Of Taboo, the Ages of Magic, Religion, and Science, and Of the Comparison of the three.

Well. I recently got a book out of the local library. It was entitled The Golden Bough, by one James George Frazer. Sir James George Frazer to be precise. He was a Scot who was educated at a variety of schools, got his diploma from Glasgow University, and then studied and took up residence at Trinity College in Cambridge, on the grounds that Scottish universities were not deemed prestigious enough to start an academic career from.

Anyway, he became, through one thing or another, interested in Anthropology, and wrote two major treatises on the topic. One, concerned with taboo and the rules by which society governs itself became known as the Golden Bough.

I'm only halfway through it so far, but I figured I'd go over my impressions so far. may do a more indepth review later on.

Anyway, it begins by explaining the source of the title. Which is taken from an old greek temple at Aricia. Legend (Supported by contempary sources) mantains that at this site, there was a sacred tree. And the High Priest of Dianna at Aricia was responsible for guarding this tree. And any escaped slave, coming upon this tree could take a bough from it. And this bough gave him the right to face the priest in single combat. And should he fail, well, he was dead. but should he slay the slayer, he became high priest, until he too was slain in turn.

From that beginning he goes on to claim that any society must undergo three ages. The age of Magic, in which Man believes he can control the natural by cantrips and superstition, and well, magic. This is then followed by the age of Religion, where Man, seeing that his attempts to control the natural through supernatural means fail, attributes control to greater supernatural beings, be they gods, spirits, daemons, devil, shades or such like. And these can be propitiated, and manipulated by certain actions, normally the domain of priests and such like. And then, as man begins to realize that those beings to which he attributes such control fail him as often as they do as he bids, they begin to looker deeper and begin to attribute control of the natural to natural processes. hence the age of Science. Much evidence is provided, and assuming his sources are cited accurately (And with him being a classically tutored victorian scientist this is probably the case) It is entirely possible that he is correct.

He then proceeds to describe the roles given to certain positions of authority in each age, and what happens to them as the ages shift. Such as Magicians from the age of science either forming a priesthood or being persecuted as things shift into religion. He also claims that Magic is simply Failed Science, and that as soon as magical procedures begin to work regularly they fall under the heading of science. It is on this basis, citing such examples as Alchemy gradually shifting into Chemistry, that he claims that as the Age of Religion gives way to the Age of Science, that he claims that many of the once persecuted magicians turn to scientists (or perhaps that this shift from magicians to scientists triggers the shift in the ages)

Several chapters are giving to the role of the king in early society, where the king often had a direct religious significance and was hemmed in by many rules dictating his life. An example of this still surviving at the time of his writing are the Japanese Emperors, and many examples are available in earlier societies.

So far it has been decidedly interesting, and I am now getting into the parts that detail beliefs in the mortality of the divine and the divinity of mortals, Examples of the former being Christ, Wodin, Osiris and such like, and examples of the latter being the Japanese Emperors, the Egyptian Pharoahs, and one or two obscure christian sects stamped out by the papal inquisition in the medieval ages...

All told, it be an interesting and well-though out work, and I would advocate its reading to any who are not religious fundamentalists... In fact, so far, the only issue I have with it is the assumption (common in Victorian Britain) that European Society was the most advanced, and the majority of the rest of the worlds cultures were best described as Savages. But barring that, I approve so far.