Science vs Religion
Before today's hypermobile, mass society modern era, we lived in a more static, small community orientated age of religion. But in Europe and elsewhere we are now living in the age of science, and it is probably these two world-views, science and religion, that are still doing battle today under cover of the 'war on terror'. Marx used different terminology, positing feudalism against capitalism as the battleground of the modern age. But perhaps this comes to the same thing? The dynamism of modern capitalism is as much a product of the empirical, rationalist scientific world-view as the static feudal culture is of the traditional religious one that preceeded it. One might look at religious terrorism through this Marxist lens: just as Luddites raging against the machinery of the industrial revolution in the early 1800s, neo-Luddites such as Al-Qaeda want to smash [scientific] capitalist modernity and somehow return to some romantic ideal of the pre-modern; in other words an oppressive, pre-modern system.
Science, Religion, Art
Alongside the ideals of science and religion, the third essential human ideal is art, an open, creative, world-changing attitude and activity. As Brecht once said, art is not so much a mirror reflecting reality, as potentially a hammer with which to break it. Or perhaps it is both. And with two titans like science and religion still battling for the soul of the world, there is an urgent need for a third titan to build the bridge, honouring the essence of both, while bringing something fresh, the art of love and war: a synthesis that neither of them alone are capable of?
Return of the Missing Link
So perhaps it is time to go full circle with the missing link. The rise of primordial art was linked by Charles Darwin, and more recently by the empiricism of carbon dating, to the beginning of human civilization: the earliest cave paintings appear to be contemporaneous with the loss of human body hair [approx 70,000 years ago] and some scientists are now suggesting the rise of art was linked to our earliest attempts at self-decoration, for the purposes of attracting a mate. Could this be the birth of self-consciousness, the genesis moment of original biblical knowledge ?
Democratic Art as Bridge
Later came the axial age of religion, and now, as a dialectic, the age of science, the pinnacle of our abstraction from nature. It follows that perhaps next comes the synthesis: another age of art, only this time with an integration of the lessons of religion and science in a higher order.
The Three Jewels
Plato called these three the good, the true and the beautiful. In the Buddha's tradition they are known as The Three Jewels: Sangha [the community, or 'we'], Dharma [the law, 'it', or the environment] and Buddha [the individual, or 'I', the soul that is awake]
The Banner of Peace
"Let us be united - you will ask in what way?
You will agree with me: in the easiest way,
to create a common and sincere language.
Perhaps in Beauty and in Knowledge."
These are the words of Nicholas Roerich, designer of the Banner of Peace, representing the synthesis of art, science and religion within the whole circle of culture. Likewise it could be said to represent a society that balances their correlates: beauty, truth and goodness .. the individual, the community and the environment .. I, it and we.
Art as the Gift of Life
With science and religion continuing to slug it out, perhaps the best way to ensure an enlightened civilization will be to build a community which balances all three: art, religion and science. With an emphasis on art, the art of living, of building sustainable and liberating community, at heart the art of finding the work the heart delights in, and giving it over to others, for free!
Before today's hypermobile, mass society modern era, we lived in a more static, small community orientated age of religion. But in Europe and elsewhere we are now living in the age of science, and it is probably these two world-views, science and religion, that are still doing battle today under cover of the 'war on terror'. Marx used different terminology, positing feudalism against capitalism as the battleground of the modern age. But perhaps this comes to the same thing? The dynamism of modern capitalism is as much a product of the empirical, rationalist scientific world-view as the static feudal culture is of the traditional religious one that preceeded it. One might look at religious terrorism through this Marxist lens: just as Luddites raging against the machinery of the industrial revolution in the early 1800s, neo-Luddites such as Al-Qaeda want to smash [scientific] capitalist modernity and somehow return to some romantic ideal of the pre-modern; in other words an oppressive, pre-modern system.
Science, Religion, Art
Alongside the ideals of science and religion, the third essential human ideal is art, an open, creative, world-changing attitude and activity. As Brecht once said, art is not so much a mirror reflecting reality, as potentially a hammer with which to break it. Or perhaps it is both. And with two titans like science and religion still battling for the soul of the world, there is an urgent need for a third titan to build the bridge, honouring the essence of both, while bringing something fresh, the art of love and war: a synthesis that neither of them alone are capable of?
Return of the Missing Link
So perhaps it is time to go full circle with the missing link. The rise of primordial art was linked by Charles Darwin, and more recently by the empiricism of carbon dating, to the beginning of human civilization: the earliest cave paintings appear to be contemporaneous with the loss of human body hair [approx 70,000 years ago] and some scientists are now suggesting the rise of art was linked to our earliest attempts at self-decoration, for the purposes of attracting a mate. Could this be the birth of self-consciousness, the genesis moment of original biblical knowledge ?
Democratic Art as Bridge
Later came the axial age of religion, and now, as a dialectic, the age of science, the pinnacle of our abstraction from nature. It follows that perhaps next comes the synthesis: another age of art, only this time with an integration of the lessons of religion and science in a higher order.
The Three Jewels
Plato called these three the good, the true and the beautiful. In the Buddha's tradition they are known as The Three Jewels: Sangha [the community, or 'we'], Dharma [the law, 'it', or the environment] and Buddha [the individual, or 'I', the soul that is awake]
The Banner of Peace
"Let us be united - you will ask in what way?
You will agree with me: in the easiest way,
to create a common and sincere language.
Perhaps in Beauty and in Knowledge."
These are the words of Nicholas Roerich, designer of the Banner of Peace, representing the synthesis of art, science and religion within the whole circle of culture. Likewise it could be said to represent a society that balances their correlates: beauty, truth and goodness .. the individual, the community and the environment .. I, it and we.
Art as the Gift of Life
With science and religion continuing to slug it out, perhaps the best way to ensure an enlightened civilization will be to build a community which balances all three: art, religion and science. With an emphasis on art, the art of living, of building sustainable and liberating community, at heart the art of finding the work the heart delights in, and giving it over to others, for free!
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