Unit 1, Lecture 1: Why and How to Study Religion

Why study religion: Understanding others and ourselves, history/political/daily life of Asia The 3 Big Questions 1. Self (theoretical) 2. Ultimate Reality (many answers, theoretical) 3. How to live (practical how religion shapes daily life) Inside vs Outside Approaches (How to study) Inside – useful when learning language and culture in church - Try to understand tradition by people who have been already taught this Seeing their own intentions and meaning they derive from their practices without evaluating them in terms of form and function o Ex. Hindu text wasn’t written by anyone, existed eternally, no beginning, so understand why this claim is made and stand above all other texts Sympathetic Imagination (empathy): imagination plays a role in ensuring it's grounded in truth and realities, imagine if I did have this other worldview what reasons I would believe even if uncomfortable Even being an insider in one’s own family but it’s limited cuz you don’t know whole community or the whole religion - Used in this class as best for beginners Outside – in a classroom - Understand by a more critical viewpoint Constructing our ideas about why they are doing what they are doing so evaluating what they are studying, but also understand their experiences - Might or might not match with inside traditions o Ex. Academic critical tools that walk you through a conclusion about it is made during a certain era Ludwig: both approaches are important for rich religious understanding, but for people just starting you should start off with inside approach - Others argue the balance of the two, and even only using one Understanding and Evaluating: done simultaneously, understand it and acting the evaluation at same time and constantly - Aim to separate these tasks as evaluation can get in the way of our understanding - Evaluating -> Judgement: normative language of something as normal/abnormal o Trapped in a distinctive worldview that if not evaluate it, everyone else is abnormal in eyes o Automized, worldview is not consciously rationally chosen but is inherited from parents, friends, culture around you o Learning challenged views can make one more grateful Bracketing / epoche (used for understanding): recognize own starting assumptions and put them in brackets and set them aside so they don’t interfere with what you’re learning - Judge -> prejudice can distort without first understanding, but can after - Have sympathetic imagination Goal of Religious studies: “To make the foreign familiar to make the familiar boring” Thinking that eating food with hands was dirty became more familiar the more you did it, so it became normal to reflect that own views are foreign to others as they are to us - If use same logic, then using same silverware is “weird” to others - Everyone’s inside is someone else’s outside