Hey folks,

Noah and Nima helped with my query on Islam originating from the question
about religious trends by Julie, thanks Morgan, Robert, Jon and Ethan for
list moderation reminders on this.

BTW been inspired of late to keep tabs on religious trends by a fictional
romp that depicts a group of modern day occult researchers who decide to
focus their 'scientific' investigation of magical phenomena onto the world's
religions:

³Forget everything you ordinarily associate with religious study. Strip away
all the reverence and the awe and the art and the philosophy of it. Treat
the subject coldly. Imagine yourself to be a theologist, but a special kind
of theologist, one who studies gods the way an entomologist studies insects.
Take as your dataset the entirety of world mythology and treat it as a
collection of field observations and statistics pertaining to a hypothetical
species: the god. Proceed from there.²

Anyway in the future I will direct posts in this vein to other lists, thanks
all,

James


On 9/28/12 7:01 PM, "Morgan Leigh" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Greetings Ethan,
> Sorry, my bad. I see now you really didn't say what I thought when
> replying. That's what I get for reading mailing lists at 3am when I
> should be asleep...
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Morgan Leigh
> PhD Candidate
> School of Sociology and Social Work
> University of Tasmania
> 
> On 29/09/2012 5:49 AM, Ethan Doyle White wrote:
>> Hello there!
>> 
>> 
>> Jon Sharp's take on my message was exactly as I intended; there are many
>> areas of religion that do clearly intersect with magic, but equally
>> there are many more than do not, and I do not see what relevence a
>> discussion of these unrelated topics has on an "Academic Study of Magic"
>> message board. So far we have begun to talk about both the dangers of
>> Salafist Islam and the comparison that can be made between the
>> development of Protestantism and contemporary Islam, despite the fact
>> that neither of these topics are directly related (or indeed, one could
>> argue, indirectly related), to the academic study of magic.
>> 
>> 
>> Are we next to talk about issues regarding ethics in Zoroastrianism, or
>> succumb to a criticism of the practices of the Church of Scientology ?
>> How about a discussion of the comparative merits of various Popes, or a
>> debate as to how Shinto is portrayed in the works of Hayao Miyazaki ? I
>> fear that unless we draw the line somewhere, ultimately this list will
>> simply descend into a general "Discussion on Religion" group, and this
>> is not what I, or I suspect many others, signed up for. Although such
>> irrelevent threads are hardly a major menace to my life, it is ever so
>> slightly annoying to find them clogging up my email account on what
>> seems like a daily basis recently. There must be multiple forums for the
>> general academic study of religion out there, but this is not one of them.
>> 
>> 
>> In response to Morgan Leigh's message, in no way did I mean to suggest
>> that there was no connection between magical beliefs and/or praxes and
>> Islam. Indeed, through close personal connections with members of the
>> British Pakistani community I've come across tales of Islamic folk magic
>> which I found to be thoroughly fascinating.
>> 
>> 
>> All the best to all!
>> 
>> 
>> Ethan Doyle White
>> 
>> Greater London
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>>> Date: Fri, 28 Sep 2012 15:15:09 +0000
>>> From: [log in to unmask]
>>> Subject: Re: [ACADEMIC-STUDY-MAGIC] Religious Teachings
>>> To: [log in to unmask]
>>> 
>>> My take on Ethan's comment was that he was arguing that religions are
>> intrinsically linked to magical beliefs and or their praxes, but that
>> not every discussion about religion would necessarily be relevant to
>> those aspects of religion/ religious belief that are related in some way
>> to magical beliefs and or praxes
>>> Bw
>>> Jon
>>> ________________________________________
>>> From: Society for The Academic Study of Magic
>> [[log in to unmask]] on behalf of Morgan Leigh
>> [[log in to unmask]]
>>> Sent: 28 September 2012 16:03
>>> To: [log in to unmask]
>>> Subject: Re: [ACADEMIC-STUDY-MAGIC] Religious Teachings
>>> 
>>> Greetings Ethan,
>>> Please supply an example of any religion that is "not directly linked to
>>> magical beliefs and/or praxes in any way". If you are suggesting that
>>> Islam fits this category then I expect N.W. Azal to post in 3..2..1..
>>> 
>>> Regards,
>>> 
>>> Morgan Leigh
>>> PhD Candidate
>>> School of Sociology and Social Work
>>> University of Tasmania
>>> 
>>> On 23/09/2012 1:54 AM, Ethan Doyle White wrote:
>>>> Dear all
>>>> 
>>>> As much as I do happen to find this thread rather interesting, I do have
>>>> to support the claim that is is "off-topic" and therefore not
>>>> appropriate material for this "Academic Study of Magic" list. It is a
>>>> discussion of the development of a world religion, and not directly
>>>> linked to magical beliefs and/or praxes in any way. Yes, religion and
>>>> magic are intrinsically linked, as I'm sure we would all recognise, but
>>>> surely this does not open up this list to a discussion of any topic
>>>> related to religion in any way.
>>>> 
>>>> My best to all
>>>> 
>>>> Ethan Doyle White
>>>> London
>>>> 
>>>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>> Date: Sat, 22 Sep 2012 10:10:38 +0100
>>>> From: [log in to unmask]
>>>> Subject: Re: [ACADEMIC-STUDY-MAGIC] Religious Teachings
>>>> To: [log in to unmask]
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> Dear Friends
>>>> 
>>>> Magick is part of religion (and studies) or in some cases is a religion
>>>> in its own right.
>>>> Magick has often been involved in political phenomena - eg renaissance
>>>> philosophy/humanism; 3rd Reich etc.
>>>> Magick often has ethical implications - ethics and politics are clearly
>>>> related.
>>>> I also find some of the discussions about theory interesting - ie
>>>> accusations of "Orientalism", reductionism etc etc.
>>>> The rise of radical islam/fundamentalism seems like something we ought
>>>> to be informed about for sure, especially as a great deal of
>>>> magical tradition of the west comes via Islam.
>>>> I suppose I'd say that magick as in paganism may have an answer or
>>>> response to fundamentalism ie Pagan values are pluralistic.
>>>> 
>>>> Perhaps the problem is the size of the topic -
>>>> and the fact somehave already objected -
>>>> but there again i not sure why if things are in clear threads on an
>>>> elist those who are bored with it can't just skip over it?
>>>> 
>>>> bb/93
>>>> 
>>>> Mogg
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> Personally I don't think that this is off topic and it is
>>>> interesting to read James' response. I tend to agree with him too.
>>>> 
>>>> My own understanding of magick is heavily influenced by religion. It
>>>> would seem to me to be hard to separate the two.
>>>> 
>>>> David
>>>> 
>>>>