Ebook: Spirituality without God: A Global History of Thought and Practice

Religions and spiritual traditions that deny the existence of God existed long before spiritual but not religious became the catchphrase of the day. Spirituality without God reminds us that the West does not hold patents on agnosticism or atheism and is the first survey of godless spirituality, beginning in ancient India, China and Greece. Peter Heehs explores systems of religion or philosophy that rejected the idea of a creative God, including Jainism and Buddhism, Confucianism and Daoism, and Epicureanism and Scepticism. We are shown Indian traditions that deny the existence of any sort of god, as well as philosophies of the Greco-Roman world that focused on enhancing quality of life rather than buying the favor of the gods through sacrifice or worship. Heehs shows how these traditions, rediscovered during the Renaissance, helped jump-start the European Enlightenment and opened the way to the atheism and agnosticism of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. This personal, inner, approach later became known as spirituality. Spirituality without God is an accessible counterbalance to theistic narratives that have dominated the field, as well as an introduction to modes of spiritual thought and practice that may appeal to people who have no interest in God.