Carl Jung (1875-1961) was the founder of analytic psychology, the name given to Jungs psychological-therapeutic system which divides the unconscious mind into the personal and the collective. The term fundamentalism can be used in very different religious contexts and texts to describe the devotion and strict loyalty to a set of principles or ideas. And the best- known scholar of comparative religion of the last generation was Mircea Eliade (1907-1986), whose studies included the concepts of sacred space and mythic time, and the sacredness of nature (Paden 2005, 215). The specific question which political and legal philosophers (should) ask themselves is this. Religion is both a fascinating and an essential subject of study. Some of the contributions of William James were his distinction between institutional religion and personal religion, his analysis of religious experiences as mystical experiences, and his pragmatic approach to the value of religionthat the truth and value of a religious belief for an individual depend on the beneficial effects of the belief on the life of the individual. So the starting point of the disaggregation strategy is to accept that, as religion is indeed not a thing but a term of art (it has different meanings in different contexts), different dimensions of it will be appropriated in different ways in different disciplines. Secularism and freedom of religion, in liberal thought, are connected to moral values such as individual autonomy, moral self-determination, freedom of conscience as well as more political ideals such as non-theocratic constitutional democracy, separation of church and state, and non-establishment of the dominant religion. Fall 2005. Study for free with our range of university lectures! These philosophical issues include, among many others, whether we can adequately prove the existence of God, reconcile the existence of evil with the existence of a God who is wholly good and all-powerful, reconcile Gods omniscience (the power to know everything) and foreknowledge (the power to know future events) with human freedom, explain the nature of miracles, determine the meaningfulness of religious language (how religious linguistic expressions acquire their meanings), and many others. Thus, the bracketing means forgetting about beliefs of ones own that might endorse or conflict with what is being investigated. Freud viewed religion negatively. II. The law does not describe and regulate the full experience of marriage: the fact that, in law, marriage is a contract does not mean that marriage is, or should be experienced as, a contract. Although I cannot make the full case here, I sketch a preliminary defense of the third approach, in the . Transcribed image text: To address the following questions, consider the four approaches to religion described in the introduction to this module exclusivism, inclusivism, pluralism and empathetic interest in other people. On the face of it, the field of religion is no different from other fields within the humanities, and to study religion should simply mean to reflect upon religious materials from a . Chapter 1 in the The Comparative Study of Religions World Religions: A Voyage of Discovery, Fourth Edition, considers one religion at a time, chapter by chapter. From the belief in human souls grew the belief in other spirits, like those that inhabit nature and those venerated as gods. The belief in the soul as something separate from the body though residing in the body resulted from dealing with certain biological questions such as those concerning the difference between a living body and a dead one; the causes of waking, sleep, trance, disease, and death; and the origin of dreams and visions involving human images. Sociology studies human societies, their interactions, and the processes that preserve and change them. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). Thus, when William James describes religion as. Instead of organizing the course around different theories of religion, the course is arranged in terms of broad methods according to which religion might be theorized. In this lesson, we will discuss the difference between the scientific and the religious approach and will look at some examples of each. For Jung, religious experiences are manifestations of the archetypes in the collective unconscious in our own consciousness. There are doubts about how far there can be neutrality and objectivity in the study of religion. So how would Aurobindo address questions upon doctrine say within the New Testament? Human biomonitoring (HBM) approaches can provide inter alia information on the chemicals that are in our body at one point in time. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. We also study religion in order to learn more about how different aspects of human lifepolitics, science, literature, art, law, economicshave been and continue to be shaped by changing religious notions of, for example, good and evil, images of the deity and the divine, salvation and punishment, etc. In the above definition Marx has stressed few points about religion which require special emphasis. As to the first sense, one of the challenges to the student of religion is the problem of evoking its inner, individual side, which is not observable in any straightforward way. Most approaches come up with what are called theories of religion, referring to accounts or explanations of the origins and functions of religion. These studies suggest the significance of religion in health communication and in our . The second ground for skepticism is that religion has served to define the western idea of the secular, and remains deeply entangled with it. Although there is still no agreement on this issue, the frontier between traditional religions and modern political ideologies remains a promising topic of study. Aside from being exploited, the workers were also dehumanized or alienated in the workplace. The only appropriate scholarly stance towards this object is one that is critical and skeptical. Sociology is one such approach that this essay will be looking at through its founding fathers Emile Durkheim, Max Weber and Karl Marx. But because they wanted to know who would eventually be saved and enter heaven, they thought that financial success was one good indicator. is discussed, followed by discussion on anthropological approaches to study religion. Since becoming aware of our unconscious makes us a whole person (a fully realized Self), religion is thus seen by Jung as something positive (Merkur 2005, 177). Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to exclusive content. There are religions, however, in which even worship rituals are not central. Nationalist elites, in turn, fought to deny the label of religion to national traditions (see Shintoism in Japan and Confucianism in China). This article examines three anthropological theories explaining how religion has evolved and continues to evolve. village and nad level bring in solidarity and unity among different social segments . Second, however, we may ask whether the normative analogy used by egalitarian theorists of religious freedom is the right one. Yet we may wonder whether analogizing religion with conceptions of the good is satisfactory. In the Australian context, the interdisciplinary pedagogy that defines global studies is gaining wider acceptance as a coherent and necessary approach to the study of global change. He illustrate the introduction of Phenomenology saying, a lot of opinions have been written about not only the physical interchange of races but;, also ethnical and cultural, and especially upon values, so what take place when religions and their tradition convene? This approach can be better understood in his ritual dimension, involvement with worshipping, meditations, pilgrimages, sacrifices and healing activities .Of course doctrinal and philosophical dimension is to be taken in consideration without living behind the experimental and emotional dimension and the important ethical and legal dimension. So neutrality, for liberals such as Rawls and Ronald Dworkin, is generalized non-establishment. Egalitarian theorists of religious freedom offer a compelling response to the critical religion school. This idea led Calvinists to engage in activities that would increase their wealth, paving the way for the development of capitalism. Even this cursory summary of this first approach is, I hope, sufficient to convey the force and depth of the critique of religion. It is the logic of Natures process. Approaches to the Study of Religions. If you need assistance with writing your essay, our professional essay writing service is here to help! It fosters innovative research, nurtures new generations of social scientists, deepens how inquiry is practiced within and across disciplines, and mobilizes necessary knowledge on important public issues. We've received widespread press coverage since 2003, Your UKEssays purchase is secure and we're rated 4.4/5 on reviews.co.uk. TTh 2:40-4:00. Another illustration of religious beliefs is the creation stories we find in different religions. Some of these theories may be controversial, or questionable, for some people; nonetheless, knowing them broadens our understanding of the meaning and nature of religion. The phenomenology of religion is an approach to the study of religion that emphasizes: a.) The normative objection is slightly different. Talal Asad and Saba Mahmood have shown, for instance, that liberal secularism requires individual beliefnot communal observance, rituals or embodied pietyto be taken as the essence of religiosity. (Ninian Smart,pp10-12,Dimension of the sacred an anatomy of the worlds beliefs ,Harper Collins Publisher 1196) We see from Smarts classifactory account, Smarts perspective in sustaining a phenomenological perception to the methodology of approach to the study, is far different from the approach that Sri Aurobindo use. Author of, Robert Segal, Chair in Religious Studies, University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen, Scotland. Given this, we, however, also use other approaches especially comparative religion and philosophy of religionwhich we will discuss next. Accordingly, God is just the projected ultimate father image that helps humans deal with their feelings of helplessness and guilt. d.) the impossibility of studying other cultures' religions. The academic study of religion is an inherently interdisciplinary field, incorporating textual studies of the world's sacred texts, language studies, art, history, philosophy, anthropology, politics, economics, sociology, psychology, comparative literature and literary studies, cultural studies, gender and ethnic studies, legal studies, and . After studying the indigenous Australians, Durkheim claimed that the totems (sacred objects used as emblems or symbols of a group of people, family, clan, or tribe) that the aborigines worship represented their own conceptions of a unified group or society. St. Augustine used this theory to resolve the philosophical question, If everything comes from God, where does evil come from? According to him, evil exists in the world but it does not come from God, for what only comes from God is good. Intellectual historians and students of political thought study religious traditions as coherent, inter-generational, scholarly bodies of thoughtthe Islamic or the Christian or the Confucian tradition, for example. There are many ways of studying religions. These questions within Smarts Classifactory account would help to define a religion. For example different opinions regarding the Trinity between Roman Catholics and Jehovah Witnesses. Which of these four approaches do you take in your everyday life, and why? One of the many reasons for this failure is that each discipline enlisted to study religion has its own distinctive methods and topics, and scholars often disagree about how to resolve the inevitable conflicts between these different intellectual perspectives. How can we best identify and protect the normative values which historically have underpinned freedom of religion, non-establishment and the like? Sociology of religion, on the other hand, studies religious beliefs, practices, and organizations using the theories and methods of the discipline of sociology. Required fields are marked *. The absence of good (the moral kind) is caused by our disobedience to the will of God. The study of religion emerged as a formal discipline during the 19th century, when the methods and approaches of history, philology, literary criticism, psychology, anthropology, sociology, economics, and other fields were brought to bear on the task of . (Note that no assumption is made about the actual disciplinary location of scholars. 5 Evangelical Christian. Here you can choose which regional hub you wish to view, providing you with the most relevant information we have for your specific region. In Marrett's view, the first form of religion was a belief in an ever-present and ubiquitous force that gave power to all elements of life (Durkheim 203). I do not think it is, although I cannot make the full case here. On the contrary, religion, as it is studied in the secular state university, is both a category and an aspect of human behavior that must be subjected to the same types of scrutiny as any other category of human behavior that one may study. Method & Theory in the Study of Religion publishes articles, notes, book reviews and letters which explicitly address the problems of methodology and theory in the academic study of religion. The distinction, however, is not an absolute one, for, as has been noted, descriptions of religion may sometimes incorporate theories about religion that imply something about the truth or other normative aspects of some or all religions. It may perhaps intensify your religious experience. For a Christian, Christ is the only way of salvation and the Bible is the only source of saving revelation today. R.R. Sociologists are primarily interested in examining the effects of religion on society. Critics have pointed out thatby analogizing religion with individual conscience or conceptions of the goodliberalism reveals its Protestant, individualistic bias, and is unable to capture the fullness of the religious experience. c.) the truth or falsity of religion. 2. 300 Cadman Plaza West 15th Floor Brooklyn, NY 11201 USA June 03, 2016. Sensory experience. For critics, this is visible in three different ways. It looks at the percentage of each country's population that belongs to eight major religious groups, as of 2010. The term theology, though often used to refer to Christian theology, also applies to the systematic study of the other monotheistic religions, standardly referring to Judaism and Islam. Yet the strategy of disaggregating religion has a further, more portentous implication for normative political theory. Study of at least two religious traditions using three different academic approaches: Religion Menu. Religious fundamentalism is the approach of those religious groups that look for the literal interpretation of original religious texts or books believing that teachings obtained from . Each perspective uniquely conceptualizes society, social . A theory of religion may be internal or external. Its object is not personal, although is a necessary condition of the yoga. The term phenomenology refers first to the attempt to describe religious phenomena in a way that brings out the beliefs and attitudes of the adherents of the religion under investigation but without either endorsing or rejecting the beliefs and attitudes. As the world's largest democracy, India . Aurobindo did not just stick to an immanental experience of a divine being but that there must be transcendence within the individuals life which is seen in Auroville with a lived approach to ones faith rather like that which is common within Charismatic and Evangelical Churches. This means that a student of theology is a follower of the particular religion he/she is studying; whereas a student of religious studies is usually not a follower of the religions he/she is studying. Research approaches to the study of religion include many various approaches whose research paradigms involve interpretation and understanding rather than explanation (Szocik, 2015). Contact. The study of religion emerged as a formal discipline during the 19th century, when the methods and approaches of history, philology, literary criticism, psychology, anthropology, sociology, economics, and other fields were brought to bear on the task of determining the history, origins, and functions of religion. Other religions are sourced in man's rebellion against God and/or demonic influence. Emile Durkheim (1858-1917) defines religion as "a unified system of beliefs and To a great extent, the meanings now attached to the terms religion and religions have tended to promote the study of religion in order to understand the world in which we live rather than as part of a desire for personal religious self-fulfillment. While for Marx religion isa creation of capitalism, for Weber it is the other way roundcapitalism is largely due to religion, more specifically, the Calvinist religion. Introduces students to the study of religion, world religious traditions and ethics through an exploration of death and dying. Psychology of religion involves the application of psychological methods and interpretive frameworks to religious institutions, as well as to individuals of all religious or noreligious persuasions. Continuum International publishing group .2006. Nevertheless, common to all these different terms and their respective definitions of approach was the motivation to dispense with theologically orientated normative constructions in the study of religion. Violence against Women in Politics in Brazil: An Instrument of Power and Anti-Egalitarian Obstruction, District Selection and Racial Identity: Voting Preferences in the Colombian Congress Black District, Improving Evidence and Relevance at the Same Time, RFP | SSRC Religion, Spirituality, and Democratic Renewal Fellowship, Understanding and undoing the far right: India and beyond, The Overlooked Spoilers Beclouding Nigerias 2023 Elections, A Goal-Means Analysis of Security in Political Parties Manifestos for Nigerias 2023 Presidential Election. Ontology. Phenomenology or Religion (3) Study of consciousness and experiences. He also introduced a broad program and methodology of comparing religions, which included principles like gaining knowledge of others through their own writings, grouping religions according to their regional, linguistic contexts, and avoiding the common distortion of comparing the positive aspects of one religion with the negative aspects of another (Paden 2005, 212-213). New approaches to the study of religion: the cognitive, the biological, and the neurological. Erin has an M.Ed in adult education and a BS in psychology and a BS in management systems. Updates? by Ccile Laborde February 5, 2014. Accordingly, Calvinists believed in predestination, the view that God has already decided on who will enter heaven or not. Anthropologists, for example, legitimately study a key dimension of human experiencethe religious experiencein its diversity and unruliness. The book is a vast collection of rituals, myths, and religions organized by patterns and themes, which made extensive use of sources from primitive and folk cultures (Paden 2005, 213). It also depends heavily on the motives the researcher brings to his or her investigation of religious or worldview issues. (Scott London ,the future of religion an Interview with Ninian Smart June 1999 issue ofThe Witnessmagazine. ) In particular, a student of theology intends to deepen his/her understanding of a particular religion, while a student of religious studies intends to understand the different religions of the world. The findings that focus on the scientific study of religion, including the SSSR and the SSR units within the AAR, are especially highlighted, as are contrasts between sociological and psychological approaches in the academic study of religion. Like Muslim reformists' approach of reform, which attempted to reconstruct Islamic religious thought in the light of modern science and knowledge, Christian neo-orthodoxy insisted that Christianity itself needs continually to be rethought and that theology must engage seriously with the . It may well be true that the boundaries between religion and other cognate concepts such as tradition, culture, ideology, faith, reason, and so forth are porous and fuzzy. 3.7 Robert Marrett and Animatism. As it happens, one group of influential political philosophers has tried to do just that. At this juncture, let us x-ray some of the approaches in studying religion scientifically. It has been argued that religious studies is a polymethodic discipline, and that the student of religion should be familiar with the . Download file to see previous pages. 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