On Sat, 22 Jan 2005 10:25:30 -0600, Mark A. Foster <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Gilberto, > I wrote: > >>>>All the perennialisms I have observed are deductive systems. They begin > >>>>with certain first principles and read them into various religious and > >>>>spiritual systems. That is what I meant by triumphalist.<<<< > You replied: > >>That seems really odd to me. I would tend to think of triumphalism more as > >>an attitude of superiority.<< > Exactly. You don't see my point? If you begin with a set of first principles, > and you then deductively read them into various religious and spiritual > systems, isn't that an attitude of superiority?
I guess from where I'm coming from the only truly deductive system (really) is mathematics. But if even if you want to loosen it somewhat, I'm still not convinced To be honest, I don't think I see everything you are talking about. I think the Bahai view with a notion of progressive revelation is much more susceptible to Triumphalist tendancies. The Bahai faith literally sests up a hierarchy of the worlds religions, ranked by chronology, where the most recent religion is the most progressed. To me that has alot more potential for abuse, and would have a tendancy to encourage more arrogance than the perspective which says that many different religions in the world are basically equal in terms of their potential for spiritual depth. I'm certainly willing to entertain the possibility that the specific Traditionalist groups might have been arrogant and even had fascist tendancies but I doubt that it stemmed from perennialism per se. They were also affluent "Orientalist" Europeans who probably had attitudes typical for people in that situation. Peace Gilberto "My people are hydroponic" __________________________________________________ You are subscribed to Baha'i Studies as: mailto:archive@mail-archive.com To unsubscribe, send a blank email to mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] To subscribe, use subscribe bahai-st in the message body to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Baha'i Studies is available through the following: Mail - mailto:bahai-st@list.jccc.edu Web - http://list.jccc.edu/read/?forum=bahai-st News - news://list.jccc.edu/bahai-st Public - http://www.escribe.com/religion/bahaist Old Public - http://www.mail-archive.com/bahai-st@list.jccc.net New Public - http://www.mail-archive.com/bahai-st@list.jccc.edu
