Why worship?
- Thread starter Saint
- Start date
Define "worship".
The structural purpose of religion is to provide a vehicle through which a society or culture interacts with "the sacred"--a rather nebulous concept, but "sacred" things can be just about anything given a non-mundane significance. Through that interaction, a society experiences a sense of cohesion and fulfilment. Veneration is just a natural consequence of religious respect for an object, idea, or entity.
That's the anthropological perspective.
From the perspectives of religious people themselves, who may or may not understand the social forces behind the construction of their religion, the purpose is to accrue the favour of a divine being. This is rather consistent all throughout the history of religion, from indigenous animism to polytheistic religion to modern monotheism. The difference among religions is what kind of relationship is to be gained through this favour. For most religions in the world, it's contractual; a person gives offerings and says their prayers, and the divine being is expected to reciprocate with supernatural aid or at least averting their wrath. Piety in these religions is ritualistic rather than faith-based. Specific beliefs matter much less than ritual cultivation of worship towards an object or being.
Some religions are mystical; the person interacts with deity in order to sublimate themselves to the sacred, rather than seeking divine aid for some task or situation. In such religions, piety is more about specific beliefs and devotion to a particular object or entity. Most religions of this form--some of which are mystery cults and mystery religions--take the route of ecstatic practices, in which participants dissociate themselves to experience euphoria. However, some rare but influential religions have gone the route of contemplative practices--seclusion in order to isolate oneself from the profane and interact purely with the sacred over a long period of time.
Take Christianity, for example--because people are going to anyway. While large, is actually a rather atypical religion. It is dominantly a religion of faith, with less emphasis on ritual, and a significant place for mysticism in the form of contemplative monasticism. In Christianity, the purpose of worshipping God is to rejoin the divine in Heaven after death; a posthumous sublimation of the self. Most religions in the world, taken on a case-by-case basis, are not like this.
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The way i see it from the Christian view... proper worship involves prayer which will then lead to positive results.!!!
The prevous religion i was a part of was Pentecostal... an the prayer largely consisted of tryin to get the Holey-Gost to let his presence be felt... prayin to be saved (go to heaven)... an prayin for the sick to be healed.!!!
The total success of those prayers was over 80%... so its no surprize to me why people worship.!!!
Superior than us? How can something that does not have anything to do with the stopping of crimes, mutilations, wars, diseases, murders, genocide become superior to humans? Something superior to humans would be able to prevent all of the problems that humans have but it doesn't seem to be doing that, ever wonder why not? Perhaps it doesn't exist for the supernatural being only hides in the space above us and doesn't do a thing. Only humans do things that help humans or hurt humans not a deity. Isn't it strange when an airliner crashes and all on board are killed but one person and people say it was a miracle that that one survived but how about the 400 people that died, I guess the deity wasn't in a good mood at the time of the crash or it would have saved everyone on board.
sculptor
Valued Senior Member
meditations on worship
There is comfort in those silent moments of worship which free us from the desire to be doing something with us in charge.
The ego becomes transparent, dissolves, and falls away, and then may be restructured within community of fellow worshipers.
There is comfort in community, associating with one's peers if only in this narrow lens.
People worship because it makes them feel good.
Ophiolite
Valued Senior Member
Your presumption is that these are bad things. A superior being might not consider them so.
Perhaps that's because you presume a superior being would take an interest in humanities affairs. When did you last do something that benefits wood lice?
Again, you seem hung up on the idea that superior beings should be interested in our affairs. Why is that?
Because this supernatural being seems to need attention by others. Since there are no supernatural beings that need an audience in order to be "superior" what then does this one need to be paid attention to....ego?
No, I hold that there's no such entity as a supernatural one and if there were it sure wouldn't bother with humans.
Prolly lots of people worship to ease ther fear of bein dead.!!!
Hmmm - and how was "success" established? If the sick person received medical treatment as well as prayers, and then got better, was it claimed as a success for prayer?
And who was to judge the success of "feeling his presence" - as opposed to it just being wind, or indigestion etc (and yes, I'm being facetious, but the question is valid).
Not at all... good questons... an based on the times that i was thar... after bit of worship the Preecher woud anounce that the Holey Gost is here (100% success)... an the Preecher woud ask for any unsaved people to come forward... nobody came forward (100% saved)... an at least half of the sick people i know of who got prayed for... got beter... so based on my observations... an 80% success rate is prolly understated... an yes... if a person went to the Dr. an also received prayer... the prayer got the credit... cause people also prayed for God to give the needed medical knowledge to the Doctors.!!!
We need to learn that there is no such thing as a supernatural being that controls everything. If people want to believe in myths then as long as they realize it is a myth only then it would be OK to do so. If however they think there is a god that is a fact, which cannot be proven , then they are mixing up facts from fiction. Believe in what you want but separate it from the facts that it can't be proven.
Why worship, indeed.