Ex.
Internal religion:
A. The emergence of inner knowing or awareness of things perceived as being spiritual that leads to a form of practice.
B. The internal dialogue and disciplined cognitive processes a person takes on/practices in an attempt to maintain alignment to a code of ethics and morality.
C. Neither
D. A combination of the two (please elaborate)
E. Something else
Please elaborate.
Internal religion is idealistic belief in anything. External religion is organized religion. Today's internal religion is highly centralized academia exemplified by: Ohnemus , Alexander . "A Girardian Case for PhDs by Publication." ResearchGate.net . www.researchgate.net/publication/373639875_A_Girardian_Case_for_PhDs_by_Publication. Accessed 5 Sep. 2023.
External religion relates to the outward performances and rituals undertaken by the believer within the context of their wider faith community, whether in a religious building or public space
internal religion is much more difficult to define as it is a subjective outworking of an individual in relation to their faith beliefs. This will involve values, behaviour and priorities (based on their understanding of the scriptures or tradition of their faith community) by which an individual live their live and make decisions. It will also prayers and meditations undertaken in their private space and time away from others.
Internal religion seems to mean religion related to inner being, while external religion refers to outward activities or meetings. Can we define them in this way?
Paul Kuei-chi Tseng I do agree internal religion is related to an inner knowing. I lean toward external religion as a source of what some people adopt as their truth, though it is from a source outside themselves. The operational definition was to be used as a baseline for aging adults to express how the presence of internal or external religion and their conception of it affects their ability to cope with aging. I think both internal and external religion will result in an outward expression or "practice" and the internal or external is related to the emergence or source of the truths adopted.
The attempt to forensically differentiate between what goes on inside a person (convictions, values, volitional impulses and emotional attachments) and the external manifestations (worship practices, spiritual disciplines, behavioural modifications etc) is not without its problems. When spirituality is healthy, there ought to be a harmonious balance between the two, otherwise 'religion' becomes either a kind of private delusion, or some kind of pragmatic public performance. In a relentlessly secular culture, intent on pursuing a strictly materialist agenda, there is an inevitable trend towards privatisation and internalisation, because the very expression of belief must be constrained in order to be acceptable to secular reductionism. This feeds into the kind of individualism where the very concept of community is eroded, relational connections are broken and we lose the historic systems of checks and balances which kept multicultural societies viable.
I agree with Kevin in that when spirituality is healthy, the two strike a balance, beneficial to the wellbeing of humans.
Internal religion refers to faith [Doctrines] while external religion refers to actions. Eman [Faiths] is related to beliefs and it is related to the heart while Islam is related to actions and it is related to the external organs. Therefore, if a person affirms the beliefs of his religion with his heart and carries out the deeds of his religion with actions, then this is the main difference between inner and external religions.
Another difference is that internal religion is related to Sufism while external religion is related to Shariah.
Internal religion can be defined as spiritual growth while external religion is called phenomenology.