Monotheism is a hard slog

[sackett]

Monotheism is a hard stance to maintain.

The Hindus, of course, make no effort to be monotheistic, and cheerfully bow down to what sounds like thousands of supernatural beings, some of them borrowed and most of them of great antiquity, positively a museum of gods.

The Jews do their damnedst. But they have angels, the Messiah, the devil, ascended masters of various types (think of the Lubivitchers), and of course the legend of the Gollems of Prague and Warsaw, miraculous beings endowed with magical power by rabbis of more than human kabbalistic cleverness.

Popular Buddhism long ago adopted devils and saints and bodhisattvas and who knows what all; Buddha himself was elevated to deity status pretty early on. The Buddhists have even borrowed Heaven and Hell from (I suppose) the Christians, to combat declining enrollments.

Muslims have had a Devil from the very beginning of their sect, and have also kept the angels and djins they had before Mohammad (to whom the more besotted of them pray). The famous Black Stone is an ancient cult object, apparently a much-bopped fertility goddess lying on her side; she was just too full of mana to kick out of the temple. The Muslims have even added saints remarkably like Catholic saints.

And Catholicism! Talk about a polytheistic religion! Father, Son, Spirit, Virgin, Satan, saints, angels, demons: holy ghost, Batman! Catholics are more tangled up in gods than any Hindu - and plenty more deities are coming down the pike, including a sour-pussed old Albanian nun who wanted poor people to suffer just because it was good for their souls.

Maybe Protestants will assert that they at least are pure-quill monotheists, but I fear that a confused two-headedness, the idea of Jesus as both father-god and son-man, is intrinsic to Christianism. Don't most Protestants buy the Trinity too?

The religious will object that I'm widening the definition of God to include other beings - and so I am, because, after all, once you admit the reality of supernatural creatures, who's to say which one is a deity? Wouldn't it be safer to send a little devotion Beelzebub's way, just in case? Hadn't we better re-gild that idol of the Madonna? She's bodily up in Hebbin', and who knows what superpowers she may have now!

Why is true monotheism so rare, maybe unheard of? Because it's boring! The continuous multiplying of gods illustrates the teeming nature of the subconscious: so many aspects of the self, so little time to embody them all!

This is just to say that religious people make things up and then believe them -- no news to skeptics, but challenge a devout person with it and watch him burst into righteous fire and smoke.

 

[arcticpenguin]

Perhaps we should all worship the one true god: money.

 

[Abdul Alhazred]

Monotheism is a hard stance to maintain.

The Jews do their damnedst. But they have angels, the Messiah, the devil, ascended masters of various types (think of the Lubivitchers), and of course the legend of the Gollems of Prague and Warsaw, miraculous beings endowed with magical power by rabbis of more than human kabbalistic cleverness.

Just some points of information. The golem stories were never taken literally. The "ascended master" is controversial within Lubavitch, and rejected by all other Jews.

Angels, including Satan, are subordinate beings not unlike humans in this respect. See the book of Job. Satan is not the "anti-God", just one of his sons.

The Messiah is a man. It's not like the Christian concept.

All in all, I'd say that Jews come the closest to being real monotheists, though maybe Sunni Muslims are tied for first place in this "contest".

Angels, the djinn, Satan (who is a djinn not a fallen angel in Islam), etc. are not "gods" either.

 

[sackett]

Today's god may be tomorrow's demon. This happened to Egyptian gods whose priests lost power. Conversly, the scorned god of today can turn into the avenging father of all creation if his cult becomes the official one; cf. Christianism in the later Roman world.

My point is that nobody with a capital No seems really and truly to believe in just one supernatural being.

We've seen way too many believers in ghosties and sperrits turn cultish on us to doubt that -any- supernatural entity can be made into a god. Even flesh and blood ancestors, or rather their spirits, can be worshipped, and are in some parts of this benighted world. Worse: Tin-pot messiahs are always popping up and declaring themselves almighty (think of Father Devine and Master D. Koresh), and finding plenty of converts.

Not that monotheism is more than one step from the truth; I see no virtue in an empty tabernacle. But the rarity -- I say, absence -- of true monotheism is a good twig for stinging the backsides of the believers.

 

[Abdul Alhazred]

My point is that nobody with a capital No seems really and truly to believe in just one supernatural being.

This much is true. There's always at least the souls of the dead.

My hypothesis is that religion started as fear of ghosts. The gods and God came much later. No reason to eliminate useful categories just because they are fuzzy around the edges.

 

[Yahweh]

Perhaps we should all worship the one true god: money.

I also enjoy fine art and the natural beauty of women...

DAMMIT! I'm a polytheist!...

 

[Leif Roar]

My point is that nobody with a capital No seems really and truly to believe in just one supernatural being.

But monotheism isn't the belief that there is only one, unique god; not that there is only one supernatural being. As to where to draw the line between a god and "a regular supernatural being", well - that's really up to the various religions themselves, isn't it? So monotheism is any religion which only accepts one, unique supernatural entity as a god.

 

[sackett]

Getting out my old American Heritage Dictionary, I find:

"Religion…The expression of man's belief in and reverence for a superhuman power recognized as the creator and governor of the universe."

"Superstition…A belief that some action or circumstance not logically related to a course of events influences its outcome."

I think American Heritage is going too far in its definition of religion; the editors (I imagine them as a bunch of Episcopalians) want to exclude a whopping lot of beliefs. On the other hand, I think they nail down superstition pretty accurately.

Wait a sec while I climb onto my fave hobbyhorse; ah, that feels good. Okay, here I go:

THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE BETWEEN RELIGION AND SUPERSTITION!

So I'm saying that no, it's -not- up to the worshippers to define what they consider a god; they're kidding themselves.

Think of it this way: If you encountered Christian doctrine somewhere up the Amazon or in the backwoods of New Guinea, you'd be able to view it objectively and describe it accurately: "Besides the major deities Yahoowah, Maree, and Jezuss, there are numerous subsidiary or lesser gods, grouped loosely into anjelz and deemons. These receive varying amounts of devotion, at times appearing to preoccupy the natives almost more than the ostensibly cult-central beings. Harrumph." (Forgive me; I spend a lot of time around academics.)

As for Satan and the djins: I fear that the explainers have been at work. When people overthrow alien gods, the gods don't go away, they turn into debbils, and then you're never rid of them; well, they fill a psychic need.

Angels appear in a lot of traditions, perhaps spontaneously; maybe they're the make-believe helpers of childhood incorporated into "adult" religions. Named angels of the Judeo-Christian acceptation have their own histories, and I fear that you'll find that they usually started as popular gods that the simple folk just couldn't bear to give up. As I said at the beginning, monotheism is a hard road to follow.

 

[Leif Roar]

THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE BETWEEN RELIGION AND SUPERSTITION!

Of course there is. Religion is a structured set of beliefs and superstition is unstructured.

 

[Abdul Alhazred]

As for Satan and the djins: I fear that the explainers have been at work. When people overthrow alien gods, the gods don't go away, they turn into debbils, and then you're never rid of them; well, they fill a psychic need.

Sometimes. Other times not.

The djinn were never "gods", though they were part of the pre-Islamic Meccan belief system. In Islam, some djinn are Muslims and some are infidels. Iblis (Satan) was a devil under the old religion, too. The only thing new was the identification of Iblis with Satan.

Perhaps Iblis was the God of some even earlier unrecorded religion?

 

[sackett]

Maybe we can define religion and superstition as points on a continuum. The more structured your beliefs, the more "religious" they are; the more unorganized (as distinct from dis-organized), the more clearly "superstitious" they are.

Hmm. Viewed that way, the lush woowooism of the Catholic Church, which specifies dank near -everything- you're supposed to believe, is more "religious" than the plodding intellectualism of the Unitarians, who barely know what the hail mary they believe.

 

[Yahzi]

Perhaps we should all worship the one true god: money.

But which one? Dollars? Lira? Yen? Big fat wads of Kroner, or piles of gold coins?

Don't even think of suggesting that anti-fiducial the "Eurodollar!"

 

[Acrimonious]

Another word swap like Religion / Superstition (from Merriam-Webster http://www.m-w.com)

Mythology:
1 : an allegorical narrative
2 : a body of myths : as a : the myths dealing with the gods, demigods, and legendary heroes of a particular people b : MYTHOS 2 <cold war mythology>
3 : a branch of knowledge that deals with myth
4 : a popular belief or assumption that has grown up around someone or something <defective mythologies that ignore masculine depth of feeling -- Robert Bly>

Gospel
1 a often capitalized : the message concerning Christ, the kingdom of God, and salvation b capitalized : one of the first four New Testament books telling of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ; also : a similar apocryphal book c : an interpretation of the Christian message <the social gospel>
2 capitalized : a lection from one of the New Testament Gospels
3 : the message or teachings of a religious teacher
4 : something accepted as infallible truth or as a guiding principle <the gospel of conservation -- R. M. Hodesh>
5 : gospel music


Gospel is simply a specified word that basically means "Christian Mythology."

How obvious can you get? The main definition of Gospel involves: a popular belief that has grown out of an allegorical narrative of a legendary hero/demigod/god.

Because of this, I like to use the word Mythology when referring to people's (especially Christians) beliefs. It really pisses them off, and even moreso when you show them the definitions of the words.

 

[ceo_esq]

Of course there is. Religion is a structured set of beliefs and superstition is unstructured.

I'm not sure that's necessarily true. Some religions (or religious worldviews) are remarkably unstructured; arguably, certain superstitions have attained highly organized and structured status (viz. the British Homeopathic Association, perhaps?).

A lot more could be said about the differences/similarities between religion and superstition than can be gleaned from their respective dictionary entries, but it’s useful to examine them just the same:

Religion

"A particular system of faith and worship."

"Recognition on the part of man of some higher unseen power as having control of his destiny, and as being entitled to obedience, reverence, and worship; the general mental and moral attitude resulting from this belief, with reference to its effect upon the individual or the community; personal or general acceptance of this feeling as a standard of spiritual and practical life."

- Source: Oxford English Dictionary

Superstition

"Unreasoning awe or fear of something unknown, mysterious, or imaginary, esp. in connexion with religion; religious belief or practice founded upon fear or ignorance."

"In particularized sense: An irrational religious belief or practice; a tenet, scruple, habit, etc. founded on fear or ignorance."

"An irrational religious system; a false, pagan, or idolatrous religion."

- Source: Oxford English Dictionary

"An excessive reverence for, or fear of, that which is unknown or mysterious."

"An ignorant or irrational worship of the Supreme Deity; excessive exactness or rigor in religious opinions or practice; extreme and unnecessary scruples in the observance of religious rites not commanded, or of points of minor importance; also, a rite or practice proceeding from excess of sculptures in religion."

"The worship of a false god or gods; false religion; religious veneration for objects."

- Source: Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary

"When you believe in things you don’t understand"

- Source: Stevie Wonder, "Superstition"

Furthermore, the usage discussion from Webster's Unabridged indicates that, in a religious context,

Superstition springs from religious feeling misdirected or unenlightened. ... [It] leads in some cases to excessive rigor in religious opinions or practice; in others, to unfounded belief in extraordinary events or in charms, omens, and prognostics, hence producing weak fears, or excessive scrupulosity as to outward observances.

Several things emerge from this. One of them is that merely imposing additional structure on superstition, or a group of superstitions, will not necessarily nudge it towards the scope of the definition of "religion" - among other things, it will not necessarily generate reverence and veneration of the divine, nor give rise to a particular moral or spiritual attitude.

One might say that all religions are essentially superstitious, whereas a superstition is not necessarily religious (though many are). However, this conclusion is not inherent in the respective meanings of those terms, but reposes rather on the external premise that all religious worship is ignorant, irrational, false or unenlightened. In other words, the explanations given in the dictionaries clearly discourage the reader from concluding that all religious beliefs can properly (in a purely linguistic, rather than a factual, sense) be characterized as superstitious. In addition, there is an indication of superstition as being something that can occur within religion, without being coextensive with it - which can often, perhaps paradoxically, result in the appearance of heightened religiosity because of "excessive rigor" or "excessive scrupulosity".

All of this suggests that superstition and religion share some common features, but are hardly synonymous. Moreover, strictly speaking, they differ not in degree (of structure or otherwise) but in kind, and so cannot easily form the basis for a continuum.

 

[sackett]

"All of this suggests that superstition and religion share some common features, but are hardly synonymous. Moreover, strictly speaking, they differ not in degree (of structure or otherwise) but in kind, and so cannot easily form the basis for a continuum."

Damned well said, ceo-esq, and well researched.

Only trouble is, I don't buy it. I only used dictionary entries to illustrate the congruities between the concepts of religion and superstition. Like you, I note that the grave scholars who compile those fascinating and useful books ". . . clearly discourage the reader from concluding that all religious beliefs can properly (in a purely linguistic, rather than a factual, sense) be characterized as superstitious." I think these serious-minded men had more than a linguistic distinction to make: they were deeply uneasy about seeming to disparage religion as they and their set understand it.

It's the factual sense that I'm concerned with: in descriptive terms, you cannot distinguish between religion and superstition. Both are bodies of practice and belief based on the same bunkum. We may see an esthetic difference between a Catholic high mass and Samaritan animal sacrifice, and it's entirely right and seemly that we should prefer the mass; but we can't usefully define a fundamental difference between the origins of these practices - hell's afire, the Catholics and the Samaritans will even tell you they worship the same god!

When I was a boy, a few people in our village still had horseshoes nailed up over their doors "for luck." This was a dying superstition by then; nobody really believed in it, and certainly nobody was fervid about it, but, well, danggit, they didn't feel quite right not having that horseshoe up there. And not just hung on a single nail, nossir, you had to hammer it down points up, or the luck would run out! We can be pretty sure that the horseshoe business was a relic of a very old religious practice. (I leave the dreary labor of comparative religion to better men, but I think this is safe interpretation.) At one time, that religion inspired worshippers to great efforts, it burned in their souls, it drove them through life - as a religion always does, until it wears away into what we call superstition.

But I'm going on too long. I read your citations happily because they seemed (to me) to confirm what I had said rather than to qualify it: as long as we're using English, we're speaking of the same one thing when we say the words religion and superstition.

 

[ceo_esq]

"All of this suggests that superstition and religion share some common features, but are hardly synonymous. Moreover, strictly speaking, they differ not in degree (of structure or otherwise) but in kind, and so cannot easily form the basis for a continuum."

Damned well said, ceo-esq, and well researched.

Only trouble is, I don't buy it. I only used dictionary entries to illustrate the congruities between the concepts of religion and superstition. Like you, I note that the grave scholars who compile those fascinating and useful books ". . . clearly discourage the reader from concluding that all religious beliefs can properly (in a purely linguistic, rather than a factual, sense) be characterized as superstitious." I think these serious-minded men had more than a linguistic distinction to make: they were deeply uneasy about seeming to disparage religion as they and their set understand it.

It's the factual sense that I'm concerned with: in descriptive terms, you cannot distinguish between religion and superstition. Both are bodies of practice and belief based on the same bunkum. We may see an esthetic difference between a Catholic high mass and Samaritan animal sacrifice, and it's entirely right and seemly that we should prefer the mass; but we can't usefully define a fundamental difference between the origins of these practices - hell's afire, the Catholics and the Samaritans will even tell you they worship the same god!

When I was a boy, a few people in our village still had horseshoes nailed up over their doors "for luck." This was a dying superstition by then; nobody really believed in it, and certainly nobody was fervid about it, but, well, danggit, they didn't feel quite right not having that horseshoe up there. And not just hung on a single nail, nossir, you had to hammer it down points up, or the luck would run out! We can be pretty sure that the horseshoe business was a relic of a very old religious practice. (I leave the dreary labor of comparative religion to better men, but I think this is safe interpretation.) At one time, that religion inspired worshippers to great efforts, it burned in their souls, it drove them through life - as a religion always does, until it wears away into what we call superstition.

But I'm going on too long. I read your citations happily because they seemed (to me) to confirm what I had said rather than to qualify it: as long as we're using English, we're speaking of the same one thing when we say the words religion and superstition.

I find all of this rather interesting. This exchange, unfortunately, simply serves to show the limitations of relying on the definitions of words to come to conclusions about real examples of their referents. As I pointed out, while it's not reasonable to conclude that "religion" and "superstition" are synonyms, it is possible to argue that all religions fall within the realm of superstition (and this I take to be your point). But as I also noted, this relies on an external premise - to the effect that every actual religious belief is "false", "unreasoning", "founded upon fear or ignorance", "excessive" or what have you. The ultimate soundness of that premise has proven extraordinarily difficult to demonstrate, however, and although (like you) I consider that every deity actually worshiped is a false deity (à la the definition of "superstition"), something bothers me about collapsing any distinction between the concepts.

The respective definitions of religion and superstition presuppose that there is theoretically at least one example of the former that is not an example of the latter - i.e. there is at least one religion that is not a false religion. In factual terms, we differ with the dictionary drafters on that point. But I'm not sure that the fact that I believe the distinction between a religion and a superstition has no real-world manifestation (because there are no "true" religions of which one can speak) suggests that the distinction is meaningless, such that to speak of religion is to speak of superstition. By the same token, I believe that there are no real-world manifestations of the distinction between a mermaid and a manatee (because there are no real mermaids of which one can speak), yet I would not agree that when we are talking about mermaids we are talking about manatees. Even as I write it, of course, I see faults in that analogy, but I still would hesitate to conflate the terms "religion" and "superstition" even in practical usage. Perhaps it's merely a vestigial sensibility on my part, of the sort you speculate may have afflicted the dictionary drafters.

 

[sackett]

. . .I still would hesitate to conflate the terms "religion" and "superstition" even in practical usage. Perhaps it's merely a vestigial sensibility on my part. . . .

Not vestigial, highly developed, I think I can say civilized. It does you credit.

Here is the only way we disagree: I think it's delightful to equate religion and superstition; it clears the air at the same time that it causes the purveyors of faith to puff up all red and angry.

Now let me add this, and it may sound a little strange coming from a man who so obviously dislikes credulous faith: Religion -- or superstition -- has inspired men to do valuable things. There is nothing wrong with Hagia Sofia, or Bach, or Avebury, or Ten Eyck's Saint Gerome, or the Blue Mosque, or the Medicine Wheel on that strange mountaintop in Wyoming. The beliefs that led men to do such things were erroneous, but the capacity for inspiration was theirs, and only humans could have displayed it. Bravo for us! My hope is that the time for superstition is passing, and my faith (you see? I can use that word) is that the power of inspiration will remain.