Wozu außereuropäische Religionsgeschichte? Überlegungen zu ihrem Nutzen für die religionswissenschaftliche Theorie- und Identitätsbildung
Taking the »big question« of the content and range of the scientific term »religion« as an example – which in my opinion is essential for the identity and institutional integrity of Religious Studies as an autonomous academic discipline – I intend todemonstrate that extra-European religious history...
| Published in: | Zeitschrift für Religionswissenschaft |
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| Main Author: | |
| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | German |
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| Published: |
Diagonal-Verlag
2012
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| In: |
Zeitschrift für Religionswissenschaft
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| Online Access: |
Volltext (Verlag) |
| Summary: | Taking the »big question« of the content and range of the scientific term »religion« as an example – which in my opinion is essential for the identity and institutional integrity of Religious Studies as an autonomous academic discipline – I intend todemonstrate that extra-European religious history still is to be considered anindispensable pillar of Religionswissenschaft. For this purpose I try to make itclear that only researches, trained in Religionswissenschaft, who have a soundknowledge of extra-European religious history as well as the relevant source languages,are in a position to analyse and sensibly evaluate the respective empiricaldata and to feed their knowledge into the general theories of religious studies.Only if we take into account emic discourses and object-linguistic terminologies(e. g. from Asian religious history) can we avoid premature judgments as to thealleged absence of semantic equivalents of the modern European term »religion«in Asia as well as eurocentric definitions of that term. Taking East Asia as an exampleand resorting to Wittgenstein’s concept of »family resemblances«, that isthe methodological tool of »polythetic classification«, I hope to prove that althoughthere has never existed a singular general term to be regarded as an immediateequivalent of the modern European term »religion« in premodern East Asia, thereexisted a concept of »religion« nonetheless, notwithstanding that the terms used todenote it varied according to the discursive contexts. Subsequently I pose thequestion whether or not a social system (in the sense of N. Luhmann’s functionalsystem theory) that might be denoted by the umbrella term »religion« was distinguishedfrom other social systems in premodern East Asia. The insights gained bysuch an investigation, which can only be roughly outlined here, will greatly contributeto the formation of general theories and scientific terminology in religiousstudies. Thus, extra-European religious history is not mere nitpicking on exoticground but absolutely vital to theory formation in our discipline. |
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| ISSN: | 2194-508X |
| Contains: | In: Zeitschrift für Religionswissenschaft
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1515/zfr.2010.18.1.3 |