One of the concepts that Taylor wants to put across in his book was that the process of secularisation was abetted by a loss of the sense of "enchantment' in the pre-Modern world. Enchantment, as I understood him to mean it, meant that the world we lived in was seen as being infused with supernatural forces of both good and bad kinds. Trees and rocks could be good, streams bad, forests foreboding and all of which could pass the "their magic" onto the individual According to Taylor this worldview aided religious belief and the loss of it was one of the factors which led to secularisation.
Taylor holds that this belief in "enchantment" resulted in the individual being "porous". Porosity in this instance being an "openness" to experiential states which would lead to transcendence. It also generated a sense of external agency affecting the human condition.
Now one of the things he tries to get across is that the rise of Protestantism set forth a chain of events which resulted in a loss of this worldview. The Protestant mindset resulted in a man that was less open and more "buffered" in the sense that there was less of a sense of external agency and more of inner responsibility for the outcome of a mans affairs. I'm not doing Taylor in this brief description but essentially the shift was that from being at the mercy of the gods to being agents of self-control responsible largely for their own destiny.
I personally don't buy it.
Protestantism may have resulted in more individual responsibility but it doesn't follow that the more responsible a man the less "enchanted" he is.
Rather Christianity itself was rather disenchanting. Good old Roman Catholicism seem quite keen to get rid of the pagan Gods and idols. As Eugene Weber mentioned in his book, Catholic priests, especially of the more stricter Jansenist/Augustinian types took to the destruction of pagan symbols and shrines with quite a bit of gusto. Christianity as a whole wanted to drive out all the other Gods for the one true God. It wasn't just the humanists doing the disenchanting. And the Old Testament is full of contempt about worshiping rocks and wooden idols
What I think that Taylor--obscured in all his verbiage-- is trying to get at is that superstition i.e. enchantment, was one of the foundations of belief. Once again this is humanism 101 and really doesn't help the Christian analysis with regard to the process of secularisation. Faith and superstition are two separate things.
Another good post.
ReplyDeleteMaybe it would be helpful to disaggregate some of the points here.
First, you summarize Taylor on (I) his concept of enchantment, (II) that phenomenon's inverse relationship with the process of secularization, and (III) the way enchantment conduces to a certain kind of religious experience. So far just summary. I don't object to (I)-(III) and it doesn't seem that you do, either.
Next, you talk about (IV) Taylor's thesis attributing the disenchantment of modernity to the rise of Protestantism. In particular, Taylor grounds this in a supposed Protestant paradigm of people "being agent[s] of self-control responsible largely for their own destiny," and then links that paradigm to a "disenchanted" experience of the world. It's here that you say that you "personally don't buy it."
I agree with you, but I want to offer an alternative account. I think (I)-(III) are true, but that (IV) is mistaken, at least in part. Protestantism might have emphasized individual agency, and this might have had some impact on "enchantment," but I think that the question of enchantment is largely orthogonal to agency in the sense used here.
Instead, it may be more accurate to say that Protestantism brought about (or coincided with) three things: (1) a flattening of nested/fractal hierarchies, bringing the individual into less-mediated relationships with God and the State; (2) a less sacramental religious worldview, downplaying the ways in which matter cooperates with the spirit; and (3) a general trend in metaphysics whereby matter is treated as something completely alien to the spirit. (In this third category, I would point to Cartesian dualism, to voluntarism, to nominalism, and so on--a hylomorphic conception of matter is, in a sense, enchanted, whereas a mechanical conception is not.)
I think it highly plausible that these three changes produced a modern frame of mind that was much less porous than its medieval predecessor.
And I think this complicates your analysis which seems to locate enchantment in idolatry and superstition. Even limiting ourselves to in its most orthodox expressions, medieval Catholicism seems to have provided the social, sacramental, and theological scaffolding sufficient to support an enchanted worldview.
--Rex
Yes. Christianity is pretty disenchanting. The enchantment of medieval Christianity was due to the pagan elements that remained. From the XIII on, Christianity purified these pagans remains and the enchantment disappeared
ReplyDelete@ Anon
ReplyDeleteThanks.
I don't object to (I)-(III) and it doesn't seem that you do, either.
I have lots of reservations about (I)-(III). If instead of calling it "enchancement" we relabeled it as "superstition", what Taylor is proposing is that a "superstitious" mindset is conducive to the faith. Clearly, a belief in a existence of a reality outside the immediate reach of our senses is not going to be hostile to the notion of faith, but it's also very likely to encourage corruption of it. As commentator Chent mentions, it really does open door to all sorts of other beliefs such as paganism. The thing about superstition is that it more about conjecture of the other world whereas faith is more a vision of it. (I hope I'm explaining myself clearly here.)
and (3) a general trend in metaphysics whereby matter is treated as something completely alien to the spirit.
Augustine haunts this book. City of God, City of Man: There's your dualism.
I think that the spirit/matter distinction was well established in Catholicism well before the Reformation. (more on that in a different post). Protestantism took this distinction and reformulated it in a different expressive form while simultaneously encouraging other forms of hylomorphism. The Protestant response was more complex than Taylor lays out and I'm beginning to agree with Troeltsch that Protestantism was the last gasp of medievalism. I think that many Catholics, in particular, tend to see the Middle Ages in terms of social structure, whereas I think of as an attempt to truly form a Christian society, where each element tried to live a Christian life as possible. In this light, the Reformation can also be seen as an attempt by Christian medieval society to purge itself of a corrupt clergy, ditching it because it wouldn't change. It really depends on the perspective you take here.
medieval Catholicism seems to have provided the social, sacramental, and theological scaffolding sufficient to support an enchanted worldview.
Yes but that would also appear to be because Catholicism was "slack" when it came to purging itself of local pagan practices especially at the local level. One of the things that Eugene Weber points out is that mid 19th Century France still practiced a lot of paganism covered by a veneer of Catholicism. Catholic priests trying to expunge the paganism found that attacking it also undermined the "religion" of the rank and file. It's a weakn faith when you have to lean on pagan practices to shore your own one up.
@Chent
From the XIII on, Christianity purified these pagans remains and the enchantment disappeared
Yep.
Thanks for the reply.
ReplyDeleteThere is some reason to doubt the straightforward identification of medieval enchantment with paganism. See, e.g., https://www.firstthings.com/article/2020/02/the-myth-of-medieval-paganism
More importantly, and while I do accept that there are important things for Catholicism to learn from the Protestant experience, I don't think a more minimalist and austere approach to religious devotion is one of them. The alleged pagan elements of Catholicism--Marian devotion, the cult of the saints, icons, etc.--are essential.
Why assume that the "Catholic priests trying to expunge . . . paganism" were right? In some places and times, there is a naïve paganism that needs to be eradicated because it threatens to subsume Christian revelation into its own framework--Christ being just one more god in the pantheon, for example. On the other hand, a "paganism" that is subsumed within a Christian framework poses no such threat. If the peasant believes in one God, the trinitarian ground of all being, and in the historical resurrection of Christ, he does no harm by also believing in woodland nymphs or whatever. It has been a great error, however understandable, for churchmen to conflate these two discrete phenomena.
I think Taylor, as a Romantic, is onto something.
--Rex
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ReplyDeletehttps://www.firstthings.com/article/2020/02/the-myth-of-medieval-paganism
ReplyDeleteGreat article, Anon, that I had already read but it doesn't say what you think it says.
It says that the idea of medieval Europeans having a pagan religion and hiding it from the Christian authorities is a myth.
In addition, it also says that the pagan practices were mixed with the Christian faith so Christian people considered them as Christian. Of course we are not talking about Mary and the saints, but about amulets, the evil eye, dead souls wandering the earth, the cult of relics,all kind of superstition, etc.
Which was my point all along
Chent,
ReplyDeleteSure, the historical record is a mixed bag. The issues are (1) whether core elements of the faith--like Mary and the saints--can survive an approach hostile to alleged paganism; and (2) whether all non-essential "pagan" practices are actually *opposed* to the Faith per se.
As for (1), I say no. We've run that experiment, and the "anti-pagan" elements of the Reformation dissolved essential parts of the faith.
As for (2), also no. "Pagan" beliefs can be opposed to Christian ones but are not necessarily so.
--Rex
@ Rex and Chent
ReplyDeleteSorry for the late reply, its been a busy weeken.
From the First Things article.
" Once we accept that most culturally alien practices in popular Christianity were products of imperfectly catechized Christian cultures rather than pockets of pagan resistance, we can begin to ask the interesting questions about why popular Christianity developed in the ways it did. Rejecting the myth of the pagan Middle Ages opens up the vista of medieval popular Christianity in all its inventiveness and eccentricity."
I suppose it's better not to call it Paganism, rather "sloppy" Christianity. The point is that it wasn't a pure faith as much as superstition mixed in with faith. From a purely doctrinaire perspective the superstitious admixture is a corruption of the religion. From a realistic Christian humanist perspective, however, given the variations in human intelligence, there's always going to be some well intentioned superstition mixed in with any widespread human faith. There may be good prudential grounds for letting a few of these superstitions slip if they are harmless.
@ Chent
Of course we are not talking about Mary and the saints, but about amulets, the evil eye, dead souls wandering the earth, the cult of relics,all kind of superstition, etc.
Exactly.
What's important here is not to conflate faith and superstition, something that Taylor doesn't really seem to recognise, Seeing one as a preconditional "frame" for the achievement of the other. I think this is wrong. I suppose what I'm trying to say is that faith is independent of superstition. Lots of superstitious people will believe but so will lots of non-superstitious. Taylor doesn't really seem to account for this second group who are not "porous." I think the whole "superstition as a precondition for religion" approach is just a standard sociological perspective on the subject.
The issues are (1) whether core elements of the faith--like Mary and the saints--can survive an approach hostile to alleged paganism;
I think they can. I imagine every abuse of religion exists under the sun, but at least in my neck of the woods, even the simple-folk can distinguish the difference between veneration and worship. Even the most zealous Marian devotee recognises that God is in charge.
I agree with you that Protestant "minimalism" is a great impediment to the faith of many who have a hard time "abstracting" their religion. Having a relic to pray in front of makes the religion "real". Though I personally find the who statuary, relics, etc. thing really distracting. I like my minimalism but I can see how it could be toxic to many. I think one of the reasons why the Church is "true" is because it accounts for human frailty and allows for worship in ways which the religious puritan (or minimalist) might find offensive.
*Note: there is an interesting angle here to explore between the relationship of abstract "cerebral" art and natural "instinctive" art. One of the reasons many people find modern church's so alienating is that that they cannot relate to "cerebral" type of design.
.....
.....cont.
ReplyDelete(2) whether all non-essential "pagan" practices are actually *opposed* to the Faith per se.
I actually think that they are, though I'm realist enough to understand that some men are incurably stupid. I think one of the fallacies "front loaded" in modern scholasticism is the notion of universal rationality in humans. The scholastics may deny this explicitly but the whole concept of apologetics is the premised on the ability to reason. I prefer the realist position of most of the trads who understood that a majority of men were "invincibly ignorant" and therefore somewhat guiltless. "Some" tolerance is for the best. But it's one thing to tolerate an evil it's another to see it as a precondition of the faith.
The evil eye or amulet in a hillbilly is an excusable vice, in a bishop it's a culpable evil. (Though I would maintain that a hillbilly with pure faith with cast these pagan relics aside.) But it's one thing to tolerate an evil it's another to see it as a precondition of the faith. That's where I think Taylor gets it wrong.
Thanks for all that. I understand your perspective much better now and find it reasonable. Much to think about. --Rex
ReplyDelete