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The Passion of the Western Mind

The Passion of the Western Mind: Understanding the Ideas That Have Shaped Our World View
The Passion of the Western Mind.jpg
Cover of the first edition, featuring Thomas Cole's painting, The Architect's Dream
Author Richard Tarnas
Country United States
Language English
Subject Philosophy
Published 1991 (Ballantine Books)
Media type Print (hardcover and paperback)
Pages 544
ISBN

The Passion of the Western Mind: Understanding the Ideas That Have Shaped Our World View is a 1991 book by cultural historian Richard Tarnas.

In The Passion of the Western Mind, Tarnas argues that the movement from the Greek and Christian world views, through modernity and to postmodernism can be seen as a natural and dialectical unfolding of a collective mind or psyche. Tarnas outlines the intellectual-cultural development of the modern world view from its origins in Greek and Judaeo-Christian mythologies. He then argues that with the advent of postmodernism, the modern world is in a serious spiritual crisis, which manifests as the global ecological crisis. He proposes that a potential resolution, which he calls the participatory framework, has also been in development in the West for centuries.

Tarnas first describes the ancient world view, in which the self is undifferentiated from the world-soul in a participation mystique. The rise of the great monotheistic religions began with the Axial age in the sixth century BCE. In monotheistic religion, god is transcendent. The cosmos became a de-sacralized object, which is no longer imbued with divinity and meaning. Mankind began to see the world as an objective reality which can be studied by science and manipulated with technology. The human subject, on the other hand, became empowered, liberated, and autonomous.


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