The "New Age"
Vision:
A
Fresh Perspective on Thought and Action?
Prof. Stephen Palmquist,
D.Phil. (Oxon)
Department of Religion and Philosophy
Hong Kong Baptist University
When I was a teenager growing up in the
U.S.A., there was a popular little book entitled How To Be
A Christian Without Being Religious. It defined Christianity in
terms of a living relationship of faith, arguing that Christians need
not adopt any specific thoughts or actions that could be called
"religious". Although the book deeply influenced me at the time, I
have since come to see that it has some serious flaws. While it is true that
Christianity is, or at least ought to be, primarily a living, personal
relationship with the God-Man, Jesus Christ, this does not negate the importance
of "being religious", but rather heightens its value and
significance.
That book, like the
"fundamentalist" movement it represented, was the product of a
culture dominated by a worldview, especially popular during the middle decades
of this century, in which science and technology are regarded as the sole path
to truth and utility, while religion is either completely denied or banished to
the merely subjective realm of "values". In order to be respectable
in such a culture, Christianity must be rooted in some empirically
verifiable fact (such as Jesus' resurrection, and/or the disciples' eye-witness
reports, as found in the Bible), and can safely turn its back on anything that
smacks of merely "religious" thoughts and practices.
In the last two or three decades, there
has been a direct attack from many quarters on this "scientific" way
of viewing the world, with its tendency to divorce the realms of matter and
spirit, of body and mind, of fact and value. Actually, the roots of this attack
reach back at least 100 years, if not further (see below), and can be found in
the works of philosophers such as Friedrich Nietzsche, psychologists such as
Carl Jung, and theologians such as Paul Tillich. Many
of these thinkers pursued their attack as a lonely calling, alienated from the
mainstream of scholarship in their discipline, yet forging new paths in the
process. Recently, however, their ideas have been adopted by a large number of
people and formed into a unified "vision" of how modern human beings
ought to think and act. The name most often used to describe this attack on the
"old" worldview is the "New Age Movement". This movement
includes a wide variety of apparently distinct ideas, united only by a common
"perspective" or "vision" of the way people ought to think
and act.
Since we are living in Hong Kong, one of
the last remaining colonies of Great Britain, it is worth noting before we
proceed that the old, "scientific" worldview had the same cultural
basis as the colonialism and imperialism that reigned supreme over many western
countries during the past two or three centuries. It is not surprising,
therefore, that as this worldview weakened, western
countries began to give up their imperialistic ideals, while at the same time
the people began to view religion in a new, less "scientific" way.
Formerly imperialist countries now feel pangs of (religious?) guilt at the
thought of their forefathers' exploitation of foreign lands, so much so that
they are willing—even eager—to "give away" their
prize jewels, such as Hong Kong.
One of the most fundamental aspects of
the New Age Vision is the conviction that religion is good and healthy and
proper to human beings, and that science—at least when viewed as the sole
path to truth—often does more harm than good. Proponents tend on the one
hand to affirm all religions, yet on the other hand, are reluctant to
be committed to any one traditional religious community.[1]One could in fact summarize the typical attitude of
those who see with New Age eyes by saying their goal is to teach us How to
be religious without being a Christian! In this respect, many "New Agers" certainly have something to learn from faithful
Christians.
The religious emphasis
of the New Age Visionmustnotleadustoconfuseitwiththephenomenon
of "cults". A cult is a (usually relatively small) perversion
of a traditional religion, which is typically founded by one authoritarian and
charismatic leader, emphasizing strict obedience and withdrawal from the world.
The New Age, by contrast, looks kindly upon interfaith dialogue,
cross-cultural experiences, and an individualistic frame of mind that would
make cults impossible. I believe the troubling phenomenon of cults witnessed
in the twentieth century arose as a cultural compensation for the imbalanced
worldview that was dominant for so long. Far from
encouraging cults or cult-like practices, the New Vision (at its best) attempts
to restore to western culture a religious mind-set that would cure the
cultural disease that leads people to take refuge in cults. The fact
that some people do end up engaging in cults or cult-like practices under the
banner of the New Age is more an indication of people's need to react against
the scientific worldview than it is a legitimate implementation of the basic
Vision.
Unfortunately, some of the forms of
thought and behavior now associated with the term "New Age" are
really little more than cultural fads, addressing people's desire for
immediate results (a kind of "fast food religion") rather than their
the deeper spiritual needs. For example, walking on hot coals, absorbing the
good vibrations from crystals, and some extreme approaches to otherwise beneficial
practises such as meditation or dream interpretation,
can be harmful when used as nothing more than a means of self-indulgence or
pleasure-seeking.
The deeper truths reflected by New Age
thinking are, in fact, hardly new. Indeed, a question that is all-too-rarely
asked is: "When did the New Age begin?" A popular song from
the sixties ("The Age of Aquarius") would seem to indicate that it
began very recently, in conjunction with a special alignment of the stars and
planets. However, much of Jesus' preaching focused on his Vision of a New Age
("the kingdom of heaven"), as did the preaching of the earliest
Christians (who called themselves followers of "the Way"). And some
of the hallmarks of that Age (universal peace, love, harmony, etc.) are
quite consistent with those preached by this century's New Agers.
A simple example of the oldness of
the basic contours of the New Age Vision is its distrust in experts. The
scientific worldview encourages individuals to place an almost religious faith
in the reliability of the well-educated, or "experts" in any field.
In particular doctors, lawyers, and theologians join together with scientists
to enjoy a high degree of clout in any culture dominated by this world view.
The New Age Vision encourages us, by contrast, to trust in our own
abilities more than those of the so-called "experts". This is surprisingly
close to the point Jesus was making when, just before his ruthless attack on
the false authoritarianism of the Pharisees, he calls people to take
responsibility for their own spiritual health, saying:
But you are not to be called "Rabbi", for
you have only one Master and you are all brothers. And do not call
anyone on earth "father", for you have one Father, and he is in
heaven. Nor are you to be called "teacher", for you have one Teacher,
the Christ. (Matt. 23:8-10)
The difference here, of course, is that those with New Age eyes tend to
put themselves in the place of God, rather than recognizing the need for
the transcendental Master, Father, and Teacher to whom Jesus was referring.
The closest thing to a New Age in philosophy
was ushered in over two hundred years ago by the German philosopher, Immanuel
Kant. Kant developed a complex philosophical System which was, among other
things, an attempt to counter-balance the adverse effects of the
"Enlightenment" worldview in which he himself was raised. The
Enlightenment was the eighteenth century's version of what we would call
"the modern scientific worldview": all human problems, it was
believed, could be solved by an appeal to human reason. Kant attacked this
worldview by demonstrating that reason has certain fixed limits, beyond which
human knowledge cannot reach. He did this, in order to humiliate (make
humble) the proud claims of the philosophical "experts" who came
before him, many of whom claimed to be able to "prove" that (for
example) God exists (or does not exist).[2] Instead, Kant called people to a new and humbler
form of Enlightenment. His version of the motto of this movement ("Have
courage to use your own reason"[3]) shows his affinity with today's New Age Vision of
harmony between autonomous individuals.
How then are we to respond to this movement—we
in Hong Kong, whose future is so very much a product of the tension between the
old, imperialist vision of one "superior race" ruling the world and
the New Age Vision of a "global village", ruled by tolerance (as in the
ominous slogan, "one country, two systems")? The New Age is such a
wide-ranging movement, encouraging so many different types of thought and action, that no conclusive answer to this question can be
given in such a short article. However, let me conclude by offering a few
general guidelines for answering it in any particular case. My hope is that
these can establish a "perspective" from which we can see clearly and
respond appropriately to each new aspect of the New Age Vision we meet.
First, we should always keep in mind the
fact that the call to adopt a "Vision for a New Age" is actually very
old—perhaps as old as religion itself. Indeed it could be agreed that
the whole Bible is devoted to the task of expounding just such a Vision.[4] In this sense, the "New Age" is clearly
a misleading name for what is really a revival of ancient wisdom. The only
people who should feel compelled to reject the New Age in its entirety are
those who are still convinced of the unique validity of the scientific
worldview.
A second guideline for responding to the
New Age Vision is to regard it not as a simple set of well-defined thoughts and
actions, but as a complex and varied array of trends. Some of these are
revivals of very ancient ways of understanding or adapting to our world, such
as astrology, meditation, numerology, shamanism, and tai-chi. Others are new
perspectives on otherwise ordinary activities, such as smelling
(aromatherapy), dancing (as a form of self-expression), and concern for the environment
(as an expression of love for the earth). With this in mind, we should beware
of the tendency to use the term "New Age" as a "catch all"
label, that includes everything a particular person regards as bad (or
good, for those who approve) about today's newest cultural trends. Instead, we
should assess each particular claim separately and rationally, asking ourselves
whether or not it will contribute positively to our culture, our faith, and our
lifestyle.
Finally, instead of strengthening our
resolve to defend the old worldview against this "evil" threat (as
some Christians see it), or being "converted" and so engaging naively
in all the latest cultural fads, I suggest we attempt to strike a balance between
these two extremes. Christians and non-Christians alike can surely benefit from
learning to appreciate some New Age insights, while others are bound to
be irrelevant, if not positively harmful, to most of us. Rather than responding
in fear—or, by contrast, in gullible joy—we should look objectively
at each claim advanced under the banner of the New Age Vision. Doing so is
bound to provide a fresh perspective for the twentieth (and
twenty-first) century, even though, in the context of world history it is
hardly new.
Notes
[1]Indeed, I once had a
conversation with someone who expressed her solidarity with the latest fashions
in western culture by stating in two successive sentences: "I am an atheist. I believe in all religions." At first I took this to be a blatant
contradiction. But later it occurred to me that it could have been a typical
example of the New Age tendency to "appreciate" religion while rejecting any call for a personal
faith in God.
[2]See Immanuel Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, tr. Norman Kemp Smith
(London: Macmillan, 1929), pp.629, 651-652.
[3]See Immanuel Kant, "What is Enlightenment?", in Lewis White Beck (tr. and ed.), On History
(Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1963), p.3.
[4]See my book Biblical
Theocracy: A vision of the biblicalfoundations for a
Christian political philosophy (Hong Kong: Philopsychy
Press, 1994).
This etext is based on a prepublication draft of the published
version of this essay.
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