History of Religion as Critique of Religion?

The Scottish eighteenth-century philosopher and historian David Hume can be considered a pioneer of the “natural history of religion” in the sense of a universal history of religion that is not based on theological presuppositions. This chapter offers a characterization of his methodological achievements and a reevaluation of his empirical claims concerning monotheism, polytheism, religion and tolerance. It also interprets the German reception of Hume in Herder and other eighteenth-century thinkers as a serious critical continuation that is free from Hume’s anti-Christian motives. This continuation opens the perspective of a serious study of the literary character of religious texts, in this case of the Bible. All simple contrasts between Enlightenment and religion are overcome as soon as we take this interaction of thinkers into account.

Introduction

This book is an attempt to divest of its enduring enchantment one of the concepts central to the way in which modernity understands itself, namely that of disenchantment. As we will see, this concept is profoundly ambiguous, as are contrasting terms such as “enchantment” and “re-enchantment,” which also began to circulate after it was coined. Such ambiguity may lead to confusion and has, in fact, often done so in this case. Conveyed covertly along with the term itself, this ambiguity may also serve to establish a false sense of certainty. This undoubtedly applies to the narrative of a progressive process of disenchantment extending across millennia. If my argument is correct, we cannot simply project this narrative forward into the future. What we need, then, is an alternative to it, or perhaps several such alternatives—new narratives of religious history as it is intertwined with the history of power, narratives that might supersede that of disenchantment....

Religious Experience and the Theory of Signs

The foundation of the psychology of religion in the work of William James and others is a major methodological breakthrough in the empirical study of religion. This psychology of religion focuses on experience, offering an alternative to the emphasis on religious doctrines or institutions. This chapter first presents a reconstruction of William James’s relevant writings. It then compares them to the theological writings of Friedrich Schleiermacher, who is sometimes seen as a source of inspiration for James. Finally it demonstrates the epochal achievement of Josiah Royce’s combination of pragmatist semiotics and the psychology of religion.

Fields of Tension

Max Weber’s “Intermediate Reflection,” also known under the title “Religious Rejections of the World and Their Directions,” is usually interpreted as the classic text for a theory of the differentiation of value spheres. As such it has become part of the sociological canon. The new and very detailed interpretation presented in this chapter demonstrates that this view is problematic both with regard to Weber’s own intentions and in itself. An alternative reading shows what the fields of tension that Weber deals with really are. This is an important point of departure for an alternative to the narrative of disenchantment.

Multiple Forms of Ideal Formation or Process of Disenchantment?

More than any other authors around 1900, Max Weber and Ernst Troeltsch developed a synthesis of the history, psychology, and sociology of religion. While in the conventional view the two thinkers were rather similar, this chapter contrasts them. I characterize Troeltsch’s views as a study of history that is open to ever new sacralizations. Weber’s notion of a world-historical process of disenchantment, meanwhile, I interpret and criticize as based on an ambiguous concept in urgent need of differentiation. If we do distinguish the different meanings of this highly ambiguous concept, the narrative of one world-historical process of disenchantment collapses.

Transcendence as Reflexive Sacredness

This chapter provides a comprehensive overview of the debate on the so-called Axial Age. It presents the major contributors from Karl Jaspers on, but also the predecessors in the 18th and 19th centuries. , It explores concepts such as the age of transcendence that have been used to characterize the fundamental innovation of that age. It particularly emphasizes the emergence of moral universalism in that period. The chapter also attempts to bring the different perspectives together by interpreting a reflexive view of the sources of sacredness as a major turning point in the global history of religion.

Ritual and the Sacred

Émile Durkheim’s sociology of religion is presented in this chapter not as a functionalist analysis, but as an understanding of religion that sees it as anchored in collective corporeal practices. These practices and the intense experiences to which they give rise lead to the attribution of sacredness to times, places, persons, and ideas and make ideals possible. This Durkheimian idea has a rich prehistory which is reconstructed here with a special focus on Fustel de Coulanges and Robertson Smith. This prehistory sensitizes us to the persistence of ritual in modernity and even under conditions of the decline of religion. This chapter adds the discussion about a sociological perspective in the study of religion to the discussions about historiography and psychology in the previous chapters.

The Sacred and Power

This chapter presents the outlines of an alternative to Max Weber’s narrative of disenchantment. It does so first by setting out a theory of the dynamics of sacralization in summary form. Second, this theory is applied to the history of the fusions of this dynamic and the dynamics of power formation and the history of the tensions between the two. The guiding thread for this alternative history is the topic of collective self-sacralization and the sources of resistance to it. The chapter ends with a short reflection on the normative implications of this alternative.