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The Sacred and the Profane
Mircea Eliade
其他書名
The Nature of Religion
出版Harcourt, Brace, 1959
主題Philosophy / ReligiousReligion / GeneralReligion / Comparative ReligionReligion / PhilosophyReligion / ReferenceReligion / Christian Theology / ApologeticsSocial Science / Sociology of Religion
ISBN015679201X9780156792011
URLhttp://books.google.com.hk/books?id=o_FOAAAAMAAJ&hl=&source=gbs_api
註釋This is one of my favorite books. Renowned anthropologist and historian of religion Mircea Eliade attempts to describe how religious people experience the sacred. He also gives a fascinating explanation of primitive religions. The popular image of the religion of primitive peoples is pretty unflattering: they worship rocks, animals, and whatnot; their rituals are just attempts to extract favors from imaginary spirits; their myths are laughably bad attempts at scientific explanations, etc. Eliade shows that these are complete misunderstandings. Primitive people don't worship natural objects, but they believe that natural objects can be revelations of the sacred, and that one can worship the gods through them. Primitive men certainly do want help from their gods (who wouldn't?), but they are also driven by what Eliade calls an 'ontological nostalgia', a desire to live in the presence of the gods who are the preeminently real and the source of all being. Nor do their myths seem so silly when one understands the function they serve and the universal symbolism they employ.