The metaphysical movement in the United States is a set of idealist religious groups that emerged in the 19th century, several of them in New England. The movement encompasses Christian Science and several groups belonging to the New Thought family, such as the Unity Church, Church of Divine Science and Religious Science.[1] It may also be defined to include other movements such as Theosophy.[2] The term metaphysical in this context has little or nothing to do with the branch of philosophy known as metaphysics.[3]

The groups have in common that physical and mental health, and prosperity in general, are attainable by forming the right relationship with, or understanding of, the underlying principle of the universe, referred to variously as Mind, Divine Mind, Truth, Principle, God, the Absolute, Life, Love, Spirit, Soul. Humankind was seen as a perfect reflection of Divine Mind, and primarily (or, for Christian Scientists, entirely) spiritual in nature, rather than material.[4]

The father of the movement is generally identified as "mental healer" Phineas Parkhurst Quimby (1802–1866), a clockmaker in Portland, Maine, who began practicing mesmerism/hynosis in the late 1830s. By the 1850s he had 500 patients a year, and come to realize that the cures he appeared able to effect were caused by suggestion, rather than mesmerism.

Notes

edit
  1. ^ Meredith B. McGuire, Ritual Healing in Suburban America, Rutgers University Press, 1988, p. 79: "Drawing eclectically from several strands of thought, including Eastern religions, mesmerism, and transcendentalism, the metaphysical movement first emerged in the middle of the nineteenth century. The teaching of Phineas P. Quimby served to articulate the movement's philosophy and give it its distinctive emphasis upon healing. The main strand of this movement was loosely organized into an association called "New Thought," which spawned such groups as the Church of Divine Science, the Church of Religious Science, and the Unity School of Christianity. ... The most familiar offshoot of the metaphysical movement, however, is Christian Science, which was based upon a more extreme interpretation of metaphysical healing than that of the New Thought groups."
  2. ^ Dell DeChant, "World Religions Made in the U.S.A.: Metaphysical Communities—Christian Science and Theosophy", in Jacob Neusner (ed.), World Religions in America, Westminster John Knox Press, 2003.
  3. ^ John K. Simmons, "Christian Science and American Culture", in Timothy Miller (ed.), America's Alternative Religions, SUNY Press, 1995, p. 61: "The broad descriptive term 'metaphysical' is not used in a manner common to the trained philosopher. Instead, it denotes the primacy of Mind as the controlling factor in human experience. At the heart of the metaphysical perspective is the theological/ontological affirmation that God is perfect Mind and human beings, in reality, exist in a state of eternal manifestation of that Divine Mind."
  4. ^ Simmons 1995, p. 61.


movement emerged :2. Jacob Neusner, Introduction to World Religions, Abingdon Press, 2010, pp. 313–314:

"The American Metaphysical Movement ... emerged in the late nineteenth century from a variety of different strands of religious thought and practice, chiefly the mental healing (or Mind Cure) movement, Spiritualism, the Western Esoteric tradition, New England Transcendentalism, popular religious idealism and export forms of Hinduism and Buddhism. ... Rooted in the socially volatile world of America's late nineteenth-century urban culture, its earliest manifestations were groups such as Theosophy and Christian Science. Later manifestations include Divine Science, Religious Science, Unity, the International New Thought Alliance ..."



(Philosophers studying metaphysics examine issues such as existence, freewill and determinism, causation, space and time.) Here the term refers to a set of idealist belief systems – encompassing Christian Science and various New Thought groups – that emerged in the United States in the 19th century. Charles S. Braden wrote (Spirits in Rebellion: The Rise and Development of New Thought, Southern Methodist University Press, 1963, pp. 4–5):



Metaphysical (Christian Science–New Thought) family

edit

Note

edit

The word metaphysical in metaphysical family or metaphysical movement has little or nothing to do with the branch of philosophy known as metaphysics. (Philosophers studying metaphysics examine issues such as existence, freewill and determinism, causation, space and time.) Here the term refers to a set of idealist belief systems – encompassing Christian Science and various New Thought groups – that emerged in the United States in the 19th century. Charles S. Braden wrote (Spirits in Rebellion: The Rise and Development of New Thought, Southern Methodist University Press, 1963, pp. 4–5):

Mesmerism had developed as a therapeutic method; but it was in America that it was invested with religious significance and gave rise to a complex of religious faiths varying from one another in significant ways, but all agreeing upon the central fact that healing and for that matter every good thing is possible through a right relationship with the ultimate power in the Universe, Creative Mind – called God, Principle, Life, Wisdom, and a dozen other names by one group or another – since man in his real nature is essentially divine.

This broad complex of religions is sometimes described by the rather general term "metaphysical," because its major reliance is not on the physical, but on that which is beyond the physical.

It was the Portland healer, P. P. Quimby, who seems to have started it all, around the middle of the nineteenth century. It was a woman, Mary Baker Eddy, who, healed of a serious ailment by Quimby, first made a religion of it, produced a scripture, Science and Health, and is regarded by her followers as the final revelator of Truth. Where but in America could such a movement have arisen?

The general movement has proliferated in many directions. Two main streams seem most vigorous: one is called Christian Science; the other, which no single name adequately describes, has come rather generally to be known as New Thought.

Sources

edit

Selection of sources classifying Christian Science as part of the metaphysical (Christian Science–New Thought) family/movement:

For the heading, "Metaphysical (Christian Science–New Thought) family":
1. James R. Lewis, Legitimating New Religions, Rutgers University Press, 2003, p. 94:

"Groups in the metaphysical (Christian Science–New Thought) tradition ... usually claim to have discovered spiritual laws which, if properly understood and applied, transform and improve the lives of ordinary individuals, much as technology has transformed society."

2. Jacob Neusner, Introduction to World Religions, Abingdon Press, 2010, pp. 313–314:

"The American Metaphysical Movement ... emerged in the late nineteenth century from a variety of different strands of religious thought and practice, chiefly the mental healing (or Mind Cure) movement, Spiritualism, the Western Esoteric tradition, New England Transcendentalism, popular religious idealism and export forms of Hinduism and Buddhism. ... Rooted in the socially volatile world of America's late nineteenth-century urban culture, its earliest manifestations were groups such as Theosophy and Christian Science. Later manifestations include Divine Science, Religious Science, Unity, the International New Thought Alliance ..."

3. Frank Spencer Mead, Samuel S. Hill, and Craig Atwood, Handbook of Denominations in the United States, Abingdon Press, 2010 (13th edition), p. 354:

classifies Christian Science as one of the "Esoteric, Spiritualist and New Thought bodies."

4. Gail M. Harley, "Church of Christ, Scientist," in J. Gordon Melton and Martin Baumann (eds.), Religions of the World, ABC-CLIO, 2010, p. 671:

"Christian Science is a metaphysical religion with a spiritual healing component ..."

5. J. Gordon Melton, Melton's Encyclopedia of American Religions, Gale Research International, 2009 (8th edition), p. 867ff:

classifies Christian Science and New Thought as part of the "Christian Science–Metaphysical" group within the "Western Esoteric Family."

6. John A. Saliba, Understanding New Religious Movements, Rowman Altamira, 2003, p. 26:

"The Christian Science-Metaphysical Family. This family, known also as 'New Thought' in academic literature, stresses the need to understand the functioning of the human mind in order to achieve the healing of all human ailments."

7. Philip Jenkins, Mystics and Messiahs: Cults and New Religions in American History, Oxford University Press, 2000, pp. 7, 53–54:

"By 1900, the most active of the new sects included apocalyptic movements like the Watch Tower Society (later Jehovah's Witnesses) and the Adventists, and metaphysical healing sects like Christian Science and the various schools of New Thought. ...

"Throughout the first half of the century, the primary target of cult critics was Christian Science, together with the associated mind-cure movements generally known as New Thought. These are the original cults in the modern sense of the word. ... Christian Science and New Thought both emerged from a common intellectual background in mid-nineteenth-century New England, and they shared many influences from an older mystical and magical fringe, including Swedenborgian teachings, Mesmerism, and Transcendentalism."

8. Ann Taves, Fits, Trances, and Visions, Princeton University Press, 1999, p. 212:

"The metaphysical movement that gave rise to Christian Science and, eventually, New Thought had its origins in the thought and practice of Phineas P. Quimby and four of his students, Mary Baker Eddy, Annetta and Julius Dresser, and Warren Felt Evans."

9. Wouter J. Hanegraaff, New Age Religion and Western Culture, Brill Academic Publishers, 1996, p. 487:

"Mary Baker Eddy's church of Christian Science is based on New Thought principles ...," though other pupils of Quimby's played a greater role in disseminating New Thought ideas.

10. John K. Simmons, "Christian Science and American Culture," in Timothy Miller (ed.), America's Alternative Religions, SUNY Press, 1995, p. 61:

"While members, past and present, of the Christian Science movement understandably claim Mrs. Eddy's truths to be part of a unique and final religious revelation, most outside observers place Christian Science in the metaphysical family of religious organizations ..."

11. Meredith B. McGuire, "Traditional Metaphysical Movements," Ritual Healing in Suburban America, Rutgers University Press, 1988, p. 79:

"Drawing eclectically from several strands of thought, including Eastern religions, mesmerism, and transcendentalism, the metaphysical movement first emerged in the middle of the nineteenth century. The teaching of Phineas P. Quimby served to articulate the movement's philosophy and give it its distinctive emphasis upon healing. The main strand of this movement was loosely organized into an association called "New Thought," which spawned such groups as the Church of Divine Science, the Church of Religious Science, and the Unity School of Christianity. ... The most familiar offshoot of the metaphysical movement, however, is Christian Science, which was based upon a more extreme interpretation of metaphysical healing than that of the New Thought groups. ... Christian Science is unlike New Thought and other metaphysical movements of that era in that Mary Baker Eddy successfully arrogated to herself all teaching authority, centralized decision-making and organizational power, and developed the movement's sectarian character."

12. Charles S. Braden, Spirits in Rebellion: The Rise and Development of New Thought, Southern Methodist University Press, 1963, pp. 14, 26:

"New Thought and Christian Science are [not] identical, for they differ significantly at a number of points; but ... they are both facets of the same general thought movement, sometimes described as the Metaphysical Movement."

"Perhaps the thing that is really important about New Thought – or, more broadly, the whole 'metaphysical' movement, which includes Christian Science as well as New Thought and other developments also – is that it represents a merging of the two emphases [healing and an ideology/theology that explains the healing's source]."