Spirituality would generally be defined as other-dimensional spirit that inhabits the physical world, imbuing it with Consequence in and of itself, said to be of consciousness and intelligence. The individual may believe they live within a living unified organism, that may communicate with them, and in which they can communicate in return.
Proto-Religion:
Proto-religion is a term used to describe all the many Conservative Spiritual interpretations, wherein the commonality is that the Internal Authority of the natural world is believed to be a spiritual realm.
The essence of Proto-religion is symbolism, wherein all or specific aspects of of any given conditions of reality, may be interpreted as symbolic of intelligent communication with spiritual sources, thought capable of the manipulation of circumstances and situations of one's experience. The sight of five crows meant nothing, but if seven crows are seen one usually might correlate it with a coming significance.One interacts with one's reality as if it were intelligent, communicative and talks to one. One creates contexts for the interpretation of random events where specific happenstance is interpreted as supernatural causation.
One builds a library of such instances over time, such that specific meaning is ascribed to specific events, like the rain-maker through experience used a prescribed set of procedures to induce rain. When one uses cultural symbolic language, as established by the community at large over time as tradition, it is called External Authority, as not created internal to one's own experience and self-interpretive contexts. One avoids walking under a ladder, crossing the path of a black cat or stepping on a crack.Philosophy (18 of 19) Next Page