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This article is about a synthesis of deism and pantheism. For other uses, see Pandeism (disambiguation).
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Pandeism (or pan-deism) is a doctrine that combines aspects of pantheism and deism. It holds that the creator of the universe actually became the universe, and so ceased to exist as a separate and conscious entity.[1][2][3] Pandeism is proposed to explain as to deism why God would create a universe and then abandon it,[4] and as to pantheism, the origin and purpose of the universe[4][5]

The word pandeism is a hybrid blend of the root words pantheism and deism, combining Template:Lang-grc with Template:Lang-la which means "god". It was perhaps first coined in the present meaning in 1859 by Moritz Lazarus and Heymann Steinthal.[6]

A pantheistic form of deism

Pandeism falls within the traditional hierarchy of philosophies addressing the nature of God. For the history of the root words, pantheism and deism, see the overview of Deism section, and history of Pantheism section. The earliest use of the actual term, pandeism, appears to have come as early as 1787,[7] with another use related in 1838,[8] a first appearance in a dictionary in 1849 (in German, as 'Pandeismus' and 'Pandeistisch'),[9] and an 1859 usage of "pandeism" in contrast to both pantheism and deism by Moritz Lazarus and Heymann Steinthal.[6]

Progression

Pre-Enlightenment and Enlightenment era philosophy

Religious studies professor, F. E. Peters noted of the Milesians that "[w]hat appeared... at the center of the Pythagorean tradition in philosophy, is another view of psyche that seems to owe little or nothing to the pan-vitalism or pan-deism that is the legacy of the Milesians.[10] Gottfried Große in his 1787 interpretation of Pliny the Elder’s Natural History, describes Pliny, a first century figure, as "if not a Spinozist, then perhaps a Pandeist."[7]

Literary critic, Hayden Carruth, said of 18th century figure Alexander Pope that it was "Pope's rationalism and pandeism with which he wrote the greatest mock-epic in English literature"[11] In 1838, Italian phrenologist Luigi Ferrarese in Memorie Riguardanti la Dottrina Frenologica ("Thoughts Regarding the Doctrine of Phrenology") critically described Victor Cousin's philosophy as a doctrine which "locates reason outside the human person, declaring man a fragment of God, introducing a sort of spiritual pandeism, absurd for us, and injurious to the Supreme Being."[8] The 1859 German work, Zeitschrift für Völkerpsychologie und Sprachwissenschaft by philosophers and frequent collaborators Moritz Lazarus and Heymann Steinthal, stated, "Man stelle es also den Denkern frei, ob sie Theisten, Pan-theisten, Atheisten, Deisten (und warum nicht auch Pandeisten?)...[6] ("Man leaves it to the philosophers, whether they are Theists, Pan-theists, Atheists, Deists (and why not also Pandeists?)..."

According to American Philosophy: An Encyclopedia, "later Unitarian Christians (such as William Ellery Channing), transcendentalists (such as Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau), writers (such as Walt Whitman) and some pragmatists (such as William James) took a more pantheist or pandeist approach by rejecting views of God as separate from the world."[12] In the 19th century, poet Alfred Tennyson revealed that his "religious beliefs also defied convention, leaning towards agnosticism and pandeism".[13] Friedrich Engels has also been described by at least one historian as having pandeistic views.[14]

Post-Enlightenment philosophy

In 1896, historian Gustavo Uzielli described the world's population as influenced "by a superhuman idealism in Christianity, by an anti-human nihilism in Buddhism, and by an incipient but growing pandeism in Indian Brahmanism."[15] In The Pilgrimage from Deism to Agnosticism, Moncure Daniel Conway stated that the term, "Pandeism" is "an unscholarly combination."[16] A similar critique of Pandeism as an 'unsightly' combination of Greek and Latin was made in a review of Max Bernhard Weinstein's 1910 survey of religion and philosophy, which discussed Pandeism extensively.[17] The reviewer further criticises Weinstein's broad assertions that Scotus Erigena, Anselm of Canterbury, Nicholas of Cusa, Giordano Bruno, Mendelssohn, and Lessing all were Pandeists or leaned towards Pandeism.[17]

Towards the beginning of World War I, an article in the Yale Sheffield Monthly published by the Yale University Sheffield Scientific School commented on speculation that the war "means the death of Christianity and an era of Pandeism or perhaps even the destruction of all which we call modern civilization and culture."[18] The following year, early 19th century German philosopher Paul Friedrich Köhler wrote that Pantheism, Pandeism, Monism and Dualism all refer to the same God illuminated in different ways, and that whatever the label, the human soul emanates from this God. [19]

In his process theology, Charles Hartshorne preferred pandeism to pantheism, explaining that "it is not really the theos that is described".[20]: 347  However, he specifically rejected pandeism early on, finding that a God who had "absolute perfection in some respects, relative perfection in all others" was "able consistently to embrace all that is positive in either deism or pandeism."[20]: 348  Hartshorne accepted the label of panentheism for his beliefs, declaring that "panentheistic doctrine contains all of deism and pandeism except their arbitrary negations".[20]: 348 [21]

Charles Anselm Bolton states in a 1963 article, Beyond the Ecumenical: Pan-deism?[22] that he "first came upon this extension of ecumenism into pan-deism among some Roman Catholic scholars interested primarily in the 'reunion of the churches,' Roman, Orthodox, Anglican," and wondered, "what is the ultimate aim of the Curia in promoting the pan-deist movement."[22]

A 1995 news article quoted this use of the term by Jim Garvin, a Vietnam veteran who became a Trappist monk in the Holy Cross Abbey of Berryville, Virginia. Garvin described his spiritual position as "'pandeism' or 'pan-en-deism,' something very close to the Native American concept of the all- pervading Great Spirit..."[23] In 1996, Pastor Bob Burridge of the Genevan Institute for Reformed Studies[24] wrote in his Survey Studies in Reformed Theology an essay on "The Decrees of God,"[25] also identifying pandeism—described as a deistic refinement or subset of pantheism—as incompatible with Christianity:

All the actions of created intelligences are not merely the actions of God. He has created a universe of beings which are said to act freely and responsibly as the proximate causes of their own moral actions. When individuals do evil things it is not God the Creator and Preserver acting. If God was the proximate cause of every act it would make all events to be "God in motion". That is nothing less than pantheism, or more exactly, pandeism.[25]

Burridge disagrees that such is the case, decrying that "The Creator is distinct from his creation. The reality of secondary causes is what separates Christian theism from pandeism."[25] Burridge concludes by challenging his reader to determine why "calling God the author of sin demand[s] a pandeistic understanding of the universe effectively removing the reality of sin and moral law."[25] Alan Dawe's 2011 book The God Franchise, though mentioning pandeism in passing as one of numerous extant theological theories,[3] declines to adopt any "-ism" as encompassing his view, though Dawe's theory includes the human experience as being a temporarily segregated sliver of the experience of God.

Notes

  1. ^ Sean F. Johnston (2009). The History of Science: A Beginner's Guide. p. 90. ISBN 1-85168-681-9. In its most abstract form, deism may not attempt to describe the characteristics of such a non-interventionist creator, or even that the universe is identical with God (a variant known as pandeism).
  2. ^ Paul Bradley (2011). This Strange Eventful History: A Philosophy of Meaning. p. 156. ISBN 0875868762. Pandeism combines the concepts of Deism and Pantheism with a god who creates the universe and then becomes it.
  3. ^ a b Alan H. Dawe (2011). The God Franchise: A Theory of Everything. p. 48. ISBN 0473201143. Pandeism: This is the belief that God created the universe, is now one with it, and so, is no longer a separate conscious entity. This is a combination of pantheism (God is identical to the universe) and deism (God created the universe and then withdrew Himself).
  4. ^ a b Allan R. Fuller (2010). Thought: The Only Reality. p. 79. ISBN 1608445909. Pandeism is another belief that states that God is identical to the universe, but God no longer exists in a way where He can be contacted; therefore, this theory can only be proven to exist by reason. Pandeism views the entire universe as being from God and now the universe is the entirety of God, but the universe at some point in time will fold back into one single being which is God Himself that created all. Pandeism raises the question as to why would God create a universe and then abandon it? As this relates to pantheism, it raises the question of how did the universe come about what is its aim and purpose?
  5. ^ Peter C. Rogers (2009). Ultimate Truth, Book 1. p. 121. ISBN 1438979681. As with Panentheism, Pantheism is derived from the Greek: 'pan'= all and 'theos' = God, it literally means "God is All" and "All is God." Pantheist purports that everything is part of an all-inclusive, indwelling, intangible God; or that the Universe, or nature, and God are the same. Further review helps to accentuate the idea that natural law, existence, and the Universe which is the sum total of all that is, was, and shall be, is represented in the theological principle of an abstract 'god' rather than an individual, creative Divine Being or Beings of any kind. This is the key element which distinguishes them from Panentheists and Pandeists. As such, although many religions may claim to hold Pantheistic elements, they are more commonly Panentheistic or Pandeistic in nature.
  6. ^ a b c Moritz Lazarus and Heymann Steinthal (1859). Zeitschrift für Völkerpsychologie und Sprachwissenschaft. p. 262. Man stelle es also den Denkern frei, ob sie Theisten, Pan-theisten, Atheisten, Deisten (und warum nicht auch Pandeisten?)..." Translation: "Man leaves it to the philosophers, whether they are Theists, Pan-theists, Atheists, Deists (and why not also Pandeists?)... {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |trans_title= ignored (|trans-title= suggested) (help)
  7. ^ a b Gottfried Große (1787). Naturgeschichte: mit erläuternden Anmerkungen. p. 165. Beym Plinius, den man, wo nicht Spinozisten, doch einen Pandeisten nennen konnte, ist Natur oder Gott kein von der Welt getrenntes oder abgesondertes Wesen. Seine Natur ist die ganze Schöpfung im Konkreto, und eben so scheint es mit seiner Gottheit beschaffen zu seyn." Translation: "In Pliny, whom one could call, if not a Spinozist, then perhaps a Pandeist, Nature is not a being divided off or separated from the world. His nature is the whole of creation, in concrete, and the same appears to be true also of his divinity.
  8. ^ a b Luigi Ferrarese (1838). Memorie risguardanti la dottrina frenologica. p. 15. Dottrina, che pel suo idealismo poco circospetto, non solo la fede, ma la stessa ragione offende (il sistema di Kant): farebbe mestieri far aperto gli errori pericolosi, così alla Religione, come alla Morale, di quel psicologo franzese, il quale ha sedotte le menti (Cousin), con far osservare come la di lui filosofia intraprendente ed audace sforza le barriere della sacra Teologia, ponendo innanzi ad ogn'altra autorità la propria: profana i misteri, dichiarandoli in parte vacui di senso, ed in parte riducendoli a volgari allusioni, ed a prette metafore; costringe, come faceva osservare un dotto Critico, la rivelazione a cambiare il suo posto con quello del pensiero istintivo e dell' affermazione senza riflessione e colloca la ragione fuori della persona dell'uomo dichiarandolo un frammento di Dio, una spezie di pandeismo spirituale introducendo, assurdo per noi, ed al Supremo Ente ingiurioso, il quale reca onda grave alla libertà del medesimo, ec, ec.
  9. ^ Christian Ferdinand Fleissbach (1849). Heilmittel gegen einen Krebsschaden der Deutschen Literatur: Erläuternde Bemerkungen. p. 31. Pantheismus, Pantheistisch, n. Pandeismus, Pandeistisch. Gebildet aus dem Griech. πᾶν und θεός.) {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |trans_title= (help)
  10. ^ Francis Edwards Peters (1967). Greek Philosophical Terms: A Historical Lexicon. NYU Press. p. 169. ISBN 0814765521.
  11. ^ Hayden Carruth (1993). Suicides and Jazzers. p. 161. ISBN 047209419X.
  12. ^ John Lachs and Robert Talisse (2007). American Philosophy: An Encyclopedia. p. 310. ISBN 0415939267.
  13. ^ Gene Edward Veith, Douglas Wilson, and G. Tyler Fischer (2009). Omnibus IV: The Ancient World. p. 49. ISBN 1932168869. Alfred Tennyson left the faith in which he was raised and near the end of his life said that his 'religious beliefs also defied convention, '. leaning towards agnosticism and pandeism.'{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  14. ^ Tristram Hunt, Marx's General: The Revolutionary Life of Friedrich Engels, Page 43, 2010, ISBN 080509248X.
  15. ^ Gustavo Uzielli (1896). Ricerche Intorno a Leonardo da Vinci. p. xxxv. Certo è che quel concetto forma una delle basi morali fondamentali di religiosi i cui segnaci sono oltre i due terzi della popolazione del globo, mentre è influenzato dall'indole speciale di ciascuna di esse, cioè da un idealismo sovrumano nel Cristianesimo, da un nichilismo antiumano nel buddismo, e da un pandeismo eclettico nell'incipiente ma progrediente Bramoismo indiano; e a queste credenze che ammettono il principio ideale della fratellanza universale..." Translation: "It is certain that this concept forms a fundamental moral bases of religious whose cable markers are more than two-thirds of the world's population, while special influence on the capacities of each of them, by a superhuman idealism in Christianity, by an anti-human nihilism in Buddhism, and by an incipient but growing pandeism in Indian Brahmanism; and those who admit the principle ideal of universal brotherhood... {{cite book}}: External link in |title= (help)
  16. ^ Moncure Daniel Conway, “The Pilgrimage from Deism to Agnosticism,” published in The Free Review, Vol. I. October 1, 1893, pages 11 to 19. Edited by Robertson, John Mackinnon and Singer, G. Astor.
  17. ^ a b Otto Kirn, reviewer, Welt- und Lebensanschauungen, Hervorgegangen aus Religion, Philosophie und Naturerkenntnis ("World and Life Views, Emerging From Religion, Philosophy and Nature") in Emil Schürer, Adolf von Harnack, editors, Theologische Literaturzeitung ("Theological Literature Journal"), Volume 35, column 827 (1910): "Dem Verfasser hat anscheinend die Einteilung: religiöse, rationale und naturwissenschaftlich fundierte Weltanschauungen vorgeschwebt; er hat sie dann aber seinem Material gegenüber schwer durchführbar gefunden und durch die mitgeteilte ersetzt, die das Prinzip der Einteilung nur noch dunkel durchschimmern läßt. Damit hängt wohl auch das vom Verfasser gebildete unschöne griechisch-lateinische Mischwort des ,Pandeismus' zusammen. Nach S. 228 versteht er darunter im Unterschied von dem mehr metaphysisch gearteten Pantheismus einen ,gesteigerten und vereinheitlichten Animismus', also eine populäre Art religiöser Weltdeutung. Prägt man lieh dies ein, so erstaunt man über die weite Ausdehnung, die dem Begriff in der Folge gegeben wird. Nach S. 284 ist Scotus Erigena ein ganzer, nach S. 300 Anselm von Canterbury ein ,halber Pandeist'; aber auch bei Nikolaus Cusanus und Giordano Bruno, ja selbst bei Mendelssohn und Lessing wird eine Art von Pandeismus gefunden (S. 306. 321. 346.)." Translation: "The author apparently intended to divide up religious, rational and scientifically based philosophies, but found his material overwhelming, resulting in an effort that can shine through the principle of classification only darkly. This probably is also the source of the unsightly Greek-Latin compound word, 'Pandeism.' At page 228, he understands the difference from the more metaphysical kind of pantheism, an enhanced unified animism that is a popular religious worldview. In remembering this borrowing, we were struck by the vast expanse given the term. According to page 284, Scotus Erigena is one entirely, at p. 300 Anselm of Canterbury is 'half Pandeist'; but also Nicholas of Cusa and Giordano Bruno, and even in Mendelssohn and Lessing a kind of Pandeism is found (p. 306 321 346.)".
  18. ^ Louis S. Hardin, '17, "The Chimerical Application of Machiavelli's Principles", Yale Sheffield Monthly, pp 461–465, Yale University, May 1915, p. 463: "Are we virtuous merely because we are restrained by the fetters of the law? We hear men prophecy that this war means the death of Christianity and an era of Pandeism or perhaps even the destruction of all which we call modern civilization and culture. We hear men predict that the ultimate result of the war will be a blessing to humanity."
  19. ^ Paul Friedrich Köhler (1916). Kulturwege und Erkenntnisse: Eine kritische Umschau in den Problemen des religiösen und geistigen Lebens. p. 193. Pantheismus und Pandeismus, Monismus und Dualismus: alles dies sind in Wirklichkeit nur verschiedene Formen des Gottschauens, verschiedene Beleuchtungsarten des Grundbegriffes, nämlich des Höchsten, von dem aus die verschiedenen Strahlungen in die Menschenseele sich hineinsenken und hier ein Spiegelbild projizieren, dessen Wahrnehmung die charakteriologische Eigenart des Einzelindividuums, die durch zeitliches, familiäres und soziologisches Milieu bedingte Auffassungsgabe vermittelt.
  20. ^ a b c Charles Hartshorne (1941, republished in 1964). Man's Vision of God and the Logic of Theism. ISBN 0-208-00498-X. {{cite book}}: Check date values in: |year= (help)CS1 maint: year (link)
  21. ^ Donald Luther Jackson, Religious Lies – Religious Truths: It's Time to Tell the Truth!, page 175 (2012), ISBN 1475243987 : "Charles Hartshorne introduced his process theology in the 1940s, in which he examined, and discarded pantheism, deism, and pandeism in favor of panentheism, finding that such a doctrine contains all of deism and pandeism except their arbitrary negative aspects."
  22. ^ a b Charles Anselm Bolton, "Beyond the Ecumenical: Pan-deism?", Christianity Today, 1963, page 21.
  23. ^ Albuquerque Journal, Saturday, November 11, 1995, B-10.
  24. ^ Genevan Institute for Reformed Studies.
  25. ^ a b c d Bob Burridge, "Theology Proper: Lesson 4 – The Decrees of God", Survey Studies in Reformed Theology, Genevan Institute for Reformed Studies (1996).

See also

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