Cultural Religion Versus Scholarly Religion

Is a "religion" such as Buddhism the beliefs of the masses of Buddhists who inherit their beliefs informally and culturally, or is "Buddhism" the beliefs of Buddhist scholars who have studied the major Buddhist texts? Is "Christianity" best considered to be the popular-Christianity that most people believe in, or is "Christianity" the formal, complex theology of the great Christian scholars of the past? Christianity, now, is completely different to the Christianity of the first few hundred years. Christianity in the dark ages was completely different to Christianity now. Are all three forms all "Christianity"? Is a religion the grassroots beliefs of people on the ground, or is the well-considered philosophies and beliefs of the founders and scholars? These problematic questions are introduced on this page.

Grassroots Religion

If the mostly ignorant masses define their own religion, doesn't it lose all the intellectual truth that was first put into it by its founder? Without understanding, a religion's adherents are ignorant, not truly believing because they don't understand. They're merely going along, be it with the best intentions or with no conscious intention at all. A religion is spoilt by its ignorant followers. To an extent, we must always resist allowing a religion to be defined by its followers, and try to consider the beliefs of its leaders. And although we concentrate on the philosophy of the leaders for the intellectual content, we must also concentrate on the actual actions and grassroots beliefs if we are to understand where the religion is going and what its people might do!

The grassroots religion is frequently merely a culture, a set of traditions that also happen to be beliefs. Partially a religion is what its followers say. Take Hinduism... the religion itself is a collection of folk practices, sayings, stories, traditions that we Westerners took to categorize under a single name. Hinduism is a grassroots religion.

“An established religion becomes something that people put by default. Out of habit, and because it is the normal thing to do, entire households and communities will state their religion to be the common religion, no matter what their personal beliefs might be. Children, for example, are taught what religion to write down by their parents, and until the child or even teenager or young adult understands decides to put otherwise, they will continue to put that.

I have known many grown adults who consistently put a particular religion (normally 'Church of England'), despite being completely atheist. When asked, the frequently say that they do consider themselves part of that religion because their parents were, or because they were baptized into it, or because they've 'always put that'. This is the result of a religion that has become established, even when the basic beliefs in the religion have evaporated.”

"Numbers of world religions tend to be exaggerated" by Vexen Crabtree (2001)

Momen (1999) summarizes some of the popular elements of religion, and states that these are frequently 'looked down upon' by religious professional:

“The religious professionals in each religion will usually look down upon the manifestations of popular religion. They will often refer to them as a corruption of the true religion or as evidence of the ignorance or sinfulness of the mass of the people. The truth is somewhat more complex than this. Popular religious practices fill some of the needs felt by ordinary people - needs that the official religion ignores. Thus, for example, most varieties of official religion disapprove of, or even forbid, recourse to talismans, spells, charms and other forms of magic. They are also against necromancy, astrology and other occult practices. Yet, in almost every society, these elements can be found in popular religion. [...] People regard these popular elements as an integral part of the religion and they are thought to derive their power and efficacy through the spiritual forces of the religion. For example, in most Muslim countries, amulets are worn as a magical protection against danger. These amulets usually contain verses from the Qur'an, which is considered to be the source of their power. Such practices persist despite the prohibition against them in the official religion.”

"The Phenomenon Of Religion" by M. Momen [Book Review], p387-389

It is often the case that as a religion, or a set of religious ideas, moves from one culture to another, such as when the Theosophists brought Indian spirituality to the West, its character can change. In this case the strict, teacher-student, lifelong disciplines of the East were decimated into what is now known broadly as the New Age. This is a mix between one scholarly interpretation of religious beilefs, and its interpretation within a new culture.

Daoism, a 2400-year old atheist Chinese religion has to do with cause-and-effect in a cosmic sense. But like other religions, the masses mix it with a multitude of superstitions.

“Daoism as a religion has, over many years, absorbed many 'folk' beliefs as well as aspects of Buddhism and Confucianism. Consequently, there is much to do with spirits, sorcery, exorcism, fortune-telling, the promotion of amulets and talismans and geomancy. For example, a common form of geomancy that has, in recent years, become very popular in the West is feng shui (wind and water).”

"Encyclopedia of New Religions" by Prof. Christopher Partridge, p217

Scholarly Religion

Religion is frequently top-down and mostly a religion at its core is best considered to be the teachings of its teachers and the ideals of its idealists. Taking Buddhism as an example; what the elders and educated of Buddhism teach is misunderstood and misapplied by much of those who call themselves Buddhists. What the mass followers say is different to what the religion actually is. There is no simple solution other than to look at each religion and religious group one by one to determine what the religion is.

During Protestant and Reformation eras, wide-ranging top-down changes were forced onto the grassroots of the Christian religion in the UK. The populace would tend to profess the formal beliefs when told to, but otherwise go one believing what they'd believed before. Their beliefs changed only slowly, and nearly always combining the old and the new however contradictory this was. The same happened with Celtic Christianity - a fusion of existing beliefs with an aggressive religion forcing top-down changes from Rome, but never managing to eradicate old folk beliefs.

Theologians will tend to take the side of the 'professionals', and stick to the more formal, written, codified forms of religion. They will consider other elements, not discussed in literature, to be anomolies, sinful, and mistaken. Anthropologists will, more usefully, examine the actual practices of the people on the ground, and will therefore sometimes report that a religion of a local area is one thing, while theologians say it is another.

Conclusion

It is frequently difficult to say if a religion is the beliefs of most of its followers or if a religion is what is preached by its scholars. Frequently the formal doctrine of a religion contradicts what the popular beliefs are of most of its adherents. The mean grassroots of a religion is nearly always watered-down, mixed-up, confused and ignorant. It is often pick-and-mixed from multiple sources, cultural traditions and folklore all blended haphazardly with the scholarly portion of the religion. Formal and developed scholarly religion, such as Christian philosophy or Muslim Sufi philosophy, is often complex, more complete, demanding to study and frequently convoluted as the religions' scholars debate its weakspots and difficult spots. The more difficult the area of study of a religion, the more maze-making its scholars will do in attempts to explain away irrationality. The more complex and difficult the intellectual aspect of a religion, the more the lowly masses will fail to comprehend or implement it.

You will need to engage the grassroots religion or the scholarly religion in different circumstances. Frequently you will need to address the cultural beliefs to the religions' followers, who are less intelligent, and address more scholarly and political concerns to the religions' leaders. A "religion" is a contradictory mix of both what the leaders say the religion is, plus what the mass of the actual followers believe. The difference between the intellectual top of a religion is normally quite an opposite to the grassroots bottom of the same religion!