Pagans romantizing the past?

[David19]

This is something i've been thinking about for awhile, and today, when i was in a bookstore, they had 'Witches, Druids, and King Arthur' by Ronald Hutton, and the parts i read did seem really cool, and made me want to get it out of the library (i'll probably get it later), but on one of the pages (i can't remember which one, though), he says that in modern Paganism, 'pagans' seem to ignore any of the hardships in the natural world, and also pay little attention to any danger from the supernatural realms, which doesn't seem to be in line with ancient 'pagan' religions (e.g. in most cultures and religions, there were (and are?) many supernatural beings and spirits capable of harming the living, e.g. vampiric beings (usually in incorporeal form), demonic beings, ancestors that are angered at you, ghosts who may just be evil, etc), and, from the sites and books i've seen, that seems to be missing from modern Paganisn, a lot of people seem to believe that all supernatural beings and spirits are 'friendly, full of love and 'light'', that there are no evil beings out there, or that if there are demons, then they must all be 'thought-forms' which can be 'destroyed' by imagining 'white light'.

Also, Hutton mentioned a man called Iamblichus, who from what i've gathered was an ancient 'pagan', who had some kind of mystical powers (and who, i think, did a lot of work with Theurgy), from this Hutton said that Iamblichus was someone who said not to draw down or invoke a full god into themselves, and it should be reserved for experienced priests and priestesses, and Theurgists will never do it anyway, and to work with 'lesser' beings such as demi-gods, nymphs, angels, demons, etc, and that a god can't just be 'commanded' or mixed with others, and i think this made sense and i'm glad Hutton talked about him, 'cause, IMO, a lot of Pagans will usually 'work with' any god, they read a short description of, and then mix it with another from another pantheon, and also will say they drawed it into them or invoked it, etc, when even ancient 'pagans' saw this as something that shouldn't be done, which contrasts a lot with what Pagans who say they drew down Hecate or Athene or the Morrigan, etc.

Anyway, i hope that made some sense, and sorry if it the last part kind of rambles or something, but i can't remember the exact quote, but what are your thoughts/opinions/beliefs on this, do you think Pagans are romantizing the past, or ignoring any of the dangers that come from the supernatural realms (e.g. ghosts, angry ancestors, vampiric beings, demons/demonic beings, pissed off deities, etc)?.

[Ben Gruagach]

Romanticizing the past is not exclusive to Pagans -- it's pretty standard in any religious group (and even in many political groups) that you might want to examine.

For instance Christians overall have a rather romantic idea of what life was like in biblical times, and even in the early few centuries of the Christian faith. I expect the same can be said for most other faiths too especially when it comes to their claimed origins. (How many of them claim they are "God's chosen people"? Too many to count.)

You are correct though that in the modern magickal community there are quite a few examples where the challenges, dangers, and honest-to-goodness hard work are downplayed in occultism as though doing magick was really just a matter of saying the right words with the right ingredients on hand and miracles will happen. Doing real magick takes a lot of effort!

On the other hand, I'm of the opinion that the dabblers 99.99% of the time can't really hurt themselves (other than by deluding themselves perhaps) because a misspoken word in an incantation doesn't unlock the gates to nether worlds -- the worst that happens is NOTHING. It's like juggling -- if you don't have it right, you're not going to surprise yourself by accidentally juggling a dozen objects at once when you were really trying to just juggle two. If you don't do things right you just drop things and they end up on the floor which is a big difference.

In a lot of the magickal texts and descriptions from before the 1900s there was a lot more about the dangers. I think a lot of that has to do with the general outlook that bad things were caused by evil invisible beings. Today there are fewer people who attribute illness, poverty, and war to the direct actions of evil invisible beings. That leaves magick more for other purposes such as love, wealth, health, and in negative cases things like revenge or power over others.

[Wolfsong]

I tend to agree that this happens in all religions. I also think that one can see it quite often within paganism. Just recently I remember seeing a post questioning if pagans actually sacrificed humans. Humans tend to try to sanitize things whenever they can. Add to this the fact that more and more humanity is becoming a society instant gratification and a lot of what you said can be seen as the truth. There are so many times that I get asked questions from people where I live where I go home, log onto the computer, do a simple word search and within the first three links find the answer. The people who ask these questions have computers and internet access yet they are unwilling to look even though at times they say they have been "looking for years" for the answer. There are people out there not willing to do the "leg work" but who want all the benefits.

A lot of the ignorance about the past in my opinion is due to the fact that some people get so tied up with studying pagan spiritual beliefs that they disregard or totally ignore scientific and historical books. We are so caught up with learning the spiritual aspect that we ignore the historical facts. We see this in every religion and I think this is largely the case due to the fact that science/history and religion, in the past, have never really mixed and the two sides are for the most part always at odds. This mentality has in some cases carried over to paganism.

From my experience with covens, errrr... 20 years ago anyways :p, this same mentality holds true. Most back then focused on spiritual books and although reading historical books was brought up very little of this was actually part of the study course. The one exception would be the witch trials which, in a way, only drove a wedge between historical fact and today' pagan spirituality. Hopefully teaching these days is more rounded in its approach.

A few years back I was talking to a Native American friend of mine and we talked about thier "old ways" and today's Native American youth. She would tell me about stories passed down by her elders about the hardships endured by thier medicine men during thier learning process. The days of being alone in the wilderness.. the fasting and so on. This carried over to the tribe in a lot of ways as all youth went through some form of initiation. She mentioned that many times the elders would talk about today's youth and how little they know about thier own history and how the vast magority would not survive the old ways.... We came to the conclusion that today's world is vastly different and that all modern people following ancient spritual paths need to adapt to that. But it would be nice if all of us would at least try to learn as much as we can about the lives of the people who followed a similar path to our own hundreds or even thousands of years ago.

Here's something I have always believed. Religions throughout history have let go of the true historical past to glorify thier beliefs. Christianity took the factual life of a truely remarkable human named Jesus and turned it into the glorified myth which so many follow today. The same can be said for every religion even paganism. For a more recent example just look at GG. Although this man, who some believe is the founder of modern Wicca, wrote about all this less than 70 years ago the facts about his life are already blurring into the realm of myth. Witch wars were taking place in the 90s where people questioned who's path was more legitimate. This was less than 50 years after his writings and already people couldn't get it right or had differing beliefs regarding his writings.

Everything must evolve including religions. But evolution must take place without forgetting historical facts both good and bad.

[Tabbykitty]

Anyway, i hope that made some sense, and sorry if it the last part kind of rambles or something, but i can't remember the exact quote, but what are your thoughts/opinions/beliefs on this, do you think Pagans are romantizing the past, or ignoring any of the dangers that come from the supernatural realms (e.g. ghosts, angry ancestors, vampiric beings, demons/demonic beings, pissed off deities, etc)?.

I do think that romantizing of the past and the spirit world is somewhat of a trait in modern new age / alternative religions, and not just the pagan community. I live in the east where there is a proliferation of traditional polytheistic practices. The idea of being pagan or of worshiping whole pantheons isn't some foreign notion, cos I grew up in a district where you could find 4 temples set up by devotees of different religions on the same street.

It has however afforded me some measure of comparison. Most traditional polytheists that I know of view communication with the spirit world as the province of the temple priest, the medium or 'unfortunate' individuals who have been 'cursed' with the third eye. Spirits are always bribed or implored with promises, gifts and offerings. Having a 'personal' relationship with a particular deity isn't something that is common and widespread among many worshipers. Ghosts are regarded as something negative and either exorcised or persuaded with offerings to leave the living alone. If you happen to see ghost, even the ghost of someone who was a colleague or a loved one, it means that you are currently experiencing a patch of bad luck in your life.

Which is why I kinda found the new age view of a loving spirit world full of light and entities who only want the best for humanity, quite erm.... disconcerting. I do believe that when dealing with entities of the spirit world, one should exercise caution and judgement. There is a lot of deception going on and it sometimes results in people who get strange messages from some spirit being.

Oftentimes, when I visit a psychic who is communicating with his or her 'spirit guides' I sometimes wonder who these 'guides' really are. I wonder sometimes if the 'spirit guides' advising a certain person isn't just some entity who is invisibly observing someone's life and just telling the psychic what the person the psychic is 'reading' for what he or she wants to hear.

I have had experiences like that with several psychic readers. Sure the psychic's 'spirit guides' inform the psychic of stuff about me which the psychic can't logically know. But it doesn't quite provide REAL insight to issues I might be confronting in the future. I even had quite a few wrong predictions and erroneous readings about my current state.

That is why I tend to view the spirit world with caution. Or as people in my grandparents' generation would say, "Ghosts are the greatest liars."

This view unfortunately has not sat well with the new age / alternative religion crowd that makes up the majority of my local community. Most people think that I am just some nasty person who is full of fearful thoughtforms... But just a generation ago, the parents of these same people hold the 'negative' view that I am currently expressing in this post.

I think there needs to be an objective evaluation of messages and 'guides' from the spirit realm if one is in constant contact with them. After all, there is one thing I am sure about, entities and spirit beings, like humans, all have their own agenda... question is, are you sure their agenda is truly to guide humanity to a 'better tomorrow'.

[Zephyrstorm]

I think lots of folks, not just religious ones, romanticize the past - longing for the 'good old days' (tm). heh.

I think every point in history is romanticized by someone. It's far more fun to pretend you're a princess being pampered in a palace than it is that you are a peasant mucking out the horsestalls on the farm before milking the cows, chopping wood, and doing a half-million other tasks. One of the great ironies of the way that people look at the Renaissance is that the Renaissance was the time of some of the darkest times of human history - they had the death of thousands of heretics and the Black Plague.

The people of Renaissance Italy were really good at romanticizing both the Ancient Middle East and the Graeco-Roman world.

And people romanticize Nature just as much - they picture walking serene forest trails, encountering birds and beasts who frolic and romp at a safe distance. They never think about having to break trail themselves, or encountering things like poison sumac... until it happens.

*note: people and they are not indicative of a specific group or person, simply a reference to those who do romanticize nature and history.

[David19]

And people romanticize Nature just as much - they picture walking serene forest trails, encountering birds and beasts who frolic and romp at a safe distance. They never think about having to break trail themselves, or encountering things like poison sumac... until it happens.

I agree with you, 'cause like what Hutton in the book said, many Pagans don't seem to see the dark side or negative side of nature or the natural world, like Tsunami's, Hurricanes, tornadoes, volcanoes, killer insects, etc.

[Meadhbh]

They don't but thats because its hard for a lot people to deal with. We'd all like to live in a world where nothing bad ever happened to any one and every thing went the way we'd like it to. One way of dealing with the things we don't like is to pretend they aren't real. Its not just pagans that does that though its a lot of people. Although pagans need to be able to except them to have a well rounded world view.

[mystic_peacock]

Everyone romanticizes the past. It's why Renaissance Faires are so popular. The people that adore the times because of it's costume, theatre, culture, wares, etc, can experience it without the grit. The real Renaissance probably sucked to live in. At least compared to the relative luxory many people of today's wealthy countries live in (and by luxory I don't mean money, I mean... dishwashers, washers/dryers, medicine, cars, etc).

As Zephyrstorm pointed out, the people of the Renaissance romanticized the world of the Middle East and the Greeks/Romans. So I think it's sort of in our nature :)

Romanticizing a culture and romanticizing nature are very different though... only because nature can kill you. So for Pagans dealing with nature, I would say it's more important to know the truth than to think of things as all "lightness." I heard a saying once that "there is nothing in the night that can hurt you." But believe me, there are.

The point of this long ramble is to say basically "yes."

--Serra

[Wolfpoet]

I've been saying this for sometime now. People are recreating idealised forms of paganism and conveniantly making them seem oh so perfect.

My own faith is a classic example, the Norse where a fatalistic and hardy folk who lived in harsh times and in a harsh climate. yet some folks seem to get off on romanticising the Norse, putting their philosophy in modern good/evil terms when this morality had no meaning to the Norse. The Nordic people ahd their own morality which often seems barbaric by our more refined, modern standards.

[Cindlady2]

I have guided several people onto an early path. Most of them were young, and one of the first things I would tell them is "Don't mess with what you don't know or understand!" Some of these 'kids' came to me after they had already unleashed something they shouldn't have, then wanted me to 'clean up the mess'! Oh yes, there is a dark side!

I do feel that most ghost and spirits etc. are benign or even friendly. However there are ones that like to make people shake in their boots and love to make life miserable for us. (Like the one that burned up my camper because I didn't move it 10 ft.! Grrrrr) And then there are the one who just wait for an invitation to enter someone or fallow them around and menace them to the point of insanity! Where are these things in your average Wicca book? (Not saying it's just Wicca so please don't get mad.) Teaching good and light is a very good thing. Talking about how to 'cleanse' or bless something is fine, but sometimes it dose take allot more. Once you learn to become more 'in tune' with 'other worlds' you may find more than you bargain for. My point being, (yes, there is one) that it is a teacher's duty to inform students (even if it is just books) about the good as well as the bad.
*Here's a thought I had while typing the above.... Perhaps many don't teach about 'the dark side' because they have never had a personal encounter with it. I don't know... I have just always dealt with things as they come and passed on the knowledge.

Another reason I believe that the past gets romanticized is because living in the times that we do, it's hard for us to fully understand all the hardships of past times.


Originally Posted by Zephyrstorm
And people romanticize Nature just as much - they picture walking serene forest trails, encountering birds and beasts who frolic and romp at a safe distance. They never think about having to break trail themselves, or encountering things like poison sumac... until it happens.

I totally agree here!

*Hope I made sense, I got interrupted like 5 times and I'm getting very tired! :(

[Cat]

I enjoy romanticizing the past. I like ren faires, SCA, etc. I don't fool myself into ignoring some of the few realities I know about those times.

But I'm a city witch. I don't want to live in the past, mine's a modern religion with modern sensibilities. I have no firm sense of when it began, and while it's an interesing subject, the answer to that question wouldn't change a thing about what I do.

As for the dangers of both nature and the arts magickal-- other posters have covered that well enough that all I can say is that I agree.

[Brightshores]

I agree - there is a danger in romanticizing the past.

But, we should keep in mind that, while from our modern perspective earlier times might have seemed dirty, or grimy, or unsanitary, or tedious, the people who lived then wouldn't have seen it that way. To a person who has never heard of a modern toilet, the use of an outhouse or hole in the ground would seem neither strange nor unsanitary. To a person in an agricultural economy for whom cows are a major economic resource and their main source of income, milking them and mucking out after them would probably seem neither hateful nor disgusting. Not fun, certainly, but not hateful either. Sure, there must have been people back then who were discontented with their lot, just as many people are now. I just think it's important to relate to the past on it's own terms, and not on ours.
Just my two cents. :viking:

[Druchii]

Romanticizing the past is not exclusive to Pagans -- it's pretty standard in any religious group (and even in many political groups) that you might want to examine.


I agree and expand upon this just from the aspect that the past for any and everyone seems to have this wonderfully sepia tinged or parchment intoned blanket of reality that covers a lot of ideals of the past. Whether it's embellished childhood stories that we keep within ourselves as trinkets of "better and simpler times" or the lack of wanting to believe how truly wayward the present can seem when compared to the more seemingly simplistic past.

I don't care if you're pagans around a bonfire, boy scouts on a hike, or old men sitting in front of the local gas station remembering the good old days. People romanticise.

[ModernKnight]

I think we're combining two different issues here. The first is romanticizing the past ... there really is no inbetween, people tend to either romanticize or villify the past. It seems to be based on the biases of the historians one is reading. It's a way to take a very complex situation and distill it into a simple thought.

On the other hand, when I see people believing that all is good in the world, I see them willfully blinding themselves. I have seen times when a spirit begins making trouble for someone, but in their blindness the victim thought it was all coincidence. Many times, people don't want to understand that their actions have consequences. Real life doesn't give people second chances just because they're newbies, but newbies might not have the *awareness* to understand the consequences of what they're doing. The "To Summon the Darkness" thread on the Rituals board is a perfect example of someone playing around with what they shouldn't and getting bitten.

[demonique]

Romanticising the past and believing in the inherent dangers of spirits, evil beings, etc. are two completely different things, to begin with.

Everyone romanticises the past. Our grandmothers live in the "good old days". So, probably, did their grandmothers. When we're that old, our days will be the "good old days" where prices are reasonable and everyone was kind to each other, and those kids didn't play awful music, etc. A lot of people romanticise the past because they didn't live there. They read about the good, ignore the bad, and imagine that, say, medieval life was all castles and kings and banquets, and forget that the everyday person lived with his cattle until he died at age thirty-five as an "old man".

That said, I've noticed that a large faction of pagans have the tendency not only to romanticise the past but change it into something else completely - don't you remember learning about the One Religion in the past where everyone worshipped the Goddess until evil men began to cast her out and subjucate women? Right... right...

As for the dangers of spirits and vampires and whatnot... I don't think this has anything to do with "romanticising the past". In the "good old days" they believed that spirits and demons and vampires were the cause of a great LOT of things that happened naturally, simply because they couldn't be explained by science yet. These days, many people, pagan and otherwise, put a more solid foundation into science and disregard this. We know that illness is caused by viruses and bacteria, not demons, for example.

Is this 'ignoring the spiritual realm and its dangers'? Maybe, maybe not. Depends on if you even believe in that realm, and then it depends on if you believe that the spirits, dieties, etc. even play a part in this one. And if they do, how much? If you don't believe in these, that doesn't mean you're ignoring the dangers of the natural world. You can be very grounded in the realities of life, and nature without believing in demons, spirits, etc. at all.

But hey, whatever rocks your boat. Personally, I've had no experiences with any sort of spirit or demon or ghost or anything like that at all, though I'm not quite willing to say "they definitely don't exist". I don't, in any case, believe that you must believe in evil and malicious spirits in order to be a good pagan, for sure. And I don't think that people who don't are 'ignoring the dangers' of anything, necessarily.

If I was to believe in spirits and ghosts and whatnot, I probably wouldn't take the "they're all nice and fluffy" view, but then, I don't even take that view about humans, either. I'm actually a pretty cynical gal. But hey, I haven't experienced /any/. If some chick out there believes in nice, harmless angels or something, and that demons are thoughtforms you can will away... well, so be it. If their experiences tell them that much, why shouldn't they believe it? Perhaps they've experienced a 'good, loving spirit'... or three, or whatever, but never a bad one. Maybe the idea that all nature is naturally good fits into their religious beliefs.

Now that I'm through defending the white-lighters for believing whatever happy love they'd like, I'd like to say that while I don't believe in a lot of this supernatural mumbo jumbo, I am open enough, I'd hope, to change my mind if experience dictated it. And I, personally, would believe that any spirits and whatnot out there, if they did exist, would be more neutral than either good nor malicious - but that's pretty much what I think about the world in general.

And if I'm wrong, and people are really ignoring a bunch of dangers that exist by playing with fire... heck, survival of the fittest, right? ;-)

[coyoger]

Everyone likes to beleive that the past was better is some way shape of form. I think it's just a common idea. Anything is better than what we have now. But I wouldn't limit it to just Pagans. (Just as others have mentioned.)