What is supernaturalism?

Supernaturalism is the belief in a realm or reality beyond the observable, physical universe and is often linked to various forms of religion. It involves the conviction that there exists a supernatural power and order of existence. In many religions, a distinction is made between the sacred and the profane, leading to a division between the natural and the supernatural. Some religions posit a connection between these realms, while others, like Christianity and Islam, emphasize a separation between the old and new. The secularization of Western civilization has further widened the gap between the natural and supernatural due to scientific understanding.

What are examples of supernatural things or events?

Supernaturalism is the belief in a realm or reality beyond the observable, physical universe, often associated with religion. Examples of supernatural events or entities include miracles, which are attributed to divine powers, such as a deity intervening in natural phenomena. Other examples are angels, demons, spirits, ghosts, goblins, and fairies, which are viewed as intermediate beings between the sacred and profane. These beings can influence humans and nature, and are often associated with various rituals and practices.

How is supernaturalism different from natural explanations?

Supernaturalism is a belief in a realm or reality beyond the observable, physical universe, often linked to religion. In contrast to natural explanations relying on scientific laws, supernaturalism posits explanations that defy scientific understanding. Naturalism explains the world through natural or physical sciences, asserting that everything is part of the natural world. Supernaturalism, conversely, suggests that mentality and teleology are fundamental aspects of reality, attributing consciousness and purpose to beings whose properties aren't derived from non-conscious parts.

Why do some people believe in supernatural forces or beings?

Belief in supernatural forces or beings is common across religions and cultures. In many nonliterate societies, people believe spirits possess supernatural power, or mana, and can be either benevolent or malevolent depending on circumstances. Animistic religions, which emphasize a particularistic worldview, recognize numerous spirits with distinct roles. People may believe in these forces to explain unusual events, seek protection, or understand the world around them. These beliefs often involve rituals, taboos, and the appeasement of spirits to avoid trouble or misfortune.

What role does supernaturalism play in different cultures or religions?

Supernaturalism is a belief in a realm or reality beyond the natural world, commonly linked to various religions. Evidence suggests that ancient people associated sacred power with uncanny experiences, while higher religions distinguish between the sacred and profane, creating a divide between the natural and supernatural. In Eastern religions, supernatural roles are taken by avatars and bodhisattvas, while demons are viewed as forces that inhibit humans from achieving nirvana. Chinese religions feature demons in all aspects of nature, countered with bonfires and torches. Native California religions incorporate supernatural power to control events, with magic used for weather, harvests, and foretelling the future. Across cultures, myths reflect self-image and explore the link between human activity and the stars.

How has supernaturalism influenced literature, movies, and art?

Supernaturalism, the belief in a supernatural power and order of existence, has significantly shaped creative expression across various mediums. In literature and movies, supernatural themes have been used to explore the unexplained through the use of ghosts, spirits, and magic. Classic movie monsters such as vampires, mummies, and werewolves are examples of supernatural figures that have been portrayed in film. Religious folk art often incorporates supernatural elements and symbols, like crucifixes and saints, which are freely combined with secular decorations. Religious iconography uses hybrid motifs that fuse anthropomorphic, theriomorphic, and phytomorphic forms, seen in winged demons or angels in Christian art.

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Top Questions

What is supernaturalism?
Supernaturalism is the belief in a realm or reality beyond the observable, physical universe and is often linked to various forms of religion. It involves the conviction that there exists a supernatural power and order of existence.

In many religions, a distinction is made between the sacred and the profane, leading to a division between the natural and the supernatural. Some religions posit a connection between these realms, while others, like Christianity and Islam, emphasize a separation between the old and new. The secularization of Western civilization has further widened the gap between the natural and supernatural due to scientific understanding.
3 Britannica Sources
Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.
What are examples of supernatural things or events?
Supernaturalism is the belief in a realm or reality beyond the observable, physical universe, often associated with religion. Examples of supernatural events or entities include miracles, which are attributed to divine powers, such as a deity intervening in natural phenomena. Other examples are angels, demons, spirits, ghosts, goblins, and fairies, which are viewed as intermediate beings between the sacred and profane. These beings can influence humans and nature, and are often associated with various rituals and practices.
4 Britannica Sources
Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.
How is supernaturalism different from natural explanations?
Supernaturalism is a belief in a realm or reality beyond the observable, physical universe, often linked to religion. In contrast to natural explanations relying on scientific laws, supernaturalism posits explanations that defy scientific understanding.

Naturalism explains the world through natural or physical sciences, asserting that everything is part of the natural world. Supernaturalism, conversely, suggests that mentality and teleology are fundamental aspects of reality, attributing consciousness and purpose to beings whose properties aren't derived from non-conscious parts.
6 Britannica Sources
Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.
Why do some people believe in supernatural forces or beings?
Belief in supernatural forces or beings is common across religions and cultures. In many nonliterate societies, people believe spirits possess supernatural power, or mana, and can be either benevolent or malevolent depending on circumstances.

Animistic religions, which emphasize a particularistic worldview, recognize numerous spirits with distinct roles. People may believe in these forces to explain unusual events, seek protection, or understand the world around them. These beliefs often involve rituals, taboos, and the appeasement of spirits to avoid trouble or misfortune.
4 Britannica Sources
Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.
What role does supernaturalism play in different cultures or religions?
Supernaturalism is a belief in a realm or reality beyond the natural world, commonly linked to various religions. Evidence suggests that ancient people associated sacred power with uncanny experiences, while higher religions distinguish between the sacred and profane, creating a divide between the natural and supernatural.

In Eastern religions, supernatural roles are taken by avatars and bodhisattvas, while demons are viewed as forces that inhibit humans from achieving nirvana. Chinese religions feature demons in all aspects of nature, countered with bonfires and torches. Native California religions incorporate supernatural power to control events, with magic used for weather, harvests, and foretelling the future. Across cultures, myths reflect self-image and explore the link between human activity and the stars.
6 Britannica Sources
Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.
How has supernaturalism influenced literature, movies, and art?
Supernaturalism, the belief in a supernatural power and order of existence, has significantly shaped creative expression across various mediums.

In literature and movies, supernatural themes have been used to explore the unexplained through the use of ghosts, spirits, and magic. Classic movie monsters such as vampires, mummies, and werewolves are examples of supernatural figures that have been portrayed in film.

Religious folk art often incorporates supernatural elements and symbols, like crucifixes and saints, which are freely combined with secular decorations. Religious iconography uses hybrid motifs that fuse anthropomorphic, theriomorphic, and phytomorphic forms, seen in winged demons or angels in Christian art.
4 Britannica Sources
Created from Britannica articles using AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify using Britannica articles.

supernaturalism, a belief in an otherworldly realm or reality that, in one way or another, is commonly associated with all forms of religion.

Evidence of neither the idea of nature nor the experience of a purely natural realm is found among primitive people, who inhabit a wonderworld charged with the sacred power (or mana), spirits, and deities. Primitive man associates whatever is experienced as uncanny or powerful with the presence of a sacred or numinous power; yet he constantly lives in a profane realm that is made comprehensible by a paradigmatic, mythical sacred realm. In the higher religions a gulf usually is created between the sacred and the profane, or the here and the beyond, and it is only with the appearance of this gulf that a distinction becomes drawn between the natural and the supernatural, a distinction that is not found, for example, in the classical religious traditions of Greece and China. Both the Olympian deities of ancient Greece and the Tao (“Way”) of ancient China were apprehended as lying at the centre of what today is commonly known as the natural; yet they were described in language that was imbued with concepts of the sacred.

Paradoxically, the most radical division between the natural and the supernatural is established by those forms of religion that posit a final or ultimate coincidence between the natural and the supernatural, or the sacred and the profane. This is true both in Indian mystical religion and in Near Eastern and Western eschatological religions, which are concerned with the last time that inaugurates a new sacred age. Buddhism, from its very beginning, established a total distinction between the realm of life and individual (saṃsāra), which it identified interiorly as the arena of pain and suffering, and the goal of the Buddhist way, Nirvāṇa, which is understood in wholly negative terms as a final and total release from saṃsāra. As Buddhism developed in India, however, and did so in part by way of making the distinction between Nirvāṇa and saṃsāra ever more comprehensive and pure, it gradually but decisively reached the point of identifying Nirvāṇa and saṃsāra, and this identification, according to some scholars, became the foundation of Mahāyāna (“Greater Vehicle”) Buddhism.

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