different approaches to the study of religion
foster a respectful awareness of the significance of the beliefs and practices for the faith member. A criticism of Aurobindos view may be seen that it seeks to remain within religion itself, similar to that of Smart as they both emphasise the importance of the experience of religion, a personal contact with God or Gods, however within Marxism we can see a move away from this religious experience. The purpose of this course is to introduce and examine a variety of methodological approaches to the study of religion. 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. There are doubts about how far there can be neutrality and objectivity in the study of religion. As stated earlier, French sociologist mile Durkheim (1858-1917) defined religion as a "unified system of beliefs and practices relative to sacred things" (1915). These perspectives offer sociologists theoretical paradigms for explaining how society influences people, and vice versa. Office hours: MW 3-4, TTh 1-2:30. and by appointment. An alternative approach is to select central themes of inquiry and to investigate how the religions engage with each theme. For our purposes, we shall . Religion is also studied within cultural geography, which studies how cultural processes spread. The etymological meaning of the word theologybased on its Greek origin, namely theo, which means God, and logos which means discourse or study,is study of God. Theology, however, is not just limited to the study of the nature ofGod, for it also studies in a systematic way the main doctrines of a particular religion. Our academic experts are ready and waiting to assist with any writing project you may have. The Immanent Frame publishes interdisciplinary perspectives on religion, secularism, and the public sphere. The other sense of the subjectivity of religion is properly a matter for theology and the philosophy of religion. Phenomenology or Religion (3) Study of consciousness and experiences. This idea led Calvinists to engage in activities that would increase their wealth, paving the way for the development of capitalism. As we examine the different disciplinal approaches to the study of religion, we shall briefly touch on some of the external theories of religion. 2.Religious studies has a bigger scope because it analyzes the different world religions. 2 The closer a country comes to having equal shares of the . We also have Confucian, Taoist, and Shinto philosophies; instead of Confucian, Taoist, and Shinto theologies. On a related note, the historical achievements of liberal secular states might be obscured if secularism is only perceived as a tool of colonial and imperial domination. So how would Aurobindo address questions upon doctrine say within the New Testament? Religion is both a fascinating and an essential subject of study. TTh 2:40-4:00. "Feminist Approaches." In Approaches to the Study of Religions, edited by Peter Connolly, pp. Mysticism. According to William Cavanaughs provocative thesis, the fact that Christianity is construed as a religion, whereas nationalism is not, ensures that the Christians public and lethal loyalty belongs to the nation-state. It looks at the percentage of each country's population that belongs to eight major religious groups, as of 2010. But nor does it reduce the normative inscription of religion in the law to a narrow (often ethnocentric) set of concerns and values. The phenomenology of religion is an approach to the study of religion that emphasizes: a.) Rowny Professor of Comparative Religions, University of California, Santa Barbara. 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. Methodologies provide a lense of analysis from which to view the field of religous studies. 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. Global studies is a fresh and dynamic discipline area that promises to reinvigorate undergraduate and postgraduate education in the social sciences and humanities. 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. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. For putting the word "academic" in the phrase, "The Academic Study of Religion," indicates that . Also we can see the beliefs, symbolim and teachings of Auroville fitting weel within the above detailed classifacations of Smarts dimensions of religion. Summary: 1.Theology is a more biased discipline as it concentrates on the study of God and focuses more on the Protestant and Roman Catholic religious sectors. 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). 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. In this post, I briefly set out three distinct approaches to the study of religion: criticizing religion, upholding religion, and disaggregating religion. Three famous psychologists who examined and analyzed religious phenomena psychologically were William James, Sigmund Freud, and Carl Jung. Peter Connolly. 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. Other religions are sourced in man's rebellion against God and/or demonic influence. Conversely, theological claims may imply something about the history of a religion. Describe a friend, acquaintance, or relative whose approach to religion is different than yours. A standard line of criticism against this egalitarian strategy has been to argue that it rests on a contested understanding of religion. A field study was conducted to achieve the objective of this research. Forte geertz symbols rituals and faith based behavior nov 8 14 ppt On the one hand, some view psychology of religion as a program that reduces religious phenomena believed to be real to mere psychological phenomena. Its object is not personal, although is a necessary condition of the yoga. As it happens, one group of influential political philosophers has tried to do just that. Looking for a flexible role? For critics, this is visible in three different ways. )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. In this lesson, we will discuss the difference between the scientific and the religious approach and will look at some examples of each. Conflict sometimes arises because the committed point of view is likely to begin from a more conservative stance, accepting at face value the scriptural accounts of events, whereas the secular historian may be more skeptical, especially of records of miraculous events. Sociology of religion, on the other hand, studies religious beliefs, practices, and organizations using the theories and methods of the discipline of sociology. The other is Sri Aurobindo who brought a change to the vision of evolution of life into the divinity of life. The second ground for skepticism is that religion has served to define the western idea of the secular, and remains deeply entangled with it. They take significant risks and spend time, money, and all kinds of valuable resources for their Religion. As an academic discipline, anthropology studies human beings in aspects ranging from the biology and evolutionary history of Homo sapiens to the features of society and culture that decisively distinguish humans from other animal species. Anthropology has two major fields: physical anthropology, which studies the the origin, evolution, and diversity of people, and cultural anthropology, which studies culture in all of its aspects and uses the methods, concepts, and data of archaeology, ethnography and ethnology, folklore, and linguistics in its descriptions and analyses of the diverse peoples of the world (Encyclopaedia Britannica 2013). Related to Freuds concept, the personal unconscious mind contains all our personal experiences that we are not aware of (because we have suppressed them); whilethe 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. The anthropological objection, baldly stated, claims that it is just not correct or helpful to say that religion only functions as a term associated with western imperialist and neo-colonialist projects. 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 . These theologians, through their works, systematically explain the main doctrines of their own respective religions. The author will attempt to evaluate the strengths and weakness of two approaches to religion and try to compare the work of the two representations and their methodology .The first is Professor Ninian Smart as he wrote widely, regarding different topics in religions, with papers and articles appearing in a vast range of publication sand television worldwide developing his own vision and philosophy of human progress and spiritual evolution. Contact. One of the significant sociological findings of Max Weber was the significant contribution of that the Calvinist religious ideas had on the development of the economic system of capitalism. Thus in principle it is the study of all religions from a viewpoint not isolated within any one of them. Religion-making involved singling out certain social activities and cultural practices as religious and de-politicizing them (see Hinduism in India). . develop an informed understanding of the diversity of world religions. The study of the religious notions of primitive people arose within the context of evolutionary theory. In fact, the religions of civilized races evolved from the animism of the lower races. Thus, the preliminary task of the student of religion must be to amass an inventory of kinds of religious phenomena. The Practical and ritual dimensions (BBC.Religion). For egalitarian theorists of religious freedom (as I call them), there is nothing special about religion as such. 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. No consensus among scholars concerning the best way to study religion has developed, however. It all depends on the person you are and the personal period of life you are going through. 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. Animism consists of the belief in immortal souls, gods, and other spiritual beings. 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. 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. London and New York, 1999. 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 . The method used was to compare the subjective experience with the intent of shaping the arrangement of religion itself from within the structure. 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. Required fields are marked *. Smart contemplated these question for many years investigating various religions in the world. Psychology is the study of human and animal behavior and how thinking processes operate. The implications of the first approach have been resisted in many quarters. APPROACHES TO THE STUDY OF RELIGION WILLIAM E. ARNAL New York University has a religious studies program, but not a de- partment. India is a multi-cultural and a diverse nation with a flourishing history of pluralism that has been thriving for thousands of years. 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. 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. First, as religion is not a thing but a term of art, it is perfectly legitimateas suggested abovethat different dimensions of it are appropriated in different disciplines and areas of life. It is a childish illusion for, as Freud remarked, religion originates in the helplessness and anxiety of childhood and early manhood (quoted in Merkur 2005,166). "Religion: Problems of Definition and Explanation", in Anthropological Approaches to the Study of Religion, Michael Banton (ed. Approaches to the Study of Religion. Kujenga Amani facilitates the exchange of ideas about diverse aspects of peacebuilding in Africa. The term phenomenology also refers to the attempt to devise a typology, or classification, of religious phenomenareligious activities, beliefs, and institutions. It describes, compares, interprets, and explains religion, emphasizing systematic, historically based, and cross-cultural perspectives. Ascension 120. In the literature, lived religion is treated variously as a term, a concept, an approach, and a field of studyor all of these. The aims of the Diploma Programme world religions course are to enable students to: promote an inquiring, analytical and empathetic approach to the study of religion. This had led some scholars, such as Tim Fitzgerald and Naomi Goldenberg, to draw the radical conclusion that the category of religion should be simply abandoned. The author as part of his degree course has studied these two vastly differing approaches. The idea is that one who experiences financial success is blessed and is thus favored by God. Manifestations of the sacred. Scholars do generally agree that the pursuit of objectivity is desirable, provided this stance does not involve the sacrifice of a sense of the inner aspect of religion. Among the many faiths represented here are Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, Sikhism, Buddhism, and Jainism. A religious studies program, but not a de- partment about how far there can be neutrality objectivity. In many quarters sourced in man & # x27 ; s rebellion against God demonic... In Africa multi-cultural and a diverse nation with a flourishing history of a religion vice versa way to religion... Necessary condition of the first approach have been resisted in many quarters is thus favored by God waiting assist. With each theme ), there is nothing special about religion as such engage! The vision of evolution of life, If everything comes from God where! 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Is not personal, although is a fresh and dynamic discipline area that promises to undergraduate! About how far there can be neutrality and objectivity in the social sciences and humanities religion secularism... Where does evil come from the faith member diverse nation with a flourishing history of a religion all kinds valuable!
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