Man it feels good to get back into this thread while I still have time.
Khalid;8681513
said:
Even modern attempts of people to make religions in the West are utterly
ridiculous and are mere throwbacks to 1) the ancient heresies (such as Arianism or Gnosticism/New Age/Scientology, to a point, Mormonism and Masonry), 2) throwbacks or lack of eradication of indigenous animism, such as Santeria and Voodoo, 3) religions that aren’t religions, such as the various cults derived for the benefit of leaders, or around something like drug use (the Way of Infinite Harmony, Santa Muerte), or 4) revivals of the ancient paganisms and mythologies of the barbarians, sometimes in a syncretic manner (Asatru, Wiccanism), or the paganisms of cultures that didn’t even believe in their own paganisms (like Rome and Greece).
Hey Khalid.In your opinion would controversial groups like *“The Nation of Islam” and *“The Nation of gods and Earth” fall into the group category that you pointed out and I bolded.Both those groups I’ve heard are controversial for things like black supremacy and I think in the Nation of Islam (which I think primarily uses Islamic terminology but AFAIK not much or none their theology) anti-semitism.Should they actually be regarded as religions though or just some kind of movement similar to like a “new age movement”?.
Khalid;8681513
said:
or the paganisms of cultures that didn’t even believe in their own paganisms (like Rome and Greece)
, of whence it was said, “Of the [pagan] religions, the philosophers know them to be equally false, the people believe them to be equally true, and the magistrates think them to be equally useful”.
What makes you think that?.Just b/c of a* few * **intellectuals like Socrates and they influence they had?.I mean after all it took a few centuries until the common people gave up on believing in the old mythological stuff.By the way,who’s that quote from
“Of the [pagan] religions, the philosophers know them to be equally false, the people believe them to be equally true, and the magistrates think them to be equally useful”.That’s an interesting one.
There’s something else that occured to me that tends to exemplify the degree of orthopraxy and orthodoxy of religion which as Khalid nicely said
It does seem to hold true that the further East one goes, the more the emphasis is on orthopraxy instead of orthodoxy, reaching its ultimate expression in Confucianism for exclusive orthopraxy, and its ultimate expression in gnosticism for exclusive orthodoxy. All other religions have a combination of both, with some bent more towards orthopraxy, and some towards orthodoxy. There may also be a pattern according to chronology as well.
It’s “mythology” and “folklore”.The “Mahabharata”,“Ramayana”,the bird like creature the “Garuda”,“Journey to the West” (which has Taoist dieties in it).I’ve noticed in particualar with Buddhist dieties is that even there presence might be acknowlegded they dont really play a role in a person’s development the same way the Abrahamic version of God does.I guess you can say that even though they might be there religious principles dont depend on them
for some reason.
Also I could probably go on on how with East Asian ****mythology in particulary you see it leniently interpreted in media like anime and manga (ex.Goku and King Yemma from the
Dragon ball series who are based on Sun Wokung and the diety Yama)
Before proceeding please let me quote wikipedia on this (
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_mythology please read the paragraph under "Christian attitudes toward myth)
*
“
In ancient Greek, muthos, from which the English word “myth” derives, meant "story, narrative.”** By the time of Christianity, muthos had started to take on the connotations of “fable, fiction, lie”. Early Christians contrasted their sacred stories with “myths”, by which they meant false and pagan stories.*
Within contemporary Christianity, the appropriateness of describing Christian narratives as “myth” is a matter of disagreement. George Every claims that the existence of “myths in the Bible would now be admitted by nearly everyone”, including “probably all Roman Catholics and a majority of Protestants”.As examples of Biblical myths, Every cites the creation account in Genesis 1 and 2 and the story of Eve’s temptation.A number of modern Christian writers, such as C.S. Lewis, have described elements of Christianity, particularly the story of Christ, as “myth” which is also “true”.However, other Christian authors assert that Christian narratives should not be categorized as “myth”. Opposition to the term “myth” stems from a variety of sources: the association of the term “myth” with polytheism,the use of the term “myth” to indicate falsehood or non-historicity,and the lack of an agreed-upon definition of “myth”."
We could most likely argue about the terminlogy of the word mythology but what I notice is that when from the perspective of Eastern religions they consider some of their own narratives the same as way as the sentence I underlined.On account of that they might regard the narratives leniently and this I’ve noticed that this trend increases as you go East (ex.Hinduism,Taoism and Shintoism) and the belief system becomes more of an orthoproxy.
