What is pantheism? Stay tuned to find out.

Hello everyone. I’m Angela and welcome to my symposium. I’m a PhD and a University Lecturer and this is your online resource for the academic study of Magic and Magic practising religions and traditions.

I’ve recently had a two hours lecture with my Magus Level Patrons on the topics of Pantheism, Panentheism and Panpsychism and I thought it might be useful to offer a concise version in a series of three short videos as these concepts may be of interest for most people engaging with earth-based religions or Magic practising traditions so let’s move on to the topic, shall we?

Pantheism comes from the ancient Greek words pan and theos and literally means ‘all is god.’ Pantheism is therefore the belief that everything is god – not godlike, not created by god but god in and of itself – everything is seen as being ontologically identical to god. Pantheism has often been contrasted by theism which is the belief in a personal god whether it be Monotheism the belief in one god, Polytheism the belief in multiple gods, and so on and so forth. Pantheism being the belief that all is god is not personal in the way it conceptualizes the idea of the deity and in that it can be seen as contrasted by Theism or Theisms. A pantheistic view denies that the divine and the world are ontologically distinct. The unity, which is here god, is no other than the world they are the same substance. This doesn’t mean, however, that the finite entities and the pantheistic god, which is the divine unity, may not be distinct. The totality can in fact articulate itself into a multitude of separate entities but they would still manifest as aspects or amifications of the unity which is what ultimately exists in terms of the contrast between Theism and Pantheism.

Whereas Theism claims that god is personal and transcendent meaning that the deity dwells outside of our phenomenological world. Pantheism sees an impersonal god which is also radically immanent meaning that the deity dwells within and is embedded in our natural world. Yet Pantheists may also believe that there are transcendent aspects to this divine unity. According to Levine Pantheists may maintain the divine unity’s immanence without denying that one divine unity and finite entities are ontologically distinct. Or two, that there are transcendent aspects of this Pantheistic unity, still with some exceptions Pantheism is non-theistic.

So now that we know what Pantheism is and that it states that all is god we can move on to tackling the two main interpretations of this understanding of the world. On one end we have what I would call re-enchanting Pantheism and on the other hand, what can be defined as materialistic Pantheism. The re-enchanted Pantheism is perhaps the most popular among Magic Practitioners where the idea of the divine being the world re-enchants every element of reality. Stones and herbs hold divinity within them and enhance power since deity is here associated with power and creative agency. I see this view linked to what Corrington defines as ‘deep Pantheism’ or ‘ecstatic Naturalism.’ In the latter view, according to Corrington and I quote;

“Nature is ecstatically self-transforming and contains a deep unconscious that is the source for both the human and the sentient collective unconscious as well as the human personal unconscious. Nature is all there is. There is no supernatural realm nor nothing beyond nature.”

R.S. Corrington

Interestingly, saying that nature is ecstatically self-transcending also means that all transcendence is in and of nature and never entails a world beyond nature, nothing supernatural, really, everything is natural being nature all there is. Thus the creation itself of the world is from the world and of the world and it is all part of nature, part of the natural world which is self-creating, self-maintaining and really contains everything there is. This is interpreted by Magic Practitioners and Pagans, for instance, in a re-enchanting way in that the supernatural is actually the natural and since nature is all there is and is self-creating and it is deity itself manifest that means that all parts of it entail, contain, and exert a creative divine power.

A second interpretation of Pantheism is more materialistic and it is the one endorsed by the famous philosopher Baruch Spinoza. For Spinoza, the idea that everything is god means that there is nothing beyond the realm of the physical world and this is all there is. This also means that we are self-determined and everything that happens is necessitated to occur. It is hence not a way of bringing the metaphysical and the divine power in nature but rather a way of collapsing the metaphysical onto the physical world and saying look there is nothing beyond, it’s all here, this is all there is, god is nature literally, nothing more nothing less, nothing beyond, no re-enchantment here but rather a de-enchantment. Human actions are, for Spinoza, like leaves on a tree that fall onto the ground during autumn. They may appear intentional to the tree but are really just necessary occurrences for nature to run its course. Just as growing up and growing old, every human action is here for Spinoza and for a more materialistic form of Pantheism determined by nature because nature is god and god is nothing beyond the physical world.

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What is pantheism? The word comes from ancient Greek and means all is god. In contrast, theism holds that god and the universe are separate. There are two main interpretations; materialistic and re-enchanting. Pagans tend to favour the second also known as ‘deep Pantheism’ or ‘ecstatic Naturalism. It means that all parts of the cosmos entail, contain, and exert a creative divine power that the practitioner can tap into. The first comes from the philosopher Spinoza who thought there is nothing beyond nature, basically collapsing metaphysics into reality – a disenchantment of the world. Perhaps not as exciting but still, a valid worldview.

Summary

REFERENCES

Corrington, R. S. (2015) Deep Pantheism: Toward a New Transcendentalism (ebook), Lexington Books.

Levine, M. P. (1994) Pantheism: A Non-Theistic Concept of Deity, 1st edition., London ; New York, Routledge.

Mason, R. (1999) The God of Spinoza: A Philosophical Study, Cambridge University Press.

Spinoza, B. de (1991) Tractatus Theologico-politicus: (Gebhardt Edition, 1925), BRILL.

First uploaded 18 Jan 2021