THE DYNAMICS OF CULTURAL PLURALISM AND WORSHIP PATTERNS

Abstract

"All things with God a changeless aspect wear" says Goethe as quoted in the 'caption of G. van der Leeuw's book, Religion in Essence and Manifestation. It does seem that religion is  experienced as bringing down to changeable man the experience of the immutable world. In the much-loved words of the Isa Upanisad, 'isa oasyam idam saruam yat kiiica jagatyiim jagat-
"whatever moves in this moving world must be covered by the Lord." The reality to which religion refers us is the 'unchangeable,' whether it be conceived as pure Transcendence, or as first Mover,
or as divine Immanence, and it comes to man as a remedy for the sickness of constant evolution. The religious experience of mankind is thus generally a medium through which man holds to the permanent, the eternal and unchangeable, which he believes lies behind all the experiences of change. "All things with God a changeless aspect wear."