Do We Need Religion?: On the Experience of Self-transcendence

Do We Need Religion?: On the Experience of Self-transcendence
ISBN-10
1317260996
ISBN-13
9781317260998
Category
Social Science
Pages
144
Language
English
Published
2015-11-17
Publisher
Routledge
Author
Hans Joas

Description

The old assumption that modernization leads to secularization is outdated. Yet the certainty that religion is an anthropological universal that can only be suppressed by governments is also dead. Thus it is now a favorable moment for a new perspective on religion. This book takes human experiences of self-transcendence as its point of departure. Religious faith is seen as an attempt to articulate and interpret such experiences. Faith then is neither useful nor a symptom of weakness or misery, but an opening up of ways of experience. This book develops this basic idea, contrasts it with the thinking of some leading religious thinkers of our time, and relates it to the current debates about human rights and universal human dignity.

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