William E. Paden - Interpreting the Sacred: Ways of Viewing Religion
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Ways of Viewing ReligionAdding a wise and sympathetic voice to the many contradictory perspectives on religion, Paden, professor of religion at the University of Vermont, argues that how we see religion has everything to do with where we are standing. To appreciate the fascinating, forbidding landscape of current religious theory, one needs a clear map annotated by an observant guide. Interpreting the Sacred qualifies on both counts.-Christian Century
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Interpreting the Sacred : Ways of Viewing Religion
author
:
Paden, William E.
publisher
:
Beacon Press
isbn10 | asin
:
0807077070
print isbn13
:
9780807077078
ebook isbn13
:
9780807077047
language
:
English
subject
Religion.
publication date
:
1992
lcc
:
BL48.P215 1992eb
ddc
:
291/.01
subject
:
Religion.
Page iii
Interpreting the Sacred
Ways of Viewing Religion
William E. Paden
Page iv
Beacon Press 25 Beacon Street Boston, Massachusetts 02108-2892
Beacon Press books are published under the auspices of the Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations.
1992 by William E. Paden All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America
99 8 7 6 5
Text design by Hunter Graphics
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Paden, William E. Interpreting the sacred : ways of viewing religion / William E. Paden. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-8070-7706-2 (cloth) ISBN 0-8070-7707-0 (paper) 1. Religion. I. Title. BL48.P215 1992 291'.01dc20 91-12152
Page v
For Natasha
Page vii
Contents
Preface
ix
1 Interpretive Frames
1
2 The Challenge: Critical Interpretations of Religion
15
3 As Society, So Religion
28
4 As the Psyche, So the Gods
48
5 Comparative Perspective in the Study of Religion
67
6 Religious Interpretations of Religion: Views from the Inside
87
7 The Contextuality of Interpretation
110
8 Plurality: Issues and Implications
125
Notes
137
Index
153
Page ix
Preface
There are thousands of books that interpret religion, and each has its point of view. As in the story of the blind men describing an elephantone arguing that it is like a rope (he holds the tail), another that it is like a wall (he is touching the side) and another that it is like a tree (he has the leg)explanations of religion treat a vast subject from decidedly partial points of view and limited locations.
Yet we cannot get to religionor for that matter, the worldexcept through a point of view, and what we see will inevitably be a consequence of our particular standpoint. The differences we have about religion are the results of these root differences of context and perspective.
This book, then, is not one more view or theory of religion, but proposes that it is necessary and useful to step back and become aware of the role that views and lenses themselves play in revealing a subject like this. We need to understand the different perspectives that are already in use. In doing this we must include the outlooks of both critics and insiders, as well as some of the main sociological, psychological, and comparative approaches.
Privileged, singular models of the universewhether strictly religious or strictly scientificcan no longer be easily assumed. There are many versions of the world, depending on our glasses (which, for example, can be anything from poetic to mathematical), depending on who is viewing it, depending on which form of knowledge is being used, and depending on which cultural lens is in play. I am sure that other people besides myself have found themselves moving through varying world-interpretations in the process of growing up in an expanding pluralistic culture. What at one time was presented to us as "the world," later began to look like the point of view of a certain class of people in a certain society, or one certain approach among other approaches, or perhaps even a pernicious ideology. We realized that the world did
Page x
not have to be seen that way. Worldviews became just thatviews. Horizons continue to shift, to coexist, to be questionable.
Such transformations have also altered our thinking about religion. The biblical religions of our upbringing appear in completely different lights when looked at by means of the modern disciplines of psychology or sociology, or in the context of the teachings of Asian traditions.
Yet such a pliant universe offers the occasion not for cynicism but for plural vision. It gives us an opportunity for reflection upon the varying models which we use to organize the world of meaning. It provides a chance for self-awareness about the positioned, selective character of the language we use to describe human existence, realizing that existence gives itself back to us through the language by which we approach it.
I have been especially motivated to write this book in order to help bridge a portion of the huge, growing gap between the general reading public and professional, academic circles of "interpretation." Too often academics write only for each other. Interpreting the Sacred
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