The Encyclopedia of World Religions

seasons and religion S 415

ple live in them. They do so, among other ways, by giving attention to seasons. The seasonal dimen sion of religion is often especially important for people like hunters, gatherers, and farmers, whose livelihood makes them aware of the rhythms of nature. One way religions pay attention to the seasons is by telling stories. A well-known story from the ancient Greeks tells about Kore or Persephone, who was abducted by Pluton and eventually had to spend six months a year below ground and six months above. Most people connect this story in some way with the seasons and the rhythms of plant life. A more visible way of celebrating the seasons is through public RITUALS . Public RITUALS often mark important points in the agricultural calendar. Two important S HINTO FESTIVALS take place at the time of planting in spring and harvesting in autumn. But the agricultural calendar is not always defined by spring and autumn. Two H INDU FESTIVALS , Dussehra and Divali, mark the end of the rainy season and the planting of winter crops. Still other seasonal festivals mark events in the solar year. The ancient Romans celebrated the rebirth of the sun at the time just after the winter solstice on December 25. European folklore pre serves memories of celebrations of the summer solstice on Midsummer Night’s Eve. During the summer, although not on a specific date, Native Americans on the Great Plains often celebrated Sun Dances ( see N ATIVE A MERICAN RELIGIONS ). Many religions mark the beginning of the N EW Y EAR , although the dates on which they do so vary considerably. One common feature of New Year festivals is excess. Some scholars connect this excess with a disappearance of the old order, fol lowed at the end of the festival by the establish ment of a new order. The conditions of modern life often distract people from the rhythms of the seasons. Neverthe less, many rituals common in North America have a seasonal dimension, even if it is not always very apparent. The J EWISH FESTIVALS of P ASSOVER , Sha vuot, and Sukkot correspond to important times in the agricultural year of ancient Canaan. C HRISTMAS

THE TEXT OF THE HEBREW SCRIPTURES One characteristic of the Hebrew scriptures that may seem peculiar is the wide variety of versions that exist for many of the books. The text that Jews consider authoritative, also used by Christians, is known as the Masoretic text. That is because scholars known as Masoretes finally established it as authoritative around the year 1000 C . E . But there are also very different versions for many of the books. For example, the Samaritans have a version of the Torah, or Pentateuch, that differs consider ably from the Jewish version. The Greek text of the Hebrew scriptures known as the Septuagint con tains very different versions of the Latter Prophets, for example, the prophet Isaiah, as well as of some of the writings, such as Esther and Daniel. In the past people saw different versions of the Hebrew scriptures as corruptions of the origi nal text. Discoveries of ancient manuscripts such as the D EAD S EA S CROLLS have tended to change that view. They seem to show that for many of the Hebrew scriptures there never was an origi nal text, written by a single author, from which all the others diverged. Instead, various people seem to have collected various materials together under the same name, for example, Isaiah. As time went on, different religious communities established standardized versions of these books. Further reading: Lawrence Boadt, Reading the Old Testament: An Introduction (New York: Paulist Press, 1984); The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls in English, Geza Vermes, trans., new ed. (New York: Penguin Books, 2004); The New Oxford Annotated NRSV Bible with the Apocrypha, 3d ed., Michael D. Coogan et al., eds. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001); Tanakh: The Holy Scriptures, The New JPS Translation According to the Traditional Hebrew Text (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1985); Joseph Telushkin, Biblical Literacy: The Most Important People, Events, and Ideas of the Hebrew Bible (New York: William Morrow, 1997).

seasons and religion Religions celebrate envi ronments, make them meaningful, and help peo