The Anthropology of Religion Part I: Definitions

[path_of_one]

Just happened on this article while perusing the Internet for an entirely unrelated subject.

10 Extraordinary Burial Ceremonies From Around The World

It didn't bring up some of the oddest (to us Westerners) of all- eating the dead. In some societies, a proper burial is to be cooked and eaten by the community, which ensures you live on in the community. This can be contrasted with cannibalism between enemy tribes, which is generally a way to obtain your dead opponent's power and add it to your own.

Cannibalism as a means of disposing of the dead, such as that practiced among the Fore people, was recently linked to diseases similar to mad-cow disease and was partially how they figured out what was going on with mad-cow disease. Such diseases seem to be a response among some types of animals (other examples include mink and sheep) to eating neurological material such as the brain. Since the diseases are caused by prions, which are fairly indestructible to either heat or cold and are not exactly "living," it is best to avoid cannibalism of neurological material.

 

[Snoopy]

Its popularization via Quick-Fix methods for salvation was what kept it going (e.g., chanting to the Buddha). It was like salvation for everyone without really trying.

I say steady on there n-n! Are you taking something like Pure Land and generalising it to the whole gamut of the Mahayana? I feel you're being a bit too broadly sweeping; and I can broadly sweep a bit meself.

An alternative broad sweep might be that “it” was becoming just an organised religion, run by monks for monks, and the suttas could not be interpreted for a new place or time. The slow development of the Mahayana was a reaction against this to revitalize the true purpose and spirit of the teaching.


s.

PS note to self: stop derailing this thread...

 

[Dawud]

Why would ritual burial be deemed as religious? Couldn't it be that the species evolved to the point that they wished to cope with death of their loved ones in some respectable manner? That by burying them, that brought some sort of closure?

Do not athiests bury their dead, too?

I don't think atheists completely avoid religion... our laws are, for the most part, from religion. Thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not steal... if you get rid of every trace of religion you'd have anarchy.

There was a poll recently that found that 20% of atheists believe in God. (Maybe they thought atheist meant unaffiliated.)

 

[Dawud]

Apparantly the Buddha did not accept his mission as teacher until visited by a spirit. Also, he was tempted with wordly things by a spirit being (as Jesus was).

There are some other parallels, also. Both the Buddha and Baha'u'llah gave up a life of luxury. Many Prophets have been imprisoned... Zoroaster, John the Baptist, Joseph (of Egypt,) Baha'u'llah. Many Prophets have been killed... Jesus, the Bab, ...many have almost been killed.... Abraham, Baha'u'llah... both Abraham and Baha'u'llah travelled from Mesopotamia to Palestine/Canaan/Israel. Many Prophets (if not all of them) have spent time alone in the wilderness, for instance Jesus for forty days (forty might be symbolic, not exactly forty. (could have been more)) Baha'u'llah spent time alone in the mountains of Kurdistan (northern Iraq) for two years.

 

[Dondi]

Since the diseases are caused by prions, which are fairly indestructible to either heat or cold and are not exactly "living," it is best to avoid cannibalism of neurological material.

I'll try to veer away from that delicacy.

 

[path_of_one]

I'll try to veer away from that delicacy.

I know it's so tempting, but it is for the best.

 

[Netti-Netti]

There was a poll recently that found that 20% of atheists believe in God. (Maybe they thought atheist meant unaffiliated.)

I saw that poll, too. There has to be something wrong with the atheist classification.

 

[Netti-Netti]

I say steady on there n-n! Are you taking something like Pure Land and generalising it to the whole gamut of the Mahayana? I feel you're being a bit too broadly sweeping; and I can broadly sweep a bit meself.

Pure Land has been the single most popular kind of Buddhism - even today - so maybe a broad sweep is warranted by the numbers involved.

 

[Dawud]

I saw that poll, too. There has to be something wrong with the atheist classification.

I think it said about eight or nine percent of atheists very strongly believe in God

 

[seattlegal]

It is possible to have sign language without the vocal tract-- which is interesting to me as a possibility, that people developed the sign language first and vocalized to punctuate the sign language... then there would have been evolutionary pressure to develop better vocalization over time. However, this is purely speculative on my part and not commonly accepted. I'm no expert in linguistic origins. But it seems to me that the thought process and signing/vocalizing (much as chimps do today as origins among early humans, leading to ever more complexity to a modern human language like ASL) could put the pressure on humans to favor any mutations of the vocal tract that could produce better, more nuanced vocalizations. There must be a huge evolutionary pressure for language in humans because we have a huge cost with the way our vocal tract operates- a very much increased risk of choking.

Interesting. I remember reading in National Geographic about a study that compared injuries sustained by Neanderthals to occupational injuries sustained by modern man. The pattern of injuries Neanderthals show best match injuries sustained by modern day bull riders--rodeo. Considering the robust nature of Neanderthal bones as compared to the more gracile bones of modern man, Neanderthals seem to have had a very rough life, and were likely in a constant state of injury. Sign language would be difficult to do if you are constantly injured, as you need your body to communicate, whereas one can communicate with vocal language even while injured. If that isn't evolutionary pressure to develop vocal language, I don't know what is.

{I can picture it now--an injured guy trying to make a sign for water, and vocalizing the equivalent of "ouch" while trying to make the sign...and how different groans could be vocalized for different signs due to the different type of pain the different body postures would cause due to the injuries...}

 

[China Cat Sunflower]

“Religion is human transformation in response to perceived ultimacy.”

Ultimacy, in this sense, is all but ungraspable, though, isn't it? It's the same as saying "Religion is human transformation in response to the question why?."

Chris

 

[path_of_one]

That could be, Chris. As I'm working on this text with another anthropologist, the consistent problem is getting a definition sufficiently broad to encompass even the major world religions plus animism, without making it so broad that it becomes a non-definition.

I think ultimacy, in this sense, refers to most religions having some sort of goal state for humanity- an ultimate. The response to this ultimate on the part of humanity is to work through some sort of means (prayer, devotion, meditation, ritual, whatever) to take us from our current problematic state to the ultimate state.

Of course, what the ultimate/goal state is, the means, and the problem are all up for grabs.

 

[Vajradhara]

Namaste Path,

thank you for the post.

Thanks, Vaj. This is a good thing to bring up. I was being succinct and sloppy in my description of Buddhism in an effort to keep the text short. Of course, you are correct that the way we (in English) think of suffering is not equivalent to how this is meant in Buddhism. Like "fear" in Greek, as presented in the Bible, in needs unpacking to be properly conceptualized.

it is always the case when transliteration of foreign languages occurs that some loss of meaning will ensue. by and large, in our daily discourse, it is of little consequence. in my view such changes when we enter the realm of religious discussion simply due to the nature of the subject matter and the impact it has upon a beings life.

As I understand it, Dukkha is a form of... not sure what emotion to use here- anxiety? Because even in moments of happiness we are, on some level, aware that our happiness is transitory and will not last. So we suffer even when we are experiencing joy. This is because we want the universe to operate a certain way, and it doesn't. But when we accept how the universe operates, then we can be freed to be truly happy without this anxiety, since we will be accepting each moment without worrying about how long it will last. I'm not sure if I'm saying what I mean, but I'll end there for now. Is that at all accurate?

hmm... i'm not particuarly apt with analogies but think of dukkha like the spice in a food dish. you can have many different food dishes (emotional states) yet, in our kitchen, we always cook our food with the same basic spice (dukkha). thus, our burnt and yukky food (negative emotional states) and our delicious, moist cake (positive emotional states) all contain this same spice (ignorance). the spice isn't a different form of the food, per se, though it is inextricably mixed up in it.

Now what is much more important here, in a broad sense, for anthropology is that you've hit the nail on the head with the issue of supernatural vs. natural. This is why Kottak's definition (and all such of religion that base it on supernaturals) is insufficient. I was, again, being kind of sloppy the other day (sorry, everyone), which another anthropologist pointed out to me over dinner last night as we discussed this little bit I wrote. It isn't just that some religions are not concerned with supernaturals, but more to the point that *many* religions fail to distinguish between natural and supernatural at all. This distinction seems to be largely related to the modern Western world and traditional peoples everywhere don't seem to operate in this way. For example, animistic people see everything as both natural and supernatural. Ghosts, spirits, gods are just as natural as crows, wolves, and cattle. Conversely, crows, wolves, and cattle have spirits and sentience and must be appeased and respected and so forth just as when one relates to ghosts, spirits, and gods. In many traditional myths, people can shape-shift into other animals and vice versa. In some, the animals spirits are also the creators. To define religion as the cultural space, so to speak, of supernaturals is to ignore that this supernatural vs. natural distinction is relatively limited and recent.

spot on

further.. modern science would seem to agree with you in the sense that every phenomena and noumena within our universe is natural even if such is quite exotic and unusual to our experience.

prior to becoming a Buddhist i'd spent several years studying a particular iteration of indigenous shamanism and found the interconnected view to be very appealing. the difference between phenomena is not intrinsic...

metta,

~v

 

[Dawud]

The Golden Rule can be found in every religion, and I think the purpose of religion is love and unity.... could we say that religion is about the advancement of civilization and being civilized?

 

[China Cat Sunflower]

That could be, Chris. As I'm working on this text with another anthropologist, the consistent problem is getting a definition sufficiently broad to encompass even the major world religions plus animism, without making it so broad that it becomes a non-definition.

I think ultimacy, in this sense, refers to most religions having some sort of goal state for humanity- an ultimate. The response to this ultimate on the part of humanity is to work through some sort of means (prayer, devotion, meditation, ritual, whatever) to take us from our current problematic state to the ultimate state.

Of course, what the ultimate/goal state is, the means, and the problem are all up for grabs.

“Religion is human transformation in response to perceived ultimacy.” doesn't seem to imply anything about religion being a social construct. It's nicely philosophical, but can we really say anything about the philosophical outlook of Neanderthals burying their dead in somewhat ritualistic ways? Maybe a concise definition isn't possible.

When I think of religion I tend to think of it as a social and political tool of civilization. Psychologically I view religion as a set of culturally specific socio-political programming mechanisms. In that sense its actual, as opposed to perceived, function has very little to do with the metaphysical answers it proposes. So the fact that religion functions as a social control mechanism would need to be part of the definition as well.

Chris

 

[path_of_one]

“Religion is human transformation in response to perceived ultimacy.” doesn't seem to imply anything about religion being a social construct. It's nicely philosophical, but can we really say anything about the philosophical outlook of Neanderthals burying their dead in somewhat ritualistic ways? Maybe a concise definition isn't possible.

That's what I was saying. It's a nice philosophical start, but what it's missing is the social part of it. Otherwise, it could be talking about individual spirituality. It misses a key feature of religion- it's sociality.

I'm for a new definition. I just haven't written it yet.

When I think of religion I tend to think of it as a social and political tool of civilization. Psychologically I view religion as a set of culturally specific socio-political programming mechanisms.

But then, how is it different from other socio-political programming?

In that sense its actual, as opposed to perceived, function has very little to do with the metaphysical answers it proposes. So the fact that religion functions as a social control mechanism would need to be part of the definition as well.

I agree that it is an important piece for discussion, but there are many other functions as well (I'll get to these soon- it's another topic I have in mind). The problem with making functionality part of the definition is that in social science, function may vary by society and even by individual. We could say that generally, we want to define something we're going to look at, and then functionality falls into theories about the something we're looking at. Functionalism is one way to theorize about some aspect of culture, but it isn't the only way, nor are there generally only one or two functions of an aspect of culture, so it would make definitions unweildly and limiting to include it. However, it is extremely important to social science and certainly social control is one function of religion.

 

[Netti-Netti]

When I think of religion I tend to think of it as a social and political tool of civilization. Psychologically I view religion as a set of culturally specific socio-political programming mechanisms. In that sense its actual, as opposed to perceived, function has very little to do with the metaphysical answers it proposes. So the fact that religion functions as a social control mechanism would need to be part of the definition as well.

Chris

To me the words "personal religion" says a great deal.

As I see it, the social control mechanism is secondary to the more fundamental aspect of devotion. Arguably, even religious ethics are secondary.

 

[earl]

Namaste Path,

thank you for the post.



it is always the case when transliteration of foreign languages occurs that some loss of meaning will ensue. by and large, in our daily discourse, it is of little consequence. in my view such changes when we enter the realm of religious discussion simply due to the nature of the subject matter and the impact it has upon a beings life.



hmm... i'm not particuarly apt with analogies but think of dukkha like the spice in a food dish. you can have many different food dishes (emotional states) yet, in our kitchen, we always cook our food with the same basic spice (dukkha). thus, our burnt and yukky food (negative emotional states) and our delicious, moist cake (positive emotional states) all contain this same spice (ignorance). the spice isn't a different form of the food, per se, though it is inextricably mixed up in it.




spot on

further.. modern science would seem to agree with you in the sense that every phenomena and noumena within our universe is natural even if such is quite exotic and unusual to our experience.

prior to becoming a Buddhist i'd spent several years studying a particular iteration of indigenous shamanism and found the interconnected view to be very appealing. the difference between phenomena is not intrinsic...

metta,

~v

Long ago-somewhere-I recall some writer saying that the Sanskrit term "dukkha" is actually roughly translatable in terms of the metaphor of a wheel not properly centered upon its axle and therefore "wobbly." Earl

 

[China Cat Sunflower]

To me the words "personal religion" says a great deal.

As I see it, the social control mechanism is secondary to the more fundamental aspect of devotion. Arguably, even religious ethics are secondary.

I'm all for personal and micro religion! Still, it seems that the point is to participate in some sort of commonly held spiritual continuum. Even a one person religion has to in some sense beg, borrow, or steal from what's already out there.

Chris

 

[China Cat Sunflower]

Hi Kim!

When I think of religion I tend to think of it as a social and political tool of civilization. Psychologically I view religion as a set of culturally specific socio-political programming mechanisms.

But then, how is it different from other socio-political programming?

It's different in the way that institutionalizes ritual as a repository for cultural memory.

Chris