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New Age describes a broad movement characterized by alternative approaches to traditional Western culture. This New Age movement is particularly concerned with spiritual exploration, holistic medicine, and mysticism, yet no rigid boundaries actually exist, making the term point to its own perspective on history, philosophy, religion, spirituality, medicine, music, science, and lifestyle. New Age has many attributes of a new, emerging religion.The term "New Age" at one time, perhaps in the late 1960s, referred to a movement started by the followers of Alice Bailey's ideas concerning the coming New Age. Since then New Age has broadened into its current meaning. No longer a single belief system, it is an aggregate of beliefs and practices (syncretism) which are drawn from earlier myths established religions and new religious movements. Inside this movement are individuals using a "do-it-yourself" approach, while other groups formulate coherent belief systems resembling traditional religion.
Some people, including neo-pagans, who are frequently labeled as New Age, might find the term inappropriate since it appears to link them with beliefs and practices they do not espouse. Others think that the classification of beliefs and movements under New Age has little added value due to the vagueness of the term. Instead, they prefer to refer directly to the individual beliefs and movements. Indeed, use by religious conservatives, scientists and others has caused the term "New Age" to sometimes have a derogatory connotation.
1 History
Although the idea of a new age has clear precedents in JewThe word Jew is used in a wide number of ways, but generally refers to either a follower of the Jewish faith, a child of a Jewish mother, or a member of the Jewish culture or ethnicity. This article discusses the term as describing an ethnic group; for aish apocalypticism, New Age people may derive their beliefs from religious and philosophical traditions originally outside the Western mainstream, including the occultFor other uses of this term, see occult (disambiguation). The word occult comes from Latin occultus (hidden), referring to the knowledge of the secret' or 'knowledge of the hidden' and often meaning 'knowledge of the supernatural', as opposed to 'knowledg, some sects of HinduismThis article is about the Hindu religion; for other meanings of the word, see Hindu (disambiguation). Aum, the most sacred syllable and quintessential symbol of Hinduism, represents the first manifestation of the unmanifest Brahman. Hinduism Santana Dharm, TaoismFor other uses of the words "tao" and "dao", see Tao (disambiguation) and Dao (disambiguation). Taoism or Daoism is usually described as an Asian philosophy and religion, although it is also said to be neither but rather an aspect of Chinese wisdom. The T or BuddhismTian Tan Buddha statue in Hong Kong, remind followers to practice right living. Buddhism is a religion and philosophy based on the teachings of Siddhrtha Gautama ( Sanskrit; in Pli, Siddhattha Gotama , who lived between approximately 563 and 483 BCE.. Most of the phenomena listed below under See also can be traced to less common practices in Europe and North America over the past few centuries. For example the Theosophical Society of the late 19th century espoused many principles, whose roots may be linked to present time New Age ideas:
Though many of these terms are associated with Eastern religions, they should not be considered as being identical with the concepts and practices of those religions. Ancient traditions such as Hinduism, Taoism, and Buddhism can hardly be referred to as New Age religions.
The New Age movement emerged as a disorganized coalition out of the 1960s counter-culture movement or " happening" in North America and Europe, perhaps only tangentially informed by Alice Bailey's neo-theosophy. In a manner similar to the grassroots political and lifestyle movements of that time, New Agers dissatisfied with the then widely accepted norms and beliefs of western society offered new interpretations from a spiritual viewpoint of science, history, and the religion of the Judeo- Christian establishment. An important center for the New Age movement during the twentieth century was the Findhorn Foundation in northern Scotland. These recent populist origins may indeed help characterize the New Age approach, which emphasizes an individual's choice in spiritual matters; the role of personal intuition and experience over societally sanctioned expert opinion; and an experiential, rather than primarily empirical, definition of reality. Thus, reality is considered to be illuminated by the infinite number of spectral hues emanating from an experiential , faith-driven, subjective viewpoint; which leads us, finally, to a general principle: the New Age coexists and correlates within each individual's fundamental paradigm shift.
The New Age is often called the Age of Aquarius. This comes from astrology, a practice long associated with the New Age. The name of the Solar Age for a period in history is determined by the constellation appearing over the horizon during sunrise on the
first day of Spring (around the 21st March in the modern Gregorian calendar). Each sign on the zodiac belt shifts an average of one degree every 70 years. If we liken the zodiac belt to a circle with each of the 12 signs occupying 30 degrees, then one sign will require 2,100 years to shift along the belt and give way to the next. The beginning of the solar age of Pisces coincided approximately with the birth of Jesus Christ at approximately 1 BCE ; and is due to end at around 2600 CE to be replaced by the solar age of Aquarius.
