Shamanism, Polytheism and Animism
World Scripture takes a universal outlook in emphasizing the common features of all religions; nevertheless religions also have their unique characteristics and emphases. The following six topics treat specific religious traditions, pointing out their unique features and Father Moon’s teachings about them. It cannot be overemphasized that any treatment of a religion’s unique features in no way exhausts its spiritual riches or detracts from its universal qualities that join in common witness to the one God and one Reality. Not all the religions are treated here; just those on which Father Moon has commented upon out of his own experience. Korea is a religiously pluralistic country, with roots in Shamanism, Buddhism and Confucianism; it has a large and vibrant Christian community and also a growing Muslim minority.
Father Moon’s views on Shamanism are largely the result of his experience with the homegrown Korean variety. Shamanism remains strong in rural Korea, where its practitioners, called mudangs, are largely women.
Their ability to communicate with spirits can be impressive. During his years in America, he befriended Eskimo shamans in Alaska and Native Americans in Brazil and Paraguay.
Father Moon is very aware of the reality of the spirit world and the spiritual discipline required to be an effective channel to that world. For this reason, he does not cast dogmatic condemnations on Shamanism and Animism in the manner of Bible-centered Christians. Rather, he regards Shamanism as an authentic stage, albeit a low one, on the path of humankind’s spiritual development.
Notable also is Father Moon’s teaching that Shamanism and polytheism are “servant of servant” religions, whose original objects of worship were fallen angels. This can be seen rather clearly in Greek and Hindu mythology, where the gods’ amorous activities with earthly women are of a piece with Satan’s seduction of Eve at the Human Fall.
Nevertheless, God still taught through these forms by empowering devoted practitioners to rise above their gods and attain a higher moral plane. In this way, human beings transcended the position of servants’ servants to become their masters, thus opening a higher stage of religious development. Passages from Hinduism and Shinto illustrate how these traditions were thus elevated over time to form higher religions.