However, as soon as the One becomes many, with Shaktis, various kinds of plenary and partial manifestations, shaktyavesha avataras, etc., etc., with the divine manifest in the guru, etc., etc., we are a long way from the rigorous monotheism of the "Semitic" religions.
The reason I post is because of the following notes that I came across in the course of another project, taken from a book that has influenced me, The Changing of the Gods by Naomi Goldenberg, a Wiccan (at least when she wrote it). I am sorry, but for some reason I did not keep the page numbers:
A person may be polytheistic in her or his political, social and aesthetic attitudes simply by recognizing that several dynamics and sets of standards determine people’s organization of their world. Monotheists are those among us who always want to “get it all together” to decide on one overriding principle which will explain all of life, all thought and all feeling.
Jung taught that the most important feature of any religion is its myth. When a person is aware of living mythically, he is experiencing life intensely and reflectively. Such persons experience life as meaningful. Meaning is a feeling that results from the sense of reality or tangibility about the life one is leading. Jung, “It is only meaning that liberates.”
True religion has to be alive. This life consists in how well that religion nurtures a mythic understanding in its followers.
About prophets like Mohammed, “the process of discovery of the myth that gave them their power.”
In monotheisms "a heretic is someone who experiences religious consciousness in myths other than those prescribed by the tradition."
About creativity: "the more aware one is of one’s individuality, the less likely the standardized religious package is likely to suffice."
It is not necessary to share symbols, but to share the process of symbol creation
It is only when an image is asserted to hold a monotheistic and universal posture that it is vulnerable to attack by relativism, by facing the power that other images can hold for other individuals with other psychic patterns.
Jung taught that the most important feature of any religion is its myth. When a person is aware of living mythically, he is experiencing life intensely and reflectively. Such persons experience life as meaningful. Meaning is a feeling that results from the sense of reality or tangibility about the life one is leading. Jung, “It is only meaning that liberates.”
True religion has to be alive. This life consists in how well that religion nurtures a mythic understanding in its followers.
About prophets like Mohammed, “the process of discovery of the myth that gave them their power.”
In monotheisms "a heretic is someone who experiences religious consciousness in myths other than those prescribed by the tradition."
About creativity: "the more aware one is of one’s individuality, the less likely the standardized religious package is likely to suffice."
It is not necessary to share symbols, but to share the process of symbol creation
It is only when an image is asserted to hold a monotheistic and universal posture that it is vulnerable to attack by relativism, by facing the power that other images can hold for other individuals with other psychic patterns.
This hardly gives a good idea of what this book states. I'll try to do a more thorough job later on in the book review section.
