Do you feel animism influences your neopaganism? If it does what do you consider animism?
I find it hard to explain what animism is so this is going to be longer then it needs to be... but I think my concept of animism defo influences my neopaganism because of my personal feelings, the things that influence my neopaganism like medieval literature and folk culture and because of the history of neopaganism...
On a basic level the idea of everything having a spirit resonates with me: animals, plants, rocks, even man made things and I think is reflected in medieval literature and folk culture. We humanize all those things and in doing that I think we're giving them our qualities - like a spiritual life... Sometimes we even emphasise a supernatural spiritual nature.
Animals and the landscape have voices and personalities in literature but they are often deified too and would have a greater spiritual nature then us... Examples from medieval literature might be Cu Chulainns horse crying when he knows cu chulainn will die and returning to the otherworld or the gods that take animal forms, the river, mountain and land deities... they dont just have a spiritual quality they have a greater capacity then us.
In folklore if you kill a weazel its family will come for you in the night or you might see a weazel funeral and the relatives of the dead will kill you for interupting unless youve got a good dog with you.... they seem to have a similar society to our own and a similar spiritual capacity if not a purer spiritual nature by virtue of them being wild.
Id say that empirically animism as a victorian concept also influences neopaganism because weve got sun and moon gods around )o( but also in its earth based focus... and as a neopagan I think its impossible to escape animisms influence through neopaganisms...
Phew
I find it hard to explain what animism is so this is going to be longer then it needs to be... but I think my concept of animism defo influences my neopaganism because of my personal feelings, the things that influence my neopaganism like medieval literature and folk culture and because of the history of neopaganism...
On a basic level the idea of everything having a spirit resonates with me: animals, plants, rocks, even man made things and I think is reflected in medieval literature and folk culture. We humanize all those things and in doing that I think we're giving them our qualities - like a spiritual life... Sometimes we even emphasise a supernatural spiritual nature.
Animals and the landscape have voices and personalities in literature but they are often deified too and would have a greater spiritual nature then us... Examples from medieval literature might be Cu Chulainns horse crying when he knows cu chulainn will die and returning to the otherworld or the gods that take animal forms, the river, mountain and land deities... they dont just have a spiritual quality they have a greater capacity then us.
In folklore if you kill a weazel its family will come for you in the night or you might see a weazel funeral and the relatives of the dead will kill you for interupting unless youve got a good dog with you.... they seem to have a similar society to our own and a similar spiritual capacity if not a purer spiritual nature by virtue of them being wild.
Id say that empirically animism as a victorian concept also influences neopaganism because weve got sun and moon gods around )o( but also in its earth based focus... and as a neopagan I think its impossible to escape animisms influence through neopaganisms...
Phew
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