Why Study Religion?

Understanding Humanity's Pursuit of the Divine

Terry C. Muck

• Publisher: Baker Academic
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN:
  9780801049958
• eBook ISBN:
  9781493404483
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Comparative Religion

Why Studying Religion Matters in a Pluralistic Context

This brief primer explains why Christian students should study religion, how they should go about it, and why it is important in our contemporary, pluralistic context. Senior religion scholar Terry Muck introduces the discipline and explains how it can be approached by Christian students. He explores the contemporary significance of studying religion in a complex, multicultural world and concludes by addressing the skills students must bring to the study of religion in the twenty-first century. Written in accessible prose suitable for undergraduates, this introduction can be used to supplement any standard religion textbook.

Part 1
Why?

If you are a student taking your first course in religious studies, you need to know not only what it is you are studying and what skills you need as a student but also what benefits you will receive from such study. That’s what the two chapters in part 1 aim to provide.

Chapter 1 begins by defining the study of religion. For this purpose, I use an essential definition—that is, an “x equals x” kind of definition. Following this I offer a brief history of the scholarly study of religion, which one might call a historical definition of the study of religion. I then look at the merchants, militarists, missionaries, and migrants who provided the essential data that the earliest scholars of religion used in this fledgling discipline. Finally, I examine some of the ways in which the study of religion is used in everyday life—its fruits, as one might say.

Chapter 2 suggests that the study of religion makes better world citizens, especially in terms of the ways in which they contribute to world peace, improve scholarship in religion, and (at least indirectly) improve religions by offering critical commentary from outside perspectives. Even though scholars are expected to be “objective” about their study, the chapter makes an argument that the student of religion will most likely experience a deeper understanding of his or her own religion in the process. Finally, since most readers of this book are probably Christians, I offer some thoughts on whether a “Christian” study of religion exists and what it might look like.

Maybe you are not a student taking your first course in religious studies. Maybe you have already taken quite a few such courses, or maybe you have developed sophisticated knowledge of religions in some other way, perhaps through a private course of reading or via study on the internet. If so, you will probably read chapters 1 and 2 differently, asking more sophisticated questions.

Chapter 1, for example, can be read as an exercise in definition, showing that any human phenomenon can be defined in many different ways. I use a number of these definitional strategies in the introduction and chapter 1, starting with a family resemblance definition for religion and moving, in turn, to an essential definition, a historical definition, and a personality-based definition for the study of religion. One might ask what other kinds of definitions could be put forward that are not used in this book. Metaphorical definitions come to mind here, particularly definitions that use metaphors and similes to explain what the study of religion is like. As an exercise, finish the following sentence: “The study of religion is like . . .” Any answer that is provided will be a metaphorical definition. As an additional exercise, brainstorm other ways in which the study of religion might be defined and explained.

Although chapter 2 introduces questions concerning the “objectivity” of the religious studies scholar, much more can be said about this subject, particularly about how a student’s faith can either help or hinder his or her scholarly work. If you have already studied religion as an academic subject, you might reflect on the effects of that study on your personal religious commitments. Has it had little or no effect? Or has it had dramatic effect? As an exercise, consider writing five hundred words on the subject. You might also reflect in a more nuanced way on how you view objectivity, including (1) what scholarly objectivity is, (2) what scholarly objectivity is not, and (3) how scholarly objectivity might be attained.

When you have finished reading the two chapters that make up part 1, you should be able to define religion, define the study of religion, be aware of the history of religious studies, and know what skills are expected of someone who takes seriously the task of studying religion.

The two chapters in part 1 might also raise questions you wish to explore. Does the definition of religion change as the cultural influences of particular groups of people change? Although it is one thing to acknowledge that we cannot be totally objective in our study of religion, it is quite another to give up objectivity altogether, resulting in relativism. How might one inhabit the space between scholarly objectivity and skeptical relativism?

1
The Study of Religion

In the introduction I attempted to define religion. In this chapter I attempt to define the study of religion.

What is the study of religion? Defining the study of religion, it turns out, is almost as difficult as defining religion itself.1 In the introduction to this book, I pointed out that religion can be defined differently, depending on the needs of the definer. Similarly, the study of religion can be defined differently, depending on the person who is doing the defining.2 To use the language suggested by Max Müller in the last chapter, when religion’s “cultured despisers”3 (Sigmund Freud, Karl Marx, the New Atheists) define religion, they begin with the assumption that religion is pathological—something to be avoided. Thus the study of such religion is seen as something roughly comparable to the medical diagnosis of a disease. On the contrary, when the adherents of different religions (such as Buddhists, Christians, Hindus, or Muslims) define religion, they are likely to define it as revealed from God or the transcendent as they understand it, so the study of religion turns out to be something akin to theology, Vedology, or Buddhology. Without suggesting that either one of these ways of studying religion is necessarily wrong, Müller advocates approaching religious phenomenon scientifically and objectively. Rather than considering all religion bad or privileging one religion over all the others, Müller thought that we should learn to study religion as human phenomena; thus began the development of the discipline we now call “religious studies.” With that in mind, I will proceed in this chapter to answer the following question: How do we define what religious studies scholars do when they “study religion”?

Like any terminology requiring a definition, the study of religion can be defined functionally, essentially, and/or historically. In the introduction to this book, I gave an example of a functional definition (sometimes called a “family resemblance definition”), which I call the Four-Question Definition of religion. For my discussion on the study of religion, I will use an essential definition:

The modern, scholarly study of religion is the comprehensive study of religion and religions as human phenomena using both historical and systematic methodologies, as far as possible without dogmatic presuppositions, comparing and contrasting both universal and particular features of those religions.4

What is the difference between a functional definition and an essential one? While a functional definition emphasizes the uses to which religion is put by its adherents, an essential definition attempts to define religion by what it is. Most dictionary definitions of nouns (like religion or the study of religion) are essential definitions. Such definitions explicitly state the characteristics of the noun under discussion and by implication eliminate the noun from the categories of things that are not stated. A dictionary usually states that in order to be a “study of religion,” a phenomenon must include characteristic A, characteristic B, characteristic C, and so on. For example, in my definition of the study of religion, characteristic A is “human phenomena,” as the subject of such study; characteristic B is “historical and systematic methodologies,” which are used in the study of religion; and characteristic C is to do such study without “dogmatic presuppositions.” For an activity to be considered a “study of religion,” it must include all three characteristics: A, B, and C.

Scientists love essential definitions. They are precise. They set specific rubrics for measuring things. The great strength of essential definitions is that anyone anywhere can use such a definition to either include or exclude a specific human behavior as religious—or not. In the case of this chapter, an essential definition of the study of religion can help teach us what the study of religion is about—and what, if anything, it is not about.

A Historical Definition of the Study of Religion

A functional definition defines something by what it does. An essential definition defines something by what it is and is not. A historical definition defines something by how it has existed in historical time: how it began, how it developed, and what it is today as a result of that history. Let us turn now to an extended historical definition of the study of religion. How did the modern, scholarly study of religion begin and develop?5

The study of religion as a Western academic subject is a relatively new discipline. Prior to the mid-nineteenth century, studying “religion” usually meant that the subject matter was one’s own religion, with occasional thoughts on how other religions compared with it. The study of religion, in other words, was nearly synonymous with theology. In the mid-nineteenth century, several trends gave these occasional and dogmatic thoughts about other religions a new, distinctive character. One trend, ironically, was the Christian mission movement. After several centuries of development, its practitioners were able to supply Western scholars with a wealth of material on non-Christian religions. A second trend at this same time was anthropologists and archaeologists who were studying non-Western cultures and sending back an avalanche of data on cultural and religious practices in Asia, Africa, and Micronesia. The third trend involved the flowering of an intellectual approach to interpreting data that emphasizes human rationality rather than divine agency. This Enlightenment viewpoint was tailor-made for attempts to make some sense of this body of religious informa...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Endorsements
• Dedication
• Contents
• Study Aids
• Preface
• Introduction
• Part 1: Why?
• Part 2: Why Now?
• Part 3: How?
• Conclusion
• Appendix 1: Classic Books in the Study of Religion
• Appendix 2: Classic Essays in the Study of Religion
• Appendix 3: Categorizing Religious Traditions
• Appendix 4: Twelve Guidelines for the Study of Religion
• Index
• Back Cover