Often, when I have presented on syncretism and I give this earliest explanation of it from Plutarch in the early 2nd c. So, “syncretism” as “doing as the Cretans do” has an important element in it that needs to be considered, and especially so in the present circumstance. Though modern “scientific” etymologies are based more on morphology and comparative phonology and semantics, and arrive at derivations of terms which are more likely than the folk etymologies, nonetheless they’re often far less colorful and infinitely less rich in terms of the intra-cultural information they convey about a given culture’s self-understanding and prioritization of meaning within its own boundaries. While Edward Butler pointed out in the comments to one of my earlier columns the possibility of Plutarch’s apparent coining of the word synkretismos by creating a story about it involving Cretans banding together and putting aside their differences (and Butler’s ideas on this should be taken very seriously indeed!), nonetheless folk etymologies are important to take into consideration when getting into the minds of the people in a particular culture. However, no matter how important it is to understand these matters as a backdrop to talking about the term “literal” in relation to anything pagan (in the adjectival/descriptive sense) or polytheistic, these matters are a bit too large to deal with in the present context…and yet, also knowing they are issues which are present does foreground one of the questions I hope to address seriously and in a provisionally complete fashion in the present column. As I have said on other occasions in other places, modern mainstream Paganism is one of the only religions I’ve ever encountered that considers actually believing in the supernatural aspects of its religion as “fundamentalism.” Things get deeper than that, however, and the critique of polytheism often arises from other forms of Paganism along the lines of “You actually believe in the literal existence of your deities,” as if a deity is in some sense “more powerful” if it remains a figment of someone’s imagination, an archetype that is only a localized form of some more universal “force” inherent in the human psyche, or some other notion which robs the deities in question of individual and independent identity, volition, and existence. I know very few (if any) polytheists who insist on a literal interpretation of any myth in any one of the cultures from which we draw our inspirations and our practices I also know very few who, whatever about the factual impossibility or non-literal approach they might have to myths, do not approach myth as something containing deep truths not only about cultures and their outlooks, but also (and more importantly) about their theologies and the personalities of our deities. I suspect that this “non-literal” approach to things, and the near-insistence upon it, is why so many mainstream Pagans do not understand polytheism and tend to call us “fundamentalists” and so forth. This same idea is then carried over to non-Christian religions, including various forms of polytheism and Paganism. Enforced biblical literalism in some denominations is what a great many people who eventually leave Christianity cite as one of the things about it which is intolerable. Many modern Pagans, polytheists, and others of an alternative and specifically non-Christiaan outlook are somewhat biased against the entire concept of “literality” when it comes to anything religious. And that’s where we have to “get literal,” as my subtitle above suggests.īefore we get literal, however, I’d like to point something out. I have attended all of them since 2007, and this year will be no exception.īut, you may wonder what this has to do with syncretism as a general topic. It is one of–if not the–largest indoor Pagan festivals in the United States, and it draws several thousand attendees over President’s Day weekend. In a short while, PantheaCon will be happening once again in San Jose, California.
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