Golden Bough, The

By Frazer, James

Book Id: WPLBN0002954684
Format Type:
File Size: 1230.90 MB
Reproduction Date: 2009

Title:	Golden Bough, The
Author:	Frazer, James
Volume:
Language:	English
Subject:	Non-fiction, Religion
Collections:	Audio Books Collection, Golden Bough, The
Historic Publication Date:	1922
Publisher:	LibriVox Audio Books


Citation APA MLA Chicago Frazer, B. J. (1922). Golden Bough, The. Retrieved from http://gutenberg.cc/

Description
The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion is a wide-ranging comparative study of mythology and religion, written by Scottish anthropologist Sir James George Frazer (1854–1941). It offered a modernist approach, discussing religion dispassionately as a cultural phenomenon, rather than from a theological perspective. Its thesis is that old religions were fertility cults that centered around the worship of, and periodic sacrifice of, a sacred king. This king was the incarnation of a dying and reviving god, a solar deity who underwent a mystic marriage to a goddess of the earth, who died at the harvest, and was reincarnated in the spring. Frazer claims that this legend is central to almost all of the world's mythologies. The germ for Frazer's thesis was the pre-Roman priest-king at the fane of Nemi, who was ritually murdered by his successor. While most of Frazer's theories (such as those on the nature of magic) have subsequently been exploded, his influence on contemporaneus European literature was immense. (From Wikipedia)

Summary
Electronic recorded live performance of a reading

Excerpt
Religion