Pour notre première séance de séminaire d’histoire des religions nous avons eu le plaisir d’accueillir Anders Klostergaard Petersen. Associate Professor, University of Aarhus.
Celui-ci eut pour thème :
DOES RELIGION REALLY HAVE TO DO WITH FAITH AND BELIEF ? A CRITICAL VIEW ON THE PREVALENT UNDERSTANDING OF RELIGION IN THE HISTORY OF RELIGIONS, THE ACADEMY, THE MEDIAS, AND THE GENERAL PUBLIC.
Many scholars in the study of religion continue to think that religion revolves around belief and faith. The same understanding is ubiquitous among colleagues in other fields, be it other humanistic disciplines, psychology, political science, biology, etc. The view is especially monopolistic in the medias and entirely dominant in the general public. I think the perspective is utterly flawed and gives us a very skewed understanding of our study object. I shall argue that neither gatherer-hunters religion, nor classical or, what I prefer to dub, urban religion concerns faith or belief. This may not come as a complete surprise to scholars of religion. Yet, I take the argument a provocative step further by arguing that no religion really revolves around faith or belief. To substantiate the understanding I take you on a small tour extending from 3,5 mya to the current world.
I hope to see you as travel fellows and critical conversation partners in a discussion with great entailments for anyone devoted to the scientific study of religion.
Les recherches du Pr Petersen portent sur l'histoire du judaïsme du second Temple, les origines du christianisme, l'histoire de la religion et de la philosophie gréco-romaines, et l'utilisation des approches évolutionnistes bio-culturelles dans le domaine de l'histoire des religions. Parmi ses nombreuses publications, on peut citer The Emergence and Evolution of Religion (Routledge, 2017) et Religio-philosophical Discourses in the Mediterranean World (Brill, 2017).