- Key People:
- Benedict de Spinoza
- Pierre Leroux
- Related Topics:
- Acosmism
- Immanence
- panentheism
- nature mysticism
- monism
pantheism
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What is pantheism?
Pantheism is the belief that the universe, seen as a whole, is God, and conversely, that there is no God but the combined substance, forces, and laws that are manifested in the existing universe. Pantheism is typically monistic, finding a sense of the divine in the worldās unity, sometimes related to the mystical intuition of personal union with God.
Pantheistic ideas are found in the ancient books of Hinduism, in the works of many Greek philosophers, and in later works of philosophy and religion over the centuries. Many modern New Age spiritual practices are pantheistic. Most Christian thinkers reject pantheism because it makes God too impersonal, doesn't allow for any difference between the creation and the creator, and doesn't seem to allow for humans to make meaningful moral choices.
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How does pantheism describe God or the divine?
Pantheism is the doctrine that equates the universe with God, asserting that there is no divine entity apart from the combined substance, forces, and laws manifested in the cosmos. Pantheism typically embraces monism, emphasizing the unity of the world and seeing the divine within it, often linked to a mystical sense of personal union with God. It stresses God's all-encompassing inclusiveness and immanence, suggesting the divine is not remote but intimately present within creation. This viewpoint fosters a sense of individual participation in the divine life, without needing mediation by an institution.
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How is pantheism different from other religious beliefs?
Pantheism is the belief that the universe, in its entirety, is God, with no separate divine entity. It contrasts with traditional theism, where God is separate from the world, a concept known as dualism.
Pantheism is typically monistic, emphasizing the unity of the world and the divine, sometimes linked to a mystical sense of union with God. Panentheism, a related concept, holds that God includes the universe but is greater than it. Some forms of pantheism are pluralistic, viewing the divine as one of many elements animating the world.
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Who are some famous thinkers or philosophers who supported pantheism?
Pantheism is the belief that the universe, in its entirety, is God, with no separate divine entity. Pantheistic ideas have roots in ancient Greek philosophy, with thinkers like the early Ionians viewing basic elements as having the motive force of living things.
Later, during the Renaissance, Giordano Bruno combined Copernican astronomy with Neoplatonism, seeing the universe as an infinite, divinely infused organism. In the 17th century, Benedict de Spinoza championed a rational pantheism, identifying God with the world because God is an infinite being. Goethe claimed to be a follower of Spinoza, but he had a different view, as he saw nature as a living unity.
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How do pantheists view nature and the universe?
Pantheism is the belief that the universe, in its entirety, is God, with no separate divine entity. It stresses the all-encompassing nature of God, emphasizing the identity between God and the world. Pantheistic ideas consider God equal to the universe, its physical matter, and governing forces.
Many pantheists view God and the world as absolute. Pantheism can deny individual freedom, but it supports the sacramental value of reverence for life.
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What are some ways pantheism has influenced art, literature, or science?
Pantheism, the belief that God is equal to the universe, its physical matter, and governing forces, has deeply influenced art, literature, and science. The poetic sense of the divine within human beings is expressed in literature, such as in the works of William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and Ralph Waldo Emerson. Pantheism encourages a sense of individual participation in the divine life without mediation, contrasting with classical theism. During the 19th century, pantheism was sustained by various kinds of idealism, with God conceived as intimately related to processes of change and development. Some suggest God is the soul of the world, which is, in turn, his body.
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pantheism, the doctrine that the universe conceived of as a whole is God and, conversely, that there is no God but the combined substance, forces, and laws that are manifested in the existing universe. The cognate doctrine of panentheism asserts that God includes the universe as a part though not the whole of his being.
Both āpantheismā and āpanentheismā are terms of recent origin, coined to describe certain views of the relationship between God and the world that are different from that of traditional theism. As reflected in the prefix āpan-ā (Greek pas, āallā), both of the terms stress the all-embracing inclusiveness of God, as compared with his separateness as emphasized in many versions of theism. On the other hand, pantheism and panentheism, since they stress the theme of immanenceāi.e., of the indwelling presence of Godāare themselves versions of theism conceived in its broadest meaning. Pantheism stresses the identity between God and the world, panentheism (Greek en, āinā) that the world is included in God but that God is more than the world.
The adjective āpantheistā was introduced by the Irish Deist John Toland in the book Socinianism Truly Stated (1705). The noun āpantheismā was first used in 1709 by one of Tolandās opponents. The term āpanentheismā appeared much later, in 1828. Although the terms are recent, they have been applied retrospectively to alternative views of the divine being as found in the entire philosophical traditions of both East and West.
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Nature and significance
Pantheism and panentheism can be explored by means of a three-way comparison with traditional or classical theism viewed from eight different standpointsāi.e., from those of immanence or transcendence; of monism, dualism, or pluralism; of time or eternity; of the world as sentient or insentient; of God as absolute or relative; of the world as real or illusory; of freedom or determinism; and of sacramentalism or secularism.
Immanence or transcendence
The poetic sense of the divine within and around human beings, which is widely expressed in religious life, is frequently treated in literature. It is present in the Platonic Romanticism of William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge, as well as in Alfred, Lord Tennyson, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. Expressions of the divine as intimate rather than as alien, as indwelling and near dwelling rather than remote, characterize pantheism and panentheism as contrasted with classical theism. Such immanence encourages the human sense of individual participation in the divine life without the necessity of mediation by any institution. On the other hand, it may also encourage a formless āenthusiasm,ā without the moderating influence of institutional forms. In addition, some theorists have seen an unseemliness about a point of view that allows the divine to be easily confronted and appropriated. Classical theism has, in consequence, held to the transcendence of God, his existence over and beyond the universe. Recognizing, however, that if the separation between God and the world becomes too extreme, humanity risks the loss of communication with the divine, panentheismāunlike pantheism, which holds to the divine immanenceāmaintains that the divine can be both transcendent and immanent at the same time.
Monism, dualism, or pluralism
Philosophies are monistic if they show a strong sense of the unity of the world, dualistic if they stress its twoness, and pluralistic if they stress its manyness. Pantheism is typically monistic, finding in the worldās unity a sense of the divine, sometimes related to the mystical intuition of personal union with God; classical theism is dualistic in conceiving God as separated from the world and mind from body; and panentheism is typically monistic in holding to the unity of God and the world, dualistic in urging the separateness of Godās essence from the world, and pluralistic in taking seriously the multiplicity of the kinds of beings and events making up the world. One form of pantheism, present in the early stages of Greek philosophy, held that the divine is one of the elements in the world whose function is to animate the other elements that constitute the world. This point of view, called Hylozoistic (Greek hylÄ, āmatter,ā and zÅÄ, ālifeā) pantheism, is not monistic, as are most other forms of pantheism, but pluralistic.
Time or eternity
Most, but not all, forms of pantheism understand the eternal God to be in intimate juxtaposition with the world, thus minimizing time or making it illusory. Classical theism holds that eternity is in God and time is in the world but believes that, since Godās eternity includes all of time, the temporal process now going on in the world has already been completed in God. Panentheism, on the other hand, espouses a temporalāeternal God who stands in juxtaposition with a temporal world; thus, in panentheism, the temporality of the world is not cancelled out, and time retains its reality.
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The world as sentient or insentient
Every philosophy must take a stand somewhere on a spectrum running from a concept of things as unfeeling matter to one of things as psychic or sentient. Materialism holds to the former extreme, and Panpsychism to the latter. Panpsychism offers a vision of reality in which to exist is to be in some measure sentient and to sustain social relations with other entities. Dualism, holding that reality consists of two fundamentally different kinds of entity, stands again between two extremes. A few of the simpler forms of pantheism support materialism. Panentheism and most forms of pantheism, on the other hand, tend toward Panpsychism. But there are differences of degree, and though classical theism tends toward dualism, even there the insentient often has a tinge of panpsychism.