UULA Adult RE: An Introduction to Religious Studies Part 2.2, Mircea Eliade
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- Опубліковано 9 лип 2024
- Adult RE Comparative Religion class given, Friday, April 19th, 6:30 at the UULA Church.
An Introduction to Religious Studies Part 2.2: Mircea Eliade.
Mircea Eliade was one of the most important of the early scholars of comparative religion. He believed that there was something "real" in the experience of "the sacred", and that the many similarities we find in human religious expression are due to a shared encounter with this sacred reality. Eliade therefore worked to catalog the many similarities that can be found in how people from wildly different cultures and ties responded to whatever they considered to be sacred.
From an epistemological perspective, it is impossible to distinguish between his belief that the many similarities he found were due to contact with a shared sacred reality, and the idea that they are due to a shared human nature. As with many who pursue this "typological" approach to the study of comparative religion, some of the similarities and patterns he found were likely due to the human propensity to see patterns and meaning in random noise. Nevertheless, Eliade's work set the stage for the study of comparative religion for years to come, and his writing was some of the first exposure I had to these ideas, and it largely motivated my own study of the topic of comparative religion.
Eliade was especially interested in the concepts of sacred time and sacred space as manifest in the sacred calendar for sacred time, and in temples, churches, and other sacred places of worship for sacred space. He was interested in the ideas of the sacred center, what he called the "axis mundi" of the world, and he noted that people from all around the world oriented their lives towards their sacred centers. He was also interested in the mythology of the "return", in this case, the return to sacred time, or to the sacred spot, or to the moment of creation.
The influence of Eliade's work can be seen in the writings of people such as Joseph Campbell (and his work "The Hero With a Thousand Faces"), and in the "Temple Typology" of scholars like John Lundquist.
Previous Lecture: An Introduction to Religious Studies Part 2.1, Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung
• UULA Adult RE: An Intr...
Related lectures:
An Introduction to Religious Studies Part 1: Defining Religion
• UULA Adult RE: An Intr...
I have given two lectures that served as an introduction to comparative religion:
UULA Forum: Similarities and Typologies: An Introduction to Comparative Religion (Part 1): • UULA Forum: Similariti...
UULA Forum: Differences and Divisions: An Introduction to Comparative Religion (Part 2): • UULA Forum: Difference...
Recommended additional resources:
"The Myth of the Eternal Return: Cosmos and History" By Mircea Eliade
www.amazon.com/Myth-Eternal-R...
"Introduction to the Study of Religion" by Charles B. Jones, The Great Courses.
www.audible.com/pd/Introducti...
"The Varieties of Religious Experience" William James
www.amazon.com/dp/0140390340/...
Course Web Page;
For more resources, links to other lectures, etc. visit the UULA Comparative Religion Course Web Page: sites.google.com/view/compara...
A Mormon here. Found great value in these lectures. Read a fair bit of Eliade and Jung. Thank you for uploading these. Very enjoyable.
Jung's most profound comment on religion IMHO: "Religion is a (psychological) defense against the religious experience." i.e. we would rather spend lifetimes building cathedrals than spend even one month fasting and praying alone in the desert to have a face to face with cosmic consciousness.
Jung was also being mainupliated by Jews
Red pill me about Jung and the Jews
Many thanks for the time and effort, as well as erudition you have shared with us. Peace
great overview - eloquent, detailed & accessible
great vid! its MEER-cha eh-lee-AH-deh
A point of critique on that article.
Eliade points out the we still performed these rituals, even if they have lost their religious consciousness.
But why is the football game so popular? It’s produces zero monetary value (unless you gamble), and yet it’s the one of the highest watched and sought out forms of action on the planet. Eliade says “Many psychologists say that the unconscious is religious, however in the modern time, religion has become unconscious”.
Interesting thought. Thank you.
Thanks for the lecture. :) I'm a psychology student and this helped me so much.
O nuvelă care mi-a plăcut mult. Despre NOPȚI LA SERAMPORE, ua-cam.com/video/dFhgZxyuvrU/v-deo.html
Some may feel something in a sacred space and some will not. Could this have something to do with different brain structures? The sacred space put out a ‘signed’ but only those with the appropriate wiring can receive it? Could this ability to defer the sacredness of a space have something to do with the fact that we are a hybrid species, with different components of our ancestors making up the different way we experience sacred spaces?
Now that you are familiar with Jung, Eliade and Campbell, just drink some jungle juice or eat some fungus and it will all be clear 😎
It's interesting to me that the authors you cite in your comment (Jung, Eliade, Campbell) leaned politically far right, and at least for Eliade, fascist. I wonder why that is, and what it might have to do with their study of mythology and religion and the narratives therein of the strong, saviour-type, leader. I'm not drawing any conclusions as that is not my field of expertise, but I wonder if that connection has been considered among academics who study this subject.
@@deirdre108 In turn, it's interesting to me to see you home in on the possibility of them leaning far right, as if that is central. It's a rather awkward time in history to seem to find fault with people who identify as being on the right. Though I have about equal disdain for both those who identify as left and right in the fake two-party paradigm (at least in the US), the left, as of 2020 has really become a shining example of madness. At least those on the right, however duped by Trump, have an easier time seeing the truth of how our freedoms are quickly being stripped away under the guise of safety (first terrorists, now a virus, perhaps tomorrow an alien?). Both sides have their faults (and it's stupid and false to identify as left or right to begin with), but it's rather odd to highlight someone's leaning right as some kind of problem in the context of this video. It would be a shame to fail to see the genius in what Jung et al articulated because of their shortcomings. As an example, I lean Buddhist in my philosophy and practice, yet most Buddhists I know (as most people) have no deep understanding of geopolitics and how eugenicist/technocratic supranational organizations work behind the scenes eroding autonomy of individuals and nations, and how so much is based on illusions and false flags. Yet those same geopolitically uninformed Buddhist authors have much of value to contribute, regardless. As for the emphasis on the hero's journey, I'm not sure which is worse--conservative naivete and adherence to the formula or leftists fixation on uprooting all old narratives and values, while glorifying the ugly and antiheroic in a nihilistic way. One thing I know from reading Jung is that he articulated the need to go beyond the hero's journey.
@@deirdre108 What is your evidence that Jung was far right?
@@deirdre108 you would be interested to learn that the bastion of perennial philosophy are more prominently found in the political right as well
why are these texts so difficult to read and understand. im so lost reading his work
Its pronounced like Mirch-Eh (Meercheh but you roll the R if you can)
is this connected somehow to that idea of mematics and memes
is god only a meme
or this different subject ?
I'm not sure. I think Jung would connect "god" to the archetypes, but I'm not sure he would claim that God is "only" an archetypes. And I'm not sure he would think that the archetypes are identical to memes, although I do see the ways the two are similar.
Si despre nuvela (ua-cam.com/video/VQRNiju-EaU/v-deo.html) PELERINA de Mircea Eliade
The problem with the readers digest article is that it mistakes these young women for virgins. ;-)
LOL
I would have preferred if the subject matter resonated more with you . I do not like the word believe in a lecture you either know or don’t know if you can guess or fool yourself.
I believe that human beings have to make decisions in the presence of uncertainty all the time. We have no choice but to make the best guesses we can. Most of the time I think we fool ourselves when we think we "know" something with absolute certainty. I think it important for us all to hold room for "I think" or "I believe" but "I don't know for sure". I think that's a form of humility.