Worship
Worship is the honouring of a god or sacred being through acts such as prayer, song, offerings and ritual. Its forms vary enormously, from the incense and processions of late ancient Christianity to the fire and water offerings of Zoroastrianism and the seasonal festivals of modern paganism.[1][2][3]
Worship and the senses
The historian Susan Ashbrook Harvey argues that scholars have tended to emphasise sight and sound in Christian worship, but that early Christians used all the senses. Writers such as Ephrem the Syrian taught that the body had been made holy, and that the liturgy taught believers both how and what to experience of God through their senses.[4] She describes the liturgy as a "thickly textured sensory weaving" of light, scent, song and rich materials.[1][5]
That richness raised a worry: it could make Christian worship look like pagan worship. Harvey shows that writers defended it by distinguishing who was being honoured, while others, such as Gregory of Nyssa, warned that all imagery falls short of God.[6]
Worship without temples
Jenny Rose reports the ancient Greek historian Herodotus's account that the Persians had no temples, altars or statues, but worshipped on high places and honoured the sun, moon, earth, fire, water and winds. Fire temples appear later, and scholars disagree about whether the early Persian kings had consecrated buildings.[7][8] The Avestan word yasna, worship, is related to the Sanskrit yajna, one of many links between Zoroastrian and Vedic religion.[2]
Worship in modern paganism
Michael Strmiska describes nature-based festivals, bonfires and offerings of food and drink as common features of modern pagan worship.[3] In Wicca, Joanne Pearson describes eight seasonal festivals, the Wheel of the Year, and full-moon gatherings, held inside a ritually cast circle.[9]
See also
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Harvey, Susan Ashbrook (2006). Scenting Salvation: Ancient Christianity and the Olfactory Imagination. University of California Press. p. 82.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Rose, Jenny (2014). "Zoroastrians Present and Past". Zoroastrianism: An Introduction. I.B. Tauris.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Strmiska, Michael F., ed. (2005). Modern Paganism in World Cultures: Comparative Perspectives. ABC-CLIO. pp. 40–41.
- ↑ Harvey, Susan Ashbrook (2006). Scenting Salvation: Ancient Christianity and the Olfactory Imagination. University of California Press. pp. 59–64.
- ↑ Harvey, Susan Ashbrook (2006). Scenting Salvation: Ancient Christianity and the Olfactory Imagination. University of California Press. pp. 83–84.
- ↑ Harvey, Susan Ashbrook (2006). Scenting Salvation: Ancient Christianity and the Olfactory Imagination. University of California Press. pp. 84–86.
- ↑ Rose, Jenny (2014). "The Ancient Persians: Truth-Tellers and Paradise-Builders". Zoroastrianism: An Introduction. I.B. Tauris.
- ↑ Rose, Jenny (2014). "A Zoroastrian Presence from Seleucia to Sistan: The Parthian Period". Zoroastrianism: An Introduction. I.B. Tauris.
- ↑ Pearson, Joanne (2007). "Rediscovering Ritual". Wicca and the Christian Heritage: Ritual, Sex and Magic. Routledge.