What a great term “Aspected Monotheism” is. I discovered this term this morning on my commute to work, and I had to take a few minutes to share this. Now, I need to be clear I did not invent this term — I found it an email I had saved to my Palm Pilot. My friend and fellow Jewitch Asherah Batyah, whose writing I’ve featured on this site in the past, came up with it.
She’s someone that I have a lot of respect for, and our paths seem to fairly parallel, so I learn a lot from her writing that is directly relevant for me.
“Aspected Monotheism” resonates with me as about the best, simple definition of my view of the Divine that could be given. I believe in one great source of Divine — but that there are aspects of that great whole that are presented to us to allow us to gain greater understanding, and that even we Humans are aspects of the Divine, in a way.
Thanks Asherah for my morning buzz!
Tags: Go(d)dess(s)(es), god wrestling
Thank you for this. I’ve often found myself struggling for this term. I’ve shifted through several iterations of Echumenical and Agnotic with various attempts at proper adjectives. I’d even made an attempt at fitting in with Dieism..
This is a nicely descriptive term. Thanks for sharing it.
Thanks, Carly! I just found your posting and am very touched. The respect and sentiment are very mutual! Wouldn’t it be great if we lived in the same area?
If not the exact term, I’ve seen the basic idea of ‘Aspected Monotheism’ expressed in many similar ways, so I want to be careful about taking undue credit.
The aspected component is something I visualize as a prism, where the Light (i.e., Unity) is refracted into its component colours of the spectrum, with all possible sub-gradations of hue.
Thanks for your posting. You made my day.
Blessings,
Asherah B.
[...] What I’ve been finding fascinating is how misunderstood Hinduism is by most of the West. Ask five people on the street and they will probably all say that Hindus are polytheistic. This actually isn’t the case at the heart of it. Hindus have the same concept of “Ein Sof” that Jews have. They practice a very old form of aspected monotheism. Now the rituals and practices are so old that many people focus more on the aspects than the monotheism portion. But at its heart, Hinduism seems to be a monotheistic religion. After many births the wise seek refuge in me, seeing me everywhere and in everything. Such great souls are very rare. There are others whose discrimination is misled by many desires. Following their own nature, they worship lower gods, practicing various rites. [...]
[...] But those are only a few of the definitions. Most people link Paganism to polytheism, which doesn’t really apply to me. I realize to many “aspected monotheism ” might seem like polytheism, but I assure you to me the line is quite clear. Many people define Pagan as simply not being Jewish, Christian, or Muslim. Well, I’m certainly one of the three.So why does this even matter to me? Well, I spend a lot of time supporting the Pagan community in DC. I was even on the board of Pagan community center intiative for a while and continue to do work for them. What I don’t do is spend a lot of time and energy supporting the Jewish community in DC. I’ve made some attempts to reach out to communities that I feel some affinity for, but basically all I’ve had is un-returned phone calls. The Jewish community I do support is the one hidden in the Pagan community. There’s a lot more Jews who have moved into the Pagan community than many people realize, and these people often are still searching for a way to resolve their understanding of the earth-based practices with Judaism. [...]
[...] link Paganism to polytheism, which doesn’t really apply to me. I realize to many “aspected monotheism ” might seem like polytheism, but I assure you to me the line is quite clear. Many people [...]