THE EARS OF THE PEOPLE
(Posted 2009-01-06 16:15:52 by ArchPaladin)

I had a thought yesterday.  Dangerous pastime, I know.

The thought goes as follows: those who can display the ability to keep
people physically healthy will have their ears on spiritual matters.

Think about it.  Every culture from ancient history always had a
shaman-type role.  A person who was responsible not only for people's
physical health for when common remedies weren't enough, but also someone
who could interpret the spirit world.  Now the reasoning for such a
dual-purpose role is obvious: people attribute to superstition anything
that they can't explain, and health is a mysterious subject.  Being able to
bring people back into health is a sign of power, and people listen to
those with power.  Nevertheless, the fact that this type of shamanic
function cuts across so many cultures is telling.

It is only recently (perhaps 500-700 years - certainly no more than 1000)
that we have divorced the roles of physical healer and spiritual leader. 
And yet, when physical health was placed in the hands of the scientists and
researchers, people's spiritual beliefs went along with it, and scientists
are now tasked with explaining the spiritual state of man (something it is
woefully inadequate to do).

I suppose this is only true in degrees.  Some people rely on Western
medicine but do not accept a methodological naturalistic worldview.  I
posit that even though this is true, such people still have to contend with
scientific theories in their spiritual worldview even if they don't believe
in them.  For those who try not to rely on Western medicine as much, they
contend less.  This is the basic warrant of my theory.

This is not to say that science is bad, but merely that any changes to our
basic system of healthcare - which is likely to happen over the next few
decades - should result in a shift in people's spiritual perspectives.

--------

There are no comments on this post.