In SOF 42 (July 2000) we offered a first draft of “10 hypotheses” as a reflection of where our exploration of religious faith as a human creation has taken us, and what we can say together which broadly reflects a current “SoF way of looking at things”. We made it clear that the aim was to stimulate discussion, not establish an SoF orthodoxy. DAVID BOULTON reports on your response. what are we for?
When I first whispered to one or two friends and colleagues that I was contemplating flying a kite by publishing a list of propositions which might begin to suggest what Sea of Faith stands for in the year 2000 CE, I was warned in no uncertain terms that I would be playing with fire. “However clearly you state that you're not proposing a SoF creed, or a ‘basis of faith’ that everyone in the Network is expected to sign up to, they won't believe you”. “It’s bound to be divisive”. “We're far too diverse to reach agreement on anything”. “It’s a bad “A provisional statement of what we are for, from which SoF members and SOF readers can take what they find useful, leave what they find useless, and add what they think is missing.” particularly as the writer is a parson, and I am not!). “Too long” was a more frequent comment. Others were “Not enough about community”, “Too Anglican in tone” (I'll be disowned by the Quaker Universalist Group if they hear that), and “Too Christian” (I’ll be re-admitted).
But the wholly approving comments far outweighed the critical ones. One member told me: “I found myself in tears when I read it. It was what I’d been looking for for thirty years”. Others said and wrote similar things and the warmth and enthusiasm expressed by so many made the risks of the enterprise well worth taking. New Zealand SoF want to use the draft for discussion at their 2001 conference, and a radical Quaker group in the UK have asked to make similar use of it. Other nonSoF journals have asked permission to reprint it.
Around a dozen readers so far es Have responded to the invitation idea. What's the point when we don’t have a line on anything?”.
I gave these responses careful thought - then decided to go ahead anyway. I published my draft “10 Hypotheses” in the July issue (No. 42) and waited for the world to crack open and the elements to melt with fervent heat. Nothing of the sort happened. You could hear a pin not drop. Two months later, I have still received not a single protest to the effect that the magazine was out of order in this venture. No, not one.
Even I am surprised. I think it would have been different up to a year ago, but I suspect that the change in mood in the Network which I have written about in my Editorial includes a new willingness to be more relaxed about propositional statements and the idea that SoF does have a position and needs to explore ways of articulating it.
What I have received, however, is what I asked for: lots of comments about the propositions themselves, and lots of suggested amendments and re-writes. Many of the comments are general statements of agreement or disagreement, delivered either in conversation (particularly at the Leicester conference), or by phone, email or letter. The most dismissive was a three-word verdict: “typical parson’s waffle” (very wounding - to offer specific drafting amendments or rewrite the “hypotheses” altogether.
Most have suggested tightening up here and there, without proposing radical changes of content. Bruce Nightingale of Totnes, Devon, produced a skilfully edited version which managed to say everything the original said in half as many words. Rachel Jenkins of Dunnington, York, achieved a similar effect by leaving out most of the adjectives - “especially ‘wondrous’ and ‘creative’”. The result is certainly more taut and spare, but also more impersonal. On such questions of style, it’s just a matter of personal preference.
Others went the other way and proposed what were often lengthy additions. Noel Cheer used his flight from New Zealand to London for the Leicester conference to add rather than subtract. David Strachan elaborated here and altered there, to most useful effect. Thanks to all of them. They will recognise their own input when we publish the first amended version, probably in the next issue.
There were, however, inevitably and no less welcome, criticisms of particular propositions, and suggestions for additional ones. One contributor to the SoF email list (‘netiquette’ forbids that I name names without express permission) would have preferred God to be left out altogether. Another questioned No. 8: “Who are the SOF 44 / November 2000 SOF 44 / November 2000 mighty that should be put down, and do the humble and powerless necessarily deserve to be exalted and empowered? Shouldn't merit come into it somewhere? It all sounds rather socialist to me!” Frederic Lamond thought the propositions were weighted towards “the nonrealist Rationalist wing of SoF”, and proposed amendments to No.3 which would “keep on board” the pantheists. “So-called ‘supernatural’ phenomena may be just aspects of nature of which we still know little”, and deities reside not only in the human breast but in “the living spirits of animals, plants and places”. Similarly, David Strachan urged recognition of “a pre-human life-force manifest as an urge to live within the interconnected web of life”. For him, “the will to live of all organisms is a manifestation of a pre-human and preconceptual source”. Such ideas raise the question of how far a statement of “what SoF is for” should confine itself to what most members probably broadly agree on, and how far it should seek to include views which have a proper place within the Network but have not established themselves in the mainstream of its thought.
In a different vein, Noel Cheer’s expanded version proposed to label SoF as specifically “religious humanist”, and added to No. 5 the thought that, while religious scriptures had positive value at their best, “at their worst they are instruments of coercion, terror and alienation”. But it was No. 8 which gave Noel and several correspondents most trouble. Some disliked the overtly Biblical language. Some thought it was none of SoF’s business to distinguish between “true” and “false” religion, while others thought it was right to make the distinction, but with more clarity. Noel’s wholesale rewrite was as follows: “We must not shrink from distinguishing between ‘true’ and ‘false’ forms of religious expression. Failure to at least make the attempt leaves us with a tacit approval of all forms of religion and especially those that work against our spiritual nature. A religion which we should regard as true would impel and empower its adherents to help those in need and to act as advocates for those who need help in the face of oppressive powers: ecclesiastical; political; economical; commercial; cultural or psychological. Religious expression detached from justice and the relief of suffering is at best incomplete and at worst a delusion. We should regard as false those forms of religion which invoke an imagined supernaturalism to impose authority, sanctify power, promote fear and superstition, foster division, fortify the strong and gull the gullible. Such forms hold out false hope of compensation for present woes in a future heaven and threaten punishment for present disobedience in a future hell. These forms of religion additionally put a selfcentred quest for individual salvation before the greater good of the whole community of humanity and all living creatures. They turn the God of our imagination into a tyrant.” A particularly elegant rewrite was that by John Linford of Rugeley, Staffs, but it adopted a very different tack. It was aimed “not so much at members of the’ Network as at outsiders who are interested and wondering whether SoF is for them”. John’s version gives his personal account of what the Network is rather than what it stands for. Indeed, on his account it doesn’t really stand for anything beyond its broad commitment to religious faith as a human creation, and this is seen in exclusively Christian terms. We hope to print it later for wider discussion.
The shortest rewrite was that from William Spray of Marlborough, who thought ten hypotheses was seven too many. His three expressed the view that “a condition of being human is that we'll never be able to define completely any ultimate truths there may be”, that therefore “the only answers we can formulate to the big questions of life and death are provisional and personal”, and that “it is to the exchange and critical exploration of all such answers, as of the way of living each implies, that SoF is committed”. Well, it’s “exchange and critical exploration” which we're after, and that’s the purpose of this exercise.
The as yet unrevised ten hypotheses are reprinted here for readers to visit or revisit with their own criticisms, amendments and improvements. Later, we'll run a revised version, informed by what you've sent us. It still won't be a Sea of Faith creed, official or unofficial. Nor will it attempt to satisfy everyone by including every suggestion. We're not going to put it to the vote, or ask for any formal endorsement. What it will be is the editor’s best effort at producing a provisional statement of what we are for, from which SoF members and SOF readers can take what they find useful, leave what they find useless, and add what they think is missing.
If the exercise stimulates a little more “exploration” it will have achieved its modest purpose. But if anyone cites it as the definitive or “official” summation of SoF thinking, they’ll be misusing and misunderstanding it. I think that’s a risk worth taking.
Bernard Spurgin writes of THE ELIZABETHAN WORLD PICTURE by E.M.W.Tillyard: “Classicist, archaeologist, and then Professor of English Literature at Cambridge, Tillyard published this short book in 1943 to assist students of Shakespeare and Milton - his own specialities - to understand their writings. It outlines the complex hierarchical supernatural structure then supposed to be behind whatever system contolled happenings affecting Man and all other creatures, terrestrial and heavenly. “Knowledge of this ‘picture’ of the universe is needed for full understanding of literature of the time. It influenced the Book of Common Prayer and much liturgy dating from that period. So Tillyard’s book sheds light on the mystery of how we have come to have many of the strange features still found in traditional religion by relating them to their late medieval origins.
The book is available in many libraries and has been republished by Penguin.” Readers are invited to send their brief reviews and recommendations for this feature. ten hypotheses 1. No set of statements about religious faith will ever tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Time will fray them all as our insights and our ability to articulate them change. This naturally holds good for the hypotheses that follow.
Z. All religions, faith systems and varieties of religious or spiritual faith and practice are human constructs: part of the wondrous complex of experience, accumulated knowledge, creative imagination and reflective consciousness which we call culture. We may speak of the divine, the transcendent and the ultimate, but we do so in the clear understanding that these are human concepts. We created them. 3. We each live one natural life in one natural world. What we may choose to call supernatural is a product of our creative imagination, itself a part of our natural world which is made intelligible to us through the signs and symbols of language.