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The Origins of Religion


Anomalocaris

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1 minute ago, back to earth said:

What do the Maori think about these things ? 

Im no expert on Maori beliefs but their ancestors are so important to them that they write them into their Haka's. Pulling their strength down from the sky and securing it to the earth, so that they may use it in battle. Or so I am led to believe. They also find cemeteries tapu or sacred, a very strong belief still held today by Maori  I know, is that a spirit may follow you home from the cemetery and the act of washing your hands before leaving is so important that even the smallest family plots have taps installed.

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9 minutes ago, back to earth said:

NSG , are you familiar with the works of Patrick Harpur ;   ' Daimonic Reality'  &  'Philosopher Secret Fire '   ? 

From an Amazon review:

"Whether manifesting as phantom animals, fairies, channeled or medium-visiting spirits of the dead, "gypsies on the roof," vanishing hitchhikers, poltergeists, unidentifiable aerial phenomena, voodoo loa, "soul guides," lake monsters, "men in black," hairy humanoids, the "terrors that come in the night," alien "grays," or even the mysterious quasars at the ends of the known universe, Harpur argues that mankind coexists and always has coexisted with these entities throughout time."

Based on this, I doubt Harpur and I would be a good match. I describe my understanding of 'spirits' ('daemons') here:
 

 

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6 minutes ago, jmccr8 said:

People need to have other people since Adam and Eve so to speak, they function best in a group even if there are some in the group that are more detached they are dependent on each other .

Indeed !  Man is a primate, and primates function best within extended family groups ; not as individuals as nt in 'herd'  ( hence , a big modern problem where the 'herd' has been enforced to an extent  and created the 'isolated individual' at the same time. 

This is the 2nd big dynamic that affected our culture ( after that which unfolded 1400 - 1600 ) - the industrial revolution, where the 'inherited bond' between father and son was greatly broken .

6 minutes ago, jmccr8 said:

In any given a hierarchy will form and the one or ones that are at the top will still want to pass the buck and say god did it.:lol:

jmccr8

Or take their mandate from 'him' .   None  of this rules out 'the Gods ' .  I was privy to an interesting 'stand-offish' meeting between two ( close to their respective 'tops' )  indigenous from different groups ; the questions went back and forward in this order ;  " Whats your name ?  ( and that can be very descriptive )  Who is your  God ?  (name of God and the groups 'tribal'  name) ? What's your totem ? 

A friend of mine , if you asked him his religion, he would say he doesnt have of follow religion . Ask him who his God is, he will answer straight away .    Some might say 'Aboriginal Religion' or " my people's religion' .   I met one 'man at the top '   ( designation 'Pop' , under him are the 'Elders', 'Guardians' and 'Strong Culture Men and Women  ' , usually designated 'Uncle' )  of a very solid and strong cultural  Indigenous people   - he was a Christian pastor .   Such are things now . 

 

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24 minutes ago, jmccr8 said:

People need to have other people since Adam and Eve so to speak, they function best in a group

My mistake ... I thought when you said:

"I was relating it to mans need for there to be a something more."

...that you were referring to 'religion'. 

Edited by No Solid Ground
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In a sense it is what religions fundamentally do, to create a group that works and participates together, and offers some form of unity, the trappings are just that, the showmanship is part of what keeps them coming back.:lol:

jmccr8

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5 minutes ago, Kismit said:

So where did modern religion originate?

I posted my understanding of when and why here:

"The concept of 'religion', as it is now commonly understood, is a very modern invention that dates only to the 13th century and can be attributed to Thomas Aquinas."

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19 minutes ago, Kismit said:

Im no expert on Maori beliefs but their ancestors are so important to them that they write them into their Haka's. Pulling their strength down from the sky and securing it to the earth, so that they may use it in battle. Or so I am led to believe. They also find cemeteries tapu or sacred, a very strong belief still held today by Maori  I know, is that a spirit may follow you home from the cemetery and the act of washing your hands before leaving is so important that even the smallest family plots have taps installed.

Right !   Traditionally here, the remains may be put in a cave or special place.  No one goes there !  Not without good reason and a right approach.   You need to ' sing out ' , reassure them , introduce yourself and purpose ( this goes for other types of places too ). It isnt that they dont exist anymore. The are just .....   ooooh, this is hard to describe ... lets say that now they have become ancestors .  Strength comes from ancestors as well.  Sometimes, it seems, on a very genetic level ; the body goes back to earth and the  earth feeds on it and makes new plants and animals and men out of it  so it lives on 'immortal in heaven'  .....  one thing we have to realise as well, is the incredible import we give to individual ego and ego survival . But when a baby is born it inherits its 'spirit' (individuality form , personality, 'life's mission and purpose'  etc .   from its ancestors .    Some see it as very materialistic ;  the body decays, there is no rebirth and inheritance comes form or ancestors by genetics ( not that they would put it that way ) ... but to them , it is a spiritual existence .

The not follow you home thing .  Two things with that . As I was trying also to say above ; each has their own place , only at special times would ancestors come into the village ( say ,  at the 'feast for the dead ' )  - I am not using an Australian example now  .  And unusual for the living to go the ancestor ground . 

But also there is the 'spookiness' factor.   Either with the ancestors 'morphing' or certain other 'spirit beings' being associated with them or the people. Again the view on this changes .  A place I stayed at, there were 3 'spirit creatures'  ( 2 were  like men )  that the majority of people were worried about, feared and 'spooked' by. But my friend there , an Elder and Guardian considers these spirits 'his', gets his power from them,  says they look after him and is fond of them .   

Its all pretty complex ,and there are heaps of variations between groups and different views in the same group, depending on 'level' 

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29 minutes ago, No Solid Ground said:

From an Amazon review:

"Whether manifesting as phantom animals, fairies, channeled or medium-visiting spirits of the dead, "gypsies on the roof," vanishing hitchhikers, poltergeists, unidentifiable aerial phenomena, voodoo loa, "soul guides," lake monsters, "men in black," hairy humanoids, the "terrors that come in the night," alien "grays," or even the mysterious quasars at the ends of the known universe, Harpur argues that mankind coexists and always has coexisted with these entities throughout time."

Based on this, I doubt Harpur and I would be a good match. I describe my understanding of 'spirits' ('daemons') here:
 

 

yes, I read that, and on that level I think Harpur would agree with you .

What you quoted are the common modern claims of a phenomena Harpur is trying to tie in with . I dont see those things as deffinitive in any way or the big picture .

Did you see the better links I offered ?  

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NSG, May I ask you a personal question?

How would you describe your own religious beliefs?  

You do not have to answer I am just being curious.

Edited by Kismit
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The things described in your quote I see as the 'symptoms' of that lack you  earlier outlined; 

This modern invention - 'religion' - severed Earth and sky, and severed humans from the earth and sky ... rendering humanity pathologically alienated and given to religious delusions and destructive behaviors.  "

 

I see those things in the quote as  the 'old mind' ( formed over millennia )  in concert or struggling with  the 'new mind'(  a few hundred years in development )  and very evident as demonstrated by this site  and subject matters 

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2 minutes ago, Kismit said:

How would you describe your own religious beliefs?

There has never been a 'religious' cell in my being. 

This doesn't, however, mean that I am an atheist or a rabid rationalist (both formulated conceptual lenses). I've never met an atheist that doesn't have the same thought patterns that religionists have. And I can tear apart the modern scientific lens to the same degree that I tear apart the 'religious' lens. In many ways, these two lens are two sides of the same coin and derive from the same source.

Also, trained in psychology, I'm pretty critical of the mind state known as 'belief'... 

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17 minutes ago, back to earth said:

Did you see the better links I offered ?

Ah, missed them. I'll check them out.

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Great article about the Nacirema.  Having grown up in the culture, it is enlightening to see our rituals described by an observer.  This thread is thought provoking, I have not come yet to accept your exposition, but I am working on it.   The slight advantage I have is that from time to time I get to sit with Lakota friends and discuss the foibles of the dominant Nacirema culture.  It does help me step back in a way.  But it also brings a problem.  My friends  describe some of the old ways their people view the world. At its root, it is quite different from Christianity and missionary religions.  Yet, if I am grasping this thread correctly, even their understanding of their ancestral beliefs is colored by European contact only 500 years ago.  I am not yet convinced of that.   But thanks and keep it up.

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22 minutes ago, Tatetopa said:

Yet, if I am grasping this thread correctly, even their understanding of their ancestral beliefs is colored by European contact only 500 years ago.

Greetings Tatetopa,

It's another wound, on top of many deep wounds, but yes...this is evident. I'll give an example:

Shinto is regarded in Japan and around the world as a 'religion'. However, this is a clear example of the Christian export and spread of the fairly recently invented concept of religion. Jason Josephson writes in The Invention of Religion in Japan: “Throughout its long history, Japan had no concept for ‘religion’. There was no corresponding Japanese word, nor anything that came close to its meaning until the 1850s when America forced the Japanese to sign treaties demanding, among other things, freedom of religion” (Josephson 2012). This freedom of religion clause was lobbied for inclusion by Western Christian leaders, who eyed Japan as virgin territory for Christian market share. To comply, Japan was forced to create an official state-defined category for religion. Shendao (Shinto)—the way, path, law (dao) of the celestial entities (shen),—was officially categorized as a science (cultural astronomy). All other variations of the ancient story, thirty-six of them named in the scholarly documents of the time, became newly classified as religion or as superstition to satisfy treaty demands. Yet in less than 200 years, Shinto too became understood and practiced as a religion.

 

Edited by No Solid Ground
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12 minutes ago, No Solid Ground said:

There has never been a 'religious' cell in my being. 

This doesn't, however, mean that I am an atheist or a rabid rationalist (both formulated conceptual lenses). I've never met an atheist that doesn't have the same thought patterns that religionists have. And I can tear apart the modern scientific lens to the same degree that I tear apart the 'religious' lens. In many ways, these two lens are two sides of the same coin and derive from the same source.

Also, trained in psychology, I'm pretty critical of the mind state known as 'belief'... 

:).

   I found with the 'paper' I put up before  ( taken from notes from  lectures I was presenting )  I had to  ( for the sake of the paper and the dynamics in the lecture) present a lot on 'the nature of belief' as a preliminary to it .  Its just too hard for some otherwise  ..... actually, examining 'the nature of beliefs' are a bit hard for a lot of people, just on their own !  

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10 minutes ago, No Solid Ground said:

It's another wound, on top of many deep wounds, but yes...this is evident. 

I saw a billboard the other day that said "Beyond a reasonable doubt, Jesus is alive"  That didn't convince me.

"but yes...this is evident." right now has the same status for me, although you stand a much better chance of convincing me.  Could you expound on this point a bit.  Why is it evident?

 I am thinking about an example at the moment, the pipe.  Pipestone deposits have been mined for a thousand years or more.  Deposits of catlinite are few and Westerners have investigated them to some degree.  Carbon dating of  campfire remains at least on one site used previously by Oneota, and now Dakota speaking people date back to the 1200's. Certainly pipes carved from pipestone have been found in Mississippian sites, Cahokia for example that date back to widespread cultural influence of this city in the 800'sCE.   They are recognizable and stylistically similar to pipes carried and used today.  My friends believe that traditions have been handed down orally from this time or before. I would agree that the pipeway might be described as a collection of suggestions for living based on verbally transmitted past experiences that can lead to productive and fulfilling life; not necessarily a religion in the sense Europeans view it. In fact it has been viewed by them as heathen and pagan; actually outlawed,and suppressed by the Naciremo culture for the last two hundred years. Yet it seems to have persisted. It does offer an approach for a human being to integrate into the cosmos positively.  Is that one function of religion?

The artifacts appear similar for at least 1200 years, yet we do not know how the Cahokians used them.  Probably  the nomadic plains Lakota have a far different cosmological view than the sedentary, agricultural Mississippians.  For one thing hierarchy and inherited privilege are anathema to  most of the plains people. 

We can take that artifact that has been produced for 1000+ years and suggest that a thread of oral teaching has been passed down along with it that contains identifiable concepts from those earlier times.  Or, we can assume that the thread was broken 350 years ago and a newer thread grafted onto it that is at its core antithetical to most of European tradition.  A response to foreign invasion in effect.  I am sitting with those two ideas in balance and not yet sure where the weight of argument will come down.

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16 minutes ago, Tatetopa said:

Could you expound on this point a bit.  Why is it evident?

I gave an example in my post, but you may not have seen it...I edited/added this example after I made the post:

"Shinto is regarded in Japan and around the world as a 'religion'. However, this is a clear example of the Christian export and spread of the fairly recently invented concept of religion. Jason Josephson writes in The Invention of Religion in Japan: “Throughout its long history, Japan had no concept for ‘religion’. There was no corresponding Japanese word, nor anything that came close to its meaning until the 1850s when America forced the Japanese to sign treaties demanding, among other things, freedom of religion” (Josephson 2012). This freedom of religion clause was lobbied for inclusion by Western Christian leaders, who eyed Japan as virgin territory for Christian market share. To comply, Japan was forced to create an official state-defined category for religion. Shendao (Shinto)—the way, path, law (dao) of the celestial entities (shen),—was officially categorized as a science (cultural astronomy). All other variations of the ancient story, thirty-six of them named in the scholarly documents of the time, became newly classified as religion or as superstition to satisfy treaty demands. Yet in less than 200 years, Shinto too became understood and practiced as a religion."

 

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Thanks, good reference.  Still ruminating on this. Did not Zen enter Japan from India by way of China before 1850?  Is Zen a religion?   There are mountain shrines and torii far older than Commodore Perry, in what framework did the Japanese  view these sites?

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3 hours ago, No Solid Ground said:

 

"The concept of 'religion', as it is now commonly understood, is a very modern invention that dates only to the 13th century and can be attributed to Thomas Aquinas."

I have just done a brief bit of research into Thomas Aquinas and some of his works. Obviously a very brief research as I most certainly haven't read everything he wrote.

However, the brief bit of research I did manage accredited Thomas to two major works the Summa Theologica and the Summa contra gentiles.

The Summa theogica was described as a text intended as an instructional guide for theology students. And the Summa gentiles is described as taking some influence from Islam and Judaism.

Wouldn't the idea of having students of theology already in place indicate that a form of religion pre-exsisted the requirement for the Summa Theologica?

Or is it that with the writting of the gentiles,  a more complete idea of what religion is was formed?

Not so much the begining of religion, but the organisation of belief as a complete theory?

And forgive me of my ignorance on the subject, it's because I am actually very interested in the subject that I keep pursuing it.

Edited by Kismit
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It is basically hopeless to make fine inferences about the mental states of extinct (= we cannot speak to a representative) illiterate (= they leave us no record we can decipher) people. I think direct evidence of the origins of religious thinking (however defined) is out of reach.

This is a piece about ancient dog and wolf burials at a well studied archeological site in Siberia.

https://uncertaintist.wordpress.com/2014/07/23/did-long-ago-people-think-that-dogs-have-souls/

People buried the dogs, the research question is what were the people thinking? That's a simpler question than the "origins of religion," IMO. The ancient evidence in Siberia is compared with the hypothetical of some far-future archeologist discovering the modern burial of Greyfriars' Bobby (a dog who is buried, as at the archeological site, near the graves of human beings and inside a wall which marks the limits of a human cemtery).

To the satisfaction of the people who buried him, Bobby is not buried "with" any human being. You'd never know it by looking only at the stones, though, because the distinction leaves no enduring trace. Not all the ground within the wall is "consecrated" and Bobby lies in ground over which certain words were not spoken, as opposed to the humans over whose resting place those magic words were spoken.

Bobby earned his resting place by a display of secular loyalty which living people wanted to be reminded of. That is what memorial means, a reminder, and it is only the living who profit from reminders (or pay for them).

While some people do believe in an afterlife for dogs, that isn't why his survivors gave Bobby a proper grave and more recently a fancy memorial stone. They did it because of the emotional reward from being reminded of a heart-warming story. Whether or not Bobby still exists in some supernatural way was irrelevant to the decision.

Edited by eight bits
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13 hours ago, Tatetopa said:

Thanks, good reference.  Still ruminating on this. Did not Zen enter Japan from India by way of China before 1850?  Is Zen a religion?   There are mountain shrines and torii far older than Commodore Perry, in what framework did the Japanese  view these sites?

There are other socio-political dynamics as well as in Japan that can turn things into 'religion'. 

Buddhism is an interesting one. A few times here I have maintained it isn't a religion, more of a philosophy and a psychology, yet that gets hotly disputed.  Lama taught me there is no God, no soul ..... that's all illusion.

However it holds religious status here .   No tax and funding available  for building temples and infrastructure.

 

Here is another one , VERY significant  ;     the incorporation after recognition  of the  Sabaeans and hermeticism as a religion in Harran ( an hermetic centre)  by Islam . The book they put up ( to be considered as 'a people of the book'  )was the Corpus Hermeticum. This no doubt was expedient for the Harranians ( so they didnt have to convert nor be beheaded ) and politically smart for the Muslims ( the get the Jizya) - this resulted in Islam inheriting 'Hermetic Sciences'  which they greatly developed, was one of the causes their civilisation advanced to the height it did and prepared the way for science to enter Europe and Christendom . 

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12 hours ago, Kismit said:

I have just done a brief bit of research into Thomas Aquinas and some of his works. Obviously a very brief research as I most certainly haven't read everything he wrote.

However, the brief bit of research I did manage accredited Thomas to two major works the Summa Theologica and the Summa contra gentiles.

The Summa theogica was described as a text intended as an instructional guide for theology students. And the Summa gentiles is described as taking some influence from Islam and Judaism.

Wouldn't the idea of having students of theology already in place indicate that a form of religion pre-exsisted the requirement for the Summa Theologica?

Or is it that with the writting of the gentiles,  a more complete idea of what religion is was formed?

Not so much the begining of religion, but the organisation of belief as a complete theory?

And forgive me of my ignorance on the subject, it's because I am actually very interested in the subject that I keep pursuing it.

I am not wanting to give answers asked of other posters .... but maybe I will stick my article  in here  (if I can find it )  for reference and it might also clear up some issues to read things in different words , it also contains some others quotes and ideas on the matter .

I will dig out the file and see if I can post it here later  . 

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22 hours ago, No Solid Ground said:

It's an interesting question (the origin of 'religion') but this article's explanations fail largely because they depend on a common (though largely unconscious) view that ancient people were unable to perceive, mediate, and explain reality rationally ... even though the human species managed to survive and thrive for a couple hundred thousand years before the supposed birth of rational thought. The arrogant 'savage childlike stupid irrational' view of ancient people. 


Another reason these explanations fail is because they offer no challenge to the (also largely unconscious) assumption that 'religion' is ancient ... a culturally conditioned distorted perception of ancient people's sophisticated oral traditions,  records, and rites. The concept of 'religion', as it is now commonly understood, is a very modern invention that dates only to the 13th century and can be attributed to Thomas Aquinas. In his writings, he frequently included a term that originated in the 13th century, used to describe something that was believed to exist separate from nature and above it: supernaturalis, the supernatural.  He also distorted the meaning and common usage of the Latin term religio, defining it within a supernatural context, with the result that the idea, emotional states, and practice of ‘religion’ were invented. Prior to his claiming and reinventing the term, religio had a variety of common meanings, none corresponding to the modern concept of religion, nor making a distinction between religious and secular. The original meaning included nuances such as rite, protocol, decorum, sense of reserve, scruples, rules, and law - none of which are inherently ‘religious’. Several modern scholars favor the derivation re (again) and ligo from (connect), but this shouldn’t be assumed to mean connecting with anything supernatural; it should be understood as a reestablishment of a connection with social order, consistent with the established and common usage of the term previous to that time (and as I’ll make clear further along, a means of being consciously engaged with the patterns and processes of the natural world, and with the celestial mechanics that rule the natural world and that results in a perennial threat to social order and the human community.   

Aquinas’s new supernaturalized definition of religio was then used by Christian scholars to translate the Hebrew terms huqqah and dan, (now understood to have simply meant statute, custom, or enactment); the Greek term threskeia (now understood to have meant simply rite or duty); and the Arabic term dīn, from which the Hebrew term dan derives (now understood to have meant simply custom, social transaction, social order, and law). As a result, these terms came to be newly regarded as carrying religious / supernatural meaning also. However, there is no comparable term for 'religion' in Proto-Indo-European (PIE), the common ancestor of Indo-European languages. Classical Greek has no term that functions as ‘religion’. In an article in the Encyclopedia of the Qurʾān, Patrice Brodeur writes of Arabic dīn: “Prior to the twentieth century, the English word ‘religion’ had no direct equivalent in Arabic nor had the Arabic word dīn in English. They became partially synonymous only in the course of the twentieth century as a result of increased English-Arabic encounters and the need for consistency in translation” (Brodeur 2013). And the well-known Islamic scholar Fazlur Rahman Malik has suggested that dīn is best considered simply as “the way-to-be-followed” (Malik 1979). And, as in Classical Greek, there is also a notable lack of any word in premodern Chinese that signifies ‘religion’ or ‘supernatural,’ or anything that corresponds to those terms. The modern Chinese term zongjiao was first employed to mean ‘religion’ in the late nineteenth century. 

Many people in modern society have been taught to think that the concept and emotional experience of ‘religion’ and an imagined ‘supernatural’ extends back to the origins of civilization, and even that it is somehow intrinsic to human evolution. However, scholars are increasingly contesting the idea that the concept of religion is ancient. The concepts of religion and the supernatural, the habits of thought, the emotional states, and the way of seeing that are conditioned and provoked by them (religiosity), and the redefining of ancient oral traditions, seasonal festivals, and mnemonic rites as worship are carefully manufactured products of the late Middle Ages. This exploitive, science-erasing dogma was then imposed on the cultural astronomy, oral traditions, written records, symbols, rites, geoconstructions, and social codes of non-Christian and non-Western cultures, and persuasively impressed upon the leaders of these cultures, often with economic promises tied to military threats. These cultures then gradually came to accept this conceptual imposition so that their oral traditions, social codes, and mnemonic rites, now religionized and supernaturalized, will be regarded on the same level as Christianity, and to protect themselves from Christian Europe’s aggressive and frequently cruel persuasion tactics. This process meant that the (pre-religious) Old Story which was rooted in an acute awareness of the natural world and celestial mechanics, around the globe, was forced underground, where it was nearly entirely forgotten and replaced with the newly invented abstractions of religion and the supernatural imposed on traditions. 

This concept of ‘religion’ is entirely a modern Eurocentric subjective construct that func­tions as a comparison to Christianity, while applying classifica­tion and definition when used outside of Christianity. Defining and classifying the traditions of ancient cultures as supernatural religion, and defining their associated rites and codes as religiosity, is tantamount to colonization and erasure. Recontextualization is erasure. Whoever controls the story, language, images, and rites controls how the mind thinks. It is as aggressive and destructive as Christianity's burning of libraries, destruction of standing stone circles, and the imprisoning, torturing, and murdering of scientists, mathematicians, and philosophers. The ancient traditions mirrored and reflected the natural world and celestial mechanics. This mirroring was tied to social codes and practices that kept society and individuals in balance with the patterns and processes of Earth and sky. It was science preserved in a complex technical language and a corresponding social order rooted in the reality of the place we exist embedded in. It wasn’t an interiorized pursuit of, or reverence for, a supernatural abstraction designed to provoke irrational emotionality. Quite the opposite: the ancient story was a way to preserve scientific data and a corresponding social code that kept humanity from becoming self-absorbed and collectively mad. It emphasized the integration of body and mind, and integration with each other, the ecosystem, and celestial mechanics for very practical purposes: physical and mental wellbeing, social order, contentment, happiness, and the survival of the species in a constantly changing, often life-threatening Earth and sky. It was a story of integration and balance, not separation and alienation. 



The simultaneous birth in the thirteenth century of Christian-dominated high scholasticism and the invention of the ‘supernatural’; the melding of high scholasticism and supernaturalism with Aristotelianism; the co-opting and redefining of the Latin term religio and using it to define nonreligious terms in the oral tradition and rites of non-Christian and non-Western cultures, and the very unholy marriage of the church and the merchant class (to control and exploit the masses) — these signaled the beginning of the end of a sophisticated, multilayered technical language preserved in stories, rites, geoconstructions, and symbols around the globe … an enduring framework of existence that had informed, sustained, and protected humanity for countless tens of thousands of years. The ancient oral traditions, rituals, and symbols that told the story of the sky and its relationship with Earth, and humanity’s embedded place in them, have been mythified and mystified … religionized and supernaturalized. This modern invention - 'religion' - severed Earth and sky, and severed humans from the earth and sky ... rendering humanity pathologically alienated and given to religious delusions and destructive behaviors. These delusions and behaviors are tools in the hands of the ruling class…  

Your post is surely interesting, thank you for that.

 

Although I generally agree with you on most of the points you raised, I'd like to ascertain the one about the term "religion" (that also happens to be the main point of your post).

Besides the etymology of the word religio, borrowed and modified from Christian scholars in the same way they twisted the Latin term pietas (that originally meant roughly "duty towards the country and family", especially in the form of filial piety), are you implying that before Thomas Aquina there was no supernaturalis, meaning nothing beyond the physical world?

Consirering that philosophy (and metaphysics in particular) has been developed because the mythologial explanation on how the universe came to be and works wasn't enough anymore, I find it hard to believe.

Thales (the first known philosopher) rejected the divine explanation, looking for the real origin, a single cause ("Arche") that could explain all the phenomena.

If there was no supernatural, what would have he rebelled against?

 

By the way, I like to think about the term religio, rather than "re-connected", as "tied two times" (ligo means "to tie, to bind" as well), meaning that through it people are completely subjugated to the ruling class.

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