I recently learned about this article via the Pagan Studies email list from the American Academy of Religion. Chas Clifton, Pagan scholar and editor of The Pomegranate posted a link to the article as well as other responses to Rabbi Wolpe. In his response to the criticism, Rabbi Wolpe claimed he was talking about ancient paganism; however, the claim seems to fall flat for several reasons.
In the second paragraph of the article, he writes, “Most ancient pagan belief systems were built around ritual and magic, coercive practices intended to achieve a beneficial result.” Coercive practices? Most anthropologists classify shamanic magic and healing rituals as sympathetic magic, rituals or spells performed on an object that will reflect on the patient. Rituals include offering food or drink or objects and petitioning for intervention from the Divine. I do not understand how ancient magical practices could be labeled as coercive when the deity was understood to hold power.
Wolpe titles his article “The Return of the Pagans,” implying that he is referring to contemporary Paganism, big P, as it is written in the literature. Throughout the article, Wolpe uses pagan and paganism; the lowercase versions are often utilized to identify ancient pagan practices, placing them under a kind of academic umbrella. Here, I will use the lowercase pagan when referring to Wolpe’s examples and Pagan or Paganism when referring to actual contemporary Pagan philosophy and practices.
It appears that everything negative and wrong with our current culture Wolpe identifies as being pagan. He identifies aspects of people’s personalities as being Pagan, aspects which many Pagans would find offensive. While it is true that Heathenry has become popular among Neo-Nazi and white nationalist groups, the Q-Anon Shaman cited as an example in the article, Wolpe mentioning anti-Semitic tropes as being pagan is offensive to many. Judith Bulter, a well-known Jewish theologian, was a frequent co-author of Goddess follower Carol Christ. This blanket identification of anti-Semitism and Paganism is, in my view, patently untrue.
“Hug a tree or a dollar bill, and the pagan in you shines through,” Wolpe writes. I will ignore the hug a tree comment because, yes, that is a kind of Pagan. But when Wolpe writes about hugging a dollar bill, he references Donald Trump and Elon Musk, citing their greed and ego. While I agree that commercialism has definitely dug its claws into Paganism, and this should be addressed in academic and popular circles, many Pagan teachings are anti-consumerism. Not because Pagans do not like to purchase items for their craft but because they are aware of the effects of consumerism on the planet and developing nations.
Wolpe writes, “This worship of the body—of beauty, which is another form of power—is a pagan inheritance.” This is true; acceptance of all body shapes and forms is part of contemporary Paganism, especially for people whose bodies don’t conform to conventional standards of beauty, such as those who are disabled. However, Wolpe doesn’t write about this veneration of the body in all its forms. Instead, he admonishes and blames paganism for the Instagramization of culture, the plethora of cosmetic surgeries, drugs, and a glut of beauty products to reach a level of physical perfection. All this being a precursor, he claims, to the eventual development of “designer babies.” I must say I hadn’t heard or read that term in years; the last time being in an article on gene therapy and removing predispositions for cancers or genetic diseases.
Wolpe also takes issue with some parts of Pagan theology and philosophy, which place humans as part of the animal kingdom and not above it. Most Pagan authors I have read do this to underscore humanity’s role as a steward of the Earth and not as its master. However, Wolpe takes this idea to say that pagans are for treating people the way we do animals when they are injured. That we shoot horses when they are injured so why would we view a sick child with more compassion? He takes a small part of an interview with Peter Singer, writing that,
For those who believe that the pagan outlook has no consequences, Singer illustrated the radical difference between believing that human beings are created in the image of God and believing that they are animals like other animals.
Wolpe is referring to a part of an interview where Singer discussed allowing life support to be removed from a child. However, there is no context to this, which I believe is by design. Wolpe implies that pagans believe that parents should be allowed to end their child’s life if it “is not one that is going to be a benefit for the child or for their family.” This is clearly a strawman argument, much like that of Republicans when discussing late-term abortions. The parent is presented as someone lazy and heartless rather than someone who is learning their child may never live without pain, nor will they ever wake up after an accident. They must then consider what is the best option for the mental and emotional health of the child and the family.
The few times Wolpe does discuss ancient paganism, he again fundamentally misunderstands how it was practiced in the ancient world. He writes, “The virtue that falls furthest in the pagan pantheon of traits is humility,” stating that when people embraced humility and sexual restraint, Rome fell. These paragraphs make me question whether Wolpe has ever read Greek mythology, which contains many cautionary tales of what befalls those who claim to be better than the gods or turn their backs on the people. As the slave said to Caeser, “You’re only human.”
Wolpe ends his article by stating that “Monotheism, at its best, acknowledges genuine humility about our inability to know what God is and what God wishes.” I could only wonder where he got that idea; having been raised Catholic, I was told for years that we knew exactly what God thought was right and wrong. We knew what God wanted us to do. Unfortunately, this was mostly about who God wanted us to hate and what rights God didn’t want women to have. Monotheistic religions such as Christianity were able to maintain control because of fear of retribution in the afterlife for going against what the Church said was God’s will.
Many Pagan scholars have responded to Wolpe’s article; Holli Emore, the Executive Director of Cherry Hill Seminary, reached out to hold a Zoom call with him where they could engage in open dialogue. Two Pagan scholars at Harvard Divinity have said he offered to meet with them once classes resumed. Chas Clifton wrote his own response, where he pointed out that Pagans are once again fighting negative tropes, this time from academic sources, and that we must define ourselves and not let others do it for us.
As I read Wolpe’s article, I found myself having to frequently stop and make notes on the side of the paper, such as when he called Trump the avatar of paganism, his ignorance of how Pagans view the body, and their understanding of its sacrality. I could not believe that someone who is lecturing at Harvard Divinity would write so publicly about a major religious movement in the United States and not even bother to do a Wikipedia search on the topic. However, as I read the responses from other Pagans, such as Clifton, I felt that the reason Wolpe was so comfortable with writing what he did in the Atlantic is that Pagans often shy away from these mainstream publications.
I believe that we need to be more open with these and other mainstream publications to make it known that there is a vocal group of Pagan scholars who can be called upon to refute such claims in the public sphere. While Pagans will read the responses of Clifton and others, most Atlantic readers won’t; they will read Wolpe’s article, and that will be it. When there is open talk of civil war and the walking back of protections for women to make their own health decisions, we cannot lose the ground it took us so long to gain.
Link to the article from The Atlantic by Rabbi Wolpe:
https://archive.is/KXMeX#selection-963.0-963.114
Chas Clifton’s response:
Giovanna Parmigiani and Dan McKennon from Harvard Divinity School wrote for the Wild Hunt: