II. Punctuation marks in religious histories--examples of direct links to tectonism

II. Punctuation marks in religious histories--examples of direct links with tectonism

Eric R. Force

(second of a series addressing religion on the weblog Tectonic Environments of Ancient Cultures,  at https://tectonic-culture.blogspot.com/  )

Introduction

In my last posting (of 12/24/18) I showed a remarkable spatial correspondence of origination sites of today's big religions with plate-tectonic boundaries.  Some critical response thus far to this posting holds that a culture’s religion is inseparable from the whole of its  cultural aspects, and therefore that my posting basically treats a cultural phenomenon.  And so some of these responders familiar with my book (Force 2015) say that the correspondence of tectonic boundaries and origination of religion simply echoes the cultural correspondence I demonstrate there.  I see that this is a question that I myself have made more difficult. 

Therefore this post is required to show that these variables—culture and religion—are separable based on people’s elemental responses to tectonic activity. Below I list cases where religious responses are sufficiently well described to link them definitively to tectonic events. 

I have listed only responses to earthquakes rather than including volcanic eruptions, as these can be quite different.  Earthquakes generally seem totally other-worldly and unexpected, so that religious response begins at the event, whereas people living near a volcano are generally aware of that, and religious practice consequently focuses on pre- and syn-eruption protection (and in some cases volcano veneration).  These are numerous and persuasive; volcanic ties with religion have been catalogued by Chester and Duncan (2007),  consisting of at least 41 examples, 25 after 1850 and 16 before.  To their comprehensive compilation I can add only a few (Oviedo 1529, Hamilton 1776, Elson 2007, Barnes in press). 

Enumerating direct earthquake-religious links

The list below documents the religious responses I’m aware of to earthquakes, ranging from antiquity to the modern world.  I’m particularly weak on the medieval era.   Most pre-modern (and some modern) earthquakes have insufficiently recorded and preserved cultural responses, whether secular or religious, so this list is just a sampling. Not included are those pre-modern religious events--such as death of a prophet—accompanied by earthquakes, as these were easily manufactured after the fact to maximize impact.  However, one such link is included in which a religion’s appeal was changed.  Also omitted are creation myths that involve earthquakes.  Tsunami are included regardless of origin.  The listed links vary from profoundly religious to practically incidental.  In a few remarkable items the link is directly to ancient fault activity rather than to earthquakes per se. 

Pre-1300 BC: Mycenae, unusual cultic focus on recently formed fault scarp (Force and Rutter, in press)

Ca. 750 BC: an earthquake predicted by Amos (1:1) began the entire earthquake theophany of zealous prophets (Freedman and Welch 1994), described in some detail in my following post.

8^th to 4^th cent. BC: Delphi episodic gas release with active faulting as basis of veneration (Stewart and Piccardi 2017)

5^th cent. BC: Ephesus temple sited on active fault scarp with votive (Stewart and Piccardi 2017)

4^th cent. BC: Cnidus (Turkey) as at Ephesus (Stewart and Piccardi 2017)

3^rd cent. BC:  Heiropolis (Turkey) priestly manipulation of fault-motion consequences (Stewart and Piccardi 2017)

Ca. AD 32: “Holy Land” death of Jesus, earthquake suggests divinity recognized outside Judaism (Matthew 27:51-54)

AD 60: Colossae, archangel appears in earthquake (Piccardi 2007)

AD 77 then 365-400: Kenchraea (Greece), earthquake-submerged port becomes Christian basilica, then that is abandoned due to recurrent submergence (Scranton 1978)

Ca. AD 100: Philippi (Turkey), earthquake releases Paul and Silas from prison, converts jailer (Acts 16: 26-31)

AD 410: Corinth,  earthquake destruction of “pagan” temples divert populace toward Christianity, now “official”  (Rothaus 1996)

AD 1157 and 1170: Syria, “holy land” sieges and battles between Crusaders and Moslems postponed by earthquakes, then influenced by damage (Raphael 2010)

AD 1257: Kamakura (Japan), rise of lotus sect spurred by earthquake (deBoer and Sanders 2005)

15^th cent. AD: New Zealand Maori belief systems shift with occupation patterns due to earthquakes and tsunami (McFadgen 2007)

ca. AD 1500: Italy, political manipulation of religious response to earthquakes (Belloc et al. 2016)

AD 1638, 1727, and 1755: New England, the Mathers both father and son use each of these three earthquakes to push religious purification (Rozario 2007)

AD 1755: Lisbon earthquake first blamed by clerics on impious populace, then reversed by Marquis de Pombal, meanwhile used by Voltaire to address question of God’s permitting evil (many authors e.g. de Boer and Sanders 2005; Hough and Bilham 2006, Robinson 2016)

AD 1786 Lituya Bay AK, some Tlingit clans form tectonically related religions. Largely in response to tsunami (Emmons 1911, Howell and Grant 2016)

AD 1812: New Madrid MO earthquake increases local religiousity, blamed by Tecumseh on Great Spirit (Rozario 2007 p. 57-9, Hough and Bilham 2006 p. 82-3)

AD 1812: Caracas, Bolivar describes priestly manipulation of earthquake damage (Robinson 2016)

AD 1855:  Edo (Japan), religious imagery of earthquake initiated (Robinson 2016)

AD 1883: Krakatoa tsunami sparked Islamic fundamentalist reform (Winchester 2003)

AD 1906: San Francisco, Christian Science revival after earthquake (Winchester 2006)

AD 1923: Kanto (Japan), changes in Shinto religion permitted militarism, exacerbated intolerance (Robinson 2016)

AD 2011: Christchurch (New Zealand), increase in religiousity after earthquake (Sibley and Bulbulia 2012)

So dozens of examples show direct linkages between earthquakes and religious responses, representing a wide range of time periods in different parts of the world.  It seems permissible to generalize that earthquakes are religious punctuation marks.  Indirect links between earthquakes and religion seem unnecessary when direct links are so numerous.   In several cases priests used earthquakes to manipulate the laity.  In several others the religion is reformed in some way, making origination of a new religion (as in my post of 12/24/18) quite plausible. 

This result is in accord with dozens of additional links between religious responses and volcanic eruptions (Chester and Duncan 2007).  Those links are apparently not in dispute. 

 In the modern world links between earthquake-prone environments and religiousity are so strong as to be reduced to statistics and even equations (Bentzen in press).  Indeed it seems quite possible to me that the link between tectonism and culture occurs via religious responses in a majority of cases.  In those cases religious response to tectonism is the horse that pulls cultures along behind.  Of course in the modern world political responses are also common.  I review some of these in Force 2015.
It seems time to consider the hypothesis that religious responses are the most potent drivers of cultural connections with tectonism.  In the next posts we will see what the religious connections actually look like in individual cultures. 

References

Barnes, G. L., in press, Ritualized beadstone in Kofun-period society: East Asia Journal, accessed at https://soas.academia.edu/GinaBarnes

Belloc, M., Drago, F., & Galbiati, R. 2016. Earthquakes, Religion, and Transition to Self-Government in Italian Cities: The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 131(4), 1875-̃1926.

Bentzen, J. S., in press, Acts of God?  Religiousity and natural disasters across subnational world districts:  The Economic Journal.

(accessed at http://web.econ.ku.dk/bentzen/BentzenReligiosityDisasters.pdf)

Chester, D. K. and Duncan, A. M. 2007. Geomythology, theodicy, and the continuing relevance of religious worldviews in response to volcanic eruptions. In Living Under the Shadow, edited by J. Grattan and R. Torrence, p. 203-224:  Walnut Creek, Left Coast Press.

deBoer, J. Z. and Sanders, D. T. 2005. Earthquakes in Human History. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Elson, M. D. et al. 2007, Living with the volcano—the 11^th century AD eruption of Sunset Crater, in Living Under the Shadow, edited by J. Grattan and R. Torrence,  107-132: Walnut Creek: Left Coast Press

Emmons, G. T., 1911, Native Account of the Meeting between La Perouse and the Tlingit. American Anthropologist, Vol. 13, No. 2 (Apr.-Jun 1911), pp. 294-298.

Force, E. R., 2015, Impact of tectonic activity on ancient civilizations—recurrent shakeups, tenacity, resilience, and change: Lexington

Force, E. R. and Rutter, J. B., in press, Holocene fault scarps at Mycenae (Greece) and possible cultural ties:  Studi Micenei ed Egeo-Anatolici, nuovo serie #4

Freedman, D. N., and Welch, A., 1994, Amos’s earthquake and Israelite prophesy, in Scripture and other Artifacts, edited by M. D. Coogan, J. C. Exum, and L. E. Stager:  Louisville, Westminster John Knox

Hamilton, W. 1776. Campi Phlegraei:  London:Royal Society/Fabris.

Hough, S. E. and Bilham, R. G., 2006, After the Earth Quakes—elastic rebound on an urban planet:  Oxford

Howell, W. K. and Grant, K., 2016, The sixth wave: cultural responses to the giant tsunamis of Lituya Bay, Alaska:  Society of Applied Anthropology meeting abstracts, Vancouver, p. 167

McFadgen, B. 2007.  Hostile Shores: Catastrophic Events in Prehistoric New Zealand and Their Impact on Maori Coastal Communities. Auckland: Auckland University Press.

Oviedo, 1528, Description of Nicaragua.

Piccardi, L., 2007, The AD 60 Denizli earthquake and the apparition of archangel Michael at Colossai (Aegean Turkey), in L. Piccardi  and B. Masse, eds, Myth and Geology:  Special Publications of the Geological Society #273, p. 95-105.

Raphael, K. 2010, The impact of the 1157 and 1170 Syrian earthquakes on Crusader-Muslim politics and military affairs, in Sintubin, Stewart, Niemi, and Altinel, eds. Ancient Earthquakes:  Geological Society of America Special Paper 471, p. 59-66

Robinson, A. 2016, Earth-shattering Events—earthquakes, nations, and civilization:  Thames and Hudson

Rothaus, R. M. 1996. Earthquakes and temples in Late Antique Corinth, In Archaeoseismology, edited by S. Stiros and R E. Jones, 105-112:  Athens, Fitch Laboratory Occasional Paper 7 (British School at Athens).

Rozario, K. 2007. The culture of calamity: disaster and the making of modern America: Chicago, University of Chicago Press.

Scranton, R. 1978. Kenchreai--eastern port of Corinth I. Topography and architecture: Leiden: E. J. Brill.

Sibley, C. G, and Bulbulia, J., 2012, Faith after an earthquake--

-longitudinal study of religion and perceived health before and after the 2011 Christchurch New Zealand earthquake: PLoS ONE v. 7#12 p. 1-10 e49648

Stewart, I. S., and Piccardi, L., 2017, Seismic faults and sacred sanctuaries in Aegean antiquity:  Proceedings of the Geologists Association v. 128, p 711-721.

            Winchester, S. 2003. Krakatoa: New York, HarperCollins.

Winchester, S. 2006. A Crack in the Edge of the World: America and the Great California Earthquake of 1906:  New York, Harper.