REL 2000 Lecture : Lecture 1
Document Summary
Discussing validity of the category, not the validity of religious traditions: ex) just because a dolphin isn"t a mammal doesn"t mean they do not exist. We categorize things & assume when we make a category the things that fit in the category share something. It is hard to know what religions share. Change that led to a different world; intellectual movement that stressed reason. Move away from theology towards rationality (prove things by studying not relying on god: religionswissenschaft (religious-science) Religion became universal: consequence: a lot of people were expecting to find religion everywhere because there is no clear definition (including many traits into the religion definition) Bruce lincoln said religion is: arts de faire ( practices of everyday life , oriented towards the transcendent and eternal, spoken of with transcendent, eternal authority. Still not a perfect definition: too broad ( ethical absolutism, doesn"t allow for religion to be sui generis ( of its own kind )
