Does Religious Evolution and Assimilation Invalidate Religions (ritual, hell, doctrine)

Druidus · #1 06-10-2005, 03:53 PM

Does the evolution of belief systems or the assimilations of certain aspects of one religion into another invalidate the religion in some ways? For instace, if religion "A" has a ritual involving wearing "bunny hats" and religion "B" conquers "A", does "B" become less valid (or true to form) if it incorporates this ritual, or others, in order to encourage conversion? Or if a religion "A", evolves in order to fit the changing social/political clime, has it lost part of it's truth, and therefore, validity?

Jayhawker Soule · #2 06-10-2005, 03:55 PM

You might wish to read up on "Process Theology".

Druidus · #3 06-10-2005, 03:57 PM

Quote:

Process Theology

Perhaps you know of a resource for this?

almifkhar · #4 06-10-2005, 11:44 PM

druidus, me i think that it does invalidate them because religion was not never ment to change in ritual or practice. when ritual and practice is changed it cheepens the religion. makes it less powerful. look at ancient egypt for an example to this. hell even the modern religions are a mess with all the different offshoots and what not.

Master Vigil · #5 06-11-2005, 12:08 AM

Almifkhar, wouldn't that make the older religions more valid then? The way they were thousands of years ago? Why are you muslim then? Islam is quite new.

Victor · #6 06-11-2005, 01:12 AM

Although I am catholic, older doesn't necessarily mean right or more powerful. God can choose to come into the picture at any point in time. What makes a religion right and true is it's doctrines. Whether it's taken over or run by SOME unholy men. God can speak truth thru even the most evil man. The point is to have ONE entity to go get truth. There is more to this, but I'll leave it at that for now.

~Victor

michel · #7 06-11-2005, 01:21 AM

In answer to the thread title, I guess I am lucky; from my perspective, the answer is 'no' - that's purely subjective though, and based upon the fact that what I believe in isn't in any 'pigeon hole'.I would have though though, that religious Evolution is not an existing trend in what I would term 'The major religions'; I see them as being 'entrenched'. What do you all think?

Victor · #8 06-11-2005, 01:31 AM

Quote:

that religious Evolution is not an existing trend in what I would term 'The major religions'; I see them as being 'entrenched'. What do you all think?

Please clarify. Not sure if I understand.

almifkhar · #9 06-11-2005, 02:34 AM

master, i do believe that the "dead religons" if you will, died out for a reason and i think this reason was because the ritual and practice of the religions was changed up so much that they became invalad. and it is unfortunate because i believe that all of the mysteries of us and god are tied up with in these ancient practices and rituals. in modern religion which is borrowed from these old teachings, there only remains bits and peices of the truth so to speak. a good example of this would be the noah ark story which i believe goes much deeper than a deluge or a story on morals and ethics. this story was brought to the bible and quran from ancient sources and changed around a little bit. for example the orginal story from sumeria talks of the boat and the number 50 is told over and over again even in egyptian and greek myths, but in the bible and quran this number is left out. and to address the question as to why i am muslim. i will try to keep it short. there is no preisthood in islam which was a BIG turn on, the holy quran has not been rewritten and reedited to death like say the bible has. (this is not to say that the quran is word for word as muhammad dictated it to be for i do understand the errors of scribe whether intentional or not) the idea that it holds for the equality of the sexes. summission to god i think is important and after all this is islams biggest message. it was also said that the holy quran was given to man as a last ditch effort for man to get it (worship of god) right. that muhammad was the last prophet and the holy quran was to be the last book. this hit home with me. i do understand however (and this leads to what i was saying about religion as a whole being cheepened) that when we modern muslims pray, we are not praying excatally the same way muhammad did and he did not pray the exact same way ibrahim did either. some would probably want to argue this point, but it is true in my eyes, for man after time becomes lazy and does not feel the need to do this or that religiouly so this one way in how things change. god never intended the religions to change in practice or ritual, man decided that they should change.