Primitive religions : being an introduction to the study of religions, with an account of the religious beliefs of uncivilised peoples, Confucianism, Taoism (China), and Shintoism (Japan) / by G.T. Bettany.

  • Bettany, G. T. (George Thomas), 1850-1891.
Date:
1891
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Primitive religions : being an introduction to the study of religions, with an account of the religious beliefs of uncivilised peoples, Confucianism, Taoism (China), and Shintoism (Japan) / by G.T. Bettany. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    to conceive God except through human faculties; and even the purest and best representation of the Godhead which he can have, must be tinctured by his own human qualities. Consequently attempts to entirely do away with anthropomorphism have resulted in the idea of God being reduced to an impalpable imagining which is ill- calculated to produce reverence or worship, such as the late Mr. Matthew Arnold’s “ the eternal not-ourselves which makes for righteousness.” Here a middle course seems pointed out. Being human, it is impossible to keep ourselves from anthropomorphism to some extent; but we must remember, while discussing or thinking about the Deity, that our best ideas must be faint shadows of the truth, and cannot reach the full truth. The term idolatry originally designated ali worship such as is forbidden in the Second Commandment, “ Thou slialt not make unto thee a graven image; to no idolatry. v^g^]e s]iape in heaven above, or in the earth beneath, or in the water under the earth, shalt thou bow down or render service.” Such a prohibition could have had no meaning, apart from the fact that such worship and service were frequent and prevalent in the world in which the Israelites moved. That it has existed, and does still exist, may be taken as an axiom in the study of religions. An “idol” included every object of rever- ence or worship among the people with whom the Israelites came in contact; and “idolatry” came to be used among the early Christians to designate all the practices connected with the forms of religion which they found existing around them, and antagonistic to Christian- ity. Thus the term idol, according to many, includes not merely images, or representations made by human work- men, whether in the form of pictures or sculpture, of any person, Divine or otherwise, taken from actual life or derived from the imagination, and made use of in religious services ; but also any natural objects, living or dead, either worshipped or revered, though (it may be) only as signs of something not seen. It may be said with truth, that in most cases it is not the idol or image at all which is worshipped, for it is believed in merely as