Being Religious

[poliphilo]

It is said of one of the London bombers that he had recently "become more religious."

I grew up in a society where "religious" was always a praise word.

Going to church a lot, being a pal of the vicar's, helping to run some militaristic church youth group- these were all, in and of themselves, things worthy of praise. They were moral. They were good.

Morality and religion were all scrambled together. You could be sour, nasty, intolerant, ignorant, snobbish, small-minded, cruel, power-mad, not to be trusted round children, but if you were also "religious" you were automatically on the side of the angels.

It has taken me most of my life to undo this early conditioning.

And to realise that "being religious" is just a compulsion, taste or hobby like any other- and that "religious" people are no more to be counted on for moral behaviour than football supporters or stamp collectors or any other gang or group.

Comments

[seraphimsigrist.livejournal.com]

Yes...I would think of militaristic as a
negative,that is to say with referrant beyond
the boy scouts and their wanderings in wooded
areas, it certainly is used as a cant word by
some people for what they dislike in society.
as to Islam I do not know it is just a thought...
and it would need to be opened out carefully and
with awareness that fever and ecstasy are both
not in themselves bad things(in the body the
former of course an effort at cure) and that
they are the experience of everyone too...
but something about Islam may be conducive and
if so it is a sort of tenuous knowledge which
can help in understanding our...counterparts
in the Islamic world.
as to Islam and the enlightenment, well no doubt
and yet let us hope it is all for the best in the
end...certainly Neoplatonism can be said to
be alive and well in Islam, but in a specific
world among the worlds of Islam, and that may
be helpful in the end when offered back into
the mix... but tend to historical optimism.
blessings and cheers
+Seraphim

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

The Boy Scouts etc were founded during the hey-day of the British Empire- and are at least in part about turning boys into good soldiers. I've always been somewhat uneasy about the (mixed) values they teach.

I don't know enough about Islam to take the discussion much further. I know a number of Muslims socially, but have never really discussed religion with them. On a personal note I have to say that Islam is the one major world religion that has never had any attraction for me. I think this is as much a matter of aesthetics as anything else.

[seraphimsigrist.livejournal.com]

I also find Islam the most difficult to
see the need of in the general course of
things...so I have tried a little and the
results reflected in these.
+Seraphim
*of course, I think you have done esoteric
study, you know the whole school of Guenon
and Schuon and Corbin and so on in fact became
Islamic but in a very specific way.
However I do not care for them really at all
and their books and thought are not easy for me...
I belive for Guenon Islam is partly a retreat
from the Personal...

Corbin

[seraphimsigrist.livejournal.com]

Is it Corbin who says well Judaism is Law
Xty is Love
Islam is the seal of Creativity completing the triad

I would call that a crock using a perhaps yankee
vulgarism.

Re: Corbin

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I think I'd agree- about it being a crock, I mean.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I have to admit that Guenon and co are new to me. I can't place them at all.

I can admire Islamic art and thought, but I've never come across anything in the culture that touches me here *thumps chest*.

Guenonists

[seraphimsigrist.livejournal.com]

the Guenon group called "tradtionalists" was and is a sort
of extrememly intellectual approaach to world religions
and to esoterism, not all were Islamic, Ananda and Rama
Coomaraswami and Kathleen Raine and Philip Sherard were
Catholic(Sherard Orthodox). Guenon's best known book is
the Reign of Quantity and the Signs of the Times (something
like Ortega y Gasset's Revolt of the Masses as an attack
on mass culture) they tended to elitism and Jules Evola
unless I am confused lost his leg in a neofascist bomb
experiment in Italy.
but in comparative religion they must be reckoned with and
also identified so one knows where this is coming from...
Titus Burckhardt , Muslim, Alain Danielou author of "Hindu
Polytheism", Fritjof Schuon author of all sorts of mystical
rubbish...

Re: Guenonists

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Thanks.

The only one of these guys I'm familiar with is Raine. I seem to remember she rejected a poem I submitted to her magazine. Obviously she's a Bad Thing.