Ancient man experienced the divine through curious incidents whereby objects of nature appeared to transform in front of his eyes, becoming infused with a transpersonal power and significance. Rituals devoted to the gods of nature were centered around evoking these experiences through the use of song, dance, and psychedelic drugs. For the primitive man, the sacred was real, and his participation in it offered meaning to his life. The advent of Christianity in the West represented a shift away from faith and towards belief. Within Christian dogma, the sacred was experienced through heaven rather than through divine manifestations in nature, and the polytheism of many gods combined into one supreme God. Fundamentally, the sacred retained its
…show more content…
Belief, as I use it here, is the insistence that the truth is what one would wish it to be. The believer will open his mind to the truth so long as it fits with his preconceived ideas and wishes. Faith, on the other hand, is an unreserved opening of the mind to the truth, whatever it may turn out to be. Faith has no preconceptions; it is a plunge into the unknown. Belief clings, but faith lets go. In this sense of the word, faith is the essential virtue of science, and likewise of any religion that is not …show more content…
It is now time for the individual to realize himself as the creator of these values, and thus capable of forging his own meaning and embodying his own justification, rather than remaining dependent on external institutions and creeds. In essence, modern man must become ancient once again, and restore his faith in the nature that we are all part of and hence, restore faith in himself. But because a herd instinct remains a dominant force in the psyche of man, one has to overcome the limits of humanity. Nietzsche might refer to this as becoming the overman, or acting as a "rope, fastened between animal and Superman - a rope over an abyss." In other words, living as a higher type of human being today so as to pave the way for even higher types to emerge in the future. And so the individual must choose to either continue with the herd or overcome the crippling laziness of contemporary society, and act in accordance with his unique set of values and beliefs which, like him, are changing
Belief, as I use it here, is the insistence that the truth is what one would wish it to be. The believer will open his mind to the truth so long as it fits with his preconceived ideas and wishes. Faith, on the other hand, is an unreserved opening of the mind to the truth, whatever it may turn out to be. Faith has no preconceptions; it is a plunge into the unknown. Belief clings, but faith lets go. In this sense of the word, faith is the essential virtue of science, and likewise of any religion that is not …show more content…
It is now time for the individual to realize himself as the creator of these values, and thus capable of forging his own meaning and embodying his own justification, rather than remaining dependent on external institutions and creeds. In essence, modern man must become ancient once again, and restore his faith in the nature that we are all part of and hence, restore faith in himself. But because a herd instinct remains a dominant force in the psyche of man, one has to overcome the limits of humanity. Nietzsche might refer to this as becoming the overman, or acting as a "rope, fastened between animal and Superman - a rope over an abyss." In other words, living as a higher type of human being today so as to pave the way for even higher types to emerge in the future. And so the individual must choose to either continue with the herd or overcome the crippling laziness of contemporary society, and act in accordance with his unique set of values and beliefs which, like him, are changing