Tolerance:

An Inherent and Imperative Value Of Pantheism

by Daan Hoekstra

Pantheism is about thinking in a way broad enough to encompass everything. It is about inclusion, not exclusion. It is about unity, not division.

In volume 17, number 1 of Pantheist Vision Daniel Quinn and Robert M. Gilroy spoke in a disparaging way of various religious traditions. Gilroy calls these traditions "Judeo-Christian," a fashionable term that aims at describing such a broad array of beliefs mainstream and fringe, conventional and mystical, constantly changing over millennia, that it is a very inexact term and thus is practically useless. Quinn, in a like manner, suggests that "the Abrahamic tradition" represents some sort of monolith.

If modern Pantheism is to grow and prosper, it is necessary to approach Judaism, Christianity and Islam with respect, always keeping in mind the historical fact that these religious traditions often embraced Pantheist ideas and at times even routinely gave birth to Pantheists. In the book Mont Saint-Michel and Chartres, Henry Adams calls the definition of God given by Saint Gregory and Archbishop Hildebert "more Spinozist than Spinoza." Adams goes on to describe the history of Catholic Scholasticism, focusing on the controversy between nominalism and realism. Theologians began with either nominalist or realist premises. Nominalism was understood to result in materialism, while realism was understood to result in Pantheism. Both conclusions were equally unpalatable to the Church, but they resulted from the only available premises. The outcome was that realist schools of thought within the monasteries literally bred Pantheists, who generally took things as far as they could without risking execution or excommunication. Sometimes they took things farther. Sometimes they got away with it. Adams recounts the story, for example, of Francis of Assisi. Adams, with good reason, calls Francis an adherent to the "simplest and most childlike form of pantheism." By the time the Church tried to suppress Francis, his following was too great in number. The Church could not risk a schism, so it decided not to act. Thus a Pantheist heresy became officially sanctioned church doctrine in 1218.

Consider the words of Jesus Christ, who said things like, "You are the salt of the earth," "this bread is my body," and "this wine is my blood." These are arguably among the simplest, most literal, most concise and most scientific Pantheist statements ever made.

Sufism, a mystical branch of Islam, contains volumes upon volumes of what could be called the most beautiful Pantheistic poetry in existence. Look at the words of Sayid Nicmatullah Wali, for example: "I called the whole world His dream: I looked again, and lo, His dream was Himself." It describes the shift from panentheism to Pantheism in a single beautiful sentence. Though Pantheism is scientific and rational, Sufi poetry shows us how it can be passionate and mystical. Again, in Islam, we find potential allies, not opponents.

At the very least, Christianity, Judaism and Islam are belief systems that imply a reverence for Nature. All these traditions hold that God created Nature. If Nature is the creation of God, it is surely worthy of respect. It is but a small step to understand that Nature creates itself and thus Nature is God. It should be noted that the destructive idea that God created Nature for the use of man is not at all universally held by "the Abrahamic traditions." Many theologians are trying to correct this error. We should help them.

Theologians are currently working to reconnect to the historical panentheism that played a central role in Jewish, Christian and Islamic theology. The historical basis for mandatory panentheism within even the orthodox branches of these religions is so overwhelming that it could not be denied. Since it is unrealistic to expect mass conversion to Pantheism, we should support and encourage panentheism as a very large step in the right direction. If the messages of organized religion have been distorted over the years, respect and tolerance will correct the errors sooner than condescension.

The history of religious ideas in the west is immensely complex, multifaceted, paradoxical and convoluted. In the Pantheist tradition of thinking organically, one could say that the membrane between Pantheism and "the Abrahamic traditions" was soft, fuzzy and permeable. The gravest danger in the wholesale dismissal of "the Abrahamic traditions" is that it divorces us from a very real canon of Pantheism contained within western literature.

After Christianity became the official religion in Rome, Moslems, Jews and Christians were, for the most part, and for over a thousand years, the only people in the West who wrote things down. Impressive numbers of them had Pantheistic tendencies. The Catholic Church preserved "heresies" in books so that monks could be taught what not to think, but they were often the most popular books in the monastery. The line between acceptable panentheism and Pantheism was very fine and Christian mystics almost invariably crossed it. The Church needed mystics to keep the faith fresh and alive. Mystics are almost always Pantheists. The Western cannon of Pantheism begins in Greece and Rome, survives the Dark Ages in Jewish, Christian and Islamic mysticism, gains a strong foothold in Germany with the theologian Meister Eckhardt, where it evolves into the earliest German Romanticism, reaches full flowering in a broader 19th century Romanticism. It is somehow desperately damaged by 20th century modernism yet survives stubbornly within a literary tradition that is uniquely American: Emerson, Thoreau, Whitman, Muir and Abbey. Medieval tracts on theology, heresy and mysticism provided an essential link and are still some of the best places to find hard-boiled rock-solid Pantheism.

I occasionally flirt with the idea of putting together an anthology of Pantheism composed of passages taken from Western literature. It seems a formidable task, but some person, or group of persons ought to tackle it. It would require a very open mind. One could not dismiss Moses de Leon or Philo of Alexandria because the were Jews. One could not ignore Origen, John Scotus Erigena and Jakob Boehme because they were Christians. It would be foolish to exclude Ibn Arabi and Rumi because the were Moslems. At first glance, the entire Hermetica could be written off as being tainted by a Gnostic or Manicheaen hatred of matter. A closer look reveals that the Hermetica is composed by several unknown authors who constantly contradicted each other. It still contains a large cache of pure Pantheism.

One could truly argue that a number of the authors I mention are not, strictly speaking, Pantheists. I would answer that they sure had fine moments. Since there are very few authors that were strict Pantheists, an anthology of Pantheist literature would have to be composed of these finer moments and better passages. Assembling an anthology of Western Pantheism is an important task because, due to hundreds of years of colonialism, the world economy and the world culture is taking on a decidedly Western flavor. It is important to realize that Western culture always contained an antidote that was very specific to the poison that culture shared with the world.

Pantheism, by definition, is about connections. It is about what unifies humanity, not what divides it. Great opportunities are lost when the focus is upon making enemies instead of allies. A Pantheist's discussion of other religious traditions should focus on the long and venerable histories of Pantheism within those traditions. We don't want to alienate the modern day John Scotus, Ibn Arabi or Philo. We should welcome him or her with open arms.

Response to Dan Hoekstra by Paul Harrison

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For more information about Pantheism, or questions about this website please contact Harold Wood at ups@pantheist.net Pantheism \Pan"the*ism\, n. [Pan- + theism.]: Any doctrine, philosophy, or religious practice that holds universe [cosmos], taken or conceived of as the totality of forces and/or matter, is synonymous with the theological principle of God.

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