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Pagan Theology: Paganism as a World Religion
In Pagan Theology , Michael York situates Paganism—one of the fastest-growing spiritual orientations in the West—as a world religion. He provides an introduction to, and expansion of, the concept of Paganism and provides an overview of Paganism's theological perspective and practice. He demonstrates it to be a viable and distinguishable spiritual perspective found around the world today in such forms as Chinese folk religion, Shinto, tribal religions, and neo-Paganism in the West.
While adherents to many of these traditions do not use the word “pagan” to describe their beliefs or practices, York contends that there is an identifiable position possessing characteristics and understandings in common for which the label “pagan” is appropriate. After outlining these characteristics, he examines many of the world's major religions to explore religious behaviors in other religions which are not themselves pagan, but which have pagan elements. In the course of examining such behavior, York provides rich and lively descriptions of religions in action, including Buddhism and Hinduism.
Pagan Theology claims Paganism’s place as a world religion, situating it as a religion, a behavior, and a theology.
While adherents to many of these traditions do not use the word “pagan” to describe their beliefs or practices, York contends that there is an identifiable position possessing characteristics and understandings in common for which the label “pagan” is appropriate. After outlining these characteristics, he examines many of the world's major religions to explore religious behaviors in other religions which are not themselves pagan, but which have pagan elements. In the course of examining such behavior, York provides rich and lively descriptions of religions in action, including Buddhism and Hinduism.
Pagan Theology claims Paganism’s place as a world religion, situating it as a religion, a behavior, and a theology.
239 pages, Paperback
First published April 1, 2003
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
December 22, 2014
mankind has a habit of making lists, the best pizza you ever ate was at that obscure restaurant in an alley of Venice, the best live show you ever saw was at 19 with that girl and so on. One occasionally makes changes but these are the reference points you judge things in life. Today I crown this book Pagan theology: paganism as world religion to be the worst academic book in general and emperor of bad academic books on religion I ever read.
To what does this book own the privilege of these awful awards? In short because it's a mess. The book feels unfinished it reads like a master thesis but the first draft version. The book is basically a collection of ideas, methods, facts, side stories and analysis with barely any coherence and depth. But let's look at some of the main issues here because I am not done here.
The idea: the basic premise of the book is to shed some light on paganism as a world religion and how it relates to other... well non pagan religions. But what kind of pagan religions? Well all of them it seems, according to York there is a universal essence of neopagan religion behavior and theology. His proof of this rather extreme position is questionable to say the least. He makes some quick descriptions of the groups of neopagan religions such as chinese folk religion, western neo pagan religion and tribal religion.... Wait what? Yes Tribal religion according to this man there are 'primitive' religions in south america, the pacific island and half of Africa's population all have the same sort of religion. This is an insane statement to claim so many different cultures share such an intimate connection without any proof or even analysis, his entire idea of african religion comes from 2 cultures for the entire continent... any africanist should be shocked by this.
the method; well I should say methods because he skips and jumps from history, sociology, theology and anthropology methods and analysis whenever he feels like it. It seems as if he wanted to present a multiple approach to the subject and in principle this is a good idea but difficult to do and I can't say York managed to do this well resulting in a mixed result at best. The worst is his attempt at fieldwork anthropology in Asia. It attempts to show how certain celebrations of Hinduism and Buddhism have some pagan or cultic elements. However it comes across as a travel experience not a well developed thought out approach to in the field observation of religious behavior in Asia. The historical and sociological analysis aren't much better, they feel as with anything in this book as unfinished drafts or oversimplifying at best or far fetched guesswork and speculation at worst.
The structure of his book is unbalanced to an incredible degree the first chapter is 58 pages, the second 97 and the last 11 pages, no conclusion no big reflection the book simply ends. But the content of these chapters borrow from each other ; the second chapter is supposed to be individual behavior and group norm but there are significant parts on theology and religion that are supposed to be chapter 1 and 3. It is also very unclear what he tries to prove in each chapter or even subchapter.
The amount of time and effort spent on each religion he studies is also unfairly balanced. for instance not only is it questionable to assume every African pagan religion is essentially the same and primitive, he spends at most 2 pages on it. 2!!! Chinese folk religions on the other hand gets 8 and Shinto 11. He also spends more than 30 pages on Hinduism and less than 4 on Christianity. Some things are just briefly mentioned to be accepted and never referred to again. For instance he claims that in African Islam there are more pagan influences than in middle eastern Islamic experience ok but that's it, no proof, no example, no nothing as if he want's to cover his tracks when someone would ask him about African Islam so he could say: "I mentioned it".
and finally the biggest issue I had with this book, his vision on what religion is and his role as an author. It became very clear to me that his vision of what religion is and how it works as a social factor is heavily influenced by Christianity and by his own spiritual voyage. He's obsessed with presenting the true essence of religions as clear easily to differentiate and identify and largely homogenic internally, add to this a hierarchical idea of religions with non written religions as primitive and building up to the more complex religions. All of this is a classic old school puritan protestant attitude towards religion. This book also reads as a spirit quest of a western anglo saxon american protestant christian that wanted spiritual satisfaction. His dislike for Abrahamic religions, a reflection on his time as a atheist/agnostic a spirit trip starting in the hippie movement of san Francisco and continued trough asia, a book trip to neopagan traditions in ancient Greece, afro american voodoo and Native American and a sort of conclusion that basically says I am still figuering it out. The strangest part of this book? When he stated that the best chicken he ever ate in his life was in Thailand in front of Bangkok's central train station, I still am at a loss of words about this...
stay away from this book it not that it's all wrong or he at times does not raise a good question but it is simply impossible to ignore all the bad parts in this book. I Recommend more specific books, read a few books on a religion or religion as an abstract concept and if you only want to read a single book to understand an item as complex as religion than you have no idea just how complicated it really is or you are too lazy to do some real research.
To what does this book own the privilege of these awful awards? In short because it's a mess. The book feels unfinished it reads like a master thesis but the first draft version. The book is basically a collection of ideas, methods, facts, side stories and analysis with barely any coherence and depth. But let's look at some of the main issues here because I am not done here.
The idea: the basic premise of the book is to shed some light on paganism as a world religion and how it relates to other... well non pagan religions. But what kind of pagan religions? Well all of them it seems, according to York there is a universal essence of neopagan religion behavior and theology. His proof of this rather extreme position is questionable to say the least. He makes some quick descriptions of the groups of neopagan religions such as chinese folk religion, western neo pagan religion and tribal religion.... Wait what? Yes Tribal religion according to this man there are 'primitive' religions in south america, the pacific island and half of Africa's population all have the same sort of religion. This is an insane statement to claim so many different cultures share such an intimate connection without any proof or even analysis, his entire idea of african religion comes from 2 cultures for the entire continent... any africanist should be shocked by this.
the method; well I should say methods because he skips and jumps from history, sociology, theology and anthropology methods and analysis whenever he feels like it. It seems as if he wanted to present a multiple approach to the subject and in principle this is a good idea but difficult to do and I can't say York managed to do this well resulting in a mixed result at best. The worst is his attempt at fieldwork anthropology in Asia. It attempts to show how certain celebrations of Hinduism and Buddhism have some pagan or cultic elements. However it comes across as a travel experience not a well developed thought out approach to in the field observation of religious behavior in Asia. The historical and sociological analysis aren't much better, they feel as with anything in this book as unfinished drafts or oversimplifying at best or far fetched guesswork and speculation at worst.
The structure of his book is unbalanced to an incredible degree the first chapter is 58 pages, the second 97 and the last 11 pages, no conclusion no big reflection the book simply ends. But the content of these chapters borrow from each other ; the second chapter is supposed to be individual behavior and group norm but there are significant parts on theology and religion that are supposed to be chapter 1 and 3. It is also very unclear what he tries to prove in each chapter or even subchapter.
The amount of time and effort spent on each religion he studies is also unfairly balanced. for instance not only is it questionable to assume every African pagan religion is essentially the same and primitive, he spends at most 2 pages on it. 2!!! Chinese folk religions on the other hand gets 8 and Shinto 11. He also spends more than 30 pages on Hinduism and less than 4 on Christianity. Some things are just briefly mentioned to be accepted and never referred to again. For instance he claims that in African Islam there are more pagan influences than in middle eastern Islamic experience ok but that's it, no proof, no example, no nothing as if he want's to cover his tracks when someone would ask him about African Islam so he could say: "I mentioned it".
and finally the biggest issue I had with this book, his vision on what religion is and his role as an author. It became very clear to me that his vision of what religion is and how it works as a social factor is heavily influenced by Christianity and by his own spiritual voyage. He's obsessed with presenting the true essence of religions as clear easily to differentiate and identify and largely homogenic internally, add to this a hierarchical idea of religions with non written religions as primitive and building up to the more complex religions. All of this is a classic old school puritan protestant attitude towards religion. This book also reads as a spirit quest of a western anglo saxon american protestant christian that wanted spiritual satisfaction. His dislike for Abrahamic religions, a reflection on his time as a atheist/agnostic a spirit trip starting in the hippie movement of san Francisco and continued trough asia, a book trip to neopagan traditions in ancient Greece, afro american voodoo and Native American and a sort of conclusion that basically says I am still figuering it out. The strangest part of this book? When he stated that the best chicken he ever ate in his life was in Thailand in front of Bangkok's central train station, I still am at a loss of words about this...
stay away from this book it not that it's all wrong or he at times does not raise a good question but it is simply impossible to ignore all the bad parts in this book. I Recommend more specific books, read a few books on a religion or religion as an abstract concept and if you only want to read a single book to understand an item as complex as religion than you have no idea just how complicated it really is or you are too lazy to do some real research.
October 14, 2024
York spends comparitively little ink on discussing theology as such compared to discussing observations from his travels abroad. So the field remains impoverished. York does at least provide us with a substantial thesis: “Paganism is an affirmation of interactive and polymorphic sacred relationship by individual or community with the tangible, sentient, and nonempirical.”
December 11, 2019
Had a really hard time staying focused and awake through even the first chapter. I'm sure it's got some good information somewhere in here, but it's incredibly dry and I couldn't get into it.
January 7, 2020
Insufferably dense and dull, and filled with questionable conclusions and judgments.
September 7, 2014
I found this book to be incredibly interesting and a great read for anyone looking for a more academically inclined book on paganism or religion in general.
Pagan Theology is broken up into three sections: Paganism as Religion, Paganism as Behavior, and Paganism as Theology.
York's uses the "Religion" section to define paganism and explore primal tribal religions, shamanism, Native American spirituality, and contemporary Western paganism, among other topics.
The "Behavior" section is the meat of this book and explores paganism as it applies to the major religious and cultural practices. It explores folk belief, magic, and cultic or shamanistic behavior in secular life, Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity, and others. York actually spends most of his time in exploring pagan behavior in religious and cultural organizations that do not consider themselves pagan.
I found the short "Theology" section to go a little off topic at times, but was a decent wrap-up to the book.
Pagan Theology is broken up into three sections: Paganism as Religion, Paganism as Behavior, and Paganism as Theology.
York's uses the "Religion" section to define paganism and explore primal tribal religions, shamanism, Native American spirituality, and contemporary Western paganism, among other topics.
The "Behavior" section is the meat of this book and explores paganism as it applies to the major religious and cultural practices. It explores folk belief, magic, and cultic or shamanistic behavior in secular life, Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity, and others. York actually spends most of his time in exploring pagan behavior in religious and cultural organizations that do not consider themselves pagan.
I found the short "Theology" section to go a little off topic at times, but was a decent wrap-up to the book.
April 3, 2010
I give him 5 stars for what he promises, and 4 for what he accomplishes.
January 7, 2018
Foundation- to explore background, the cruxes of the religion's orgins
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews