different approaches to the study of religion

It concerns itself with providing a critical analysis of historical writings describing a particular civilization, empire or society.Dominant power structures, political ideologies, personal biases, cultural trends and social norms steer narratives . TTh 2:40-4:00. There are religions, however, in which even worship rituals are not central. Approaches to Religious/Worldview Studies 1 Sociological. Another reason is that questions about the origins and functions of religion have often been conflated with questions about the truth of religion, and this has led to controversies that tend to hinder the development of common concepts, methodologies, and problems. Sociology is one such approach that this essay will be looking at through its founding fathers Emile Durkheim, Max Weber and Karl Marx. If religion is a western concept that has been used to shore up the authority of the colonial and sovereign state, through shifting, arbitrary demarcations between religion tradition, culture, reason, and the nation, then scholars should be wary of treating it as a stable, coherent object of academic study. Our academic experts are ready and waiting to assist with any writing project you may have. Philosophy of religion deals with philosophical issues found in religion. Although I cannot make the full case here, I sketch a preliminary defense of the third approach, in the context of recent debates in political theory. Among the many faiths represented here are Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, Sikhism, Buddhism, and Jainism. How a believer of a certain religion (an insider) will study his/her own religion, for instance, will differ from how a nonbeliever of that religion (an outsider) will study it.Their motivations and methods will be different. As they do on many traditional measures of religious observance, Jehovah's . (James L.Cox,p.159.A guide to the Phenomenology of religion .key figure ,formative influence and subsequent debate. Within religious studies there are three common methodologies: Philosophy of Religion ( Phenomenology ), the study of . Religion is a concept created by modern scholars and superimposed on a variety of different phenomena for a variety of motives. Religion is both a fascinating and an essential subject of study. Research approaches to the study of religion include many various approaches whose research paradigms involve interpretation and understanding rather than explanation (Szocik, 2015). Sociology in general looks at people's . 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). A comprehensive overview of the history and context of feminist approaches to the study of religions, including a helpful discussion of the relationship of these approaches to feminist theology. "Feminist Approaches." In Approaches to the Study of Religions, edited by Peter Connolly, pp. These strategies have been identified as central to the development of programs that prioritize student development and help improve student retention, engagement, and academic performance. Attempts have been made to find a distinctive ingredient in all religions, such as the numinous, or spiritual, experience, the contrast between the sacred and the profane, and the belief in one or more gods. b.) 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. Free resources to assist you with your university studies! 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. 10. 3.Theology requires its learners to have some degree of faith whereas religious studies does not . T here are many ways of studying religions. If it is not possible, then cross-religious comparisons would mostly break down, for normally it is not possible to be inside more than one religion. There are two main reasons for this suspicion. How would a strategy of disaggregating religion help here? These different approaches disagree about the essence of religion, but all three camps operate within a shared account of the human. In his own words: Man is on a transitorily passage . Nor does the origin of a concept in itself discredit its uses: the concept may well have been forged in the crucible of missionary and colonial encounters, but its meanings and uses have further proliferated in non-colonial and post-colonial settings, in ways that escaped, distorted, and subverted the original discourse. It also depends heavily on the motives the researcher brings to his or her investigation of religious or worldview issues. Approaches to Studying Religion (three courses): Three courses, one in each area, covering more than one major religious tradition; level II or level III courses may be used to fulfill this requirement; a general education course in . To him, sacred meant extraordinarysomething that inspired wonder and that seemed connected to the concept of "the divine.". Certain attempts at a functionalist definition of religion, such as that of the German American theologian Paul Tillich (18861965), who defined religion in terms of human beings ultimate concern, would leave the way open to count these ideologies as proper objects of the study of religion (Tillich himself called them quasi-religions). Marrett (1866-1943) was, similar to Tylor, an anthropologist who studied religion and who adopted the evolutionary approach. We can confirm that the method of study that Smart used in his approach comprehend both external and internal analysis of religion, characterized by phenomenological perspectives. Consequently, the systematic study of the doctrines of Buddhism and Hinduism, for instance, are respectively called Buddhist philosophy and Hindu philosophy, and not Buddhist theology and Hindu theology. But it is necessary to be clear about what objectivity and subjectivity in religion mean. The disaggregating approach helps us answer this critique. Sociologists study religion as both a belief system and a social institution. develop an informed understanding of the diversity of world religions. So he is proposing a mystical goal and from his yogic teachings he guides,shows and achieves that. The idea is that one who experiences financial success is blessed and is thus favored by God. Secularism, on this view, transfers the individuals holy loyalties away from the church and towards the nation-state. The History of Religion as a Sociological Concept Continuum International publishing group .2006. In considering a religion, however, the scholar is concerned not only with individual responses but also with communal ones. study of religion, attempt to understand the various aspects of religion, especially through the use of other intellectual disciplines. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, just as it is the spirit of a spiritless situation. In this regard, Marx described religion as the opium of the masses.. That said, these two countries also have many similarities in terms of culture, religion, geography, and social history, and both governments have . Religious beliefs, in particular, are only one sub-set of a larger class, which political philosophers, following John Rawls, call conceptions of the good. On this view, a liberal state protects, not only freedom of religion, but more generally freedom of conscience; it disestablishes, not only dominant religion, but also any controversial conception of the good. 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. Sociologists use a variety of methods to analyze culture. Reviews aren't verified, but Google checks for and removes fake content when it's identified. Some of these approaches focus on how to understand the beliefs and practices of particular religions, while some have more general concerns such as how religion relates to the nature of society, culture, human evolution, mind, and human behavior. From the belief in human souls grew the belief in other spirits, like those that inhabit nature and those venerated as gods. In light of these considerations, our approach in examining the different world religions in the subsequent chapters mainly falls under religious studies. Often the scholar is confronted only with texts describing beliefs and stories, so the inner sentiments that these both evoke and express must be inferred. Hence, we also have Jewish theology (and Jewish theologians) and Islamic theology (and Islamic theologians). 2.Religious studies has a bigger scope because it analyzes the different world religions. Corrections? 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. A more promising method would seem to be that of exhibiting aspects of religion that are typical of religions, though not necessarily universal, such as the occurrence of the rituals of worship. So critics confuse an empirical inquiry (describing what religion is) with a normative inquiry (accounting for its status in the law). Kujenga Amani facilitates the exchange of ideas about diverse aspects of peacebuilding in Africa. Phenomenology or Religion (3) Study of consciousness and experiences. Her last book is Critical Republicanism. Accordingly, God is just the projected ultimate father image that helps humans deal with their feelings of helplessness and guilt. This research focuses on the legal basis for anti-corruption measures in Indonesia and Malaysia and touches upon aspects of enforcement. But the historical process itself has to be investigated scientificallythat is, by considering the evidence, using the techniques of historical enquiry and other scientific methods. Furthermore, if theology studies a particular religion always from the inside, religious studies study different religions mostly from the outside. Third, the secular separation between a privatized, individualized sphere of religion and a public, social, rational sphere of politics has obscured the way in which the state, the nation, and the law operate as the modern sacred. . For other religions, the systematic study of their doctrines is usually referred to as philosophy instead of theology. One obvious reason is that the term theology implies a belief in one God but other religions may not subscribe either to the belief in God or gods or to the belief that there is only one God. Religion is also studied within cultural geography, which studies how cultural processes spread. Sociology studies human societies, their interactions, and the processes that preserve and change them. We pick out, from the complex notion of religion that we have inherited, distinct elements and values that democratic law has good reason to protect. Which concept of religionif anydo we need in the law of the liberal democratic state? For instance, a student of Christian theology is a Christian; but a student of religious studies studying Shintoism is usually not a Shintoist. Religion should be disaggregated into a number of different values which relate to the law of the liberal state in different ways. This includes such traditional points of departure as history, philosophy, anthropology, psychology, and sociology, but also the natural sciences, and such other approaches as feminist theory, discourse . Faculty are drawn from a variety of other departments- including (but not restricted to) history, classics, anthropology, He- brew and Judaic studies, Middle Eastern studies, and fine arts-and there are only a . Thus, when William James describes religion as. It may perhaps intensify your religious experience. Download file to see previous pages. Your email address will not be published. The only appropriate scholarly stance towards this object is one that is critical and skeptical. This can often lead to conflicts, including those that arise on religious grounds. It looks at the percentage of each country's population that belongs to eight major religious groups, as of 2010. The worry here is the hard-won liberal right to religious freedom will not elicit much respect if the existence of religion itself is radically questioned. ( D P Chattopadhyaya p1integral sociology and dialectical sociology,Shri Jainedra press 1976). study of religion, attempt to understand the various aspects of religion, especially through the use of other intellectual disciplines. For Jung, religious experiences are manifestations of the archetypes in the collective unconscious in our own consciousness. New approaches to the study of religion: the cognitive, the biological, and the neurological. This course introduces students to the variety of academic approaches to the study of religion and to the procedures and sources used in writing academic papers in religious studies. the collective unconscious mind contains universal experiences of mankind and the archetypes (the basic universal images that recur in various forms in different cultures) which we have inherited from our ancestors. For example different opinions regarding the Trinity between Roman Catholics and Jehovah Witnesses. He is not final. At this juncture, let us x-ray some of the approaches in studying religion scientifically. Omissions? (Scott London ,the future of religion an Interview with Ninian Smart June 1999 issue ofThe Witnessmagazine. ) 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. 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. is discussed, followed by discussion on anthropological approaches to study religion. They are: commitment theory, which postulates that religion is a system of costly signaling that reduces deception and creates cooperation within groups; cognitive theory, which postulates that religion is the manifestation of mental modules that have evolved for other purposes . Tylor, in his work Primitive Culture (1871), claimed that the essence of religion or the minimum defining property of religion, is the belief in Spiritual Beings, which he called animism. In this article, I summarise and discuss basic principles for a study-of-religion(s) approach to religion education, adding arguments and perspectives from critical theories about education in general. We're here to answer any questions you have about our services. How a believer of a certain religion (an "insider") will study his/her own religion, for instance, will differ from how a nonbeliever of that religion (an "outsider") will study it.Their motivations and methods will be different. )Of course the phenomenological approach employed by Smart can be interpreted as an attempt of taking into consideration the individual experience of religion a at the same time trying to separate from it. Animism consists of the belief in immortal souls, gods, and other spiritual beings. He explains that such experience definitely will change positions on previous views regarding religious tradition. 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. London and New York, 1999. the civilized races. Religious rituals are behaviors or practices that are either required or expected of the members of a particular group, such as bar mitzvah or confession of sins (Barkan and Greenwood 2003). For the last four decades universities and schools have been acting in response to a constant, steady demand for courses upon the study of religion. The goods that the workers helped produced by means of their labor (using the materials and machines owned by the capitalists) were sold in the market at a certain value. 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. To export a reference to this article please select a referencing stye below: If you are the original writer of this essay and no longer wish to have your work published on UKEssays.com then please: Our academic writing and marking services can help you! Others have no clear vision upon their religious identity and are searching possible traditions, ready to meet their spiritual exploration .So they start looking for different approaches to their study ,bringing along different opinions and whatever the process and methodology is, will bring them information from which eventually they will find answers or give opinion. On the other hand, some view it as a way of purifying religion from the idolatry or worship of human-made objects. It is present in varying forms in the religions of the lower races up to the civilized races of mankind. It studies religion in relation to other social institutions and compares religious beliefs and practices across cultures. The realities of the modern world significantly contribute to communication between representatives of different cultures. Understanding Religious Pluralism in India. Significance is reported at the p < .10 level. Lesson Transcript. Accordingly, Calvinists believed in predestination, the view that God has already decided on who will enter heaven or not. Contact. SSRC activities span more than 80 countries on 6 continents, Apply for research opportunities across the globe, Contributions fund research and scholarship worldwide. Theologians adopt a more content-based approach: they study the texts and dogma which capture our fundamental dependence on a greater order of things. While theology attempts to understand the transcendent or . 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An anthropologist who studied religion and who adopted the evolutionary approach and Malaysia and touches upon aspects of peacebuilding Africa. The inside, religious studies study different religions mostly from the inside, religious study!

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