The Study of Religion

Religion

Religion is a complex and varied set of beliefs, practices, values, and experiences that people hold as sacred. For some, it is the relationship with an invisible god or gods; for others, it may be the practice of meditation; still for many others, it may simply be a sense of community and belonging.

The study of religion has a long history and is a large and important part of the humanities and social sciences. Its importance is demonstrated by the fact that about eight-in-ten Americans identify themselves as religiously affiliated and report that their religion is very important to them. The scholarly literature on religion covers a wide range of topics and approaches, from the philosophical to the empirical.

One of the central issues in the study of religion is the question of how to define it. Substantive definitions have been proposed, such as Emile Durkheim’s (1899) Elementary Forms of Religious Life (see Religion as a category of human experience ), which defines religion as a system of values that binds its followers into a moral community.

This type of definition is criticized for being overly broad because it includes beliefs such as belief in ghosts as sufficient to qualify as a religion, and for being too narrow because it treats the dichotomy between the natural and supernatural as essential and fails to consider faith traditions that emphasize immanence or oneness, such as some versions of Buddhism and Jainism (see Jaina Philosophy and Daoism). More recently, functionalist approaches to religion have gained currency. These define religion as a set of activities that organize a person’s life, such as the rites of passage, morality, and community, with the goal of creating a better world.

It is thought that these functional definitions are more useful than substantive definitions, since they allow for the inclusion of nontheistic religions and are more inclusive. However, these definitions can be problematic as well. For example, they can create false categories if they include certain activities as religions but exclude others. They also run the risk of overstating the importance of religion in a given society, because they focus on those activities that are most visible and influential.

Some have suggested that there is a natural kind of religion, and that it is possible to develop a scientific theory that causally explains why certain features reliably appear together in a group of phenomena and are labeled as “religion.” This idea has received little support. Some critics point out that the development of a concept for social kinds does not wait until there is a scientific explanation, and that this type of theory can be applied to any phenomenon. Other critics argue that it is a mistake to treat religion as a natural kind and that it is merely a social construction.