PERSPECTIVES ON BELIEFS: An Introduction to World Religions (original) (raw)
Related papers
2020
In the modern age, religion seems to have abandoned its role as a symbol of meaning to the extent that, conversely, the scientific, rational view of the world has taken over this task. Apparently, there is an exclusive relationship between the two that makes a peaceful and equal coexistence more or less impossible. In this volume of the series "Philosophy and Psychology in Dialogue", Martin Klüners and Jörn Rüsen analyse the role religion plays in human existence and life. While Klüners interprets religion historically as a "pre-scientific" science of the soul and sees the antagonism between the reality principle and the pleasure principle as causally responsible for the opposition between reason and faith, Rüsen locates religion within historical thinking. Like history itself, religion appears as a significant factor in the cultural orientation of human life practice.
Religion: Its Origins, Social Role and Sources of Variation
Open Journal of Philosophy, vol. 10(3), pp. 346-367, 2020
Religion emerged among early humans because both purposive and non-purposive explanations were being employed but understanding was lacking of their precise scope and limits. Given also a context of very limited human power, the resultant foregrounding of agency and purposive explanation expressed itself in religion's marked tendency towards anthropomorphism and its key role in legitimizing behaviour. The inevitability of death also structures the religious outlook; with ancestors sometimes assigned a role in relation to the living. Subjective elements such as the experience of dreams and the internalization of moral precepts also play their part. Two important sources of variation among religions concern the adoption of a dualist or non-dualist perspective, and whether or not the religion's early political experience is such as to generate a systematic doctrine subordinating politics to religion. The near ubiquity and endurance of religion are further illuminated by analysis of its functions and ideological role. Religion tends to be socially conservative but has the potential to be revolutionary.
McGee, Jon R. and Richard L. Warms. 2013. Theory in Social and Cultural Anthropology. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.
The history of the theory of the anthropology of religion follows, to a degree, the general history of anthropology. Varying between amicability and terse rebuttal, the particular and the universal, anthropological approaches to religion seek to understand social constructs wherein actions, narratives, and texts coalesce around the whole of the social experience. Saturated with meaning, constituent ritual and myth are a part of the dynamic, interwoven, interactive fiber of cultural experience. At present, some anthropologists focus primarily on practice, others on meaning, others on the sociohistorical context, still others on the political ecology, some on cognitive science, and some on a combination of these models.
Religion What Is It to Mankind
2014
The relationship between religion and morality has long been hotly deliberated and contested. Are religions moral and do they make us more moral? Are religions necessary for morality? Do moral natures develop independently of religious intuitions? We have two contrasting views. "It is simply impossible for people to be moral without religion or God." Laura Schlesinger, 2008. And, "Faith can be very dangerous, and deliberately to implant it into the vulnerable mind of an innocent child is a grievous wrong." Richard Dawkins, 2006, p. 348. The questions regarding morality and religion are antiquated. In the Euthyphro, Socrates asked whether 'goodness' is loved by the gods because it is 'good,' or whether 'goodness' is good because it is loved by the gods. Though Socrates preferred the former proposal, many have maintained that morality is dictated by-and indeed impossible without-God. So, we could rightly ask, 'Is morality valuable by virtue of its moral nature or is morality valuable because it is valued by the Gods?' And 'are moral activities less moral if they are done for religious reasons and are moral activities more moral if done at great expense to oneself or with no expectation of reward or payment?' Introduction:
Religion viewed through a prism: A re-look at it
As progressive beings we are endowed with faculties such as reasoning, discerning, probing, inquiring, critiquing and exploring. Nowadays we could proudly say that 'sky is not the limit' and human aspirations is such that to get to know and get into the unexplored terrains and conquer everything at one point of time termed as 'mysteries', now a reality. With the application of our critical and creative faculties and questioning and exploring capacities we keep moving on to greater heights. Inquiring and questioning mind and reasoning power are the greatest components endowed in human beings that enable and extend the urge in us to move forward and higher. Homo sapiens per se have been innovative, creative and ground breaking. Science and technology contributed to approximate these achievements. Parallel to these developments, side by side, religion co-exists. Organized religion from time to time instills or refills its adherent not to drift from the basic tenets, rituals, religious practices, traditions and belief system. The belief in God as the center of being continues and for this the organized religion sustains their belief in varied ways. In trials and tribulations and frustrations and hopelessness, the leverage of hope is extended only by religion apart from cementing the
Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 35(4):412-419, 2001
Scholars broadly agree that no persuasive general theory of religion exists. Recently, however, new efforts at producing one have appeared. These range from wishful-thinking theories to rationalist and linguistic ones, but they increasingly emphasize cognition. This paper reviews several current approaches and summarizes my own cognitive theory: that religion is a form of anthropomorphism. Earlier writers who have seen anthropomorphism as basic to religion have disagreed about is nature and causes. Most explain it as comforting or as extending what we know to what we do not. Neither explanation is sound. Instead, anthropomorphism stems from a necessary perceptual strategy: facing an uncertain world, we interpret ambiguous phenomena as what concerns us most. That usually is living things, especially humans. Thus we see the world as more humanlike than it is. Religion, this paper holds, are systems of thought and action building in large measure on this powerful, pervasive and involuntary tendency.
What is Religion?: Identifying the Explanandum
In A New Science of Religion (eds. Gregory Dawes and James Maclaurin) Routeledge, 2013
Religious traditions are both internally complex and extraordinarily diverse. This has made difficult the longstanding task of defining religion as an object of study. We stand on the threshold of a new era of scientific study of religion spearheaded by cognitive scientists, developing new and experimentally testable models of the human mind. So how should scientists understand religion? Will recent advances in these sciences provide a new definition or at least a better way of interpreting the plethora of existing definitions? In this chapter, we set out the history of debate about the nature of religion, describing the schemes scholars have devised for characterising existing religions. We then survey a number of scientific results that promise to explain aspects of the complexity and diversity of extant and extinct religions. We explore a new approach to taxonomising religions based on the new science and drawing on established principles of biological taxonomy. We compare the characterisations of religion that stem from the existing scholarly tradition with those flowing from the new science. We conclude that the new scientific approach is more likely to enhance our understanding of religion than are earlier theories based on conceptual analysis.