23 Quotes by Paul Harrison

All things were interconnected with a sacred bond. Nature was in a process of constant change, using the universal substance to mould now a horse, then when the horse dies a tree, then a man. It was crucial, Marcus believed, for us to realize that we were part of the universe and to be in harmony with it:.

One of the most popular hypotheses of cosmic origins, the inflation theory of Allan Guth and Andrei Linde, predicts that our local universe is just one of a foam of universes bubbling into existence from a dense energy field. The totality of all these universes, the greater Universe, or Multiverse, or Omniverse, would in fact be truly infinite and eternal.

The Tao te Ching never speaks of a transcendent God or God. Its central focus is the Tao or Way, conceived of as a mysterious and numinous unity, infinite and eternal, underlying all things and sustaining them. But there is a profound religious reverence and respect for the Tao, and an acceptance of the need for human submission to the Tao. In this sense the Tao is discussed much in the same spirit as Pantheism discusses the awesomeness of the Universe.

But many atheists have been uncomfortable with the purely negative. Many have had a profoundly spiritual or religious awe and humility towards nature and the Universe. As Carl Sagan wrote in Pale Blue Dot: “A religion old or new, that stressed the magnificence of the universe as revealed by modern science, might be able to draw forth reserves of reverence and awe hardly tapped by the conventional faiths. Sooner or later, such a religion will emerge.

Again and again pantheists have arisen from within all three religions, sometimes disguising their views carefully enough to avoid persecution – sometimes being condemned as heretics.