not even a channeler.
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Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado & Nepal
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Dec 13, 2018 - 08:23am PT
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Meanwhile for Antichrist, here's my favorite indigenous creation story - from the Wintu tribe.
In the beginning the Great Spirit created a man who had one peculiar feature by normal standards. He had an enormously long pen#s. It was so long that he had to wrap it around his waist many times which was a hassle to unwind and rewind every time he needed to urinate. Finally, he got tired of this and took a hatchet and began chopping it off piece by piece until it was the right length. Then he took all the pieces and flung them to the wind and everywhere one landed, a new Native American tribe sprang up.
Freud of course would have loved this story which can be interpreted at so many levels and is not to be taken any more literally than Adam and Eve and the talking snake.
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MikeL
Social climber
Southern Arizona
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Dec 13, 2018 - 09:33am PT
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To chime in a bit with Jan regarding more primitive religions . . .
Max Weber (1860-1920?) said that an ideal type of interwoven religious and socioeconomic forces in primitive religions is experienced as immanent rather than transcendent. There, the human and divine form a single nondual reality. In contrast, a rationalized notion of the divine depicts higher levels of abstractions with a more aloof God—one that seems particularly anthropomorphic and universal. (It would seem to imply more responsibility for the individuals.)
Weber said there was 2 principles that shaped religious human life. The first focused on how “religious action” was defined. For Weber, there is a sliding scale between improving the world at one extreme, and abandoning the world in order to first save oneself at the other. The second principle related to religious experience. Again, a sliding scale would represent whether one focused on mystical perceptions of wholeness at one extreme, to one of an ascetic sense of unworthiness and alienation at the other.
Thus, Weber created one of the first 2x2’s in sociology. There would be “inner-worldly” mysticism that would be world-abandoning; there would be an outer-worldly mysticism (world-improving); there would be an inter-worldly asceticism (like Calvinism or Protestantism); and there would be an outer-worldly asceticism. The inner-worldly mystics are “in the world,” but with indifference. The Inner-worldly ascetics focus on attaining mastery and control over worldliness (flaws and sins)—the results of which are evidence of religiosity in this life in this world.
Weber’s typology of religion (and ritual) is only one of many. (Analytically one can slice and dice any thing in many ways.) As Weber observed, there are many different kinds of religion. None of them show the same instantiations, although they may all be pointing to the same thing (it's been argued).
The modern view of religion these days appears to have the following descriptions: time is linear, spatial extension measures the real, matter is inert, language is arbitrary convention, and truth is the agreement between facts and propositions.
A post-modern view of religion would annul the distance between life and art; writing about writing and about reading would exhibit reflexive awareness; there would be an emphasis on play and flow; a growing taste for ritual; the crossing of categories; a longing for intimate community; a critique for cause-and-effect reasoning; celebration of both private and collective experiences—not hierarchical; indeterminacy; neo-tribal repetition; costumed performances; and synthetic holism where human beings are the measure of all things.
I’d say the post-modern view of religion is recalling certain elements of more primitive religion where immanence replaces transcendence.
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Norton
climber
The Wastelands
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Dec 13, 2018 - 10:29am PT
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Paul refers to "sacred" texts, by definition divinely inspired, connected, etc
yet Paul says he is an Atheist, perhaps he means to say "ancient" texts instead of "sacred"
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WBraun
climber
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Dec 13, 2018 - 12:13pm PT
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Anti nutcase says nobody else is talking.
That's cause you are a certified nutcase which has nothing to do with religion, science.
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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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Dec 13, 2018 - 03:24pm PT
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So what makes a religion “primitive?” The Bible and the Koran don’t seem exactly advanced. The world’s major religions, formulated prior to the scientific revolution, all seem primitive to me and the recently concocted religions read like science fiction.
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Dec 13, 2018 - 06:31pm PT
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Jim... concise, to the point, timely.
In this age of Trump and his devoted base, this evidence-based type of common sense plainly spoken has never been more important.
Thanks.
Keywords (1): primitive, formulated, concocted
Keywords (2): scientific revolution
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paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
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Dec 13, 2018 - 08:01pm PT
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So what makes a religion “primitive?” The Bible and the Koran don’t seem exactly advanced. The world’s major religions, formulated prior to the scientific revolution, all seem primitive to me and the recently concocted religions read like science fiction.
Primal or primitive religions are generally thought of as those related to animism and pantheism, though “primitive” is probably a poor label as its connotations are vague and negative. Complexity is also an issue as there is a remarkable difference in complexity between the theories of Thomas Aquinas and the animism found in the cave at Lascaux. Primal religions or myths are the most conservative of all religions, since to lose any part of a particular tradition is to lose its magic. They’re generally referred to as “tradition bound.”
It’s a mistake to read any sacred text as a failed attempt at science. That’s not what they’re trying to communicate. They are metaphors that address psychological states. They are metaphors of reconciliation that help make life bearable to those in despair. Religion needs to keep pace with the nature knowledge of its period, and atheists should recognize that the metaphors related in sacred texts, when read correctly, are valuable insights into what it is to be human. Recently concocted religions are not much different as Jung points out in his book “Flying Saucers: A Modern Myth of Things Seen in the Sky.”
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Dec 13, 2018 - 09:32pm PT
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It’s a mistake to read any sacred text as a failed attempt at science.
while this is a modern view, I do not think that it reflects the historical role of "sacred texts." Many (if not all) take a crack at explaining how humans came to be, and how the universe came to be, and humans' relationship to that universe.
Now that we have "physical cosmology" distinct from "religious cosmology" we view the religious versions as "metaphors" because we accept the physical description of cosmology, and of evolution and even the origin of life, which is fully expected to have a physical explanation.
One could attribute to humans the need to know these things, and to religions a motive to provide an explanation. The degree to which those explanations are or should be taken literally has been debated for a very long time.
Given that the texts in question existed before "science" (at least in the modern sense) it is a mistake, perhaps. However, those texts attempt to do the very same thing that science does, which is provide explanation and understanding. In many ways they can be judged to have gotten it wrong, and that can have consequences.
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Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado & Nepal
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Dec 14, 2018 - 05:03am PT
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I’d say the post-modern view of religion is recalling certain elements of more primitive religion where immanence replaces transcendence.
For an anthropologist, religion reflects the economic and social circumstances of a given people in time. Hunter gatherers, pastoralists and early horticulturalists lived in small societies that were relatively egalitarian. They also were very close to nature and depended on it for everything. God and gods were immanent. Humans or at least one's own tribe were seen as good.
With the invention of agriculture, populations multiplied, labor specialized, and society became hierarchical. Religion reflected this new situation by developing a hierarchy also, with a distant God at the top and layers of mediating hierarchy in between. God was transcendant. People were told they were born with sin and needed the help of the hierarchy not to be damned. This functioned very effectively as a social control mechanism.
As feudalism broke down, reformation efforts broke out and the emphasis was on contacting God directly with no intermediaries. This worked well with the coming industrial age and its notions of equality and democracy. Science and technology developed and made life comfortable. Religion became less important. The combination advertising psychology and economics turned religious holidays into commercial opportunities.
With the post modern information age, people can now choose and reconnect with old friends all over the world thanks to the internet, and tribalism has re-emerged. In part, it is a reaction to population growth and anonymous mass societies. In the absence of fear of hierarchical authorities, people are free to create their own belief systems, personal rituals and rites of passage. A knowledge of climate change and the mass extinction of animals has created a new importance for nature. Lacking human community, many people have turned to animal pets for companionship.
The introduction of new drugs and mechanisms for achieving meditative states promoting extraordinary experiences allow for personal mysticism. A knowledge of how large our universe is and how insignificant humans are has promoted individual searches for meaning. For the hold outs from an earlier age, the new atheists now play the role of the previous protestant reformers.
Interestingly, the human desire for personal meaning and personal experiences of both transcendence and immanence have not been erased by a greater knowledge of science. In fact, science is now trying to understand this phenomenon with neurobiology.
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paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
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Dec 14, 2018 - 07:35am PT
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while this is a modern view, I do not think that it reflects the historical role of "sacred texts." Many (if not all) take a crack at explaining how humans came to be, and how the universe came to be, and humans' relationship to that universe.
Humanity is faced with a quandary: what am I and how did I come to be here? Explanations for these questions prior to the introduction of the scientific method were based on what? Intuition? Well what is the source of intuition but the experience of being. These are explanations based on the human psyche and not attempts at quantifiable and repeatable observations in the manner of science. They are not attempts at science but manifestations of the human psyche that offer insights into that quandary and insights into the human condition.
When the bible says “in the beginning” it declares that mystery every human experiences: ex nihilo. I was not and now I am.
When Adam produces Eve through the removal of his rib he gives, with the help of divinity, birth to Eve rather than what we would expect, and this becomes a declaration of patriarchy in the same syncretic way that Zeus gives birth to Athena and Dionysus.
When Adam and Eve commit original sin in paradise what’s transpiring is the loss of our potential. The garden is the manifestation of our potential and the fall is the hard fact that that potential is so remarkably difficult to live up to and the consequences of not living up to it, because of our own foibles, are disastrous.
As the gospel of Thomas says: “the Kingdom is set upon the earth but men do not see it.” The moral: if we could just endeavor to live up to our potential things might be better.
When Cain murders Abel we come to understand hate and vengeance as products of an inconsolable injured merit that can only result in disaster, and that a sense of injured merit is a dangerous proclivity of the human race and something that seems to drive some threads right here on the ST.
When someone critiques these texts declaring “what BS, snakes can’t talk” they are missing the point by a mile. A sacred text, a myth, it’s like dreaming: you don’t wake from your dream thinking what BS. You think I wonder what that means?
The idea that bronze age cultures were piloted by idiots and know nothings because they didn't have the scientific method is ridiculous: go build a pyramid.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Dec 14, 2018 - 08:06am PT
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When someone critiques these texts declaring “what BS, snakes can’t talk” they are missing the point by a mile.
in the act of creation of Adam, the book says God was done... but Adam was lonely and God took pity and created Eve (anticipating Hank Rogers?). There are those who interpret priority in the order of creation.
And what about the those who infer blame to women for the act that got humanity thrown out of paradise?
What is the purpose of these metaphors?
The scientific explanation of "creation" puts men and women as equals.
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Dec 14, 2018 - 08:14am PT
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I said here years ago many times: Notice when it's not about the facts it's about attitude or interpretation.
I marvel at Paul's persistent attitude, interpretation of the facts, and use of language.
Does anyone get the sense that Paul's attitude has changed any? by anything posted here? or by the simple lapse of time?
I think Paul has mastered the selective response to point blank questions. Remindful of someone else on these couple of threads, lol.
Also it is true: A lot more is being grouped, called out or categorized under the heading Science nowadays. This now includes what the ancient Hebrews, Egyptians, Greeks and other Mesopotamians thought. But note this is because of two phenomena in particular: (1) that often frustrating "for lack of a better word" syndrome or shortcoming; (2) Science's ever-growing, ever-encompassing frame of thinking.
So by this reckoning even the Flat Earth "theory" or Flat Earth "belief" or Flat Earth "view" or "worldview" of many ancient tribes was their "science." (Or else it was their "ontology" or their "cosmology")
This can lead to confusion while communicating but when you have a good grasp of all the systems in play you can pretty much see through it, the mess, the confusion.
Welcome to the Science Age.
...
Me wonders if Paul has any real life substantive living experience around any fundies (aka fundamentalists) to speak of?
If the language doesn't change, you wonder if historians 200 years from now will refer to the medieval Christian Church's "view" or "epistemology" or
"truth claims" re say exorcism or purgatory or limbo or transubstantiation as their "Science."
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paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
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Dec 14, 2018 - 08:42am PT
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What is the purpose of these metaphors?
The purpose is to discover/create purpose.
Hellenism and Judaism are both patriarchal faiths. It's funny because the woman is what life is all about. The woman is the vessel of life and the man's role in the whole process is rather brief. Man's got to have something to do of importance since he exists in a state of inferiority so a myth of primacy, a kind of chicken and egg issue puts man on top.
Athena from the head of Zeus, Dionysus from the thigh of Zeus. A male God giving birth right and left. When Mary comes round in Christianity that thing is turned on its head as she gives birth to God and becomes the great intercessor to salvation. Really interesting stuff.
I learned from that to live and let live and to allow people to find their own god in their own manner in the same way I would expect them to let me find mine. I apply that same philosophy to my children - they must find their own answers, I don't try to willfully impose mine on them
Nice.
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