Before the Age of Enlightenment the earth was filled with many nations living under vastly differing beliefs about the world.
Tribes, nations and empires possessed fanciful superstitious beliefs about their own importance in the Big Picture.
Religion helped man find a place among fearful gods and demons. Faith and Belief, ritual and performance duties, helped man allay fears by
becoming active in appeasing the Gods and shunning the evil spirits.
Judaism allowed adherents a means of ridding themselves of sin (animal sacrifice) and accounting for wrongs (Justice via Law).
Christianity removed animal sacrifice and substituted fealty to the Church (Catholic). The Mass, Saints, prayers, processions and such
plugged the individual into a HUGE ENTERPRISE (Church) that worked to keep humanity safe in God's eyes.
Protestantism wrested away the Unified Obedience to monlithic structure (Catholic Church) and placed in the individual believer's own responsibility.
Luther substituted SOLA SCRIPTURA (the Bible Alone!) for the Church's Magesterium (Tradition and Infallible pronouncement).
But a huge wave of powerful NEW THOUGHTS were washing up in affairs of humanity which could not be helf back by retreat into superstition or ritual observance: RATIONAL ENLIGHTENMENT.
It began with empircal proof (telescope) that man (on Earth) was not the center of a God-constructed universe.
Galileo, Johannes Kepler, Ptolemy, Newton struck down Medieval fancies with thunderous effectiveness.
The invention of the printing press allowed circulation of individual ideas of a challenging nature.
A rebirth (Renaissance) of LEARNING, literacy and free will was wiping away fear and dependancy on Institutions of Scripture and Authority.
Isaac Newton's laws of Physics, Charles Darwin's demonstrations of gradual change in plant and animal life all struck at the core of once IRONCLAD TRUE BELIEF in what the Church and Scripture had claimed was literal TRUTH.
Abandoning superstition for rational education became the passage from Pre-Enlightenment to Post-Enlightenment.
Religions were in turmoil and society coped as best it could.
CONSTANT RE-INTERPRETATION of old belief into Modernity created a Fundamentalist core vs Agnostic Humanist separation in social structure.
Church and State were divided.
Free Will and personal interpretation made claims either tested and rejected or fought against by old world theists.
The New World was peopled by Puritans, Pilgrims and various fanatics seeking to demonstrate their Utopian perfections to the world.
As Kings were toppled and the Rights of Man gained sway, religion no longer CONTROLLED THE WORLD (the Western World, that is).
Islam remained Old World and Pre-Enlightenment. Judasm split into REFORM vs Chasidim.
But--where do YOU come in to all this?
Which are you?
Pre-Enlightenment: dependant on scripture, church and Authority?
Post-Enlightenment: testing everything with practical curiousity?
The Old vs the New has manifest itself in many ways.
Fundamentalists dig in and retrench and make war upon New thoughts by first labeling it as diabolical and secondly by reinterpreting their old belief in new ways.
Evolution is characterized as Darwinism and Creation "Science" is substituted as though it embraces actual science and scriptural authority.
Fundamentalists started Bible colleges for the purpose of teaching wave after wave of youths Biblical Inerrancy to combat the modernizing destructiveness of Textual Criticism and Higher Criticism. (Identifying errors in text on the one hand and historical discrepencies as well as errors of fact on the other.)
Inerrancy, King James Only, Evangelical movements retreat into the darkness of Medieval beliefs AS THOUGH merely declaring old ways as TRUE can staunch the tide of scientific proof to the contrary).
Other strategies recognize the plasticity of religious stories as semi-myths and scripture as man-telling-stories-for-moral-enlightenment. Liberal churches concentrate less on literalism and memorization and more on Social improvements and "Spirtual" development as a generic virtue.
There is a vast spectrum between OLD ........................................................and........................................................NEW.
My question today is largely this: WHERE ARE YOU on that vast GRAY SCALE?
How much of your thinking is rooted in supernatural power? How much Spirituality do you possess which is dependant on Ancient Texts inspired by invisible spirit?
How much logic and rational examination can you engage in without lapsing into fear you are dangerously ignoring the invisible realm of God?
Is religious thinking dominant or passive in your world of the mind?
Do you still pray imagining a listening ear? Do you interpret occurances in the world as "signs" of biblical significance?
How invested are you in clinging to either God, Bible, ritual or spiritual contexts to get you through your Hard Times?
Tell us....please.