Nature Religion is *Pagan* spirituality

Submitted by Dee (United States), Feb 23, 2008 at 20:48

Wait. Islam as a "Nature religion"?? That's hilarious.

There are indeed Nature religions in the world, but that means pantheistic pagan religions, which are usually also polytheistic. In many pagan religions, Nature is the larger divinity, of which the many Gods and Goddess are part. That's why pagan religions have sun gods and moon goddesses, and deities of the earth and trees and wind and so on. Monotheistic religions are not Nature religions, because they set their "god" outside of Nature, not within it. In a true Nature religion, Nature Itself is the highest divinity. That is pantheism, the idea that all of Nature is divine.

By contrast, most monotheistic religions seem to regard Nature as dirty and impure. That's why they are so against sexuality, for example. If Nature is holy, then sex is holy, and God and Goddess engaged in holy sexual union is the highest and most sacred act of all, the Hieros Gamos or "sacred marriage."

Far from being a "nature religion" Islam, like Christianity, has most often waged war against the true Nature religions of paganism. Would I be free to come to an Islamic nation and practice my polytheistic pagan Nature religion there? Set up temples with naked pagan Goddesses of the earth and moon and sea? And the Great God Pan, in all his hairy, horny, goat-footed glory? Hold rituals with a pagan priest and priestess engaging sex on a pagan altar, with all our pagan Gods smiling down upon us? I really doubt it.

You're free to hold whatever religious beliefs you want to, at least in America. But at the very least try to be honest and consistent about it, and don't go promoting your religion based on things that are just not true. Islam is no Nature religion, if anything it's the very opposite. Pagan religions are the real Nature religions, and Islam is very prejudiced and bigoted in its hatred of pagans and polytheists.

Pan the Goat God is the great Horned God of Nature. Maybe when Muslims start to worship Pan -- along with all the various Goddesses that He pursues with such gleeful divine lust -- then Islam will be a Nature religion. But not before then.

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