{"id":821,"date":"2007-02-14T17:15:00","date_gmt":"2007-02-14T17:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=821"},"modified":"2007-02-14T17:15:00","modified_gmt":"2007-02-14T17:15:00","slug":"blog-valhalla-polytheism-books-and-more","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=821","title":{"rendered":"Blog Valhalla, Polytheism, Books and More"},"content":{"rendered":"

¶ Yvonne Aburrow’s Pagan theologies wiki has what might be the definitive list of active Pagan blogs<\/a>. I am adding a link on my sidebar.<\/p>\n

¶ Speaking of which, this blog now appears on BeliefNet’s Blog Heaven page<\/a> again. Thanks to everyone who made a fuss.<\/p>\n

¶Bedside reading: I started, put aside, but will return to John Lamb Lash’s<\/a> Not in His Image: Gnostic Vision, Sacred Ecology, and the Future of Belief<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n

It is a difficult book for me to evaluate: I sympathize with Lash’s point of view, but I think that he distorts some of his sources too much in order to support his views. He wants to use Gnosticism<\/a> as a path that “can provide the spiritual dimension for deep ecology independently of the three mainstream religions derived from the Abrahamic traditions.”<\/p>\n

Gnosticism is still concerned with “salvation,” a concept largely at odds with polytheism, as John Michael Greer points out (see below). Much Gnostic thinking disparages physical existences as a “mistake,” so I am waiting to see how Lash reconciles that with deep ecology<\/a> and its focus on our relationship with and as a part of nature.<\/p>\n

Lash writes his introduction around the life of Hypatia of Alexandria<\/a>, a Platonic philosopher murdered by a Christian mob in 415 CE. He wants to view her as an “urban shaman,” but I see her more as today’s tenured professor of mathematics. An intellectual through and through. Note how she elevates philosophy over erotic attraction this story of her teaching, true or not<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Reviewing Not in His Image<\/em> in the Los Angeles Times<\/em><\/a>, Jonathan Kirch<\/a> writes:<\/p>\n

Lash is capable of explaining the mind-bending concepts of Gnosticism and pagan mystery cults with bracing clarity and startling insight. At moments, however, he slips into a kind of New Age rant as baffling as any mystical text. “What we seek in ‘Gaia theory’ is a live imaginal dimension,” he writes in one such passage, “not a scaffolding of cybernetic general systems cogitation.” . . . . <\/p>\n

And when he considers what he calls the “sci-fi theology” of the ancient Gnostics, he comes uncomfortably close to affirming that the otherworldly “Archons” of Gnostic myth were authentic extraterrestrials.<\/em><\/p>\n

An interesting book, but full of special pleading.<\/p>\n

¶I am happier with John Michael Greer’s A World Full of Gods: An Inquiry into Polytheism<\/em><\/a>, published by the Druidic group Ár nDraíocht Féin<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Greer’s arguments for polytheism as offering a better model of the universe (including the evil and suffering in it) than monotheism and his lucid explanation of polytheistic spirituality deserve a wide hearing.<\/p>\n

He works hard to show that monotheistic thinkers simply do not comprehend the polytheistic experience, and their arguments against it (unless enforced by violence as in Hypatia’s case) simply fail.<\/p>\n

Indeed, ancient and modern Pagans alike have the described mystical states in which they have become aware of multitudes of divine beings filling every corner of the cosmos; in the words of the Greek philosopher Thales<\/a>, they have seen that “all things are full of gods.” This is the polar opposite of henotheism<\/a>; it is also among the most powerful and transforming of Pagan religious experiences<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

¶ Yvonne Aburrow’s Pagan theologies wiki has what might be the definitive list of active Pagan blogs. I am adding a link on my sidebar. ¶ Speaking of which, this blog now appears on BeliefNet’s Blog Heaven page again. Thanks to everyone who made a fuss. ¶Bedside reading: I started, put aside, but will return […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[3,5,40,7],"class_list":["post-821","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-blogging","tag-paganism","tag-polytheism","tag-publishing"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6xQTg-df","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":10186,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=10186","url_meta":{"origin":821,"position":0},"title":"I Will Be Buying this Book on Polytheistic Theology","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"February 2, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"New from Bibliotheca Alexandrina: Ascendant: Modern Essays on Polytheism and Theology. From the publisher: Monotheistic assumptions so pervade our culture that even those few people born into polytheist religions (or those who grew up with no religion at all) cannot help but be influenced by them. Polytheology raises questions that\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Pagan studies\"","block_context":{"text":"Pagan studies","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=pagan-studies"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":841,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=841","url_meta":{"origin":821,"position":1},"title":"Polytheism, not Tradition","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"March 24, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Keep an eye on the International Year of Polytheism Web project.This is really more of a conceptual art piece than any sort of reconstructionism (definitely not reconstructionism or capital-T Tradition), although it has been mentioned earlier in the Pagan blogosphere.Still, if anyone wants to \"wants to overcome the epoch of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"polytheism\"","block_context":{"text":"polytheism","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=polytheism"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1057,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=1057","url_meta":{"origin":821,"position":2},"title":"Polytheism and Punctuation","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"September 4, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Have you seen the new ads for Gillette's Venus-brand razors? Do you think some copywriter once read some classic of pop-psychological polytheism, such as Goddesses in Everywoman: Powerful Archetypes in Women's Lives?Or perhaps more amazingly, what if someone read Pagan Meditations: The Worlds of Aphrodite, Artemis, and Hestia?Gods below! Polytheistic\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"polytheism\"","block_context":{"text":"polytheism","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=polytheism"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6893,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=6893","url_meta":{"origin":821,"position":3},"title":"Animal Sacrifice and ‘Hard’ Polytheism","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"December 2, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"There was some discussion last week at the American Academy of Religion annual meeting as to whether the Contemporary Pagan Studies Group should sponsor or co-sponsor a session devoted to issues surrounding animal sacrifice. Some voices in the Pagan world suggest that you are not really a \"hard\" polytheist (truly\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Hinduism\"","block_context":{"text":"Hinduism","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=hinduism"},"img":{"alt_text":"imrs.php","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/12\/imrs.php_-300x204.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5976,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=5976","url_meta":{"origin":821,"position":4},"title":"Resources in Pagan Theology","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"September 23, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Christine Hoff Kraemer has assembled a list of books and websites on contemporary Pagan theology. I was happy that I only once reacted with \"What is X doing here?\" And maybe I ought to give X a second look (or maybe not). You really ought to read most of those\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Paganism\"","block_context":{"text":"Paganism","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=paganism"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8498,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=8498","url_meta":{"origin":821,"position":5},"title":"Books and Movies for a Pagan Mindset","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"April 22, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"I have been thinking that I needed to add a new category of reviews \u2014 not just books etc. deliberately focused on Paganism (which to my mind automatically includes polytheism), but those that promote a Pagan mindset without coming out and saying it. Go ahead and say it: Pagan-ish. My\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"movies\"","block_context":{"text":"movies","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=movies"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/821","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=821"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/821\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=821"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=821"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=821"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}