جامعه‌شناسی دین
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جامعه‌شناسی دین یکی از حوزه‌های جامعه‌شناسی است که به نقش دین در جامعه می‌پردازد. محتویاتپیشینه[ویرایش]«چگونه می‌توانیم در دنیایی بدون خدا زندگی کنیم؟» این پرسش از قرن هجدهم به بعد، هنگامی که متفکّران اجتماعی و علمای دینی تصور کردند نفوذ دین به شدّت رو به زوال می‌رود، در فرهنگ غرب طنین افکند. نزدیک به پایان قرن نوزدهم، فریدریش نیچه اعلام داشت که «خدا مرده‌است!». به ادعای نیچه از این پس، باید بدون هیچ‌گونه اصول راهنمای ثابت اخلاقی زندگی کنیم. زندگی در دنیایی بدون خدا به معنای آن است که ارزش‌های خودمان را خلق کنیم و به آنچه نیچه «تنهایی وجود» می‌نامید، عادت کنیم. اما روشن نیست آن‌طور که نیچه تصوّر می‌کرد نفوذ دین تا مرحله‌ای تنزل کرده باشد که به کلی محو گردد (گیدنز، ۱۳۷۶: ۴۹۵). رویکردهای جامعه‌شناختی نسبت به دین هنوز شدیداً تحت تأثیر اندیشه‌های سه نظریه‌پرداز کلاسیک جامعه‌شناسی یعنی مارکس، دورکهایم و وبر است. هیچ‌یک از این سه جامعه‌شناس خود مذهبی نبودند و همگی فکر می‌کردند که اهمیت دین در دوران امروزی کاهش خواهد یافت. آن‌ها بر این باور بودند که مذهب اساساً یک توهم است، زیرا طرفداران مذاهب مختلف ممکن است به‌طور کلی در مورد اعتبار اعتقاداتی که دارند، متقاعد شده باشند، اما اصل گوناگونی مذاهب و ارتباط آشکارشان با انواع مختلف جامعه، این اعتبار را زیر سؤال می‌برد (گیدنز، ۱۳۷۶: ۵۰۲). مارکس: دین و نابرابری[ویرایش]کارل مارکس با وجود این که در این زمینه تأثیر زیادی بر جای گذاشته، اما هرگز مذهب را به تفصیل مطالعه نکرده‌است. اندیشه‌های او اکثراً از نوشته‌های تعدادی از مؤلفان علوم الهی و فلسفی اوایل قرن نوزدهم سرچشمه می‌گرفت. یکی از این مؤلفان لودویگ فویر باخ بود ف که کتاب معروفی به نام جوهر مسیحیت نوشت؛ بنابراین نظر فویرباخ، دین عبارت است از عقاید و ارزشهایی که به وسیله انسان‌ها در تکامل فرهنگیشان به وجود آمده، اما اشتباهاً به نیروهای الهی یا خدایان نسبت داده شده‌است. از آنجا که انسان‌ها تارخ خود را کاملاً درک نمی‌کنند. معمولاً ارزش‌ها و هنجارهایی را که به‌طور اجتماعی ایجاد شده‌اند به اعمال خدایان نسبت می‌دهند. بدین سان داستان ده فرمان که توسط خداوند به موسی داده شده تفسیر اسطوره‌ای سرچشمه‌های احکام اخلاقی است که حاکم بر زندگانی مؤمنان یهودی و مسیحی است. فویر باخ می‌گوید مادام که ما ماهیت نمادهای دینی ای را که خودمان ایجاد کرده‌ایم درک نمی‌کنیم، محکوم هستیم که اسیر نیروهای تاریخ که توانایی کنترل آن‌ها را نداریم باشیم. فویر باخ اصطلاح بیگانگی را برای اشاره به وجود آوردن خدایان یا نیروهای الهی متمایز از انسان‌ها به کار می‌برد. ارزش‌ها و عقایدی که به وسیلهٔ انسان‌ها به وجود آمده‌اند ناشی از موجودات بیگانه یا جداگانه یعنی نیروهای دینی و خدایان پنداشته می‌شوند در حالی که اثرات بیگانگی در گذشته منفی بوده‌اند ف درک دین به عنوان بیگانگی، به گفته فویر باخ، نوید امیدهای فراوانی را برای آینده می‌دهد. به محض اینکه انسان‌ها دریابند که ارزشهایی که به مذهب نسبت داده شده در واقع ارزش‌های خود آنهاست، آن ارزش‌ها به جای اینکه به زندگی پس از مرگ در جهان دیگر موکول گردند، در این جهان قابل تحقق می‌شوند. قدرت‌هایی را که بنابر باورهای مسیحیت تنها خداوند داراست خود انسان‌ها می‌توانند داشته باشند. مسیحیان معتقدند در حالی که خداوند قادر مطلق و مهربان مطلق است، انسان‌ها خود غیر کامل و ناقص هستند اما، فویر باخ معتقد بود توانایی بالقوه محبت و خوبی، و قدرت کنترل زندگی خودمان، در نهادهای اجتماعی انسانی وجود دارند؛ و به محض اینکه ما ماهیت حقیقی آن‌ها را درک کنیم، می‌توانند تحقق یابند. مارکس این نظر را می‌پذیرد که دین نشان دهنده از خود بیگانگی انسان است. اغلب تصور شده‌است که مارکس دین را رد می‌کرد، اما این به هیچ وجه حقیقت ندارد. او می‌نویسد دین قلب یک دنیای بی قلب است. پناهگاهی در برابر خشونت واقعیتهای روزانه. از نظر مارکس، دین به صورت سنتی آن ناپدید خواهد شد، و باید بشود، اما این از آن روست که ارزش‌های مثبتی که در دین تجسم یافته می‌تواند به صورت آرمان‌های راهنمای بهبود سرنوشت بشریت در این جهان درآید، نه به این علت که خود آرمان‌ها و ارزش‌ها اشتباه هستند. ما نباید از خدایانی که خودمان آفریده‌ایم بترسیم، و باید از بخشیدن ارزشهایی به آن‌ها که خودمان می‌توانیم تحقق دهیم خودداری کنیم. مارکس در عبارت مشهوری اعلام کرد که دین تریاک خلق بوده‌است. دین سعادت و پاداش‌ها را به زندگی پس از مرگ موکول می‌کند و پذیرش تسلیم طلبانه شرایط موجود را در این زندگی می‌آموزد بدین سان با وعده آنچه در جهان دیگر خواهد آمد توجه از نابرابری‌ها و بی عدالتی‌ها در این جهان منحرف می‌شود. دین دارای یک عنصر نیرومند ایدئولوژیکی است: اعتقادات و ارزش‌های دینی غالباً نابرابری‌های ثروت و قدرت را توجیه می‌کنند. برای مثال، این آموزش که فروتنان وارثان زمین خواهند بود بیانگر نگرش‌های افتادگی و عدم مقاومت در برابر ستم است (گیدنز، ۱۳۷۶: ۵۰۲). دورکهایم: کارکردگرایی و شعایر دینی[ویرایش]برخلاف مارکس، امیل دورکهایم بخش قابل ملاحظه‌ای از مطالعات خود را به بررسی دین اختصاص داده و به ویژه توجه خود را به دین در جوامع کوچک سنتی معطوف کرد. اثر دورکهایم به نام صور ابتدایی زندگی دینی، که نخستین بار در سال ۱۹۱۲ منتشر گردید، شاید پرنفوذترین مطالعه در جامعه‌شناسی دین باشد. دورکهایم دین را اساساً با نابرابری‌های اجتماعی یا قدرت مرتبط نمی‌سازد، بلکه آن را به طبیعت کلی نهادهای جامعه مربوط می‌کند. او مطالعه خود را بر مبنای بررسی توتم آیینی آن گونه که در جوامع بومی استرالیا معمول است قرار می‌دهد، و استدلال می‌کند که توتم آیینی نمایانگر دین در ابتدایی‌ترین یا ساده‌ترین شکل آن است و عنوان کتاب او از اینجا گرفته شده‌است. توتم، در اصل حیوان یا گیاهی بود که اهمیت نمادین خاصی برای یک گروه داشت. توتم چیزی مقدس است، که با حرمت بدان نگریسته می‌شود و با شعایر گوناگونی احاطه گردیده‌است. دورکهایم دین را برحسب تمایز میان چیزهای مقدس و چیزهای نامقدس تعریف می‌کند. او معتقد است که چیزهای مقدس و نمادها جدا از جنبه‌های عادی هستی و قلمرو چیزهای نامقدس، در نظرگرفته می‌شوند. خوردن حیوان یا گیاه توتمی، جز در مواقع تشریفاتی خاصی، معمولاً ممنوع گردیده‌است و این اعتقاد وجود دارد که توتم به عنوان چیزی مقدس واجد صفات الهی است که آن را از حیوانات دیگر که می‌توان شکار کرد، یا گیاهانی که می‌توان گردآوری و مصرف کرد، کاملاً جدا می‌کند. چرا توتم مقدس است؟ به نظر دورکهایم به این علت که توتم نماد خود گروه است، نمایندهٔ ارزشهایی است که برای گروه یا اجتماع اهمیت اساسی دارند. حرمتی که مردم برای توتم در نظر می‌گیرند در واقع ناشی از احترامی است که برای ارزش‌های اجتماعی اساسی قایل هستند. در دین موضوع پرستش در واقع خود جامعه است. دورکهایم قویا این واقعیت را مورد تأکید قرار می‌دهد که ادیان هرگز فقط یک موضوع اعتقادی نیستند. همهٔ ادیان متضمن اعمال تشریفاتی و شعایر منظمی هستند که در آن گروهی از مؤمنان گرد هم می‌آیند. در مراسم تشریفاتی جمعی، حس هم‌بستگی گروهی تأیید و تقویت می‌شود. تشریفات افراد را از امور مربوط به زندگی اجتماعی نامقدس دور کرده به قلمرویی متعالی وارد می‌کند که در آن اعضای گروه خود را در ارتباط با نیروهای عالی‌تر احساس می‌کنند. این نیروهای عالی‌تر، که به توتم‌ها یا تأثیرات الهی یا خدایان نسبت داده می‌شوند، در حقیقت بیان نفوذ و تأثیر جمع بر فرد است. تشریفات و شعایر، از نظر دورکهایم، برای پیوند دادن اعضای گروه ضروری است. از این روست که آن‌ها نه تنها در وضعیت‌های عادی پرستش، بلکه در بحران‌های گوناگون زندگی که در آن تغییرات و گذرهای عمدهٔ اجتماعی تجربه می‌شوند، مانند تولد، ازدواج یا مرگ نیز، یافت می‌شوند. عملاً در همهٔ جوامع، آیین‌های شعایری و تشریفاتی در این‌گونه گردهم‌آیی‌ها برگزار می‌گردند. دورکهایم استدلال می‌کند که تشریفات جمعی در زمانی که مردم مجبور به سازگار شدن با تغییرات عمده در زندگی‌شان هستند هم‌بستگی گروهی را مجدداً تأیید می‌کند. شعایر تدفین نشان می‌دهد که ارزش‌های گروه پس از درگذشت افراد به خصوص زنده می‌ماند، و بنابراین وسیله‌ای برای مردم داغ‌دیده فراهم می‌کند که با شرایط تغییر یافته‌شان سازگار شوند. سوگواری بیان خود به خودی اندوه نیست، یا دست کم فقط برای آن‌ها که شخصاً از مرگ متأثر شده‌اند چنین نیست. سوگواری وظیفه‌ای است که توسط گروه تحمیل می‌شود. دورکهایم می‌گوید در فرهنگ‌های کوچک سنتی تقریباً همهٔ جنبه‌های زندگی تحت نفوذ دین است. تشریفات دینی، هم اندیشه‌ها و مقولات فکری جدید را به‌وجود می‌آورند و هم ارزش‌های موجود را مورد تأیید مجدد قرار می‌دهند. دین تنها یک رشته احساسات و اعمال نیست، بلکه در واقع نحوهٔ اندیشیدن افراد را در فرهنگ‌های سنتی مشروط می‌کند. حتی اساسی‌ترین مقولات فکری از جمله تصور زمان و مکان نخستین بر حسب مقولات مذهبی تعریف شدند. برای مثال، مفهوم زمان، در آغاز از شمارش فواصل موجود بین انجام دادن مراسم دینی پدید آمد. دورکهایم معتقد است که با توسعهٔ جوامع امروزین، نفوذ مذهب رو به زوال می‌گذارد. تفکر علمی بیش از پیش جای‌گزین تبیین مذهبی می‌شود، ولی اعمال تشریفاتی و شعایر تنها بخش کوچکی از زندگی افراد را اشغال می‌کنند. دورکهایم با مارکس هم‌عقیده است که دین سنتی یعنی دینی که متضمن نیروهای الهی یا خدایان است، در آستانهٔ ناپدید شدن است. دورکهایم می‌نویسد خدایان قدیمی مرده‌اند. با وجود این او می‌گوید که به مفهومی، دین به شکل تغییریافته ممکن است ادامه یابد. حتی جوامع امروزین انسجام خود را مدیون شعایری هستند که ارزش‌های آن‌ها را مورد تأیید مجدد قرار می‌دهد، بنابراین می‌توان انتظار داشت اعمال تشریفاتی جدیدی پدید آیند که جانشین مراسم تشریفاتی قدیمی‌شوند. در بارهٔ این که این اعمال تشریفاتی چه ممکن است باشد نظر دورکهایم مبهم است. اما به نظر می‌رسد که او بزرگ‌داشت ارزش‌های انسان‌دوستانه و سیاسی مانند آزادی، برابری و همکاری اجتماعی را در نظر دارد. می‌توان استدلال کرد که اکثر دولت‌های صنعتی در واقع ادیان مدنی را ترویج کرده‌اند. در بریتانیا، نمادهایی مانند پرچم، سرودهایی مانند سرزمین امید و سرافرازی و شعایری مانند مراسم تاج‌گذاری، همه در جهت تثبیت و تأکید مجدد راه و رسم زندگی بریتانیایی عمل می‌کنند. این نمادها با نهادهای دینی سنتی، مانند کلیسای انگلستان پیوند دارند. برعکس، شوروی، بر اساس اندیشه‌های مارکس، آشکارا با دین سنتی مخالف است. با وجود این، مارکس، انگلس و لنین خود به نمادهای قدرتمندی در یک دین مدنی تبدیل شده‌اند که توسط دولت حمایت می‌شود. جشن‌های روز اول ماه مه که هر ساله در میدان سرخ مسکو برگزار می‌شود، و شعایر دیگر، تعهد نسبت به آرمان‌های انقلاب روسیه را تقویت می‌کند. این که آیا در این زمینه‌ها نیز می‌توان از دین سخن گفت قابل بحث است، این نمادها و شیوه‌های عمل در کنار ادیان سنتی وجود دارند. با وجود این به سختی می‌توان انکار کرد که نمادها و شعایر مدنی از مکانیسم‌های اجتماعی همانند با آنچه در شکل‌های سنتی دین یافت می‌شود، بهره می‌جویند. وبر: ادیان جهان و تغییر اجتماعی[ویرایش]دورکهایم استدلال‌های خود را بر مبنای تعداد اندکی از نمونه‌ها قرار می‌دهد، اگر چه ادعا می‌کند که اندیشه‌هایش بر مذهب به‌طور کلی تطبیق می‌کنند. درمقابل، ماکس وبر به مطالعه وسیعی دربارهٔ ادیان سراسر جهان پرداخت. هیچ دانشمندی پیش از او، یا تاکنون، به کاری با چنین دامنه وسیع دست نزده‌است. بیشتر توجه وبر بر آنچه آن را ادیان جهانی نامیده‌است متمرکز بود. ادیانی که تعداد زیادی از مؤمنان را به خود جلب کرده‌اند و به‌طور قطعی بر مسیر تاریخ جهانی تأثیرگذارده‌اند. او مطالعات مفصلی دربارهٔ آیین‌های هندو، بودا، تائو و دین کهن یهود انجام داد؛ و در کتاب اخلاق پروتستان و روح سرمایه‌داری (۱۹۷۶، که نخستین بار در ۵–۱۹۰۴ منتشر گردید) و کتاب‌ها و مقالات دیگرش به‌طور گسترده دربارهٔ تأثیر مسیحیت برتاریخ غرب نوشت. اما نتوانست مطالعه خود راکه دربارهٔ اسلام طرح‌ریزی کرده بود به پایان برساند. نوشته‌های وبر دربارهٔ دین با نوشته‌های دورکهایم از نظر توجه به ارتباط میان دین و دگرگونی اجتماعی (چیزی که دورکهایم چندان توجهی به آن نکرد) فرق دارند. آن‌ها در نقطه مقابل آثار مارکس هستند، زیرا وبر استدلال می‌کند که دین لزوماً نیرویی محافظه کار نیست، برعکس، جنبش‌های الهام گرفته از دین اغلب دگرگونی‌های اجماعی چشمگیری به وجود آورده‌اند. بدین سان آیین پروتستان به ویژه پیوریتنیسم منبع شیوه نگرش سرمایه دارانه موجود در غرب امروزی بود. نخستین کارآفرینان اکثراً از پیروان کالون بودند. انگیزه آن‌ها برای موفقیت، که به شروع توسعه اقتصادی در غرب کمک کرد، در اصل از میل خدمت به خداوند سرچشمه می‌گرفت. موفقیت مادی برای آن‌ها نشانه‌ای از لطف الهی بود. وبر تحقیق خود را دربارهٔ ادیان جهان به عنوان یک طرح واحد در نظر می‌گرفت. بحث او دربارهٔ تأثیر آیین پروتستان بر توسعه غرب جزئی از کوششی جامع برای درک تأثیر مذهب بر زندگی اجتماعی و اقتصادی و فرهنگ‌های مختلف است. وبر با تحلیل ادیان شرقی نتیجه می‌گیرد که آن‌ها موانع غیرقابل عبوری در برابر توسعه سرمایه‌داری صنعتی، آن گونه که در غرب رخ داد، فراهم کردند. این نه از آن روست که تمدن‌های غیر غربی عقب مانده‌اند. آن‌ها صرفاً ارزشهایی متفاوت با آنچه را که در اروپا مسلط گردید پذیرفته‌اند. وبر یادآور می‌شود که در چین و هند قدیم در دوره‌های معینی توسعه قابل توجه تجارت، صنعت و شهرنشینی وجود داشت، اما در این جوامع الگوهای اساسی دگرگونی اجتماعی که در ظهور سرمایه‌داری صنعتی در غرب دخالت داشت به وجود نیامد و دین عامل عمده‌ای در جلوگیری از این دگرگونی بود. برای مثال، آیین هندو چیزی است که وبر آن را دین آن جهانی می‌نامد این بدان معناست که عالی‌ترین ارزش‌های آن «بر گریز از رنجای دنیای مادی به سوی سطح عالی تری از هستی معنوی» تأکید می‌کند. احساسات مذهبی و انگیزش‌های برخاسته از آیین کنفوسیوس نیز مانع کوشش برای توسعه اقتصادی به مفهومی که در غرب درک می‌شود، گردیده و به جای اینکه تسلط جدی بر جهان را تشویق کند هماهنگی با آن را مورد تأکید قرار می‌دهد اگر چه چین زمانی دراز قدرتمندترین و از نظر فرهنگی توسعه یافته‌ترین تمدن در جهان بود ، ارزش‌های مسلط دینی آن همچون عاملی بازدارنده در برابر تعهد شدید نسبت به توسعه اقتصادی به خاطر خود آن عمل می‌کردند. وبر مسیحیت را به مثابه یک دین رستگاری در نظر می‌گیرد، که متضمن این عقیده است که انسان‌ها اگر اعتقادات دینی را بپذیرند و از اصول اخلاقی آن پیروی کنند می‌توانند رستگار شوند. مفاهیم گناه و نجات یافتن از گناهکاری به مرحمت خداوند در اینجا دارای اهمیت هستند این مفاهیم نوعی تنش و پویایی عاطفی ایجاد می‌کنند که اساساً در ادیان شرقی وجود ندارد. ادیان رستگاری یک جنبه انقلابی دارند. در حالی که ادیان شرق یک نگرش انفعالی نسبت به نظم موجود در درون مؤمن پرورش می‌دهند. مسیحیت متضمن مبارزه‌ای دایمی علیه گناه است؛ و از این روی می‌تواند علیه وضع موجود شورش برانگیزد. رهبران دینی مانند عیسی ظهور می‌کنند که اصول عقاید موجود را از نو به شیوه ای تفسیر می‌کنند که ساخت قدرت موجود را به رویارویی فرا می‌خواند. جستارهای وابسته[ویرایش]منابع[ویرایش]
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Sociology of religion is the study of the beliefs, practices and organizational forms of religion using the tools and methods of the discipline of sociology. This objective investigation may include the use of both quantitative methods (surveys, polls, demographic and census analysis) and qualitative approaches such as participant observation, interviewing, and analysis of archival, historical and documentary materials.[1] Modern academic sociology began with the analysis of religion in Émile Durkheim's 1897 study of suicide rates among Catholic and Protestant populations, a foundational work of social research which served to distinguish sociology from other disciplines, such as psychology. The works of Karl Marx and Max Weber emphasized the relationship between religion and the economic or social structure of society. Contemporary debates have centered on issues such as secularization, civil religion, and the cohesiveness of religion in the context of globalization and multiculturalism. The contemporary sociology of religion may also encompass the sociology of irreligion (for instance, in the analysis of secular humanist belief systems). Sociology of religion is distinguished from the philosophy of religion in that it does not set out to assess the validity of religious beliefs. The process of comparing multiple conflicting dogmas may require what Peter L. Berger has described as inherent "methodological atheism".[2] Whereas the sociology of religion broadly differs from theology in assuming indifference to the supernatural, theorists tend to acknowledge socio-cultural reification of religious practice. ContentsView of religion in classical sociologyClassical, seminal sociological theorists of the late 19th and early 20th century such as Émile Durkheim, Max Weber, and Karl Marx were greatly interested in religion and its effects on society. Like those of Plato and Aristotle from ancient Greece, and Enlightenment philosophers from the 17th through 19th centuries, the ideas posited by these sociologists continue to be examined today. Durkheim, Marx, and Weber had very complex and developed theories about the nature and effects of religion. Of these, Durkheim and Weber are often more difficult to understand, especially in light of the lack of context and examples in their primary texts. Religion was considered to be an extremely important social variable in the work of all three. Karl MarxAccording to Kevin J. Christiano et al., "Marx was the product of the Enlightenment, embracing its call to replace faith by reason and religion by science." But he "did not believe in science for science's sake … he believed that he was also advancing a theory that would … be a useful tool … [in] effecting a revolutionary upheaval of the capitalist system in favor of socialism."[3] As such, the crux of his arguments was that humans are best guided by reason. Religion, Marx held, was a significant hindrance to reason, inherently masking the truth and misguiding followers.[4] As we will later see, Marx viewed alienation as the heart of social inequality. The antithesis to this alienation is freedom. Thus, to propagate freedom means to present individuals with the truth and give them a choice to accept or deny it. In this, "Marx never suggested that religion ought to be prohibited."[5] Central to Marx's theories was the oppressive economic situation in which he dwelt. With the rise of European industrialism, Marx and his colleague Friedrich Engels witnessed and responded to the growth of what he called "surplus value". Marx's view of capitalism saw rich capitalists getting richer and their workers getting poorer (the gap, the exploitation, was the "surplus value"). Not only were workers getting exploited, but in the process they were being further detached from the products they helped create. By simply selling their work for wages, "workers simultaneously lose connection with the object of labor and become objects themselves. Workers are devalued to the level of a commodity – a thing …"[6] From this objectification comes alienation. The common worker is led to believe that he or she is a replaceable tool, and is alienated to the point of extreme discontent. Here, in Marx's eyes, religion enters. Capitalism utilizes our tendency towards religion as a tool or ideological state apparatus to justify this alienation. Christianity teaches that those who gather up riches and power in this life will almost certainly not be rewarded in the next ("it is harder for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven than it is for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle …") while those who suffer oppression and poverty in this life, while cultivating their spiritual wealth, will be rewarded in the Kingdom of God. Hence Marx's famous line – "religion is the opium of the people", as it soothes them and dulls their senses to the pain of oppression. Some scholars have recently noted that this is a contradictory (or dialectical) metaphor, referring to religion as both an expression of suffering and a protest against suffering.[7] Émile DurkheimÉmile Durkheim placed himself in the positivist tradition, meaning that he thought of his study of society as dispassionate and scientific. He was deeply interested in the problem of what held complex modern societies together. Religion, he argued, was an expression of social cohesion. In the field work that led to his famous Elementary Forms of Religious Life, Durkheim, a secular Frenchman, looked at anthropological data of Indigenous Australians. His underlying interest was to understand the basic forms of religious life for all societies. In Elementary Forms, Durkheim argues that the totems the Aborigines venerate are actually expressions of their own conceptions of society itself. This is true not only for the Aborigines, he argues, but for all societies. Religion, for Durkheim, is not "imaginary", although he does deprive it of what many believers find essential.[8] Religion is very real; it is an expression of society itself, and indeed, there is no society that does not have religion. We perceive as individuals a force greater than ourselves, which is our social life, and give that perception a supernatural face. We then express ourselves religiously in groups, which for Durkheim makes the symbolic power greater. Religion is an expression of our collective consciousness, which is the fusion of all of our individual consciousnesses, which then creates a reality of its own. It follows, then, that less complex societies, such as the Australian Aborigines, have less complex religious systems, involving totems associated with particular clans. The more complex a particular society, the more complex the religious system is. As societies come in contact with other societies, there is a tendency for religious systems to emphasize universalism to a greater and greater extent. However, as the division of labour makes the individual seem more important (a subject that Durkheim treats extensively in his famous The Division of Labour in Society), religious systems increasingly focus on individual salvation and conscience. Durkheim's definition of religion, from Elementary Forms, is as follows: "A religion is a unified system of beliefs and practices relative to sacred things, that is to say, things set apart and forbidden – beliefs and practices which unite into one single moral community called a Church, all those who adhere to them."[9] This is a functional definition of religion, meaning that it explains what religion does in social life: essentially, it unites societies. Durkheim defined religion as a clear distinction between the sacred and the profane, in effect this can be paralleled with the distinction between God and humans. This definition also does not stipulate what exactly may be considered sacred. Thus later sociologists of religion (notably Robert Neelly Bellah) have extended Durkheimian insights to talk about notions of civil religion, or the religion of a state. American civil religion, for example, might be said to have its own set of sacred "things": the flag of the United States, Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King Jr., etc. Other sociologists have taken Durkheim's concept of what religion is in the direction of the religion of professional sports, the military, or of rock music. Max WeberMax Weber published four major texts on religion in a context of economic sociology and his rationalization thesis: The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (1905), The Religion of China: Confucianism and Taoism (1915), The Religion of India: The Sociology of Hinduism and Buddhism (1915), and Ancient Judaism (1920). In his sociology, Weber uses the German term "Verstehen" to describe his method of interpretation of the intention and context of human action. Weber is not a positivist; he does not believe we can find out "facts" in sociology that can be causally linked. Although he believes some generalized statements about social life can be made, he is not interested in hard positivist claims, but instead in linkages and sequences, in historical narratives and particular cases. Weber argues for making sense of religious action on its own terms. A religious group or individual is influenced by all kinds of things, he says, but if they claim to be acting in the name of religion, we should attempt to understand their perspective on religious grounds first. Weber gives religion credit for shaping a person's image of the world, and this image of the world can affect their view of their interests, and ultimately how they decide to take action. For Weber, religion is best understood as it responds to the human need for theodicy and soteriology. Human beings are troubled, he says, with the question of theodicy – the question of how the extraordinary power of a divine god may be reconciled with the imperfection of the world that he has created and rules over. People need to know, for example, why there is undeserved good fortune and suffering in the world. Religion offers people soteriological answers, or answers that provide opportunities for salvation – relief from suffering, and reassuring meaning. The pursuit of salvation, like the pursuit of wealth, becomes a part of human motivation. Because religion helps to define motivation, Weber believed that religion (and specifically Calvinism) actually helped to give rise to modern capitalism, as he asserted in his most famous and controversial work, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. In The Protestant Ethic, Weber argues that capitalism arose in Europe in part because of how the belief in predestination was interpreted by everyday English Puritans. Puritan theology was based on the Calvinist notion that not everyone would be saved; there was only a specific number of the elect who would avoid damnation, and this was based sheerly on God's predetermined will and not on any action you could perform in this life. Official doctrine held that one could not ever really know whether one was among the elect. Practically, Weber noted, this was difficult psychologically: people were (understandably) anxious to know whether they would be eternally damned or not. Thus Puritan leaders began assuring members that if they began doing well financially in their businesses, this would be one unofficial sign they had God's approval and were among the saved – but only if they used the fruits of their labour well. This along with the rationalism implied by monotheism led to the development of rational bookkeeping and the calculated pursuit of financial success beyond what one needed simply to live – and this is the "spirit of capitalism".[10] Over time, the habits associated with the spirit of capitalism lost their religious significance, and the rational pursuit of profit became an aim in its own right. The Protestant Ethic thesis has been much critiqued, refined, and disputed, but is still a lively source of theoretical debate in sociology of religion. Weber also did considerable work on world religions, including Hinduism and Buddhism. In his magnum opus Economy and Society Weber distinguished three ideal types of religious attitudes:[11]
He also separated magic as pre-religious activity. Theoretical perspectivesSymbolic anthropology and phenomenologySymbolic Anthropology is the study of people and the understanding of their surroundings, as well as the actions of the members of their society. There are two major premises for symbolic anthropology. The first premise is that beliefs are unintelligible, become comprehensible when understood as part of a cultural system of meaning. The second premise is that actions are guided by interpretation. This allows symbolism to aid in interpreting conceptual as well as material activities. [12] Phenomenology is the study of appearances of things or things as they appear in our experience, or the ways we experience things. It studies conscious experience as from the subjective or first person point of view. Phenomenology is understood in 2 ways: a disciplinary field in philosophy or as a movement in the history of philosophy. Traditional phenomenology has focused on subjective, practical, and social conditions, where as recent philosophy of mind has focused on the neural substrate of experience. [13] Symbolic anthropology and some versions of phenomenology argue that all humans require reassurance that the world is safe and ordered place – that is, they have a need for ontological security.[14] Therefore, all societies have forms of knowledge that perform this psychological task. The inability of science to offer psychological and emotional comfort explains the presence and influence of non-scientific knowledge in human lives, even in rational world. FunctionalismUnlike symbolic anthropology and phenomenology, functionalism points to the benefits for social organization which non-scientific belief systems provide and which scientific knowledge fails to deliver. Belief systems are seen as encouraging social order and social stability in ways that rationally based knowledge cannot. From this perspective, the existence of non-rational accounts of reality can be explained by the benefits they offer to society. According to functionalists, "religion serves several purposes, like providing answers to spiritual mysteries, offering emotional comfort, and creating a place for social interaction and social control. … One of the most important functions of religion, from a functionalist perspective, is the opportunities it creates for social interaction and the formation of groups. It provides social support and social networking, offering a place to meet others who hold similar values and a place to seek help (spiritual and material) in times of need."[15] Rationalism
Rationalism is the epistemoligical theory, the branch of philosophy that investigates the possibility, origins, nature, and extent of human knowledge[16] Rationalists object to the phenomenological and functionalist approaches, arguing that they fail to understand why believers in systems of non-scientific knowledge do think they tell the truth and that their ideas are right, even when science has shown them to be wrong. They claim that one cannot explain forms of knowledge in terms of the beneficial psychological or societal effects that an outside observer may see them as producing. Rationalists emphasize the importance of looking at the point of view of those who believe in them. People do not believe in God, practice magic, or think that witches cause misfortune because they think they are providing themselves with psychological reassurance, or to achieve greater cohesion for their social groups. They do so because they think their beliefs are correct – that they tell them the truth about the way the world is. Nineteenth-century rationalist writers, reflecting the evolutionist spirits of their times, tended to explain the lack of rationality and the dominance of false beliefs in pre-modern worlds in terms of the deficient mental equipment of their inhabitants. Such people were seen as possessing pre-logical, or non-rational, mentality. Twentieth-century rationalist thinking generally rejected such a view, reasoning that pre-modern people didn't possess inferior minds, but lacked the social and cultural conditions needed to promote rationalism. Rationalists see the history of modern societies as the rise of scientific knowledge and the subsequent decline of non-rational belief. Some of these beliefs, such as magic and witchcraft, had disappeared, while others, such as religion, had become marginalized. This rationalist perspective has led to secularization theories of various kinds.[17] Typology of religious groupsOne common typology among sociologists, religious groups are classified as ecclesias, denominations, sects, or cults (now more commonly referred to in scholarship as new religious movements). The Church-Sect typology has its origins in the work of Max Weber. There is a basic premise continuum along which religions fall, ranging from the protest-like orientation of sects to the equilibrium maintaining churches. This continuum includes several additional types. Note that sociologists give these words precise definitions which differ from how they are commonly used. In particular, sociologists use the words 'cult' and 'sect' without negative connotations, even though the popular use of these words is often pejorative.[18] Churches are the religious bodies that coexist in a relatively low state of tension with their social surrounding. They have mainstream "safe" beliefs and practices relative to those of the general population. [19] This type of religious bodies are more world affirming, so they try to peacefully coexist with the secular world and are low-tension organizations. Sects are high-tension organizations that don't fit well within the existing social environment. They are usually most attractive to society's least privileged- outcasts, minorities, or the poor- because they downplay worldly pleasure by stressing otherworldly promises. [20] When church leaders become too involved in secular issues, Sects start to splinter off the existing church. They may end up forming their own sect and if over time the sect picks up a significant following, it almost inevitably transforms into its own church, ultimately becoming part of the mainstream. Cults is a religious movement that makes some new claim about the supernatural and therefore does not easily fit within the sect-church cycle. All religions began as cults, and their leaders offer new insights, claiming that they are the word of God. They are often high-tension movements that antagonize their social world and/or are antagonized by it.[21] Denomination lies between the church and the sect on the continuum. They come into existence when churches lose their religious monopoly in a society. When churches or sects become denominations, there are also some changes in their characteristics. ReligiositySome sociologists of religion explore the theoretical analysis of the sociological dimensions of religiosity. For example, Charles Y. Glock is best known for his five-dimensional scheme of the nature of religious commitment. His list consist of the following variables: belief, knowledge, experience, practice (sometimes subdivided into private and public ritual) and consequences. Glock's first four dimensions have proved widely useful in research, because generally, they are simple to measure survey research.[22][23] Similarly, Mervin F. Verbit's contribution was a twenty four-dimensional religiosity measure which includes measuring religiosity through six different "components" of religiosity: ritual, doctrine, emotion, knowledge, ethics, community, and along four dimensions: content, frequency, intensity, centrality.[24][25][26] Secularization and civil religionSecularism is the general movement away from religiosity and spiritual belief towards a rational, scientific, orientation, a trend observed in Muslim and Christian industrialized nations alike. In the United States of America, many politicians, court systems, schools, and businesses embrace secularism.[27]In relation to the processes of rationalization associated with the development of modernity, it was predicted in the works of many classical sociologists that religion would decline.[28] They claimed that there would be a separation of religion from the institutions such as the state, economy, and family.[29] Despite the claims of many classical theorists and sociologists immediately after World War II, many contemporary theorists have critiqued secularization thesis, arguing that religion has continued to play a vital role in the lives of individuals worldwide. In the United States, in particular, church attendance has remained relatively stable in the past 40 years. In Africa, the emergence of Christianity has occurred at a high rate. While Africa could claim roughly 10 million Christians in 1900, recent estimates put that number closer to 200 million.[30] The rise of Islam as a major world religion, especially its new-found influence in the West, is another significant development. Furthermore, arguments may be presented regarding the concept of civil religion and new world belief systems.[citation needed]Peter Berger, an American sociologist, considers secularization is the result of a larger sociostructural crisis in religion is caused by pluralism. Pluralism is the presence and engaged coexistence of numerous distinct groups in one society.[31] The United States is both highly religious and pluralistic, standing out among other industrialized and wealthy nations in this regard.[32] In short, presupposed secularization as a decline in religiosity might seem to be a myth, depending on its definition and the definition of its scope. For instance, some sociologists have argued that steady church attendance and personal religious belief may coexist with a decline in the influence of religious authorities on social or political issues. Additionally, regular attendance or affiliation do not necessarily translate into a behavior according to their doctrinal teachings. In other words, numbers of members might still be growing, but this does not mean that all members are faithfully following the rules of pious behaviors expected. In that sense, religion may be seen as declining because of its waning ability to influence behavior. Religious economyAccording to Rodney Stark, David Martin was the first contemporary sociologist to reject the secularization theory outright. Martin even proposed that the concept of secularization be eliminated from social scientific discourse, on the grounds that it had only served ideological purposes and because there was no evidence of any general shift from a religious period in human affairs to a secular period.[33] Stark is well known for pioneering, with William Sims Bainbridge, a theory of religious economy, according to which societies that restrict supply of religion, either through an imposed state religious monopoly or through state-sponsored secularization, are the main causes of drops in religiosity. Correspondingly, the more religions a society has, the more likely the population is to be religious.[34] This contradicts the older view of secularization which states that if a liberal religious community is tolerant of a wide array of belief, then the population is less likely to hold certain beliefs in common, so nothing can be shared and reified in a community context, leading to a reduction in religious observance.[35] The religious economy model sparked a lively debate among sociologists of religion on whether market models fit religious practices and on the extents to which this model of religious behavior is specific to the United States[36]. Peter BergerPeter Berger observed that while researchers supporting the secularization theory have long maintained that religion must inevitably decline in the modern world, today, much of the world is as religious as ever. This points to the falsity of the secularization theory. On the other hand, Berger also notes that secularization may be indeed have taken hold in Europe, while the United States and other regions have continued to remain religious despite the increased modernity. Dr. Berger suggested that the reason for this may have to do with the education system; in Europe, teachers are sent by the educational authorities and European parents would have to put up with secular teaching, while in the United States, schools were for much of the time under local authorities, and American parents, however unenlightened, could fire their teachers. Berger also notes that unlike Europe, America has seen the rise of Evangelical Protestantism, or "born-again Christians".[37]:78[38][39] Bryan WilsonBryan R. Wilson is a writer on secularization who is interested in the nature of life in a society dominated by scientific knowledge. His work is in the tradition of Max Weber, who saw modern societies as places in which rationality dominates life and thought. Weber saw rationality as concerned with identifying causes and working out technical efficiency, with a focus on how things work and with calculating how they can be made to work more effectively, rather than why they are as they are. According to Weber, such rational worlds are disenchanted. Existential questions about the mysteries of human existence, about who we are and why we are here, have become less and less significant. Wilson[17] insists that non-scientific systems – and religious ones in particular – have experienced an irreversible decline in influence. He has engaged in a long debate with those who dispute the secularization thesis, some of which argue that the traditional religions, such as church-centered ones, have become displaced by an abundance of non-traditional ones, such as cults and sects of various kinds. Others argue that religion has become an individual, rather than a collective, organized affair. Still others suggest that functional alternatives to traditional religion, such as nationalism and patriotism, have emerged to promote social solidarity. Wilson does accept the presence of a large variety of non-scientific forms of meaning and knowledge, but he argues that this is actually evidence of the decline of religion. The increase in the number and diversity of such systems is proof of the removal of religion from the central structural location that it occupied in pre-modern times. Ernest GellnerUnlike Wilson and Weber, Ernest Gellner[40] (1974) acknowledges that there are drawbacks to living in a world whose main form of knowledge is confined to facts we can do nothing about and that provide us with no guidelines on how to live and how to organize ourselves. In this regard, we are worse off than pre-modern people, whose knowledge, while incorrect, at least provided them with prescriptions for living. However, Gellner insists that these disadvantages are far outweighed by the huge technological advances modern societies have experienced as a result of the application of scientific knowledge. Gellner doesn't claim that non-scientific knowledge is in the process of dying out. For example, he accepts that religions in various forms continue to attract adherents. He also acknowledges that other forms of belief and meaning, such as those provided by art, music, literature, popular culture (a specifically modern phenomenon), drug taking, political protest, and so on are important for many people. Nevertheless, he rejects the relativist interpretation of this situation – that in modernity, scientific knowledge is just one of many accounts of existence, all of which have equal validity. This is because, for Gellner, such alternatives to science are profoundly insignificant since they are technically impotent, as opposed to science. He sees that modern preoccupations with meaning and being as a self-indulgence that is only possible because scientific knowledge has enabled our world to advance so far. Unlike those in pre-modern times, whose overriding priority is to get hold of scientific knowledge in order to begin to develop, we can afford to sit back in the luxury of our well-appointed world and ponder upon such questions because we can take for granted the kind of world science has constructed for us. Michel FoucaultMichel Foucault was a post-structuralist who saw human existence as being dependent on forms of knowledge – discourses – that work like languages. Languages/discourses define reality for us. In order to think at all, we are obliged to use these definitions. The knowledge we have about the world is provided for us by the languages and discourses we encounter in the times and places in which we live our lives. Thus, who we are, what we know to be true, and what we think are discursively constructed. Foucault defined history as the rise and fall of discourses. Social change is about changes in prevailing forms of knowledge. The job of the historian is to chart these changes and identify the reasons for them. Unlike rationalists, however, Foucault saw no element of progress in this process. To Foucault, what is distinctive about modernity is the emergence of discourses concerned with the control and regulation of the body. According to Foucault, the rise of body-centered discourses necessarily involved a process of secularization. Pre-modern discourses were dominated by religion, where things were defined as good and evil, and social life was centered around these concepts. With the emergence of modern urban societies, scientific discourses took over, and medical science was a crucial element of this new knowledge. Modern life became increasingly subject to medical control – the medical gaze, as Foucault called it. The rise to power of science, and of medicine in particular, coincided with a progressive reduction of the power of religious forms of knowledge. For example, normality and deviance became more of a matter of health and illness than of good and evil, and the physician took over from the priest the role of defining, promoting, and healing deviance.[41] Other perspectivesBBC News reported on a study by physicists and mathematicians that attempted to use mathematical modelling (nonlinear dynamics) to predict future religious orientations of populations. The study suggests that religion is headed towards "extinction" in various nations where it has been on the decline: Australia, Austria, Canada, the Czech Republic, Finland, Ireland, the Netherlands, New Zealand and Switzerland. The model considers not only the changing number of people with certain beliefs, but also attempts to assign utility values of a belief in each nation.[42][43] Thomas Luckmann maintains that the sociology of religion should cease preoccupations with the traditional and institutionalized forms of religion. Luckmann points instead to the "religious problem" which is the "problem of individual existence." This is the case as with the advent of modernity, religious meaning making has shifted more into the individual domain.[37]:82 GlobalizationThe sociology of religion continues to grow throughout the world, attempting to understand the relationship between religion and globalization. Two older approaches to globalization include modernization theory, a functionalist derivative, and world-systems theory, a Marxist approach. One of the differences between these theories is whether they view capitalism as positive or problematic. However, both assumed that modernization and capitalism would diminish the hold of religion. To the contrary, as globalization intensified many different cultures started to look into different religions and incorporate different beliefs into society.[28] New interpretations emerged that recognize the tensions. For example, according to Paul James and Peter Mandaville:
Religion and Social LandscapeNot only does religion shape big social institutions such as the government and social movements, it plays a part in families, race, gender, class, and age, since they are things that are involved in everyday lives. FamiliesIn general religion is most often associated with families, since it is normally passed on from generation to generation. Depending on the type of religion in the family, normally it involves a different familial structure. For example, Catholics tend to have big families since they are pro-life, they go to mass every Sunday, and they most always send their kids through confirmation. In Jewish families, it is very important to be nurturing and kind, helping them to make a lasting impact on their community since they are in the minority culture in the world. See alsoReferences
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