For the Romans, superstition meant being too scared of the gods
Calling something a superstition has always been an insult aimed at somebody else's beliefs. Romans used it for people who cowered before the gods like slaves before a cruel master. Luther hurled it at the papacy, and today's Catholic Catechism turns it around, branding superstition a sinful excess of religion.
Most modern definitions frame superstition as a belief that clashes with what science knows about cause and effect. Stuart Vyse says its supposed mechanism cannot fit our picture of the physical world; Jane Risen goes further, calling such beliefs impossible rather than merely mistaken. Vyse adds a practical test: a superstition must be instrumental, meaning the believer expects a real result, such as better odds of a win, not just fun.
Vyse and the scholar Dale Martin both stress that the label shifts with time and place. In a culture that has not adopted science as its yardstick, what outsiders dismiss as magic may simply be that society's science or religion. The word has also served as a weapon against minority faiths, against innovations creeping into an established church, and against displays of piety judged excessive.
Ancient usage was about temperament. Latin superstitio and its Greek counterpart deisidaimonia described overblown ritual and gullibility about prophecy. Cicero, who lived from 106 to 43 BCE, drew the line sharply, arguing that stamping out superstition would not destroy religion. Diderot's 18th-century Encyclopédie defined it as any excess of religion and tied it to paganism. In 1520 Martin Luther called the papacy the fountainhead of every superstition. The Catholic Catechism now treats it as a breach of the first of the Ten Commandments and a failure to trust providence.
Scholars have tried to sort the jumble. Dieter Harmening's 1979 book Superstitio splits it into magic, divination and observances. Observances cover signs, such as bird calls, neighing horses, comets and dreams, and lucky or unlucky times, such as dog days. Divination requires active participation, from astrology to casting lots. Folklorists, wary of the sneer built into the word, generally prefer the gentler term folk belief.
Source: Superstition
