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Ecstasy, Ritual, and Alternate Reality: Religion in a Pluralistic World
"An important book which deserves the careful attention of serious students of religion." ―Religious Studies Review
Anthropologist and spiritual explorer Felicitas Goodman offers a "unified field theory" of religion as human behavior. She examines ritual, the religious trance, alternate reality, ethics and moral code, and the named category designating religion.
Anthropologist and spiritual explorer Felicitas Goodman offers a "unified field theory" of religion as human behavior. She examines ritual, the religious trance, alternate reality, ethics and moral code, and the named category designating religion.
- GenresReligionAnthropology
208 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1988
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
September 21, 2023
I picked this one up on Kindle because it sounded mildly interesting, and it turned out to be an excellently structured book on religious theory from a local intellectual! Felicitas Goodman was a Hungarian-born German anthropologist who taught at Denison University in nearby Granville, Ohio. She retired in 1978 and then founded the Cuyamungue Institute in to continue her research into altered states of consciousness, based on the ecstatic experiences she had in the Pentecostal church. One of her books inspired the film The Exorcism of Emily Rose, and her biography appeared in graphic novel form.
Goodman neatly lays out her wide survey of religious practice in categories of ecstasy, ritual, and alternate reality (her alternate term for the ‘supernatural’) - hence the title of the book. These three aspects are expressed in how societies view good fortune, bad fortune, and divination; ethical frameworks; and their understanding of “religion” in general. The interesting move is tracing these categories through different habitats of human experience: hunter-gathering, horticulture, agriculture, and urbanism. For example, hunter-gatherers see their habitat as cyclical and never-changing, and seek a religion of balance. Horticulturalists have begun to impose their will on the earth and therefore see a possible ultimate revenge for their misdeeds. Agriculturalists instead see a threat from outside toward their cultivated and stable habitats – the origin of the fall and redemption story, and categories of blanket good and evil. And urbanists generally are so divorced from their habitat that they see no need for the systems of understanding of the past, and develop a largely individualist and practical religion to supplant it.
Goodman’s theory is supported by both her original research and volumes of readings of primary texts from across the globe. The societies she examines range from the African Pygmies to North American indigenous cultures to Nordic shamans – and of course, early Christianity (an agricultural religion evolved from early Israelite horticulture) to modern liberal Protestantism, an urban culture which has gotten rid of ecstasy and alternate reality almost altogether. Her theory is sophisticated but readable, written in plain language with loads of fascinating examples and facts. This book would serve equally well for higher-level undergraduate classes all the way to doctoral students – and a framework for new fieldwork in more recent religious developments as well.
Goodman neatly lays out her wide survey of religious practice in categories of ecstasy, ritual, and alternate reality (her alternate term for the ‘supernatural’) - hence the title of the book. These three aspects are expressed in how societies view good fortune, bad fortune, and divination; ethical frameworks; and their understanding of “religion” in general. The interesting move is tracing these categories through different habitats of human experience: hunter-gathering, horticulture, agriculture, and urbanism. For example, hunter-gatherers see their habitat as cyclical and never-changing, and seek a religion of balance. Horticulturalists have begun to impose their will on the earth and therefore see a possible ultimate revenge for their misdeeds. Agriculturalists instead see a threat from outside toward their cultivated and stable habitats – the origin of the fall and redemption story, and categories of blanket good and evil. And urbanists generally are so divorced from their habitat that they see no need for the systems of understanding of the past, and develop a largely individualist and practical religion to supplant it.
Goodman’s theory is supported by both her original research and volumes of readings of primary texts from across the globe. The societies she examines range from the African Pygmies to North American indigenous cultures to Nordic shamans – and of course, early Christianity (an agricultural religion evolved from early Israelite horticulture) to modern liberal Protestantism, an urban culture which has gotten rid of ecstasy and alternate reality almost altogether. Her theory is sophisticated but readable, written in plain language with loads of fascinating examples and facts. This book would serve equally well for higher-level undergraduate classes all the way to doctoral students – and a framework for new fieldwork in more recent religious developments as well.
December 17, 2023
Interesting. I felt that the city section was less convincing.
July 10, 2012
I won this book in a raffle in 2001 (I know because I found the flyer for the event inside!), serendipitously in that I had just finished my MA in Anthropology! Finally got round to reading it. Very enjoyable to read about different spiritual practices in different societies, from hunter gatherers to city dwellers. Sometimes a bit of an overwhelming amount of information, and sometimes not so convincing interpretations for me, but interesting.
May 17, 2012
Any book that can describe accurately the transition from horticulture to agriculture in terms of the shift in mythos is alright by me. Is her work construction or reconstruction? No matter, it surgically examines an incredible global change in human society.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews