It seems the past is not fixed, but rather ever-changing.
This study isn’t about the history of New Age religion, but rather a critical analysis of the history sceince as it manifests in the scholarly discourse on the history of New Age.
“Astute scientists understand that political and cultural bias must impact their ideas […]. But we usually fail to acknowledge another source of error that might be called literary bias. So much of science proceeds by telling stories […] bound to the rules of canonical legendmaking.” (Gould 2010: 251)
The article surveys a number of research questions in the field of the history of New Age movement, and presents different and contradicting answers given in the scholarly discourse to these questions:
1. Is New Age a trans-historical phenomenon?
2. When did the New Age religion start?
3. When did the New Age movement come to its end?
4. What are the New Age’s distinct historic roots?
5. Which local New Age narratives exist?
6. How do they present narratives of currents within the New Age?
7. Is New Age a new phenomenon?
History is not just a catalogue of events put in the right order like a railway timetable. History is a version of events. Between the events and the historian there is a constant interplay.” (A. J. P. Taylor 1993:37)
Abstract
This study makes a bold statement on the problematic nature of historic academic research, and its implications on our understanding of religion and culture. The case study is New Age religion’s scholarly historiography.
It appears that New Age religion plays a part within narrative imagination, which often contains moral allusions as to the heroes or antiheroes, as well as literary allusions to the causal sources of events or to expected developments. We review the conflicts that arise between utterly differing opinions in some of the field’s fundamental issues, and thus evoke several of the challenges historical research on NA faces: when did it debut on the historical stage? Which ideological movements did it draw upon? Who are its unmistakable heralds? Did it already reach the height of its strength, and if so, when? The survey of scholarly studies indicates that the history of New Age is ever-changing.
Thus, we argue that though historic discussion may deepen the analysis of a religious phenomenon and its understanding and give it context and meaning—it cannot decipher it. We cannot rely on history in defining a phenomenon, in attempting to comprehend its essence, its power, its importance, and most certainly not its future.
Author
Marianna Ruah-Midbar Shapiro
קישורים
Date
March 2019
Language
English
Academic/Non-academic
Academic item
Bibliographical citation
Ruah-Midbar Shapiro, Marianna, “Historians as Storytellers: A Critical Examination of New-Age Religion’s Scholarly Historiography”, in Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review 10.1 (March 2019): 1-24.
