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The Nature of Religion*. What is religion?Various definitionsApproaches to the study of religionTypical components of a religious systemWhy do people turn to religion?Religion in the contemporary age. *. Based on
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2. The Nature of Religion* What is religion?
Various definitions
Approaches to the study of religion
Typical components of a religious system
Why do people turn to religion?
Religion in the contemporary age
4. What is religion? Religion as a “binding together” (Latin, religio, from the verb religare = “to bind together”).
Religion is a relationship between the religious devotee and that which is the object of religious devotion (the gods, God, the Tao, the Holy, etc.), a relationship that binds the two together.
Religion is also a binding together of all those who share the same or similar religious attitudes. In this way, religion gives rise to a community of devotees, a collectivity (church, synagogue, brotherhood, sisterhood, etc.) that is itself related to and bound together with the object of its devotion (the gods, etc.).
6. In the “Notes,” there is a list of definitions of religion by numerous authors. Which of these definitions do you find most informative or meaningful? Why?
7. Approaches to the study of religion The historical approach
The phenomenological approach
The social scientific approach
8. Typical components of a religious belief system (world-view) A vision of reality (metaphysics)
Cosmology – questions about the origins and nature of the universe (Greek, kosmos)
Theology – Supreme Reality and the idea of the Holy
Anthropology – human nature, human existence, the human condition
A doctrine of salvation, deliverance, or liberation
A doctrine of right conduct – in ethics and in ritual
A theory of the ultimate destiny or final culmination of all things
A definition of the nature and membership of the religious community
9. Why do people turn to religion?Religion as a response to “the human condition”. The pursuit of happiness vs.
The human condition
Alienation of self and other vs. the need for a meaningful and harmonious relationship between self and other.
The insufficiency of human existence vs. the quest for fulfillment.
Guilt, meaninglessness, and death vs. the search for righteousness, meaning, and immortality.
The promise of religion: transcendence of the human condition.
10. Religion in the contemporary age The process of modernization
Modernization and change
Modern thought
The attitude of scientific reason
The doctrine of philosophical naturalism
The philosophy of secular humanism
Science and technology in the modern world
The problem of meaning in modern culture
11. To be continued . . . .