1. Introduction To Religion
McCutcheon: What is Religion?
Partridge: Phenomenology...
Bowie: The Anthropology...
Davies: Myths and Symbols
January 9, 2013

2. Lazy Views
Everyone basically believes in the same God with different ways of expressing those beliefs
Religion is private
One day we’ll find out who’s right
Religion is a crutch for the weak- minded
Imagine no religion

4. “Religion” To tie something tightly To pay careful attention
Beliefs, Behaviors & Social Institutions

5. Public or Private

6. The Essence
Assumption that Institutions, Hierarchies, Regulations & Rituals are INESSENTIAL
Inner Faith or Genuine Practice
Non-Empirical

7. Theories on Function Marx: Religion is a “pacifier”
Durkheim: Religion promotes social bonding
Freud: Religion vents anti-social anxieties
Wittgenstein: Religion share certain “family traits”
Your Theory???

8. Essentialist.
Functionalist.
Family Resemblance.

9. Phenomenology
Distinct from the Essentialist, the Functionalist and the Proponent of Family Resemblance Theory-- Phenomena!
Descriptive of objects, rituals, teachings, behavior...
Question of Ontological Truth is set aside

10. Friedrich Schleiermacher
“The essence of religion consists in the feeling of an absolute dependence.”

11. Rudolf Otto
“It is the emotion of a creature, submerged and overwhelmed by its own nothingness in contrast to that which is supreme, above all creatures...”

12. Morality
Holy
Numinous

15. You are Here

16. “Mysterium Tremendum”
Awe-fulness
Overpowering-ness
Energy or Urgency

17. In Response? Posit a Supreme Subject Beyond Existence & Non-Existence
Relationship with the Wholly Other?
Posit that Human Beings Are Embedded in Existence
Empty Ego-Attachments/Merge with the One Cosmos?

18. Insider vs. Outsider
Them Us

19. Suspend Interpretative Closure
Dialogue Around?

20. Gavin Flood Beyond Phenomenology Questions Detached Objectivity
The Disinterested Observer Does Not Exist
Self Always in Relation to the Other (Person)
One’s Experience of the Numinous Put In Dialogue with Others

21. In Your Groups Find Davies on Myths and Symbols
What is his analogy regarding music?
In what sense does “myth” communicate truth?
Symbols participate in the reality to which they point. What the hell?

22. For Friday Read Partridge, pp. 23--31
Think about or Remember a Religious Ritual in which you’ve been involved...
1 Page Paper Due Monday (See syllabus)