In The Story of B, the way you have described animism struck me as being similar to the way I have heard modern forms of pantheism defined. Are there any similarities between them in your mind, other than them both being worldviews, or attitudes that find the sacred in the nature?

I personally see no similarity. Pantheists believe the universe itself is god. I don’t (and I don’t know of any animists who do). When you speak of “the sacred in nature,” you make it clear that I didn’t get through to you in the section called “Dynamiting Nature” in The Story of B (pages 179- 181). As I’ve summarized it, animists see the world (not “nature”) as a sacred place and humans as belonging in a sacred place. The universe doesn’t have to be God for that to be true; God has nothing to do with it.

ID: 465
posted: 23 Apr 2000
updated: 23 Apr 2000