Transcript Introduction to the Study of Religion

REL 333 Week 4
World Religious Traditions I
– Should have e-mailed to me your Eastern
Religious Matrix by now
– Your learning teams should be working on the final assignment due next week too.: LEARNING
TEAM
– Time: 5 Hours (All time indications throughout the syllabus are for on-ground students.)
• Review the objectives from Week Four and discuss additional insights and questions that may
have arisen.
• Eastern Religions Learning Team Final Presentation and Paper (due Week Five) APA
– Each Learning Team will complete a paper and presentation about the impact of a
contemporary expression of an Eastern religious tradition on a particular society. The
following is a list of questions to consider:
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What role do Eastern religious traditions play in modern medicine?
What impact has Hinduism had on modern India’s society?
How is the practice of Buddhism expressed in the United States?
What is the state and practice of ancient Chinese religious traditions in Communist China?
– The paper and presentation should focus on how the societal views of spirituality and
religion have been influenced, and how social and political life has been impacted by the
selected Eastern religious tradition, then compare and contrast the selected religion to at
least one other studied in this course.
– The paper should consist of 2,100-2,450 words. The Microsoft® PowerPoint®
presentation should comprise 10-12 slides (with narrator notes if they are
available) The project must include at least five references in addition to the
textbook. Both the Final Paper and the Presentation are due in Week Five.
Week 4 Objectives
• Trace the historical
development of Taoism,
Confucianism, and Shinto
• Examine the significance and
meaning of ritual, symbols,
myths, and sacred texts in
Taoism, Confucianism, and
Shinto
Taoism (also known as Daoism)
Taoism
• The Way of Nature
– Taoism; a way of studying and
systematizing human life as well
as natural life
– Nature observations and
emulation are foremost
Ancient Traditions roots
• Ancestor Worship
– Divination
• I Ching (Book of Changes)
– Supreme Deity
• Shang-ti
• Holy Mother in Heaven (guardian of the seas)
Taoism
• Lao-tzu
• Lived approx
600 BCE
Was a court
archivist and a
contemporary of
Confucius
Chuang-Tzu
Lao-Tzu
• Retired from Government service
– ‘went west.’
– The gatekeeper and the Tao-teching
– Supposedly lived for hundreds of
years
Taoism
“The Tao that can be
named, that is not the
Absolute Tao.”
• Tao-te-ching – ‘The Way and the Power’
– About 5000 words
– Poetic
– Begins by saying that nothing can be adequately
said about the Tao.
– Calls for a return to nature and its source (the Tao)
– Downplays formal learning
– Asserts natural wonder and the harmonization of
nature and humanity
Taoist Ritual and Practice
• Blends temple worship, private
devotion, meditation, breathing, and
physical techniques.
• Also incorporates alchemy, yoga, good
deeds, shamans, superstition, and
occult magical practices
• One goal is to become immortal
Taoist practices
• Tai-Chi
– Body movements,
breathing and relaxed
concentration
– Designed to draw chi from the universe and
stimulate its flow through the body
• Feng Shui – (‘Wind and water’)
• http://www.artoffengshuiinc.com/
Bruce Lee (1940-1973)
Taoist ethics and Morality
• Wu-wei – ‘non-action.’
• Harmony –
– ‘the more forcing, the more trouble…’
• Wu-hsin – ‘no-mind’
The Tao of Pooh
• "While Eeyore frets ...
... and Piglet hesitates
... and Rabbit calculates
... and Owl pontificates
...Pooh just is.”
• "Rabbit's clever," said Pooh thoughtfully.
"Yes,"said Piglet, "Rabit's clever."
"And he has Brain."
"Yes," said Piglet, "Rabbit has Brain."
There was a long silence.
"I suppose," said Pooh, "that that's why he never
understands anything."
Taoism
“The Tao that can be
named, that is not the
Absolute Tao.”
• Tao-te-ching – ‘The Way and the Power’
– About 5000 words
– Poetic
– Begins by saying that nothing can be adequately said about the
Tao.
– Calls for a return to nature and its source (the Tao)
– Downplays formal learning
– Asserts natural wonder and the harmonization of nature and
humanity
• most translated after the Bible
– Oral Tradition
– Very Ancient
– Written by Lao Tzu (?)
The Point of Taoism
• To study the order and system of
natural life so that one can order
ones own life to move with the flow.
The path will necessarily weave as
the cosmos around you changing
– Requires great mental and physical
discipline
Life in Harmony
• Experience the transcendent unity in all things,
not separation
• reconcile opposites on a higher level of consciousness
– Everything has it’s place and function in life
• no good or bad, small or large, disfigured or beautiful
Life in Harmony continued
– Experience the universe that is directly
• cooperating with the ways things are, not
making judgments, setting standards of
morality, not labeling
– Three in the Morning
A Low Profile
– A Taoist has a low profile in the world
• like a valley, allowing things to flow into life, like a stream
• Not working for recognition, doing it because it is their
function to do it
• nourishes the “ten thousand things” of material life
• No possession of accomplishments, works effortlessly
The Way of Water
– Flowing Water
• Water doesn’t
fruitlessly attack
– effortlessly
flows around
and over,
gently
removing
obstacles
Wu Wei
• doing nothing
– nothing contrary to nature
– not expending unnecessary energy
• non-interference
– nothing is evil, things are just out of
balance
» Civilization with rigid views on
morality, and intellectual attempt
to improve what is generates
chaos
Ch’i-kung
• Very similar to Hindu meditation
practice
– Ching - generative force
– Ch’i - vitality
– shen - spirit
• management of ones “life-force” is
VERY important
Mystical Practices
• I Ching
• Life is chaotic, sometimes answers don’t
come
– the brick wall scenario
• with meditation, washing, ask your question
– a direct line to the spirit world
– T’ai-chi chuan
– Philosophical vs. Popular Taoism
• Search for Elixir of Immortality
Mystical Practices
Qin Shi Huang Di
Gods and Priests
• Some Taoists have priests, deities, and so
on
– Eight Immortals
• humans who gained immortality with their own
magic powers
– Hsien
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•
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numerous gods
ancestral spirits
magic making
ritual
priests
8 Immortals
• Zuang Guolao
• Zhong-Li Quan
• Han Xiang-Zi
8 Immortals
• He Xian-Gu
• Lan Cai-He
• Li Tie-Guai
8 Immortals
• Lu Dong-Bin
• Cao Guo-Jui
From: http://www.asianartmall.com/8immortalsarticle.htm
Confucianism
551-479 BC
Confucius Kung Fu-tzu
Confucius
Confucius, the Buddha, and Lao Tzu
Tasting Vinegar
Confucianism
• Kung Fu-tzu (Master K’ung)
– Teachings called Juchiao (“the teaching of the scholars”)
– Life Story
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Gentleman Scholar
Jen (“human-heartedness, humanity)
Golden Rule
Social Hierarchy
Rituals – Li
Filial Piety - Yi
Ancestor Worship
Mencius – Mandate of Heaven
Confucianism
• Confucius brought together many old
traditions, applied his own wisdom,
and put things in many small sayings
that were easy to remember
• Emphasized rituals
as the way to preserve
order in society
Confucianism
• Confucius not recognized
as a sage until after his
death
• Mencius (Meng Tzu) &
Hsun Tzu
Central Teachings
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Tradition
Jen
Li
Veneration of ancestors
– Food and wine offerings
– Silent prostrations at ancestral temples,
gravesites, and homes
Nature of the Divine
• Gods, Spirits and ancestors
–All supported the moral order
–Violating the moral order was
to violate your ancestors
Sacred Texts
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Five Classics
I Ching
Book of History
Classic of Rites
Spring and Autumn Annals
Four Later Books
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Analects of Confucius
Book of Mencius
The Great Learning
The Doctrine of the Mean
Art
Poem on Mountain – Ming Dynasty
Art
Wu Dao-Zi – Tang Dynasty
Art
Han-Gan White Horse – Tang Dynasty With Poem from the
Emperor in 1746
Forbidden City
Forbidden City
Forbidden City
Forbidden City
Forbidden City
Female (Left) and Male (Right) Lions Guarding the Residences
Forbidden City
Shintoism
:
神道
Shintoism
• Originated in Japan
• Has no ‘founder’
• Came to be known as Shinto in
response to incursion of Buddhism
Shinto Definitions
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Shinto
State Shinto
Kami
Torii
Ki
Aikido
Amaterasu
Hirohito
Shintoism
• Kami
• misogi,
• Kinship with
– nature
• Purity
• Purification
– Rituals
History
• The indigenous religion of Japan (790 AD)
– no name until Buddhism arrived
• used by governments to inspire nationalism
– returned to grassroots after war and separation of Church and
state
• People of the land
– agricultural
• plant, tend, harvest
– sun and moon cycles
– Spr. - Summer - Fall - Winter cycle
– Mount Fuji is sacred embodiment of divine creativity
• land thrust up from the sea
• Fuji-san is it’s name
– friendship and intimacy
– Simplicity and naturalness are the honored traits
Kami
• The divine
– Kamikaze - divine wind
• Spirits, any type
– the kami are EVERYWHERE
• Shrines to honor them
• Groves of trees
• always an enclosure to show where the Holy begins
– torii - tall gate frames
– bridges over streams
» water is particularly cleansing
» places provided to wash
• public hall - offering hall - sacred sanctuary
– only High Priest goes to the latter
» priesthood is often hereditary, takes years to learn all of the
nuances
• no images in worship, all is in nature
Kami continued
• Home worship too
– a high shelf with a shrine
• generally only a mirror inside
– greet sun with clapping and prayer, and offerings
» Rice - health
» Water - cleansing and preservation of life
» Salt - harmonious seasoning of life
– by daily incorporating the worship of the
kami into everyday life one will be in
harmony with nature
Evil or Sin…?
• No sin in Shinto
– Good and evil distinctions are for lesser people
– world is a beautiful,
enjoyable place
– Sexuality is not bad per se
• communal bathing is
traditional
• Impurity is cause of misfortune
– tsumi;
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unkind interaction among humans
corpses
menstruation
humans interacting against nature
natural disasters
And sin…? continued
No repentance required. Purification
required
• physical - I.e. washing with water
• spiritual - I.e. and enlightening moment
– unity of universe
– oharai
• stick of wood from sacred tree with white
streamers attached
– kami wind, remember?
Shinto Buddhism?
• Shinto for life events, Buddhism for
death events
• Often the two are worshipped side
by side
– theologies are very different
Shinto Confucianism?
• Hierarchy
• social cohesion
• alliance was formed to attempt to overthrow the
Buddhist influence
State Shinto
• Emperor Meiji
– Shinto became spiritual basis for
government
– Emperor was long thought to be the
offspring of the sun goddess
• imperial family would almost always consult the
shrine to the sun goddess for matters of
importance.
– Way of the kami should govern the nation
• administered by government officials
– priests were suppressed and/or done away with
• tool to enlist popular nationalism
– Emperor was a God, worthy of protection, and Japan
should expand
Various Elements
– Eternal life-force
• ch’i
– Self-generating
– Yin and Yang
• yin = female, dark, receptive
• yang = male, bright, assertive
– wisdom is in recognizing their ever shifting, always in
balance cycle. The follower will flow with these cycles.
» The cycle is called the TAO (the way)
Prayers and notes on a Shinto shrine
Chuang Tzu
• Important Taoist
– Butterfly Story:
Chuang-Tzu once
dreamed he was a
butterfly. When he
awoke, he no longer
knew if he was a
butterfly dreaming he
was a man, or a man
who had dreamed he
was a butterfly.
Japanese Baths:
Grandma & Grandson
Calligraphy
Shinto
Shin (Divine Being) Do (Way)
• Japanese in origin
– Strictly a Japanese order
• Confucianism - informs organizations and ethics
• Buddhism and Christianity - ways to understand
suffering and afterlife
• Shinto - living in harmony with the natural world
State Shinto continued
• Hirohito
– Meiji’ grandson
• thought to be a God
– Declared himself human at the end of
WWII
• thus sending Japan headlong into our
century…
Shinto Today
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Non-proselytizing
nature oriented
relationship oriented
A good example of the definition of an
indigenous religion
– for so it is...
I.
Questions:
II. Philosophy of Religion
A. Philosophy of religion is NOT meant to convert
students or to trigger emotional arguments
between students with differing beliefs
B. Philosophical study of religion is meant to enable
students to expand understanding, think critically,
and reflect on the nature of their own religious
beliefs
C. In principle, there is no reason that philosophy,
science, and religion cannot coexist
Purposes (Function) of Myth:
1. Teach about ourselves (explain origins)
2. Provide explanations
3. Provide examples or models of
behavior
4. Create meaning for yourself
5. Entertainment (social solidarity)
Methods of Studying Religion:
1. Sympathetic (participant-observer): feel
for
2. Dispassionate (apathetic): feel not
3. Normative (antipathetic): feel against
4. Empathetic (Understanding through
acquaintance): feel within
5. Analytical: study and do critical
analysis of the claims of the religion
Dimensions (Aspects) of
Religion:
From Ninian Smart (The World Religions (1989):
10-21.)
1. Ritual (Practice)
2. Experiential (mysterium tremendum et
fascionosans; emotional)
3. Mythic (Stories/narratives with sacred
significance)
4. Doctrinal (beliefs; philosophies)
5. Ethical (commandments; actions; legal)
6. Social (Institutional; Community)
7. Material (Artistic)
8. Historical: real live events