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Authentic Paganism, Pre-Christian Ethics, and Organic Spirituality

September 20, 2007 at 1:48 pm by mahud

I discovered the article Why Pagans Aren’t Really Pagan, via Under a Violet Sun, submitted to Metapagan. Basically the author claims that just because the ancients did not identify themselves as Pagan, then modern day Pagans are nothing of the sort.

One thing moderns who think of themselves as pagans have that ancient pagans never had: self-consciousness. Ancient pagans never thought of themselves as being “pagans.” They were Romans, or Britanni, or any number of folks, and they had a world-view which included a belief in various supernatural forces and the way one related to the earth, sky, the seasons, etc. But they had no self-consciousness as belonging to a religion.
Why Pagans Aren’t Really Pagan

I’m not an expert on the origins of the term Pagan, but I’m sure it became a kind of derogatory term reserved for country dwellers, who had yet to convert to Christianity as in the surrounding cities and towns. I see no problem with todays Pagans reclaiming the religious label of Pagan. I’m sure that the Christians themselves adopted the name of Christian, from Pagans (again, probably derogatory), and eventually adopted in for themselves. Does this mean that because the first Christians didn’t refer to themselves as such (according to the New Testament, they referred to themselves as ‘the way’), that they are not authentic practitioners of the Christian faith?

Neo-Pagans seek to practice many forms of ancient religion, regardless the labels (ancient or modern) assigned to a particular practice doesn’t undermine the practice itself, as something reaching back and reclaiming the wisdom of our ancient ancestors, that over a thousand generations, had evolved naturally through a process of trial and error into something that worked.

I’m a relative newcomer to Paganism, but I often wonder if the ways of the ancients and their enumerable cultures and different perceptions of the divine, offer us a spirituality that is organic, as opposed to the instant religion of Christianity?

Unlike a religious structure that enforces man made doctrines, Neo-Paganism recovers and encourages natural spiritual growth. Neo-Pagan Spirituality is constantly evolving and adapting to fit modern patterns of life.

Both Neo-Paganism and Christianity achieve growth and renewal through individual and collective innovation with a community, but I wonder if all new expressions and denominations Christianity, unlike in Neo-Paganism, are destined to fall apart, because of its man-made inorganic foundations?

In part a comment on this post The young fogey, said:

What you wrote - religious self-consciousness is Judæo-Christian - echoes what Touchstone’s Mere Comments regular Stuart Koehl has said, that neo-pagans are really obviously apostate Christians keeping a lot of the same mindset and morals only shorn from their foundation in Christian theology.

While Christianity has a enriched and unique morality, It is incorrect to imply that before Christianity and the Religion of the Trible of Israel, there was no ethical mindset in Pagan communities. Somewhere around 500 years before Christ the Buddha taught a moral doctrine, it’s five basic precepts:

  1. I undertake the precept to refrain from taking the life (killing) of living beings.
  2. I undertake the precept to refrain from stealing. (lit. “taking what is not offered”)
  3. I undertake the precept to refrain from sexual misconduct (adultery, rape, exploitation, etc).
  4. I undertake the precept to refrain from false speech (lying).
  5. I undertake the precept to refrain from intoxicants which lead to heedlessness. (Can include intoxicating ideas)

Beyond that, the law of love usually refered to as The Golden Rule, that Jesus himself adopted from his own religious tradition.

In many respects ancient morality is essentially the same as it is today. A good (and short) book to read on the subject is The Abolition of Man by C.S Lewis, especially his final chapter entitled Illustrations of the Tao. To clarify, C.S Lewis uses the Chinese concept of ‘Tao’ in the sense of a cosmic ethical order, like Dharma (Hindu), Rta (Hindu), Maat (Egyptian), Me (Sumerian), from other ancient religious traditions.
Illustrations of the Tao

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13 Comments (Have your say)

  1. R.E.

    Comment on September 20, 2007 at 2:09 pm

    “Neo-Pagan Spirituality is constantly evolving and adapting to fit modern patterns of life.”

    I suspect that ancient Paganism also evolved and adapted as civilizations evolved, urbanized, and were absorbed into other cultures. As you say, their spirituality was organic. For me, a faith rooted in the natural world is as authentic as any other. When I can create a space in my house as sacred and holy as any cathedral, then Paganism must be a viable and accessible faith. Let the fundamentalist naysayers call us names and ridicule our spiritual practices. Their reaction only rises from a fear they don’t understand.

  2. Gwydion Avalon River | Druid Journal Word of the Day

    Comment on September 20, 2007 at 3:01 pm

    Excellent post, Mahud. I couldn’t agree more about organic vs. non-organic religions. I think, though, that over time, inorganic religions tend to accrete organic material, until they become essentially organic. The original Buddhism was as inorganic as it could be, with its structure very much like a simple geometric proof from Euclid. (Was it coincidence that the Buddha and Euclid lived at nearly the same time?) Nowadays, many varieties of Buddhism have dozens of gods and spiritual beings, rituals and rites, tales of Buddha’s past lives, etc. etc. — all of which enriches the religion tremendously and makes it organic. The same has arguably occurred with Taoism, Catholicism, Judaism, and so forth. It sometimes seems to be the case that pagans coming from Catholicism, Judaism, and other very old inorganic religions are more comfortable with the polytheism and ritual-oriented nature of neopaganism than are converts from Protestantism, which has tried to shed the organic material that was added to Catholicism over the ages. What do you think?

  3. mahud

    Comment on September 21, 2007 at 6:23 pm

    The original Buddhism was as inorganic as it could be, with its structure very much like a simple geometric proof from Euclid. (Was it coincidence that the Buddha and Euclid lived at nearly the same time?)

    I think Pythagoras was a contemporary of the the Buddha as well, who was into a religious system related to Orphism. Orphic doctrine and myth closely correspond with the Hindu Samkhya system, traditionally devised by the sage Kapila (note: Buddha came from Kapilavastu, named after the legendary sage. I wonder if this a coincidence or not?

    Can a single man’s religious teachings enough to base a truly workable religion? I’m not sure to be honest. Although in the case of Christianity, where every word and practice needs to be interpreted, understood, misunderstood, and eventually frozen as a timeless doctrines of truth, in a kind of manic frenzy to protect themselves from the ‘heretic’ who had ideas of their own as to what Christianity was all about. The establishment of the early church was a very inorganic process.

    It’s only recently that I’ve become aware of the helpful use of rituals, and I can see, say Catholics, coming to Paganism, more at home, that say a more Protestant Christian, who is taught that all such things are forms of idolatry, and hindrances to experiencing God directly (minus the Eucharist and baptism).

    Saying that, I’m not sure if rituals are essential. I’ve met a number of Protestant fundamentalists, who seemed to have tapped into the divine without ritual.

    Still, I think that any religious community should be open to as many forms of spiritual communication as possible, we are not all the same, we are at different stages in our spiritually, and the more forms of religious expression the better, if all our diverse needs as individuals, is to be met.

  4. mahud

    Comment on September 21, 2007 at 6:34 pm

    Let the fundamentalist naysayers call us names and ridicule our spiritual practices. Their reaction only rises from a fear they don’t understand.

    Having been a fundamentalist, I agree with what you are saying. It is fear based on ignorance, and the unwavering belief that correct knowledge of a biblical cosmology and recreation through Christ, is the only sensible way of salvation.

    Personally, I believe it is not what you know that’s important. Spirituality is about experiencing life to its fulness. Now, if I can figure out how to do that, I’ll be happy :D

  5. Cat Chapin-Bishop

    Comment on September 21, 2007 at 10:13 pm

    Ah, Mahud… You give me still more reasons to mourn my lost free time now that school is back in session. I can’t keep up with my own blog, let alone stay current with all the fascinating posts and comments on your blog and others I like to read regularly!

    I am trying to work in a little bedtime reading I think you might enjoy, though–reading this post and thread of comments makes me think you would probably appreciate Michael York’s Pagan Theology: Paganism as a World Religion, in which he makes a case for Paganism as both the organic root religion of all humanity, and as a world-spanning family of religions with meaningful commonalities. He’s expressly looking beyond neo-Paganism, and includes movements as diverse as Shinto and shamanism (though weirdly–to my mind–excludes Hinduism). York is no sloppy thinker, either, so it’s not about not noticing the diversity of the religions he’s studying, but rather pulling out common threads.

    I’m not very far into the book–it’s tough to read scholarly stuff at bedtime, and that’s the only time I have these days–and I keep finding myself arguing with the man in my mind. That’s a good sign, though–means it’s provoking me to keep thinking.

    I bet you’d enjoy being provoked by it, too, especially since you share with York a wide appreciation of world religions.

    If I lurk in the background for the next few months, know that I’m still a fan, and definitely will be catching up whenever I get a few minutes to myself. This blog just keeps getting better and better… and I wish you luck with your unfolding Pagan path as well.

    Blessed be!

  6. Chandira

    Comment on September 21, 2007 at 10:18 pm

    So far as I’m aware, the term ‘pagan’ is one who worships out side city limits. Old cities had fortifications around, and if you weren’t living in the city, you were a ‘pagan’. Similarly, a ‘heathen’ is one who worships outdoors, and neither term reflects the WHAT it is that is worshipped.. just location!

  7. mahud

    Comment on September 21, 2007 at 10:33 pm

    Hi, Cat. I’d love to get my hands on your book recommendation! Hopefully, I can get my dad to buy it, as he recently offered to buy some books for me from Amazon :D

    I’m eagerly awaiting for the next installment of Cat’s Spiritual Journey Series.

    Thanks for the blog encouragement :D Wishing you’ll have plenty of time to write, with everything else you do :)

  8. mahud

    Comment on September 21, 2007 at 10:46 pm

    Hi, Chandira, and welcome to the blog :)

    Thanks for the information. I’ve heard that the word Heathen, derives from the world Heath, so the name was originally a way for city dwellers to refer to country dwellers.

  9. Jeff Lilly | Druid Journal Word of the Day

    Comment on September 24, 2007 at 1:56 pm

    “Pagan” did indeed originally refer to the countryside, although it’s a little more complex than that; and when it was first applied to non-Christians, the sense was more like “civilian” or “non-soldier” (since early Christianity had a lot of militaristic metaphors going on). You can read all the details by clicking the link on my name.

    The origin of “heathen” is uncertain; you can read some plausible theories here.

  10. Tracie

    Comment on October 6, 2007 at 9:21 am

    “But they had no self-consciousness as belonging to a religion.”

    It’s likely true, though. If it were possible to travel back in time and ask these people what religion they belonged to, I don’t know that they’d understand that word - esp. if you traveled to Northern Europe. “Religion” is a Latin-based word; its root is “re-ligio” which means “to re-bind.”

    If you asked them which wights they sacrificed to, that might be better. If you ask them what Gods they followed or swore oaths to, that also might be better.

    But there wasn’t an organized, structured religion called paganism. I think a vast majority of pagans who speak of “ancient practices” and all that forget that the human religious/spiritual experience prior to Levitical Judaism, the birth of Christ, and the rise of the Christian church, spans thousands of years, across thousands of miles of territory. Trying to speak of a general paganism is almost impossible. It’s like trying to just speak pure language. It can’t be done. At any point, you have to pick one - German or English or Chinese or Spanish, etc. (This is why the current tendency in the pagan world towards homogenization of paganism as a whole really scares me. It threatens to wipe out religious diversity in the pagan world.)

    Not only that, but our ancestors lived on the other side of the Enlightenment, and the Enlightenment has a definite impact on us moderns in terms of how we think of religion and science. We have more of a tendency to separate religion from other elements of our lives, but they didn’t think like that. The spirits/wights were very much a part of everything they did, all day, every day.

    Hm. I might have to blog this.

  11. Tracie

    Comment on October 6, 2007 at 9:25 am

    PS: Many Asatruar (people who walk the way of the Germanic and Scandinavian Gods and ancestors) prefer to be called “heathens” not “pagans” because they want to have a Germanic word for their path, not a Latin one.

    Heathen is a Germanic word that basically means the same thing as the Latin based word pagan.

    But since the Germans and Romans had this intense “hate at first sight” relationship, it’s better to keep the Latin words away from Germanic and Scandinavian rede/ways.

    :grin:

  12. Tracie

    Comment on October 6, 2007 at 9:35 am

    “neo-pagans are really obviously apostate Christians keeping a lot of the same mindset and morals only shorn from their foundation in Christian theology.”

    He says it like it’s a bad thing.

    Myself personally, I’m not one who is inclined to throw the baby out with the bathwater. There is much that is good in Christian teaching. And let’s also not forget that much of Christian teaching really is not for the weak of heart - it’s hard. It’s difficult to follow Jesu all the way to the Cross. It is a way that is very challenging, that requires a great deal of sacrifice…but the spiritual rewards really are unbelievable.

    I’m something of an “Episcopagan” myself, so I have prayed the 20 mysteries of the Rosary and observed the teachings to be found there. I also find there is a huge difference between fundamentalist Christianity (something that wasn’t even in existence until the late 1800s/early 1900s) and the more mystical, “Catholic-style” Christianity (est. 33 A.D.). My boyfriend Joe, himself a former Roman Catholic, has said that the step from Catholicism into paganism/heathenry is not so much a “step” as it is a “lean.” LOL!!!

    But it has been said that former Catholics make the best pagans. Haha!

  13. mahud

    Comment on October 6, 2007 at 8:25 pm

    Trying to speak of a general paganism is almost impossible. It’s like trying to just speak pure language. It can’t be done. At any point, you have to pick one - German or English or Chinese or Spanish, etc. (This is why the current tendency in the pagan world towards homogenization of paganism as a whole really scares me. It threatens to wipe out religious diversity in the pagan world.)

    I’d like to believe there’s room for both religious diversity and syncretism. I don’t see a ‘homogenization of Paganism,’ as a bad thing, if it helps an individual to become aware of the spiritual. whatever path or paths are chosen, it needs to be something that can be identified with, and I don’t really feel connected to any specific tradition, as nothing spiritual was ever passed down to me. And so I need to reawaken my spiritual self by drawing on different beliefs, rituals, and mythologies.

    That said, I don’t want to brush aside your concerns. It’s something I definitely should explore. Plus, I recently read about the religious syncretism (Theocrasia), in the centuries leading up to Christianity in the Graeco-Roman world, which may of paved the way for a single dominant religion, i.e Christianity. I’m not sure if something like that could happen today, though.

    We have more of a tendency to separate religion from other elements of our lives, but they didn’t think like that. The spirits/wights were very much a part of everything they did, all day, every day.

    I definitely want a spirituality that is present in every aspect of my life. I think this is at the heart of all religious traditions. I disagree with Joseph Campbell who would like our mythology/spirituality to be separate from our social and ethical life (kept in the secular realm). I feel that my beliefs should be connected to every area of my life, to whatever extent possible, without the preachy aspect though.

    And let’s also not forget that much of Christian teaching really is not for the weak of heart - it’s hard. It’s difficult to follow Jesu all the way to the Cross. It is a way that is very challenging, that requires a great deal of sacrifice…but the spiritual rewards really are unbelievable.

    I agree, it’s pretty hardcore. Not many are up for the challenge. I’m not, anyway. Still, Jesus does serve as an example to me about selflessness, or rather God-centered-ness. This to me is the most important message of the cross.

    Thanks for your comments (so far), Tracie. You’ve given me loads to think about :D

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