How Close the Gods?

[icymist]

How Close the Gods?
Transcendence, Immanence and Immediacy in Pagan Religion

Theology is a funny thing for Pagans to discuss. When we invented it a few thousand years ago it was a way of using discursive, mostly philosophical and sometimes rational means to explore our understanding of the nature of the Gods. We were moving from narrative and poetic ways of understanding, embodied by our myths or sacred stories, to explanations of what the myths meant. We developed the tools of logic to criticize the ideas presented in these explanations and sort out the good ones. Our ancient forebears contemplated the old stories as well as the proclamations of oracles and the teachings of earlier ‘lovers of wisdom’ or philosophers and developed a rich array of explanatory traditions. They coexisted within and among the various schools of thought whose names are well known to us but long diseased: the Pythagorean Order, the Platonic Academy, the Peripatetics of Aristotle, the Stoics, Cynics, Epicureans, . The competition was fierce though limited to the educated and leisure classes. Most folks were happy with the old stories and grandma’s explanation. Except where philosophers got involved in politics, the state had little interest in theology, and left the debaters to their own devices.

This all changed when Christianity got a hold of it. Theology or ‘God-talk’ became the means of establishing doctrine as dogma which was then enforced as belief with the power of the State, originally the Roman Empire, but later the Nation-States of Europe. A truly horrible loss and a very strange distortion of religion. For Christians, religion became what you believe, a set of propositions that were subscribed to. Among religions this focus in Christianity on belief is unique. While Islam is close, the required set of beliefs, that Allah is God and Mohammed is His prophet, is very small. Islam is centered primarily on its doctrine of submission to the will of Allah. The word "Islam" means submission.

Christianity on the other hand took this innovative approach that set about defining the nature of the God(s), which, if you dissented from it, you would be considered a "chooser" as the word "heretic" is translated. Or, in other words, you had no choice. Non-adherence to the exact nature of the doctrine may be enough for war, as the Great Schism between the eastern Orthodox and western Catholic churches, and the Sack of Constantinople attested.

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