Once again, before I continue and look forward, in my solitude I raise my hands to you, in whom I shelter, to whom in my heart I have solemnly consecrated altars, so that at all times I may not stop calling your voice Then the word, deeply engraved, lights up: the unknown God! , I belong to you even if you feel the bonds that, in the midst of the fights, throw me down and that, although I try to evade me, put me at your service. I want to meet you, O stranger who enters the center of my soul, who travels my life like a storm, incomprehensible, chained to my I want to meet you and even serve you. ?F. Nietzsche (1844-1900). [1]
In ancient times, it was not uncommon or abnormal for a man to be called a “son of God. “The world was full of men considered divine, demigods, and heroes born of “marriages” of gods to mortals. Such men claimed to be children of God and therefore in some cases were even worshipped as manifestations of divinity. Even the New Testament shows evidence of this custom among the heathen (Acts 8:9-11; 12:21. 22; 14:11. 12; 28: 6).
- The episode narrated by Luke in Acts 14:8-18 illustrates people’s belief.
- And in this case there is something peculiar: Jupiter and Mercury.
- Who were identified by the people as Barnabas and Paul.
- Respectively (Acts 14.
- 12).
- Were associated with the region through Latin literature.
Ovid (42 BC-18 A. D. ), in their main work, Metamorphosis, recounts that the poor couple, Phileman and Beucis, received Jupiter and Hermes in their humble home, Jupiter and Hermes, who came to their city disguised as mortals in search of accommodation, and that they did not stay in any of the thousand houses of the region, except for the couple. Philemón and Boucus, for this act of hospitality, Ovid tells us, were rewarded by being rewarded by the flood that destroyed the homes of their neighbors. non-hospital neighbors, including, in a simultaneous act, their small house transformed into a temple and, upon request, the task of being priests and guardians of the shrine of Jupiter and, as requested, Philemón and Baucis, died together [2]. ]
This legend, which was already well known in the time of Paul and Barnabas, explains why people so easily identified them with such deities after God’s miracle through them. [3]
Moreover, the idea of deities temporarily taking on a human form was already part of people’s religiosity. Homer, the great Greek poet, in his Odyssey, written around the century. IX BEFORE JESUS CHRIST, he noted, “The gods sometimes take the figure of strangers, who come from distant lands and, in various respects, go from city to city, to know which men are proud and which are the righteous. “
In another passage, in the same book, Homer tells how the goddess Palas Athena, daughter of Zeus (Jupiter), approached, at one point, his protégé, Ulysses:?Sheep, soft as princes’ children, shoulders covered by a double thin layer, with shiny sandals on his feet and a cane in his hand?[5]
Ulysses, in the dialogue that takes place after the identification of the goddess, says: “Goddess, when you approach a mortal, it is very difficult for him to recognize you, however skilful, because you take all aspects. “”[6]
The point is that in ancient times history was full of divine interventions and, in a way, the people were ruled by divinity, for, especially in the East, the king was considered the son of a god.
In Egypt, the reigning monarch was considered divine, being conceived as a physical generation of the supreme god, called D; the king was a kind of epiphany (manifestation) of the god himself. In Arabia, the king was worshipped as if he were a god. For the Sumerians, Babylonians and Arabs, the king was considered the adopted son of one or more gods.
The Greek colonizers in their conquests led by Philip of Macedonia (c. 382-336 BC) and later by his son, Alexander the Great (356-324 a. C. ), assimilated these ideas by mixing them with their traditional mythology, [7] which in itself was already quite complex. In this religious syncretism we find the Roman emperor, called Divi Filius; the Greeks believed that many men physically descended from the gods; It was divine ancestry that determined the existence of kings, philosophers, priests, and the righteous.
Such beliefs proliferated, assuming peculiarities in each city and even in each family, further increasing the number of deities, as well as an intense process of “canonization”. men.
The historian Fustel de Coulanges (1830–1889) wrote about this process:
Every man, having rendered a great service to the city, from the one he had founded to another who had won him a victory or perfected his laws, became a god for that city. a benefactor; it was enough to have greatly impressed the imagination of his contemporaries and become the target of the popular tradition, so that anyone would become a hero, that is, a powerful death whose protection was desired and whose feared anger (?). whoever they were, they were the guardians of the country, as long as they were worshipped. [8]
Therefore, as we progress through history, we will always find peoples, tribes, and families in the East who claim to come from a divine ancestor. [9]
There were also men who were considered to have divine abilities to perform miracles, being called divine men. Spiritual? That they understood that a person could become divine through the development of God’s knowledge. In short, the idea of the son of God reflected an existing confusion in the concept of divinity and humanity, which generally led to a decrease in god’s idea. and also, on the other hand, at an elevation of man [10].
Rousseau (1712–1778), in his social contract, states that “no people have lived or endure without religion; If you haven’t received a religious belief, should you create it so it won’t be destroyed in no time?[11] In fact, religion is a universal phenomenon. Anthropology, sociology, philosophy, archaeology and history, among other sciences, have convincingly demonstrated that religion is present in all ancient and modern cultures, so we can talk about man as a religious. Be. [12]
Man desperately seeks the meaning of his life, trying to find the balance between his existential extremes: life and death, being and nothing, order and chaos. From this perspective, the religious path is almost invariably followed by man in the search for the meaning of his existence.
Religious experience is universal, assuming personal and, at the same time, universal characteristics, just as my experience is private and personal, it has in itself the same ingredients as the experience of the other: everyone wants the same balance, even if it is not in the same way and with different names, religion is a prerogative of the human being.
The ethnologist Malinowski (1884-1942) begins his book Magic, Science and Religion with this statement: “There are no peoples, no matter how primitive, without religion or magic” [13].
In ancient times, Cicero (106-43 BC), Plutarco, Greek writer and philosopher (50-125 A. D. ) and others found this fact. Cicero pointed out that there are no such barbaric people, there are no people so brutal and savage, that they do not have in themselves the conviction that God exists. [14]
In a sentence attributed to Plutarco, [15] we find a description of this phenomenon:
You can find a city without walls, without buildings, without gyms, without laws, without the use of coins as currency, without the culture of letters, but a people without God, without prayer, without oaths, without religious rites, without sacrifices. , has never been seen.
Calvin (1509-1564) points out in different places
The appearance of heaven and earth even forces the wicked to recognize that there is a creator. (?) Of course, religion would not always have flourished among all peoples, if human spirits might not be convinced that God is the Creator of the world. [sixteen]
So even the wicked themselves are an example of the fact that there is always a certain notion of God in the soul of all men?[17].
But what does religion mean? While we cannot answer the question simply by explaining the word, we believe it can provide clues. Religion? It’s of uncertain origin. Cicero (106-43 BC), associates the word with the Latin verb?Relegere? (read, read carefully). [18] Cicero explained:
Those who carefully performed all acts of divine worship and carefully reread them were called relighter religious, elegant in elect, diligent in diliger, and intelligent intellegere; in fact, in all these words is present the same value of light that is present in religion [19].
In this way, religion would be a diligent study accompanied by observance of the things that belong to the gods [20].
However, the most famous explanation, relates the origin of the word to?Religio? Et? Religare?(Recedado) bringing the integrated idea of “re-enacted with God”. Is this explanation in Lactancio (about 240-to 320)?Divinae Institutions, (c. 304-313) and Augustine (354-430)? By Civitate Dei [21] and De Vera Religione. [22]
Lactancio, who disagrees with Cicero’s explanation, says
We have said that the name religion (religionis) derives from the bond of devotion, because God has united man to Him and maintains it out of devotion; because we must serve him as a teacher and obey him as a father. [23]
Augustine, after speaking of what we should not worship, said, “Therefore, let our religion unify us to the one and all-powerful God. “
Hobbes (1588–1679) in 1651, takes it a step further by concluding that religion is unique to human beings:
Considering that it is only in man that we find signs or fruits of religion, there is no reason to doubt that the seed of religion [25] is also found only in man and consists of a particular quality, or at least an eminent degree of that quality, which is not found in other living creatures. [26]
Religion, besides inescapable, [27] is a cultural shaper and is therefore a matter of faith and life[28]. Religious sentiment is present in our perceptions and constructions at any level. The religious phenomenon is based on the fact that man was created in the image of God and also on the fact that God revealed that it was possible to know Him [29]. ] Religion begins, in essence, in God, the Infinite Personal, who reveals himself to come to our meeting [30].
[1] F. Nietzsche, Al Dios Unknown. Poetry written when Nietzsche was under twenty years old, quoted by Georg Siegmund, Modern Atheism: History and Psychoanalysis, Sao Paulo: Loyola, 1966, p. 264.
[2] See: Ovedio, As Metamorphoses, Rio de Janeiro: Editora Tecnoprint, 1983, Book VIII, p. 214-216.
[3]? Two inscriptions and a stone altar were found near Lystre, and do they indicate that Zeus and Hermes were revered together as holy local patrons?(John RWStott, The Message of Acts: to the end of the earth, Sao Paulo: ABU. , 1994, (at 14. 11-15a), p. 258).
[4] Homero, Odisseia, São Paulo: Cultural April, 1979, XVII, p. 162.
[5] Homer, Odyssey, XIII. Page 123
[6] Homer, Odyssey, XIII. Page 125.
[7] “Mythology is a series of lies. But these lies have been, for many centuries, reason to believe. They had the value of dogmas and the reality between Greeks and Latinos. With this title, have you inspired men, supported respectable institutions?, suggested to artists the idea of many creations, including great masterpieces?(P. Commelin, Greco-Roman Mythology, Salvador: Aguiar
[8] N. D. Fustel de Coulanges, The Old Town of Sao Paulo: Hemus, 1975, p. 117-118. The author submits substantial documentation demonstrating the above statements.
[9] See J. Jeremiah, The Central Message of the New Testament, 2. Ed. Sao Paulo: Paulinas, 1979, p. 11.
[10] Cfr. C. H. Dodd, The Interpretation of the Fourth Gospel, Sao Paulo: Paulinas, 1977, p. 335-336.
[11] JJRousseau, About the Social Contract (first version): In: Rousseau and International Relations, Sao Paulo: State Official Press, 2003, III. 1, p. 167. This written version, the Geneva Manuscript, dates from 1761 In the final version, published in 1762, the theme of civil religion is covered in Chapter IV. See: JJ Rousseau, The Social Contract and Other Writings, Sao Paulo: Cultrix, 1975, IV. 8, p. 126-134. .
[12] Is it an indisputable truth that religious sentiment is natural in the human being, since there is no primitive or civilized society that does not believe in supernatural beings or practice any form of worship? , Sao Paulo: Atlas, 1999, p. 13). Geisler and Feinberg say that “man is incurably religious” (Norman L. Geisler; Paul D. Feinberg, Introduction to philosophy: a Christian perspective, Sao Paulo: Vida Nova, 1983, p. 269, 278). Similarly: Ronald H. Nash, Last Questions of Life: An Introduction to Philosophy, Sao Paulo: Cultura Crist, 2008, p. 19.
[13] Bronislaw Malinowski, Magic, Science and Religion, Lisbon: Edies Seventa, (s. d. ), p. 19.
[14] See: Cicero, Nature of the Gods, England: Penguin Books, 1972, I. 17; Ⅱ.
[15] Although I have read this sentence in quotation marks since my youth, I have never found the main source.
[16] Joao Calvino, Exhibition of the Hebrews, Sao Paulo: Paracletes, 1997, (Heb 11. 3), p. 299. Elsewhere: ??. How beautiful is your disposition [of heaven], and so excellent is its structure, that it is declared that your whole environment is the product of God’s hands?(Joao Calvino, Book of Psalms, Sao Paulo: Parakletos, 2002, v. 3, (Ps 102. 25), p. 585). See also: R. C. Sproul, We are all theologians: introduction to systematic theology, Sao José dos Campos, SP. : Fiel, 2017, p. 36-37.
[17] Joo Calvino, As Institutas, Campinas, SP. : Luz para o Caminho, 1985, I. 3. 2.
[18] Cicero, The Nature of the Gods, II. 72-74. P. 152-153
[19] Cicero, The Nature of the Gods, II. 28.
[20] See Religion: In: Richard A. Muller, Dictionary of Latin and Greek Theological Terms, Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House, © 1985, p. 262.
[21] Augustine, The City of God, 2nd ed. Petrapolis, RJ. ; Sao Paulo: Voices; Brazilian Augustinians Federation, 1990, (Part I), X. 3. P. 373. See also Ibid. , X. 32. P. 410-414.
[22] Augustine, The True Religion, Sao Paulo: Paulinas, 1987
[23] Breastfeeding, Divine Institutes, IV. 28. En: Alexander Roberts; James Donaldson, editor Ante-Nicene Fathers, Peabody, Massachusetts: Publishers Hendrickson, © 1994, v. 7, p. 131.
[24] St. Augustine, The True Religion, Sao Paulo: Paulinas, 1987, 55. p. 145.
[25] Expression already used by Calvin (See: Institutes, I. 5. 1)
[26] Thomas Hobbes, Leviat, Sao Paulo: Cultural April, (Os Pensadores, v. 14), 1974, p. 69.
[27] Can no man escape this religious determination of life, for God is inevitable?(Henry R. Van Til, The Calvinist Concept of Culture, Sao Paulo: Cultura Crist, 2010, p. 42).
[28] “Humanity, considered as a whole, has, over time, been supernatural in the depths of its being. Men have not been satisfied with the things of the world in their thoughts or in their lives; have always assumed a paradise on earth and a greater and holiest order of invisible powers and blessings behind what is visible. (?) Was religion the source of every civilization, the basis of all ordained life in the family, state, and society?( Herman Bavinck, Philosophy of Revelation, Brasilia, DF. : Monergism, 2019, p. 51).
[29] See: Herman Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics: Prolegomena, Sao Paulo: Christian Culture, 2012, v. 1, 302.
[30] One of the basic teachings of Christianity is that God has decided to get to where we are. Instead of waiting for us to find him, he comes to us. There are those who think that religion is like climbing a ladder to find God, yet does Christianity affirm that God has decided to go down this ladder to find us and take us home with joy?(Alister McGrath, The Unknown God, Sao Paulo: Loyola, 2001, p. 58).