GRE Reading Comprehension
Home > GRE Test > GRE Reading Comprehension Questions
Next steps
- Use your browser's back button to return to your test results.
- Do more GRE Reading Comprehension Questions.
Source: VW
The societies in which shamanism has flourished have been small, relatively self- sufficient social systems which see themselves as coping directly with their natural worlds. Like all human beings, the members of such groups lived in a world of uncertainty. The presence of a person who could maintain contact with the cosmic forces of the universe directly, who could make sense of both the measured order of ordinary times and the catastrophes of drought earthquake, or flood, was of incalculable value.
More complex social systems tend to have "institutionalized" specialists who transmit information without explicit recourse to the supernatural. Such societies have priests and prophets, not shamans, at the overt level. But the line between shaman and prophet is tenuous. The prophet usually does not enjoy the legitimacy within his society that is granted the shaman. His is a voice crying in the wilderness, not that of the legitimate curer and philosopher. Despite these differences, the prophet can be seen as a kind of shaman, and thus the study of shamanism illuminates some of the obscurities in religious traditions.
Consider each of the choices separately and select all that apply.
The passage provides evidence for which of the following statements about shamans?
- A A shaman is unlikely to be well-received in a socially sophisticated community.
- B There are certain aspects of a shaman that are similar to those of an institutionalized specialist.
- C The benefits of a shaman extend beyond assistance in times of need.