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08.02.2020

The disenchantment of the world

Prior to the Reformation, Counter-Reformation, Witch Trials, and Scientific Revolution, a substantial portion of Europeans still inhabited a profoundly enchanted world. This was due to the syncretic nature of their Christianity, which retained many prominent elements of paganism. Their faith was essentially a fusion of pagan beliefs with Christian doctrine, resulting in a form of religion that might be described as paganized Christianity or Christianized paganism. In this religious worldview, God was primarily seen as the bestower of prosperity in this world, rather than solely as the provider of salvation from it. Nature's elements, including fields, forests, rivers, and mountains, remained inhabited by elves, fairies, and various other enigmatic spirits. Individual desires and tribal loyalties held greater importance than abstract, universal ethics, a perspective that can be contrasted with the medieval feudal system and the proto-communal nature of the earliest Christian communities. Even when people fought and sacrificed their lives in the name of Christianity, such as during the Crusades, it was often for a European version of "folk Christianity" that was intimately connected to worldly concerns and identities. It took the tumultuous religious, cultural, and intellectual upheavals of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries to challenge and transform this worldview.

As Europe embarked on a concerted effort to "de-paganize" itself, aiming to purify its version of Christianity, a shift towards scientific materialism began to occur. The endeavor to strip nature and culture of their spiritual significance and reduce them to purely secular phenomena laid the groundwork for what is often referred to as the "mechanical philosophy." This perspective sought to explain the world exclusively in terms of physical properties, amenable to understanding through scientific and historical methods. This project has since progressed to such an extent that explaining any phenomenon in non-physical terms may now seem fanciful and absurd. For many, and possibly most people, spiritual or religious viewpoints of any kind appear arbitrary and vacuous. In today's context, Christianity itself has become a mere shadow of its former self, surviving primarily in a secularized version of its ethical framework. Paradoxically, Christianity's triumph over paganism seems to have sown the seeds of its own decline, which subsequently unfolded with remarkable swiftness.

The disenchantment of the world

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