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Author Topic: Relooking at Ronald Hutton’s The Pagan Religions of the Ancient British Isles  (Read 12725 times)

ethelwulf

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I have considered myself pagan for most of my adult life but came into some question of my beliefs after reading "The Pagan Religions of the Ancient British Isles" and serious doubt after reading "Triumph of the Moon". He effectively argues that modern paganism may be based off of some of the ideas of pre-Christian religions of Europe but it is in reality a new religion with its origin in Britain. His books were well written and well researched resulting in a convincing argument that the Pre-Christian religions were extinct by the middle-ages.  This had a profound impact on how I saw paganism and made me consider whether I could believe in a religion invented so recently. I then tried to connect with Christianity and went to the local Episcopal Church, nondenominational infused with excessive Christian rock and Methodist to see if I was following the wrong path. I enjoyed the fellow but too much of what I believe was missing so I finally accepted the fact that even if modern paganism is new it was still the closest religion to what I believe.

       Last year that a friend who teaches history and knew my interests sent me several short accounts of history from the 1200s to 1600s and told me to look at what was mentioned in the writings from the viewpoint of what I believed in. One of these I posted for discussion on this forum and once on another forum and both times members of the forum stated clearly that there was no evidence of paganism in the writing I presented. The responses were disappointing to me because it seemed no one wanted to even consider the possibility.  Because the responses were so overwhelmingly against these cases for paganism I accepted the responses and stopped looking for examples.
        Recently I decided to reread Hutton’s Pagan Religions of the Ancient British Isles. I have a great respect for Hutton’s writing and I appreciate how cautious he is in his conclusions about what we really know about the pre-Christian religions. He has had a tremendous influence on modern paganism and I like his books. In his last chapter, Legacy of Shadows, he explains why the pagan religions cease to exist in Europe and how witchcraft was mistakenly viewed as examples of surviving examples of pagan beliefs. It was in this chapter that ran into some problem with what he says and concludes and was interested to see if anyone else in the forum has any concerns about his conclusions.
1.   First what struck me in general about the last chapter was his certainty. He showed appropriate caution about conclusions made concerning pagans in the past in all of the previous chapters but in the final chapter he presented material which sounded absolute without any other possibility.
2.   Second I do not agree with his definitions of Religion and Magic. These definitions play a critical role in his conclusions in this last chapter and they seem too restrictive as if they were chosen out of many different possible definitions just to support his conclusions.
       Religion consists of an offering up of prayers, gifts and honor to divine beings who operate quite independently of the human race and are infinitely more powerful than it. The actions may be aimed at obtaining favor or merely at maintaining the existing order, but whatever the inspiration of the worshipper, the decision as to whether or not any response will be made lies entirely with the deity or deities concerned.
       Magic, by contrast, consists of a control worked by humans over nature by use of spiritual forces, so that the end result is expected to lie within the will of the person or persons working the spell or the ritual.

His clear conclusion from this was:
        All the literary sources for European paganism also make plain that magic of any kind was not connected with the worship of deities. Weather country or rural, learned or traditional, benign or malignant, it was an art or science, not part of a religion.  (Note – I find it interesting that the forward to the source he sites to back up his statement seems to directly contradict his conclusion)
3.   My third problem was that he did not identify key aspects of the pagan religions with a comparison of key aspects of Christianity to help the reader identify the source of the examples he was giving. Without this distinction how can we know what was pagan verses what was Christian in the examples he gave. If neither Christian nor pagan where was the source for of the belief?

Does anyone else have concerns about all of his conclusion?

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Quote from: ethelwulf;137111
1.    First what struck me in general about the last chapter was his certainty. He showed appropriate caution about conclusions made concerning pagans in the past in all of the previous chapters but in the final chapter he presented material which sounded absolute without any other possibility.

He's stating his conclusions and conclusions usually sound absolute unless one qualifies them to an extreme point. A lot of long academic works don't do that because the author knows his main audience (other academics) know that his work isn't the final word on the subject and will not think of his conclusions as fact. Unfortunately, when non-academics read such works, they tend to see it as the expert has said "X" so "X" is the way it is. This is how Murray's works got accepted as "gospel truth" by people outside the field who never saw the disagreement others had with her "witch cult" conclusions.  It's not "bad writing" so much as it is "writing for a different audience" than "you".

Quote
2.    Second I do not agree with his definitions of Religion and Magic. These definitions play a critical role in his conclusions in this last chapter and they seem too restrictive as if they were chosen out of many different possible definitions just to support his conclusions.

Those are fairly standard modern definitions of difference between religion and magic. They are how most (Western JCI) people probably see it. Whether they are accurate when applied to ancient or non-Western religions is indeed debatable, but I suspect Hutton used these definitions because they are fairly standard, not because they were needed to support his conclusions. That is, the definitions came first and his conclusions are in light of those definitions.
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ethelwulf

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Quote from: RandallS;137130


 
Those are fairly standard modern definitions of difference between religion and magic. They are how most (Western JCI) people probably see it. Whether they are accurate when applied to ancient or non-Western religions is indeed debatable, but I suspect Hutton used these definitions because they are fairly standard, not because they were needed to support his conclusions. That is, the definitions came first and his conclusions are in light of those definitions.

 
      I disagree that there is a standard definition for religion these terms that all of the anthropologists, historians, and theologians agree on. Everything that I have read states there is not a general consensus and multiple definitions have been proposed. His definition might be acceptable for monotheistic religions and some of the polytheistic but there are many examples including Celtic paganism where his definition does not work. He must have been aware of this since one of his citations discusses this problem with a different conclusion than his.  
     His statement, that there were no residual pagan beliefs, is so emphatic that it should have been qualified that the conclusion was based on his particular definition and that other definitions might have different answers. He was so careful with drawing absolute conclusions in most of his book that this seems out of place for him.  His definition of magic also is not so standard as he makes it sound again with some of his own sources giving different views. For a statement that could have so much impact I think he should have been more careful in how he presented it.

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Quote from: ethelwulf;137111
 This had a profound impact on how I saw paganism and made me consider whether I could believe in a religion invented so recently.  


Is there a reason why the age of a religion makes it unappealing to you?

ethelwulf

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Quote from: Materialist;137273
Is there a reason why the age of a religion makes it unappealing to you?

 
     There was a reason. I had come to understand that the pagan religions which became public after the repeal of England's witchcraft laws was based a long history representing an intrinsic relationship with nature, magic and the gods. I believed that they had uncovered the religion of my ancestors prior to their conversion to Christianity. Religions that developed in antiquity have a mystique about them that must have truth associated with them to keep the people to believe in them for so long. It would be the same as if a document was found in Israel with was found to be written by Jesus saying that his death was a hoax and what was written about him was not true at all. It would not mean that the values of Christianity were now wrong but it would have an impact on how people saw the religion. One of the big issues with modern paganism is the concern that you are believing in something that someone made up without any connection to what is true.

        After I questioned my beliefs and tried to see if another religion, in this case Christianity, was more appropriate for me. It was not very long before I realized that even without the antiquity I still feel paganism is right for me. The reason for this post is about some of the claims Hutton made which had a real impact on my life and I suspect other pagans. Whether he is correct or not is no longer important but I was surprised at what I found when I read his book more critically.  I was wondering if anyone else had questions about some of his conclusion. This does not mean I do not respect his work because I find much of what he says interesting and well written. I have read five of his books and am looking forward to his next book to be published sometime in the next month. Because of his reputation it is easy to start to believe that everything he writes must be true and I am no longer convinced of everything he writes. He is still a good author.

ethelwulf

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Quote from: RandallS;137130
He's stating his conclusions and conclusions usually sound absolute unless one qualifies them to an extreme point. A lot of long academic works don't do that because the author knows his main audience (other academics) know that his work isn't the final word on the subject and will not think of his conclusions as fact. Unfortunately, when non-academics read such works, they tend to see it as the expert has said "X" so "X" is the way it is. This is how Murray's works got accepted as "gospel truth" by people outside the field who never saw the disagreement others had with her "witch cult" conclusions.  It's not "bad writing" so much as it is "writing for a different audience" than "you".

      I am not so sure this book intended only for academics.  Not all fields of research conclude with such certainty as he has in his last chapter. Research I have done has been in scientific and medical fields and I was taught to beware of absolutes. In biological systems there is enough complexity to where any absolutes must be looked on with concern suspicion. Social systems are even more complex so I would think it difficult to make absolute statements.  In his closing statements he says “the old religions of these islands perished a very long time ago, and absolutely.” So nothing of their religions survived?  No one would argue that much was lost forever but completely lost? This chapter started to make me feel he was of a mission to correct what he thinks were mistakes written by other people in the past an so to silence those who claimed that pagan religions survived up to today. How could anyone no believe that now when he has proven that pagan religions are absolutely gone long ago without any traces left behind?
« Last Edit: January 22, 2014, 01:03:25 am by SunflowerP »

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Quote from: ethelwulf;137321

Whether he is correct or not is no longer important but I was surprised at what I found when I read his book more critically.  I was wondering if anyone else had questions about some of his conclusion. This does not mean I do not respect his work because I find much of what he says interesting and well written. I have read five of his books and am looking forward to his next book to be published sometime in the next month. Because of his reputation it is easy to start to believe that everything he writes must be true and I am no longer convinced of everything he writes. He is still a good author.

 
First law of academic writing: No author is perfect. No single source is perfect. Putting an author on a pedestal of always having the right answers doesn't do them any favours, and doesn't help the reader out either.

Second law of academic writing: there are conventions about how things are written (especially things around how things are cited, how arguments are framed, and how conclusions are written) that are following cultural norms for those specific discussions that may make no sense.

In particular, as already pointed out by Randall, conclusions in academic writing (especially in the humanities) are usually the place where you state the things you've been arguing for much more concretely. It's a habit that's been part of academic writing in the humanities for at least a century, and people familiar with that kind of style learn to read it for what it is.

Sometimes authors will pick up that idea and develop it further in a later work (or presentation, or whatever) but academic publishing (and related serious non-fiction) can be weird in terms of what's published when.

Third law of academic writing: Reading critically is always a good idea. But a lot of what Hutton's been doing in the field is putting stuff out there precisley so other people *will* pick it up and chew on it - not just agree with him. Which is awesome. But means that other people need to understand that disagreeing is part of academic discourse and scholarly understanding, and a reasonable thing to do (though as with most conversations, there are better and worse ways to do that kind of thing.)

I haven't read this particular work of Hutton's (and given other stuff in my life, probably won't until at least the summer at the earliest: my capacity for complex academic work is being eaten by, y'know, work and other complex projects right now with higher priority). But nothing you've said here about how he's going about it is particularly surprising for someone familiar with writing in the humanities, given the standard writing conventions of the field.
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ethelwulf

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Quote from: Jenett;137324




Third law of academic writing: Reading critically is always a good idea. But a lot of what Hutton's been doing in the field is putting stuff out there precisley so other people *will* pick it up and chew on it - not just agree with him. Which is awesome. But means that other people need to understand that disagreeing is part of academic discourse and scholarly understanding, and a reasonable thing to do (though as with most conversations, there are better and worse ways to do that kind of thing.)

.

 
Well then I am using the Third law of academic writing and am disagreeing with Ronald Hutton's conclusions in his book The Pagan Religions of the Ancient British Isles. I guess you can say I picked it up, chewed on it, and tried to swallow it but it came right back up.

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Quote from: ethelwulf;137327
Well then I am using the Third law of academic writing and am disagreeing with Ronald Hutton's conclusions in his book The Pagan Religions of the Ancient British Isles. I guess you can say I picked it up, chewed on it, and tried to swallow it but it came right back up.

 
Awesome. I am looking forward to reading your academic citations, or at least your points of conclusion and reasons therefore, to the contrary!
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Quote from: ethelwulf;137321
One of the big issues with modern paganism is the concern that you are believing in something that someone made up without any connection to what is true.

 
That's actually really offensive to me, personally.

Yes, I'm working on a religion that's new.  I make no claims otherwise.  But the idea that it has no connection to what is true - or that age somehow mystically makes it *more true* than it is now ....

people have been believing in Bigfoot for a good long while too, now, that doesn't make him real.

ethelwulf

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Quote from: HeartShadow;137350
That's actually really offensive to me, personally.

Yes, I'm working on a religion that's new.  I make no claims otherwise.  But the idea that it has no connection to what is true - or that age somehow mystically makes it *more true* than it is now ....

people have been believing in Bigfoot for a good long while too, now, that doesn't make him real.

 
I was not trying to be offensive. I explained that my first reaction was concern that there was not a connection to the past but later I realized the age of a religion did not matter. So I changed my view on the importance of the age of a religion. There are many posts on this forum of people having doubts about what they believe.

ethelwulf

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Quote from: Jack;137329
Awesome. I am looking forward to reading your academic citations, or at least your points of conclusion and reasons therefore, to the contrary!

 
It is very interesting and a very interesting period of history. My first concern was his definition about religion which to me is too restrictive. There are too many religions that do not fit into this category.

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Quote from: ethelwulf;137370
It is very interesting and a very interesting period of history. My first concern was his definition about religion which to me is too restrictive. There are too many religions that do not fit into this category.

 
Yes, but that is a known thing. Sociologists, anthropologists and historians know that their definitions of religion do not fit all religions. There IS no definition of religion that fits all religions, unless you start getting incredibly vague, at which point you're barely defining anything. Yet, sociologists and anthropologists and historians MUST begin by defining their terms. How exactly would you have Hutton resolve this catch-22 situation?
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Quote from: Naomi J;137376
Yes, but that is a known thing. Sociologists, anthropologists and historians know that their definitions of religion do not fit all religions. There IS no definition of religion that fits all religions, unless you start getting incredibly vague, at which point you're barely defining anything. Yet, sociologists and anthropologists and historians MUST begin by defining their terms. How exactly would you have Hutton resolve this catch-22 situation?

 
*nodnod* I had an entire class as part of my Religion undergrad degree that hammered in the fact we really don't have a good definition of this "religion" thing and that words are going to fail us no matter what we do or how inclusive our studies try to be... and in fact, some super inclusive definitions of religion end up capturing things like political movements! The Occupy movement, some forms of environmentalism, and charismatic Communism all have "religious" aspects to their identities from a scholarly standpoints, and yet most wouldn't try to argue that these are, in fact, religions. But we have to be able to talk somehow...
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Quote from: Sage;137379
*nodnod* I had an entire class as part of my Religion undergrad degree that hammered in the fact we really don't have a good definition of this "religion" thing and that words are going to fail us no matter what we do or how inclusive our studies try to be... and in fact, some super inclusive definitions of religion end up capturing things like political movements! The Occupy movement, some forms of environmentalism, and charismatic Communism all have "religious" aspects to their identities from a scholarly standpoints, and yet most wouldn't try to argue that these are, in fact, religions. But we have to be able to talk somehow...


Occupy felt almost religious to me. The first day of it moved me so deeply I devoted every spare minute to it for a year of my life.

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