Genealogy of Religion

Exploring the Origins, History and Future of Religion

Entries Tagged as 'Power'

Scientists Sell Souls to Saudis

December 12th, 2011 · 6 Comments · Magic, Power

In today’s news we learn that Saudi Arabia is on the one hand buying Western academic prestige and on the other beheading a woman accused of practicing “sorcery and witchcraft.”
The state-run Saudi news agency announced that a woman named Amina bint Abdulhalim Nassar was publicly beheaded because she claimed to be a healer who could [...]

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Iroquois Religion & Group Level Selection

November 27th, 2011 · 4 Comments · Evolutionary Adaptation, Evolutionary Byproduct, Power

While browsing at my local bookstore yesterday and looking for a diversionary read, I serendipitously discovered The Ordeal of the Longhouse: The Peoples of the Iroquois League in the Era of European Colonization (1992) by Daniel Richter. Although I’m only halfway through, it seems to be the book for those interested in a comprehensive history [...]

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Nazi (Christian) Theism

November 26th, 2011 · 3 Comments · Philosophy, Power

Almost immediately after the German surrender in May 1945, people began trying to explain what had happened. The horrors of the Nazi regime were such that almost every explanation has been offered. The weakest of explanations is bewilderment. But Nazi depravity and German complicity is not inexplicable.
As the process of explication began to unfold, one [...]

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Blooming and Buzzing

November 17th, 2011 · 1 Comment · Power

Wondering whether this election will herald the coming of a presidential prophet, Harold Bloom is in rare form in this masterpiece of compression on Romney the Mormon. He hits all cylinders at the finish:
Mormonism’s best inheritance from Joseph Smith was his passion for education, hardly evident in the anti-intellectual and semi-literate Southern Baptist [...]

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The Non-Separation of Church & State

October 25th, 2011 · No Comments · Philosophy, Power

Review: Masking Hegemony: A Genealogy of Liberalism, Religion and the Private Sphere, by Craig Martin (Equinox Pub. 2010)
“Separation of church and state.”
It is revealing that this phrase, a shibboleth of sorts, means so many things to so many different people. In law, there are endless arguments over the extent to which government may entangle itself [...]

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Etruscan Rite & Roman Religion

September 24th, 2011 · 2 Comments · History, Neolithic, Power, Ritual

“Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.”
With this famous sentence, Jean-Jacques Rousseau begins his masterful critique of political power. Less well known is another sentence from The Social Contract (1762): “No State has ever been founded without Religion serving as its base.”
My reading of history is that Rousseau was right. State-formation [...]

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China as Neolithic Exemplar

September 11th, 2011 · 5 Comments · History, Neolithic, Power

The actor David Carradine may have led a troubled life but he experienced no such trouble as Kwai Chang Caine, a Buddhist monk on the move in the old American west. From 1972-1975, the Kung Fu series was must watch television for kids my age, even if we had no idea that Caine was a [...]

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Chinese Religion: Worship Thy Parents

August 19th, 2011 · 11 Comments · Archaeology, Ecology, Economy, Neolithic, Power

There are many ways in which China remains a cipher for Westerners, most of whom labor under the misapprehension that “modern civilization” originated in ancient Greece and spread slowly outward, eventually reaching “backwards” China and even then only in attenuated fashion. This of course ignores parallel and in some ways more spectacular developments in Neolithic [...]

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Judge and Be Judged

August 15th, 2011 · No Comments · Power

In polite American company, it is considered impolitic to declare that a presidential candidate should be disqualified by his or her religion. Perhaps this is why we have a British newsmagazine asking the tough questions about Michele Bachmann’s beliefs:
[Bachmann] recommends Christian books and films that suggest non-Christians are trouble, that the government may be poisoning [...]

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A Ray of Light on Stonehenge

June 15th, 2011 · 8 Comments · Archaeology, History, Neolithic, Power

If you have ever suffered through an episode of “Ancient Aliens” on the History Channel, you might believe that every megalithic structure in the world was constructed by extraterrestrials:

Apparently inspired by the show, one credulous soul posted this question over at Answers.com: “Can scientists prove that Stonehenge was not built by ancient astronauts?” The pithy [...]

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