We are Storytelling Apes: let Faith decline


	We are Storytelling Apes: let Faith decline

abailart

7-26-2009 3:58 AM

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karen armstrong

abailart says:

A pithy, powerful critique of Armstrong and the apothatic tradition. Fairly clearly (I think) an equally pithy response could be made centred upon the fact that the criticisms partly support Armstrong's position, and do not contradict it. However, the critique of her overarchingness is totally valid: the examples of Hamas and women are indicative of the near universal tendency of a certain class of writers/thinkers to believe they need to pull a definitive view of everything from their glittering theories.

The Case for God: What Religion Really Means, Karen Armstrong, The Bodley Head, 2009

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<div style="margin: 12px 0px; font-family: arial; color: #333333; background: #ffffff; border: solid 4px #e5e5e5; width: 100%; clear: left;"><div class="CM_CTB_Content_Wrap" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;background-color: #ffffff;"><div style="border-bottom: solid 1px #dcdcdc; white-space: nowrap; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: #eeeeee ;background-image: url(http://clipmarks.com/images/source-bg.gif); background-repeat: repeat-x; height: 24px; line-height: 24px; vertical-align: middle; padding-bottom: 4px; color: #666666; font-size: 10px;" ><a href="http://clipmarks.com/clip-to-blog/" title="see clips that are hot right now"><img src="http://content.clipmarks.com/blog_embed/745c71b5-fb1b-4fc3-a9dd-fdea8c17acbd/5C8B813B-1CC0-4BDD-AE70-23929105C1DD/" alt="" width="19" height="19" border="0" style="vertical-align: middle; margin: 0px 4px; display: inline; border: none; float:none;" /></a>clipped from <a title="http://www.3ammagazine.com/3am/silence-is-easy/" href="http://www.3ammagazine.com/3am/silence-is-easy/" style="font-size: 11px;">www.3ammagazine.com</a></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.3ammagazine.com/3am/silence-is-easy/">Of all the recent pro-faith books to hit the review pages, Karen Armstrong’s is the most original and interesting. The dinner-party truism runs that spirituality is not the same thing as organised religion. Armstrong’s view is the opposite: ‘Religion, therefore, was not primarily something that people thought but something they did.’ </blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.3ammagazine.com/3am/silence-is-easy/">The book is less original in its tired and reflexive thesis that the true nature of God has been obscured by the parallel dogmas of fundamentalism and atheism.</blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.3ammagazine.com/3am/silence-is-easy/">God is ultimately unknowable, beyond the ability of humankind t0 comprehend. He is best appreciated in a chaste and reverent silence.</blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.3ammagazine.com/3am/silence-is-easy/">Armstrong seems to associate all transcendent and mystical activity with religious faith</blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.3ammagazine.com/3am/silence-is-easy/">it’s possible, necessary and more and more desirable to separate the human experience from the religious experience.</blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.3ammagazine.com/3am/silence-is-easy/"> We’re storytelling apes, and our myths can grow to devour us all.</blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.3ammagazine.com/3am/silence-is-easy/">decline of faith leaves the way for gentler narratives about the universe and our place within it.</blockquote></div><div style="margin: 0px 6px 6px 4px;"><table style="font-size: 11px;border-spacing: 0px;padding: 0px;" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tr><td style="background:transparent;border-width:0px;padding:0px;">&nbsp;</td><td align="right" style="background:transparent;border-width:0px;padding:0px;width:107px" width="107"><a href="http://clipmarks.com/share/5C8B813B-1CC0-4BDD-AE70-23929105C1DD/blog/" title="blog or email this clip"><img src="http://content6.clipmarks.com/images/c2b-foot.png" border="0" alt="blog it" width="107" height="17" style="border-width:0px;padding:0px;margin:0px;" /></a></td></tr></table></div></div>

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