Abordǎri metodologice în studiile religioase

Translated title of the contribution: Methodological approaches in religious studies

Moshe Idel*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

7 Scopus citations

Abstract

"Religion" is a conglomerate of ideas, cosmologies, beliefs, institutions, hierarchies, elites and rites that vary with time and place, even when one "single" religion is concerned. The methodologies available take one or two of these numerous aspects into consideration, reducing religion's complexity to a rather simplistic unity. In order to avoid this situation, the ensuing conclusion is a recommendation for methodological eclecticism. The text attempts to characterize not specific scholars or schools but major concerns that define the specificity of particular styles. I propose that they may be grouped in eight main categories of approaches: the theological approach, the historical approach, the psychological approach, the textual-literary approach, the comparative approach, the ritualistic-technical approach, the phenomenological approach and the cognitive approach. This proposal for methodological eclecticism is supplemented with another concept: perspectivism. The last part of the article deals mainly with topics found in a vast literature designated by the umbrella term "Kabbalah", addressing especially the approach proposed by Gershom Scholem.

Translated title of the contributionMethodological approaches in religious studies
Original languageRomanian
Pages (from-to)5-20
Number of pages16
JournalJournal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies
Volume6
Issue number16
StatePublished - Mar 2007

Keywords

  • Different approaches to religion
  • Gershom scholem
  • Jewish mysticism
  • Kabbalah
  • Methodological eclecticism
  • Perspectivism
  • Religious studies

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