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Author: Rodney Stark
Publisher: New York : P. Lang
ISBN:
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 396
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Book Description
This book offers the first modern theory of religion. A deductive theory, beginning with seven axioms about human nature and the world humans inhabit, it derives hundreds of formal propositions about human religious behavior. Included are the origins of religion, the sources of religious commitment, the development of religious institutions, the emergence of religious movements, and the postulation of good and evil gods. Step by step, the authors explain the social processes of recruitment to a group, propagation of a faith, and competition between denominations. They show that secularization is a never-ending process in which particular faiths are discredited while new faiths arise to take their place. Thus, religion is an eternal human response to the conditions of existence, changing in form throughout history but always a vital part of culture and society.
Author: Georges Bataille
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN:
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 134
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Book Description
Theory of Religion brings to philosophy what Bataille's earlier book, The Accursed Share, brought to anthropology and history; namely, an analysis based on notions of excess and expenditure. Bataille brilliantly defines religion as so many different attempts to respond to the universe's relentless generosity. Framed within his original theory of generalized economics and based on his masterly reading of archaic religious activity, Theory of Religion constitutes, along with The Accursed Share, the most important articulation of Bataille's work.Georges Bataille (1897-1962), founder of the French review Critique, wrote fiction and essays on a wide range of topics. His books in English translation include Story of the Eye, Blue of Noon, Literature and Evil, Manet and Erotism.Robert Hurley is the translator of The History of Sexuality by Michel Foucault and cotranslator of Anti Oedipus by Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari. Distributed for Zone Books.
Author: Martin Riesebrodt
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226713946
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 244
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Book Description
Why has religion persisted across the course of human history? Secularists have predicted the end of faith for a long time, but religions continue to attract followers. Meanwhile, scholars of religion have expanded their field to such an extent that we lack a basic framework for making sense of the chaos of religious phenomena. To remedy this state of affairs, Martin Riesebrodt here undertakes a task that is at once simple and monumental: to define, understand, and explain religion as a universal concept. Instead of propounding abstract theories, Riesebrodt concentrates on the concrete realities of worship, examining religious holidays, conversion stories, prophetic visions, and life-cycle events. In analyzing these practices, his scope is appropriately broad, taking into consideration traditions in Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Daoism, and Shinto. Ultimately, Riesebrodt argues, all religions promise to avert misfortune, help their followers manage crises, and bring both temporary blessings and eternal salvation. And, as The Promise of Salvation makes clear through abundant empirical evidence, religion will not disappear as long as these promises continue to help people cope with life.
Author: Stephen S. Bush
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199387419
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 273
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Book Description
Winner of the Gustave O. Arlt Award in the Humanities Three understandings of the nature of religion--religion as experience, symbolic meaning, and power--have dominated scholarly discussions, in succession, for the past hundred years. Proponents of each of these three approaches have tended to downplay, ignore, or actively criticize the others. But why should the three approaches be at odds? Religion as it is practiced involves experiences, meanings, and power, so students of religion should attend to all three. Furthermore, theorists of religion should have an account that carefully conceptualizes all three aspects, without regarding any of them as more basic than the others. Visions of Religion provides just such an account. Stephen S. Bush examines influential proponents of the three visions, arguing that each approach offers substantial and lasting contributions to the study of religion, although each requires revision. Bush rehabilitates the concepts of experience and meaning, two categories that are much maligned these days. In doing so, he shows the extent to which these categories are implicated in matters of social power. As for power, the book argues that the analysis of power requires attention to meaning and experience. Visions of Religion accomplishes all this by articulating a social practical theory of religion that can account for all three aspects, even as it incorporates them into a single theoretical framework.
Author: Jack Snyder
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231526911
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 233
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Book Description
Religious concerns stand at the center of international politics, yet key paradigms in international relations, namely realism, liberalism, and constructivism, barely consider religion in their analysis of political subjects. The essays in this collection rectify this. Authored by leading scholars, they introduce models that integrate religion into the study of international politics and connect religion to a rising form of populist politics in the developing world. Contributors identify religion as pervasive and distinctive, forcing a reframing of international relations theory that reinterprets traditional paradigms. One essay draws on both realism and constructivism in the examination of religious discourse and transnational networks. Another positions secularism not as the opposite of religion but as a comparable type of worldview drawing on and competing with religious ideas. With the secular state's perceived failure to address popular needs, religion has become a banner for movements that demand a more responsive government. The contributors to this volume recognize this trend and propose structural and theoretical innovations for future advances in the discipline.
Author: Richard King
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231518242
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 558
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Book Description
Religion, Theory, Critique is an essential tool for learning about theory and method in the study of religion. Leading experts engage with contemporary and classical theories as well as non-Western cultural contexts. Unlike other collections, this anthology emphasizes the dynamic relationship between "religion" as an object of study and different methodological approaches and openly addresses the question of the manifold ways in which "religion," "secular," and "culture" are imagined within different disciplinary horizons. This volume is the first textbook which seeks to engage discussion of classical approaches with contemporary cultural and critical theories. Contributors write on the influence of the natural sciences in the study of religion; the role of European Christianity in modeling theories of religion; religious experience and the interface with cognitive science; the structure and function of religious language; the social-scientific study of religion; ritual in religion; the phenomenology of religion; critical theory and religion; embodiment and religion; the impact of colonialism and modernity; theorizing religion in terms of race and ethnicity; links among religion, nationalism, and globalization; the interplay of gender, sex, and religion; and religion and the environment. Each chapter introduces the topic, identifies key theorists and issues, and respects the pluralistic nature of the scholarship in the field. Altogether, this collection scrutinizes the explicit and implicit assumptions theorists make about religion as an object of analysis.
Author: James A. Beckford
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1107320100
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 407
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Book Description
Many aspects of religion are puzzling these days. This 2003 book looks at ways of improving our understanding of religious change by strengthening the links between social theory and the social scientific study of religion. It clarifies the social processes involved in constructing religion and non-religion in public and private life. Taking illustrations of the importance of these boundaries from studies of secularisation, religious diversity, globalisation, religious movements and self-identity, Beckford reviews social scientific knowledge about religion and assesses the strengths and weaknesses of a wide range of theoretical attempts to account for religious change and continuity. The discussion goes in two directions. The first is towards identifying ways in which studies of religion would benefit from taking better account of themes in recent social theory. The second is towards identifying reasons for social theorists to pay more attention to the findings of empirical investigations of religion.
Author: Nickolas Roubekas
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1317535308
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 203
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Book Description
An Ancient Theory of Religion examines a theory of religion put forward by Euhemerus of Messene (late 4th—early 3rd century BCE) in his lost work Sacred Inscription, and shows not only how and why euhemerism came about but also how it was— and still is—used. By studying the utilization of the theory in different periods—from the Graeco-Roman world to Late Antiquity, and from the Renaissance to the twenty-first century—this book explores the reception of the theory in diverse literary works. In so doing, it also unpacks the different adoptions and misrepresentations of Euhemerus’s work according to the diverse agendas of the authors and scholars who have employed his theory. In the process, certain questions are raised: What did Euhemerus actually claim? How has his theory of the origins of belief in gods been used? How can modern scholarship approach and interpret his take on religion? When referring to ‘euhemerism,’ whose version are we employing? An Ancient Theory of Religion assumes no prior knowledge of euhemerism and will be of interest to scholars working in classical reception, religious studies, and early Christian studies.
Author: Rodney Stark
Publisher: New York : P. Lang
ISBN:
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 396
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Book Description
This book offers the first modern theory of religion. A deductive theory, beginning with seven axioms about human nature and the world humans inhabit, it derives hundreds of formal propositions about human religious behavior. Included are the origins of religion, the sources of religious commitment, the development of religious institutions, the emergence of religious movements, and the postulation of good and evil gods. Step by step, the authors explain the social processes of recruitment to a group, propagation of a faith, and competition between denominations. They show that secularization is a never-ending process in which particular faiths are discredited while new faiths arise to take their place. Thus, religion is an eternal human response to the conditions of existence, changing in form throughout history but always a vital part of culture and society.
Author: Bryan S Turner
Publisher: SAGE Publications Limited
ISBN: 9780803985698
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 288
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Book Description
The second edition of this major book on the social analysis of religion incorporates a substantial new introduction by Bryan S Turner. Religion and Social Theory assesses the different theoretical approaches to the social function of religion. Turner discusses at length the ideas of key contributors to these approaches (including Engels, Durkheim, Weber, Nietzsche, Freud, Parsons, Marcuse, Habermas and Foucault). In so doing, he develops a distinctive perspective on the role of religion as an institutional link between economic and human reproduction. Social theories of religion are explored through a resolutely comparative and historical analysis of the Abrahamic faiths - Judaism, Islam and Christianity. Relating c
Author: William E. Deal
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135887977
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 144
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Book Description
Theory for Religious Studies presents the key theoretical influences on religious studies since the 1960s - an essential guide to the figures and ideas animating religious studies today. Drawing on thier complementary knowledge of Eastern and Western religious traditions, William Deal and Timothy Beal begin with four foundartional figures - Marx, Nietzsche, Saussure and Freud - and go on to provide guided introductions to Althusser, Bakhtin, Barthes, Bataille, Baudrillard, Benjamin, Bourdieu, Butler, Cixous, Deleuze and Guattari, Derrida, Foucault, Gadamer, Irigaray, Kristeva, Lacan, Lefebvre,
