Religion And The Decline Of Magic [CRACKED]
Political and religious discord, disease, famine, fire, and death afflicted the lives of the English population between 1500 and 1700. While alcohol and tobacco provided an escape, Keith Thomas argues that astrology, magic, and religion offered all levels of society a way to make sense of human misfortune. These competing systems of belief shared the ethical assumption that difficulty struck those who deserved it, and thus operated as systems of social control during this period. Religion and the Decline of Magic provides a detailed account of how and why people practiced an eclectic systems of belief in early modern England. The transition from Catholicism to Protestantism, which stripped Christianity of its magical power to provide believers protection from misfortune, he argues, explains the boom in magical beliefs in the early sixteenth century. Yet the widespread use of non-religious magic before the Reformation tempers this conclusion. This balanced study offers explanations and arguments while also acknowledging their weaknesses.
Religion and the Decline of Magic
The question of why magic declined but religion endured underpins the book. Thomas points to a fundamental difference in function between religion and magic: religion offered an explanation of human existence while magical practices commonly addressed specific temporary problems. The popularity of the holistic system of astrology, however, which seemed to do both, provides a counterpoint to this distinction. He also demonstrates the malleability of religion. Thomas shows that Christianity shed magical elements, such as a belief in the ability of idols to intervene in human affairs, while developing new theologies that kept up with contemporary intellectual thought and technology. The author also notes the importance of scientific and philosophical revolutions resulting in a widespread belief in natural rather than supernatural laws, which Christian theology successfully integrated with the rise, for example, of natural theology. Technological advances, such as improvements in agriculture, firefighting, and complex mechanisms of banking and insurance, also improved life expectancy and reduced misfortunes. Thomas appears most convinced by the idea that over the course of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries English people developed a belief in their own capacity to help themselves thus rendering the everyday power of magic redundant. He largely relates this self-help philosophy to Protestant theology. However, this diligent scholar demands further research before reaching definite conclusions.
While some of the arguments rest on premises now refuted, such as the idea that elite individuals drive changes in our conception of ourselves, the depth of detail and its clear engaging prose makes this book a must for anyone interested in the history of belief in early modern England. The idea that religion maintained importance in English society into the eighteenth century, despite increased emphasis on scientific and rational understandings of the world, significantly challenged previous explanations of the incompatibility between religion and science at the time of publication. This radical conclusion represents the key legacy of this excellent classic work of history.
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_OC_InitNavbar("child_node":["title":"My library","url":" =114584440181414684107\u0026source=gbs_lp_bookshelf_list","id":"my_library","collapsed":true,"title":"My History","url":"","id":"my_history","collapsed":true,"title":"Books on Google Play","url":" ","id":"ebookstore","collapsed":true],"highlighted_node_id":"");Religion and the Decline of MagicKeith ThomasScribner, 1971 - England - 716 pages 7 ReviewsReviews aren't verified, but Google checks for and removes fake content when it's identifiedReligion & the Decline of Magic is Keith Thomas's classic history of the magical beliefs held by people on every level of English society in the 16th and 17th centuries and how these beliefs were a part of the religious and scientific assumptions of the time. It is not only a major historical and religious work, but a thoroughly enjoyable book filled with fascinating facts and original insights into an area of human nature that remains controversial today- the belief in the supernatural that still continues in the modern world. From inside the book if (window['_OC_autoDir']) _OC_autoDir('search_form_input'); What people are saying - Write a reviewUser ratings5 stars34 stars43 stars02 stars01 star0Reviews aren't verified, but Google checks for and removes fake content when it's identifiedLibraryThing ReviewUser Review - kukulaj - LibraryThingThis is a mighty big book! I don't remember when I started it... probably a couple years ago. I would generally read one chapter at a time, then read another book or two before reading the next ... Read full review
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_OC_InitNavbar("child_node":["title":"My library","url":" =114584440181414684107\u0026source=gbs_lp_bookshelf_list","id":"my_library","collapsed":true,"title":"My History","url":"","id":"my_history","collapsed":true,"title":"Books on Google Play","url":" ","id":"ebookstore","collapsed":true],"highlighted_node_id":"");Religion and the Decline of Magic: Studies in Popular Beliefs in Sixteenth and Seventeenth Century EnglandKeith ThomasPenguin Books, 1982 - England - 853 pages 7 ReviewsReviews aren't verified, but Google checks for and removes fake content when it's identifiedReligion & the Decline of Magic is Keith Thomas's classic history of the magical beliefs held by people on every level of English society in the 16th and 17th centuries and how these beliefs were a part of the religious and scientific assumptions of the time. It is not only a major historical and religious work, but a thoroughly enjoyable book filled with fascinating facts and original insights into an area of human nature that remains controversial today- the belief in the supernatural that still continues in the modern world. What people are saying - Write a reviewUser ratings5 stars34 stars43 stars02 stars01 star0Reviews aren't verified, but Google checks for and removes fake content when it's identifiedLibraryThing ReviewUser Review - kukulaj - LibraryThingThis is a mighty big book! I don't remember when I started it... probably a couple years ago. I would generally read one chapter at a time, then read another book or two before reading the next ... Read full review
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_OC_InitNavbar("child_node":["title":"My library","url":" =114584440181414684107\u0026source=gbs_lp_bookshelf_list","id":"my_library","collapsed":true,"title":"My History","url":"","id":"my_history","collapsed":true,"title":"Books on Google Play","url":" ","id":"ebookstore","collapsed":true],"highlighted_node_id":"");Religion and the Decline of Magic: Studies in Popular Beliefs in Sixteenth and Seventeenth-Century EnglandKeith ThomasPenguin Books Limited, 30 Jan 2003 - History - 880 pages 7 ReviewsReviews aren't verified, but Google checks for and removes fake content when it's identifiedWitchcraft, astrology, divination and every kind of popular magic flourished in England during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, from the belief that a blessed amulet could prevent the assaults of the Devil to the use of the same charms to recover stolen goods. At the same time the Protestant Reformation attempted to take the magic out of religion, and scientists were developing new explanations of the universe. Keith Thomas's classic analysis of beliefs held on every level of English society begins with the collapse of the medieval Church and ends with the changing intellectual atmosphere around 1700, when science and rationalism began to challenge the older systems of belief. What people are saying - Write a reviewUser ratings5 stars34 stars43 stars02 stars01 star0Reviews aren't verified, but Google checks for and removes fake content when it's identifiedLibraryThing ReviewUser Review - kukulaj - LibraryThingThis is a mighty big book! I don't remember when I started it... probably a couple years ago. I would generally read one chapter at a time, then read another book or two before reading the next ... Read full review
Even a brief perusal of the bestseller lists (of books for both children and adults) reveals a continuing fascination with magic. There is, of course, a standard explanation for this fascination: magic offers an escape from the dreary, law-governed realities of our everyday lives. But while it is fashionable to point out that we are not as rational as we believe ourselves to be, I think a second explanation stems from what is ultimately a deep-rooted disbelief in magic. Because that disbelief is so ingrained, magic can function as a convenient shorthand for the alien and, especially, for the pre-modern. If the creators of a television programme want to convey the idea that a fictional society exists in some distant, unspecified past, there is no easier way to signify this than to have a character perform a magical ritual or to speak of demons, fairies or witches. Newspapers may still print horoscopes, but not even the most devoted followers of the phases of Venus really believe themselves to be in continuity with ancient astrological traditions.
Michael Hunter, in his book The Decline of Magic: Britain in the Enlightenment, re-examines this transformation from the perspective of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Deists and freethinkers to argue that these skeptical humanists, rather than a monolith called the Scientific Revolution, were the driving forces behind the decline of magic.
Hunter sets out to fill this historiographical hole by adding concepts such as deism and atheism to the conversation. By tracking the freethinking conversations of the early modern British elite, he makes a persuasive argument that magic was not pushed aside by the Scientific Revolution, as previously argued, but rather by skeptics whose views circulated by word-of-mouth. 041b061a72