Friday, 24 August 2007

Secular thinker envisaged universal religion

Recent posts on this blog have been discussing the idea that religion evolves. An interesting sidelight of the subject appears in Jack Mclean's blog.

Jack notes that Eric Fromm wrote on the development of a new universalistic religion in his 1955 book, The Sane Society. It seems Fromm may have been influenced by a Baha'i he was corresponding with. Fromm is quoted thus:

The most important feature of such a religion will be its universalistic character, corresponding to the unification of mankind which is taking place in this epoch; it would embrace the humanistic teachings common to all the great religions of the East and of the West; its doctrines would not contradict the rational insight of mankind today, and its emphasis would be on the practice of life, rather than on doctrinal beliefs.

See:


Pilgrim's Notes: Eric Fromm and the Bahá'í Faith

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2 comments:

Paul said...

Cool! So we get to pick our own religion?

I'll take butterscotch swirl.

John Bryden said...

Paul, thanks for stopping by here. I take it your comment is somewhat tongue-in-cheek, as from previous interaction you probably realise I don't endorse Fromm's views reported above. If you follow the link to Jack Maclean's article, you will read there a critique of Fromm's atheistic conception of religion, as well as some interesting historical information.

My personal reflections on this blog take inspiration from the Bahá’í teachings.