Sam Harris

Why do people constantly refer to older religions (that are not christian) as pagan religions?

The word "pagan" actually derives from the latin word "paganus" (which means country dweller, or someone that resides outside the boundaries of rome that chooses not to worship the god or gods of rome).

That's interesting, because rome wasn't always christian.  In fact, maybe people should actually go back to worshipping the gods of ancient rome.  Mithras, I'm sure would like to get some of his followers back.

Why do people constantly refer to older religions (that are not christian) as pagan religions?

The word “pagan” actually derives from the latin word “paganus” (which means country dweller, or someone that resides outside the boundaries of rome that chooses not to worship the god or gods of rome).

Political, social and religious changes begins in the cities and speads to the rural areas.  Frequently, people in rural areas do not experience the same social pressure for change and are more likely to retain the old ways.  The word heathen, from the english word heath meaning courty or back woods, was also used to describe those retained the old ways especially in religion.  Pagan or heathen can be used to describe any number of pre-Christian polytheistic religions religion native to the European peoples.  This would incude the Roman,  Greek and Norse religions which are referred to as mythologies. Pagan and heathen are sometimes incorrectly applied to describe atheists and any non-Christian.  These tems can also be correctly applied to describe the modern day revival of these religions.

Stay Well
Wot

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paganism
It always amazes me when people on this forum post questions like the one above, considering that to access this forum you must utilize the greatest research tool ever devised by man.

I mean, geez, just Google it, man!

Please don’t take the above rant personally, MisterRed2. I have alot of issues :wink:

Celsus,

I didn’t take your reply personally, nor am I upset that you said that.  I actually wasn’t asking the question looking for information at all.  I posted that in annoyance after being hounded by a bunch of bible thumpers.  But yes, I would normally look up something before asking a question that would be easily located.

Just to focus on the subject heading and not on the issues raised above….

as a pantheist living in a world with a wide array on entities not normally accepted by scientists or the practitioners of Abrahamic religions, I find the whole focus on faith-based religions a bit of a let’s take pot shots at straw men kind of affair.  Of course the monotheisms have caused and continue to cause all sorts of damage out there and deserve their pot shots, but the absurdity of having faith in specific, flawed and self-contradictory texts is not the burden of all religious people out there.

Moreno, I hope you’ll elaborate. Sounds intriguing.

By the way, I’m hoping someday to own a Moreno. (Toyota, right?)

It’s also interesting because most of what constitutes “Christian” is actually “pagan.”  The religion is a combination of a few ideas of Judaism and whole lot of stuff borrowed from the pagan mystery religions that were popular throughout the Roman Empire at the time the various early christianities begin to appear on the scence.

As is usual with Christians, they are projecting when they talk about paganism.

AG

[quote author=“homunculus”]Moreno, I hope you’ll elaborate. Sounds intriguing.

By the way, I’m hoping someday to own a Moreno. (Toyota, right?)

Well, you can base your religion (not a word I generally use, but..) on experiences both spontaneous and experienced via ritual, meditation, group work, emotional work, focusing, etc.  And also just by having an open mind.  This last is often claimed by rationalists and scientists, but in actual fact it is not easy to have an open mind.  You begin to experience something outside the accepted norm, the mind leaps in and questions the phenomenon even as it is just coming into awareness, cutting off the experience.  Ideals of having an open mind often seem to be held by people who do not really have much of a grasp of how their own mind works, how fast these processes occur and how much emotional investment they have in not experiencing anything that might indicate things?processes outside their current paradigm.

IN any case I have had a lot of experiences that indicate we are dealing with a living world, that reincarnation is true and that there are entities considered supernatural or hallucinatory by many people that do in fact exist.  I do not have faith in these things, nor do I believe because an authority figure -a text, a person, my parents, etc. - has told me to.  It is experience based.

[quote author=“Moreno”]IN any case I have had a lot of experiences that indicate we are dealing with a living world, that reincarnation is true and that there are entities considered supernatural or hallucinatory by many people that do in fact exist.

Fascinating.  Who is in your head/body right now?

[quote author=“FaixaPreta”][quote author=“Moreno”]IN any case I have had a lot of experiences that indicate we are dealing with a living world, that reincarnation is true and that there are entities considered supernatural or hallucinatory by many people that do in fact exist.

Fascinating.  Who is in your head/body right now?

I assume this was sarcastic.  But it’s a rather poor shot.  Care to elaborate your point.  Or are you someone who finds taking shots about things you know little about a safer ‘critical’ approach.

[quote author=“Moreno”][quote author=“FaixaPreta”][quote author=“Moreno”]IN any case I have had a lot of experiences that indicate we are dealing with a living world, that reincarnation is true and that there are entities considered supernatural or hallucinatory by many people that do in fact exist.

Fascinating.  Who is in your head/body right now?

I assume this was sarcastic.  But it’s a rather poor shot.  Care to elaborate your point.  Or are you someone who finds taking shots about things you know little about a safer ‘critical’ approach.

Pardon me.  You made the claim that you know reincarnation to be true.  I assumed you had first hand knowledge.  Let me rephrase.  How did you acquire the knowledge that reincarnation is true?

I have always been interested in Paganism, especially of the Classical and Wiccan variety. Whatever else you may think, at least they do not condemn people to “hell.”