Theories JOURNAL: Dimensions of religion: How do you think it happened?
TheoriesJOURNAL: Dimensions of religion: How do
you think it happened?
Ancient theories: Herodotus (5th C BCE) Cicero (3rd C BCE)
Judaism and Christianity: so different?Explorers and MissionariesReformationEnlightenmentDeism (Natural Religion)RomanticismMax Muller 1823-1900
Why?
A scientific endeavor:It was possible to find the root impulse
or cause of religion everywhere Inquiry, search far back in time to discover
the earliest religious ideas and practices of the human race, trace it onward and upward to the present.
Model of the Natural SciencesArchaeology, history, language, mythology
and ethnology (Tylor) and anthropology
Religious Studies
Myths/storiesRitualsDoctrinesEthicsCommunityEmotion/Experience (The Sacred)
Essential components (Substantive definition)
Myth and Ritual School
Primitive Culture 1871British, self educated,
agnostic religious skeptic
Born Quaker Parents died when he
was a young man. TuberculosisTraveled to Central
America Became a reader and
professor at Oxford.
E.B. Tylor 1832-1917
Intellectual IndividualismSimilarities are not coincidental but a result
of the uniformity of the human mind Give me your reaction to this.
Social evolution (The Ascent of Man)Variations are evidence of a difference in
degree or a change in the level of development
Doctrine of Survivals Ideas no longer credible that linger from an
earlier more primitive time in societyAssociation of Ideas: Magic, Religion
Myths originate from the process of logically associating ideas.
Key Ideas
Ethnography: scientific analysis of an individual society, culture or racial group in all of its many component parts.
Animism: Belief in living personal powers behind all things
Pantheism: God is synonymous with the universe
Panentheism: God contains the universe
Religion: Belief in Spiritual Beings
Vocabulary
Are religion and culture originally rooted in myth or in ritual? Belief or in practice? Society or the Individual?
Max Muller (1823-1900)Myth was poetic statements about the
worldLater cultures misunderstood them as
meaningful and symbolic language
Myths are: Philosophical attempts to explain and understand the world
Studied as an interesting product of the human mind
Religion (and myth) originated in the experience of seeing the dead in dreams.
Then: explained in beliefs and myths of spirits and souls.
Emphasized an evolutionary view of human social development (survivals)
E.B. Tylor: Summary
Offer explanations for the world around us. Experience followed by belief, myth and ritual.
Chicken or the egg?Myth is a remnant (survival) of ritual
activityRitual is the original source of most of
the expressive forms of cultural lifeRitual is unlikely to change
Sir James Frazer 1854-1941
Builds on Tylor, but sees Ritual as the building block of religion
Psychoanalysis School
Rooted in the myth and ritual schoolUnconscious forces shaping social
behavior including ritual. (Smith)“real” purposes of ritual were different
at times even from what the participants thought.
Austria, Jewish but a natural atheist
Lived in Vienna Studied ideas like
ambivalence, repression, neurosis, unconscious.
Developed the field of psychoanalysis.
Totem and Taboo 1913, Future of an Illusion 1927 and Moses and Monotheism, 1938
Sigmund Freud 1856-1939
Totem and Taboo Intellectual Evolution Psychic Ambivalence
Future of an IllusionBelief Illusion vs. delusionReligion is…..
Key Ideas
Reductionist: Reducing a complex system to a single idea
Psychoanalysis: Science of the mindIllusion: belief in something we want to
be trueDelusion: belief in something we know
to be falseNeurosis: illness of the mind related to
the subconscious
Vocabulary
Buried levels of meaning: repression, the unconscious and psychoanalysis
Religious observances (rituals) are the acting out of obsessive neurotic impulses
Taboos bring about ritual since it attempts to appease repressed desires.
Religion is individualistic
Sigmund Freud Summary
Religion serves to provide humans with emotional coddling
Sociological School
FranceJewish FatherAgnosticFather of
“Sociology” The Elementary
Forms of the Religious Life” (1912)
Emile Durkheim (1858-1917
The nature of society is the most suitable and promising subject of systematic investigation
All social facts should be investigated by purely objective scientific methods
Belief is a form of social practiceSacred as a living, social realityElementary Forms:
Key Ideas
Animism: the belief in a supernatural power that organizes and animates the material universe OR the attribute of soul given to inanimate objects
Naturalism: doctrine that all religious truth is derived from a study of natural processes and not from revelation.
Totemism: a system of belief in which each human is thought to have a spiritual connection or a kinship with another physical being or object
Vocabulary
Priority to the social dimensionA way of organizing groups of individuals. Distinction between sacred & profane is at
the root of all religionBelief: expresses the nature of sacred thingsRitual: rules of conduct governing how
people should act in the presence of the sacred
Religion arose in activities that cemented the bonds of community
Emile Durkheim Summary
Serves the function of ensuring the priority of communal identification and provide social bonding.
German philosopher Founded Communism. Class struggle is the
primary mover of history,
Religion is a social construct developed to keep the masses in check
Opium of the People, the heart of a heartless world
Karl Marx (1818-1883)
Materialism : Social institution dependent upon the material and economic realties
All religions operate this way, beliefs are irrelevant
Suffering: Economic FreedomReligious suffering is, at one and the same
time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering
Liberation TheologyAdvocated the abolition of religion
Key Ideas
Religion is irrational and a delusionReligion negates all that is dignified in a human
being by rendering them servile and more amenable to accepting the status quo.
Religion is hypocritical. Although it might profess valuable principles, it sides with the oppressors.
Religion does give hope, but it is a false hope
Karl Marx Summary
Religion is the opiate of the masses, providing an escape to the suffering of reailty. It is meant to create illusory fantasies for the poor.
German,HumanistWell educated, a
cerebral childhood.
Asexual marriage, prone to anxiety attacks after death of fathem
The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism
Max Weber (1864-1920)
Non-reductionistInterweaving of economics and societyProsperity Gospel:
Wealth and success are a sign of electionInner-worldly asceticism
Practice frugality in the worldReligious LeadersVariable ethics
Theodicy and SoteriologyGenerates variety
Key Ideas
Ideal Types: Opposite of generalization. Includes purposeful exaggeration
Theodicy: Defense of God (Why he allows bad things to occur)
Soteriology: Study of teachings on salvation
Vocabulary
Strong anti-reductionist approach. Religion isn’t “just..”
Religion developed through an influence of social institutions on the ordering of society, especially economics
Ethics is a variable to be confronted at all times and in all places when studying religion, especially in its two problematic circumstances, Theodicy and Soteriology.
Religious trends are more an indication of cultural and historical changes than evolutionary progression
Max Weber
Religion is a patterning of social relationships around a belief in supernatural powers, creating ethical considerations .
Phenomenology School
Places myth before ritualRejects Myth and Ritual school as
reductionistReligious experience is real and irreducibleExploration of the components of religion
as “sacred” or “holy” Origins weren’t as important
The history of a religion (or ritual or myth) doesn’t tell us what a religious experience ultimately is
Didn’t use an evolutionary frameworkMust look at underlying patterns Comparative in nature
Romania Studied and taught in
Western Europe, Ended in the University of
Chicago History of Religions. Humanistic approach:
Religion must always be explained on its own terms.
The Sacred and the Profane, 1907-1986,
Mircea Eliade 1907-1986
Autonomy of religion. Combination of History and
PhenomenologyAxis Mundi: Religion is a total response
of orientation towards Ultimate RealityReligion is that which is wholly otherPatterns in Comparative Religion:
Symbols, myths, modalitiesMyth of the Eternal return
Nostalgia and the terror of history
Key Ideas
Hierophany: The appearance of the Sacred in the Profane
Phenomenology: study and analysis of things through observation
Axis Mundi: a sacred centerImago Mundi: representation of the
cosmos on earthTheophany: Appearance of God in a
symbol
Vocabulary
Minimize importance of ritualMyth is the language of the sacred…
where we can experience hierophanyBring back myth and symbol
More stable and unlikely to change Tells a sacred story about the actions of gods Explains how things came about Rituals are reenactments of this. Allows participant to
identify the present with the past Ritual is dependent on myth Acknowledges that often you cannot separate one from
the other
Mircea Eliade Summary
Religion helps people make sense of the world through symbols and myths; to provide contact with the sacred, reenactment, history.
Is the function of religion to: to offer “scientific” explanations or bind a community together or to provide humans with emotional stability
(coddling?) or to connect to the Other (The Sacred/Holy)?
How (and why) did it all start?
After having completed the course, reflect back on the essentialist, functionalist and contemporary theories of the origin of religion, Which theory(ies) best explain and support your understanding and interpretation of the purpose and function of religious experience and sacred traditions? Give evidence (examples) to support your argument.
Argument paper that defends a theory and definition of religion using sacred traditions to support your claims
4 page essay
Signature Assignment
Unit 1: Theories Essentialist and Functionalist
Unit 2: Appearance of the Sacred: Hierophany
Persons, objects, spaceUnit 3: Language of the Sacred
Myths, stories, scripture, visual, musicUnit 4: Sacred Time/Traditions
Rites of passage, holidaysUnit 5: Sacred Journey
Pilgrimage
Review: