Back To Home Page

Pantheism

Pantheism is a metaphysical and religious position. Broadly defined it is the view that in some way there is really only one deity which is part of everything and everything is part of that deity. Naturally different people have different 'takes' on what that actually means. For Example

  1. "God is everything and everything is God ... the world is either identical with God or in some way a self-expression of his nature" (Owen 1971: 74).
  2. Everything that exists constitutes a "unity" and this all-inclusive unity is in some sense divine (MacIntyre 1967: 34).
  3. A slightly more specific definition is given by Owen (1971: 65) who says "'Pantheism' ... signifies the belief that every existing entity is, only one Being; and that all other forms of reality are either modes (or appearances) of it or identical with it."
Importantly the deity, as conceived of by pantheists, is that it is NOT a personal, individualised deity existing as an entity in and of its self but rather an immanent deity that is totally part of creation rather than transcendent and existing outside it. This sort of does away with the problems around the creation of the universe by totally ignoring it :)

That is not to say that pantheists don't think about such things simply that any theory that does not require a transcendent and creator deity would be compatible with pantheism.

As there are no individualised deities there is no need for prayer or worship and the lack of a central authority seems to have meant that no standardised rituals have developed over the years.

In my experience pantheists tens towards rituals that express the links between things, between people, groups, nature and the rest of creation. Generally, again in my experience, they feel uneasy with rituals that relate to distinct deities, for example a ritual to one of the Greek Goddesses where the Goddess was considered to have a personal / individualised existence and presence. They would however be happy where the 'aspect' of the goddess for example was used as a representation for one part of the nature of the deity.

Concepts such as magic, miracles and so on don't really have much to do with pantheism but where pantheists do work with such things then the 'power' is thought to come from the one / Unity that they see as deity. The 'links' / relationships between things are also, by some, thought to potentials be the vector by which things such as magic might operate.