Description
Religion is an integral part of our life. The answer to the question what is religion is subjective. Since the word `religion' and its cognates are common coinage across the literate world, most of us will have a fair appreciation of the term's connotations. Considering students and scholars alike are lacking an introductory textbook on the origins of religion in modern Western theory and archaeological practice, this work is designed to fill the lacuna.This book begin with the large question of the origins and prehistory of religion, including the bearing anthropological study has on this question, before giving space to the larger traditions themselves. The comparative method is applied not only between such enormous aggregates of phenomena as (let us say) Buddhism and Islam, but between these and small-scale, tribal traditions as well.
The book highlights that some religions will be difficult to separate from cultures because they amount to a total way of life. An attempt is made to try to interpret religion both as culture and as a distinctive set of forces in interaction with culture, or perhaps even against prevailing cultural forms. This book has been designed to help students find for themselves possible answers to existential or theological questions, but only as a side-effect to historical and phenomenological study, and as the author says "provide no such answers on a platter."
ISBN:9781932705515
