Pagan and Christian Creeds: Their Origin and Meaning [Paperback]

Edward Carpenter (Author), Paul Tice (Preface)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 1, 1999

This book provides a systematic and logical approach to the origins of religion. Many common themes are shown to exist between Christianity and earlier Pagan religions that go back in time centuries before Christianity itself. Carpenter makes an effort to get to the very roots of religion in this book. He's trying to uncover where our religious concepts first originated, and reveals an evolutionary sequence which starts with phallic and procreative cults as having the earliest known impact. Following this came a cult of magic, much along the lines of Frazier's The Golden Bough, where spirits and earth divinities were worshipped. Lastly, came the belief in actual God-figures that came down from heaven. A big part of early religion also concerns the consciousness which is generally found today. Lastly, and most importantly. Carpenter mentions a third type of consciousness found in many of the rites and beliefs of ancient religions, but which we seem to have lost today. He considers this form of consciousness "unnamed, " but provides an Appendix on the doctrines of the Upanishads which, he says, at least gives us an idea concerning this third stage of consciousness and the mental attitude required. Only here, in this higher stage that we've been striving for, are the real facts of the inner life found.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Edward Carpenter (1844-1929) was a well-regarded English poet and scholar. He studied at Brighton College and then entered Trinity Hall, Cambridge. Carpenter was close friend to E. M. Forster and Laurence Houseman and was a member of The Fabian Society. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 316 pages
• Publisher: Book Tree (July 1, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1585090247
• ISBN-13: 978-1585090242
• Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 5.5 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,351,112 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

54 of 58 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Fear and Self-Consciousness is the Root of All Religion, April 3, 2002

By 

contentgrrl - See all my reviews

This review is from: Pagan and Christian Creeds: Their Origin and Meaning (Paperback)

Carpenter proposes that self-conciousness and fear led to the entire world pantheon of different faiths.

"Naturally as soon as Man began to think about himself--a frail phantom and waif in the midst of tremendous forces of whose nature and mode of operation he was entirely ignorant--he was BESET with terrors...the natural defence against this state of mind was the creation of an enormous number of taboos...hardened down into very stringent Customs and Laws...avoidance not only of acts which might reasonably be considered dangerous, like touching a corpse, but also things much more remote and fanciful in their relation to danger, like merely...passing a lightning-struck tree; ... and acts which offered any special pleasure or temptation--like sex or marriage or the enjoyment of a meal.

"...Fear does not seem a very worthy motive, but in the beginning it curbed the violence of the purely animal passions, and introduced order and restraint among them. ...(F)rom the early beginnings (in the Stone Age) of self-consciousness in Man there has been a gradual development--from crass superstition, senseless and accidental, to rudimentary observation, and so to belief in Magic; thence to Animism and personification of nature-powers in more or less human form, as earth-divinities or sky-gods or embodiments of the tribe; and to placation of these powers by rites like Sacrifice and the Eucharist, which in their turn became the foundation of Morality...; observations of plants or of the weather or the stars, carried on by tribal medicine-men for purposes of witchcraft or prophecy, supplied some of the material of Science; and humanity emerged by faltering and hesitating steps on the borderland of these finer perceptions and reasonings which are supposed to be characteristic of Civilisation."

Carpenter goes on to compare Christian tenets with pagan practices around the world. You can see how fear of neverending winter, starvation, and death spurred belief in magic, ritual, animism, anthromomorphism, and today's conventional religions.

In his British imperialistic furor to spread civilization, Carpenter also predicts the emergence of a "Common Life" beyond self-consciousness, blasting the selfish motives of capitalism and actually hailing the practices of early Christian communities and the movements of the Communists in eastern Europe.

Granted, Carpenter's book was first published in 1920, just after WWI, before we could see Communism fall, and before Ayn Rand could inspire anyone to Constructivism. But Carpenter's view of religious history is useful. It certainly predates Campell's Hero of a Thousand Faces but has similar depth and scope.

I recommend this book along with:

* Joan O'Grady's "Early Christian Heresies" which examines the philosophies and turning points that molded Christian tenets during its birth and growth so that it could promise salvation to the masses. The scope includes Gnosticism, Marcionites, Montanists, Manichaeism, Donatists, Arianism, Nestorians, Pelagius, and more.
* Erik Davis' "Techgnosis: myth, magic + mysticism in the age of information" which proposes that forms of communication shape social and individual consciousness of reality. "It follows that when a culture's technical structure of communication mutates quickly and significantly, both social and individual 'reality' are in for a bit of a ride. ...The social imagination leaps into the breach, unleashing a torrent of speculation, at once cultural, metaphysical, technical, and financial."

41 of 45 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating reading uncovering some truths, June 4, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Pagan and Christian Creeds: Their Origin and Meaning (Paperback)

I very much enjoyed reading this book, which, for its age, has held up rather well. I had always known that Early Christianity 'borrowed' from pagan religions some holidays and practices, but it was not until I read this book did I know the depth of theft. Almost like a plaigarism of faith intended to convert the masses (which it sadly succeeded in doing). The only part of the book I disliked was the final material, in which the author offers a new religion of sorts which is very metaphysical and a little dull. But the rest of the book is a keeper.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Should be required reading, May 19, 2007

By 

D. Avery - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Pagan and Christian Creeds: Their Origin and Meaning (Dodo Press) (Paperback)

After reading the first few chapters of this book online, I had to get an actual copy of the book, and I'm glad I did. Despite the age of the text, it still holds up great today. It reads well and the ideas come across rather easy. Ideas are presented w/ just enough examples and refrences (unlike Frazer's "Golden Bough" were it seems like there are fifteen examples of everything), however in acouple places I wish there were acouple more, but thanks to great footnotes and bibliogrophy it's not hard to do your own research (however, see the next paragraph about the footnotes).

The only problem I have with this book though is the format that it comes in. Footnotes appear before the next available paragraph and ends up getting in the way of the actual text, Certain words are capatalized rather then in italics, and a few mispellings (which I don't really believe is the fault of the author). There is copy of the book online (it's public domain and no longer subject to copyright laws) and it seems like the publisher just found an online version of the book and copy and pasted it, as there are a few things...that look more like HTML code then actual words. Also the chapter on astronomy should have acouple of graphics that are missing but are still alluded too in the text.

All in all, this is an amazing book on religion and the origins of christianity and is highly recommended to everyone. It has some very eye-opening ideas and well worth the time to read.