Huxley pictured nationalism as a new evolutionary stage of religion

Evidence

To insist that nationalism should be seen as religion, or even as having been “shaped” by religion is, in my view, to miss the nature and consequence of the revolution brought about by modern doctrines and practices of the secular in the structure of collective representations. Of course modern nationalism draws on preexisting languages and practices—including those that we call, anachronistically, “religious.” How could it be otherwise? Yet it doesn’t follow from this that religion forms nationalism. — Talal Asad, Formations of the Secular, 946 (#complicates, via linked claim)

However, I am not persuaded that because national political life depends on ceremonial and on symbols of the sacred, it should be represented as a kind of religion—that it is enough to point to certain parallels with what we intuitively recognize as religion. One problem with this position is that it takes as unproblematic the entire business of defining religion. It does not ask why particular elements of “religion” as a concept should be picked out as definitive, and therefore fails to consider the discursive roles they play in different situations. — Talal Asad, Formations of the Secular, 920 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Nationalism can overtake faith as a worldview while inheriting its exclusivity — Nadim N. Rouhana and Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian, When Politics Are Sacralized:…, 170; Calling nationalism a religion uncritically presumes a fixed definition of religion; Nationalism’s borrowings from religion do not make religion its source — Talal Asad, Formations of the Secular:…, 946 (+3 more)

Broader Connections

• Nationalism’s borrowings from religion do not make religion its source #complicates (0.85) — Talal Asad, Formations of the Secular, 946
• Calling nationalism a religion uncritically presumes a fixed definition of religion #complicates (0.78)
• Calling nationalism a religion begs the question of how religion is defined. #complicates (0.76) — Talal Asad, Formations of the Secular, 920