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 pantheism and panentheism 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 pan- (Greek pas, all), 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 immanencei.e., of the indwelling presence of Godare themselves versions of theism conceived in its broadest meaning. Pantheism stresses the identity between God and the world, panentheism (Greek en, in) that the world is included in God but that God is more than the world.
The adjective pantheist was introduced by the Irish Deist John Toland in the book Socinianism Truly Stated (1705). The noun pantheism was first used in 1709 by one of Tolands opponents. The term panentheism 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.
Pantheism and panentheism can be explored by means of a three-way comparison with traditional or classical theism viewed from eight different standpointsi.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.
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 enthusiasm, 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, panentheismunlike pantheism, which holds to the divine immanencemaintains that the divine can be both transcendent and immanent at the same time.
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 worlds 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 Gods 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 hyl, matter, and z, life) pantheism, is not monistic, as are most other forms of pantheism, but pluralistic.
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 Gods 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 temporaleternal 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.
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.
See the rest here:
- PANTHEISM: Nature, universe, science and religion [Last Updated On: February 12th, 2015] [Originally Added On: February 12th, 2015]
- Pantheism - New World Encyclopedia - Info:Main Page - New ... [Last Updated On: February 12th, 2015] [Originally Added On: February 12th, 2015]
- Is your spiritual home right here on Earth? | World Pantheism [Last Updated On: February 12th, 2015] [Originally Added On: February 12th, 2015]
- The Higher Pantheism - Video [Last Updated On: February 12th, 2015] [Originally Added On: February 12th, 2015]
- Does pantheism relate to free will? - Video [Last Updated On: February 12th, 2015] [Originally Added On: February 12th, 2015]
- Pantheism Master (Original Mix) - Video [Last Updated On: February 15th, 2015] [Originally Added On: February 15th, 2015]
- Pantheism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) [Last Updated On: February 15th, 2015] [Originally Added On: February 15th, 2015]
- Pantheism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia [Last Updated On: February 15th, 2015] [Originally Added On: February 15th, 2015]
- Never losing dignity [Last Updated On: February 19th, 2015] [Originally Added On: February 19th, 2015]
- How to Pronounce Pantheism - Video [Last Updated On: March 5th, 2015] [Originally Added On: March 5th, 2015]
- Pantheism explained - Video [Last Updated On: March 8th, 2015] [Originally Added On: March 8th, 2015]
- Wk 40 Katey on Pantheism and Souls - Video [Last Updated On: March 31st, 2015] [Originally Added On: March 31st, 2015]
- Metaphysics of Pantheism - Famous Pantheist Quotes [Last Updated On: April 8th, 2015] [Originally Added On: April 8th, 2015]
- What is pantheism? - Bible Questions Answered [Last Updated On: April 8th, 2015] [Originally Added On: April 8th, 2015]
- The Presence of God The Holy Spirit and Pantheism [Last Updated On: December 8th, 2016] [Originally Added On: December 8th, 2016]
- Roman Gods And Pantheism - AllAboutHistory.org [Last Updated On: December 8th, 2016] [Originally Added On: December 8th, 2016]
- Pantheism - RationalWiki [Last Updated On: December 18th, 2016] [Originally Added On: December 18th, 2016]
- Pantheism | Neo-Paganism.com [Last Updated On: December 22nd, 2016] [Originally Added On: December 22nd, 2016]
- Monism - Wikipedia [Last Updated On: January 12th, 2017] [Originally Added On: January 12th, 2017]
- Pantheism Beliefs Explained - About.com Religion ... [Last Updated On: January 21st, 2017] [Originally Added On: January 21st, 2017]
- Our fight to the death with nature is not one we can win - The Age - The Age [Last Updated On: February 7th, 2017] [Originally Added On: February 7th, 2017]
- Pantheism - Norse Mythology for Smart People [Last Updated On: February 8th, 2017] [Originally Added On: February 8th, 2017]
- How Alexis de Tocqueville can help us stay sane - The Washington ... - Washington Post [Last Updated On: February 10th, 2017] [Originally Added On: February 10th, 2017]
- Veljo Tormis obituary - The Guardian [Last Updated On: February 12th, 2017] [Originally Added On: February 12th, 2017]
- Educational Reformer Hirsch Promotes Knowledge Against Its ... - National Review [Last Updated On: February 18th, 2017] [Originally Added On: February 18th, 2017]
- 'Evilution:' The Secret Luciferian, Spiritual Origin To One of The Biggest Hoaxes in History Evolution - The Christian Truther [Last Updated On: February 20th, 2017] [Originally Added On: February 20th, 2017]
- Poet Robinson Jeffers to be topic at OLLI meeting - Chico Enterprise-Record [Last Updated On: February 24th, 2017] [Originally Added On: February 24th, 2017]
- Our Lady of Fatima and the Battle With Freemasonry, Part 1 - Church Militant [Last Updated On: February 25th, 2017] [Originally Added On: February 25th, 2017]
- What Is Wrong With Yoga? - Catholic Church [Last Updated On: March 1st, 2017] [Originally Added On: March 1st, 2017]
- 4 books tell stories of Ky. drug world - Glasgow Daily Times [Last Updated On: March 3rd, 2017] [Originally Added On: March 3rd, 2017]
- Hinduism vs Hindutva: The search for an ideology in times of cow ... - Hindustan Times [Last Updated On: April 8th, 2017] [Originally Added On: April 8th, 2017]
- Demystifying the Beliefs of Pantheism - thoughtco.com [Last Updated On: April 8th, 2017] [Originally Added On: April 8th, 2017]
- Adventists appeal court ruling on Kellogg Sabbath accommodation case - Adventist News Network [Last Updated On: April 8th, 2017] [Originally Added On: April 8th, 2017]
- 'Sgt. Pepper's' Turns 50: The Newsweek Review of The Beatles' Masterpiece - Newsweek [Last Updated On: June 7th, 2017] [Originally Added On: June 7th, 2017]
- Seven Things Evil Is Not: What the Death of My Son Taught Me - ChristianityToday.com [Last Updated On: June 8th, 2017] [Originally Added On: June 8th, 2017]
- How Scotland inspired Bram Stoker's Dracula - The Scotsman [Last Updated On: June 14th, 2017] [Originally Added On: June 14th, 2017]
- My Turn: Respecting Mother - Concord Monitor [Last Updated On: June 16th, 2017] [Originally Added On: June 16th, 2017]
- Who were the authors of the so-called Gnostic gospels, and what did they believe? - Aleteia EN [Last Updated On: June 24th, 2017] [Originally Added On: June 24th, 2017]
- This Former MTV Icon Found Inner Peace Through Islam - HuffPost [Last Updated On: June 24th, 2017] [Originally Added On: June 24th, 2017]
- Views | Pantheism.com [Last Updated On: June 26th, 2017] [Originally Added On: June 26th, 2017]
- New Names for Old Gods - Patheos (blog) [Last Updated On: June 29th, 2017] [Originally Added On: June 29th, 2017]
- The Universe Is the Mind of God - The Costa Rican Times [Last Updated On: June 30th, 2017] [Originally Added On: June 30th, 2017]
- On religion: Being aware of our connectivity to God and each other - The Intelligencer [Last Updated On: June 30th, 2017] [Originally Added On: June 30th, 2017]
- A Modern Day Inquisition: Rabbi Joseph Dweck - The Jewish Press - JewishPress.com [Last Updated On: July 3rd, 2017] [Originally Added On: July 3rd, 2017]
- Hinman's ABEAN Argument Part 3: More Objections - Patheos (blog) [Last Updated On: July 7th, 2017] [Originally Added On: July 7th, 2017]
- 20 Options on God (Find Yours Here) - Patheos (blog) [Last Updated On: July 8th, 2017] [Originally Added On: July 8th, 2017]
- Nelsons Leads Tanglewood Resurrection - The Boston Musical ... - The Boston Musical Intelligencer [Last Updated On: July 8th, 2017] [Originally Added On: July 8th, 2017]
- Hindu-Americans Don't Vote Republican - The American Conservative [Last Updated On: July 10th, 2017] [Originally Added On: July 10th, 2017]
- Through the Viewfinder: Pamela Ryder with Peter Markus - Brooklyn Rail [Last Updated On: July 15th, 2017] [Originally Added On: July 15th, 2017]
- A Critical Look At A New Sefer: Alternative Medicine in Halachah - Yeshiva World News [Last Updated On: July 20th, 2017] [Originally Added On: July 20th, 2017]
- Why Dina Nath Batra wants Tagore, Urdu, Mughals removed from school books - DailyO [Last Updated On: July 25th, 2017] [Originally Added On: July 25th, 2017]
- 'Heretics!' Illustrates the Contentiousness Surrounding Philosophy - PopMatters [Last Updated On: August 1st, 2017] [Originally Added On: August 1st, 2017]
- Is Your Christian Worldview Cohesive? - Cape May County Herald [Last Updated On: August 2nd, 2017] [Originally Added On: August 2nd, 2017]
- Senryu pries open 'The Jaws of Life' to explore death on latest release - Maryville Daily Times [Last Updated On: August 3rd, 2017] [Originally Added On: August 3rd, 2017]
- Star Wars' religious imagery is more than just coincidence - Catholic Herald Online (blog) [Last Updated On: August 5th, 2017] [Originally Added On: August 5th, 2017]
- This World as Philosophically Necessary - Patheos (blog) [Last Updated On: August 10th, 2017] [Originally Added On: August 10th, 2017]
- Staying power: a poet's place in God's agenda - National Catholic Reporter [Last Updated On: August 10th, 2017] [Originally Added On: August 10th, 2017]
- Gratitude So Burdensome? - First Things [Last Updated On: August 11th, 2017] [Originally Added On: August 11th, 2017]
- Unitarian Universalism and Pantheism World Pantheism [Last Updated On: August 13th, 2017] [Originally Added On: August 13th, 2017]
- Pantheism - Simple English Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia [Last Updated On: August 22nd, 2017] [Originally Added On: August 22nd, 2017]
- Pantheism - History - AllAboutHistory.org [Last Updated On: August 22nd, 2017] [Originally Added On: August 22nd, 2017]
- Dennis Andrew from Poole says 'I am Druid' - Somerset Live [Last Updated On: August 25th, 2017] [Originally Added On: August 25th, 2017]
- Spinozism - Wikipedia [Last Updated On: August 25th, 2017] [Originally Added On: August 25th, 2017]
- World Pantheist Movement - Official Site [Last Updated On: January 26th, 2018] [Originally Added On: January 26th, 2018]
- World Pantheism - The online community for scientific pantheists [Last Updated On: February 4th, 2018] [Originally Added On: February 4th, 2018]
- Pantheism. I believe that the universe created itself ... [Last Updated On: February 6th, 2018] [Originally Added On: February 6th, 2018]
- Lesson 10: Pantheism and New-Age Mysticism | Free Sunday ... [Last Updated On: July 15th, 2018] [Originally Added On: July 15th, 2018]
- Naturalistic pantheism - Wikipedia [Last Updated On: July 27th, 2018] [Originally Added On: July 27th, 2018]
- Pantheism | Inters.org [Last Updated On: September 2nd, 2018] [Originally Added On: September 2nd, 2018]
- Pantheism | Encyclopedia.com [Last Updated On: September 7th, 2018] [Originally Added On: September 7th, 2018]
- Pantheism - New World Encyclopedia [Last Updated On: October 6th, 2018] [Originally Added On: October 6th, 2018]
- AN INTRODUCTION TO PANTHEISM - Personal/Professional [Last Updated On: October 6th, 2018] [Originally Added On: October 6th, 2018]
- About | Pantheism.com [Last Updated On: November 5th, 2018] [Originally Added On: November 5th, 2018]
- What is pantheism? | CARM.org [Last Updated On: November 5th, 2018] [Originally Added On: November 5th, 2018]
- Pantheism | Philosophy Talk [Last Updated On: December 16th, 2018] [Originally Added On: December 16th, 2018]
- Pantheism - Pantheism and panentheism in ancient and ... [Last Updated On: December 19th, 2018] [Originally Added On: December 19th, 2018]
- Against Pantheism Undivided Looking - Wall [Last Updated On: January 7th, 2019] [Originally Added On: January 7th, 2019]
- Pantheism | Britannica.com [Last Updated On: April 16th, 2019] [Originally Added On: April 16th, 2019]
- Lay Faithful to Gather in Rome to Pray for the Church on Eve of Amazon Synod - National Catholic Register [Last Updated On: October 1st, 2019] [Originally Added On: October 1st, 2019]
- Cdl. Burke: Revolution Is the Goal - Church Militant [Last Updated On: October 1st, 2019] [Originally Added On: October 1st, 2019]