Agenda Recap

Emile Durkheim

Biography

The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life

The Most Primitive Religion – Totemism

Criticisms

Legacy

Recap Tylor and Animism

RR. Marett and Pre-Animistic Religion

Frazer and Magic

Functionalism

• During the first decades of the 20th c. - the preoccupation with the origins of religion supplanted by other theoretical concerns

• Functional approach to religion• Different questions:

– What is the function of religion? – What does religion do for people, and for social

groups?

"If religion has given birth to all that is essential in society, it is because the idea of society is the soul of religion."(Durkheim 1912: Elementary Forms of the Religious Life)

Emile Durkheim 1858 - 1917

The Division of Labour in Society 1893

Rules of the Sociological Method 1895

Suicide 1897

The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life, 1912

an atheist, but did not believe that so widespread a human institution as religion was based on pure illusion.

felt that even “the most barbaric and fantastic religious rites and myths” must be based on some human need.

unwilling to define religion specifically in terms of the supernatural or the extraordinary

dissatisfied with Tylor’s minimal definition of religion as a “belief in spiritual beings”.

There is a need for a broader definition of religion

Elementary Forms of the Religious Life (1912)

Primary purpose:

to describe and explain religion in “its most primitive and simple form”

Secondary purpose:

to understand how things are categorized and how are these ideas related to religion .

Defining ReligionReligion can be divided into two parts:

1. Beliefs

All religious beliefs presuppose a classification of all the things, real and ideal, into two classes or opposed groups: the sacred and the profane

2. Rites

rules of conduct which prescribe how one should behave in the presence of sacred things

Sacred or Profane?

the realm of routine experience,

the secular, everyday world of work, toil and domestic duties.

It is the sphere of adaptive behaviour, and is essentially utilitarian

People often take precautions to avoid contact with the profane

anything not sacred—unholy, irreverent, contemptuous or blasphemous

The profane

a recognition of a belief, or power, or force

'non-utilitarian' - beyond the everyday.

non-empirical - the sacred is beyond empirical nature - not based on knowledge from the 5 senses

it is "supportive and strength giving" - it raises the individual above himself/herself.

it impinges on human consciousness with moral obligation, and an ethical imperative

evokes an attitude of awe, reverence, and intense respect

What makes something sacred is not connection to the “divine” but prohibitions setting it apart from the profane

Objects (sacred documents, books, chalices) Living creatures, Elements of nature, Places, Days, abstract forces, persons, states of consciousness, past events, ceremonies, and activities

The Sacred

Changing from one state to another is a fundamental metamorphosis

The sacred made Profane

Defining ReligionReligion can be divided into two parts:

1. Beliefs

All religious beliefs presuppose a classification of all the things, real and ideal, into two classes or opposed groups: the sacred and the profane

2. Rites

rules of conduct which prescribe how one should behave in the presence of sacred things

A religion. Constitutes the union of beliefs and rites

Problem: this definition includes a body of facts ordinarily distinguished from religion -- i.e., magic

Any definition of religion must therefore exclude magic

For Durkheim

Religion was a public, social, beneficent institution The really religious beliefs are always common to a determined group or `Church' Church makes a profession of adhering to beliefs and practicing the rites connected with them The individuals which compose it feel themselves united to each other by the simple fact that they have a common faith

Magic Is private, selfish, and at least potentially maleficent The belief in magic does not result in binding together those who adhere to it, nor in uniting them into a group leading a common life..

" A religion is a unified system of beliefs and practices relative to sacred things, that is to say, things set apart and forbidden -- beliefs and practices which unite into one single moral community called a Church, all those who adhere to them."

Baldwin Spencer 1860-1929

Frank Gillen1855 - 1912

Native Tribes of Central Australia (1899) -- a study of totemic clans

Totemism from Ojibway - person's family or tribe

the intimate, often mystical relationship supposed to exist between an individual or group and a class of natural objects, i. e. the totem

The conviction of the intimate union constitutes the religious aspect of Totemism

The customs which result there from form its sociological aspect.

Haida Eagle and Raven. Symbols of the two original clans of the Haida Peoples

Clanspeople of the crow believe they are descended form the Dreamtime's crow spirit who became a man.

The totem is often viewed as a companion, relative, protector, progenitor, or helper

superhuman powers and abilities are often ascribed to totems

Totems are not only offered respect or occasional veneration but also can become objects of awe and fear;

Often prohibition against killing, eating, or touching the totem, even as a rule to shun it;

hereditary transmission

Along Hawaii’s Big Island’s South Kona shore, traditional ki’i totems near Captain Cook guard the place of refuge.Photo:  Alison Gardner

Totemism and the Australian Aborigines

their type of societal organization was the most rudimentary known

Therefore Durkheim assumed their religion was the simplest

members of each clan consider themselves bound together by a special kind of kinship, based not on blood, but on the mere fact that they share the same name.

name, however is taken from an animal (usually) – the totem - with which the clan members are assumed to enjoy the same relations of kinship.

But this "totem" is not simply a name; it is also an emblem.

Each totemic group has a collection of ritual objects (eg. churingas)

The totem is a symbol of the clan; its flag. The sign by which each clan distinguishes itself from the others.

Durkheim’s Explanation of Totemic Beliefs

Images, animals, and clan members are all sacred in the same way;

Thus, their sacred character is not due to the special properties of one or the other, but rather is derived from some common principle shared by all.

Totemism, is really about an anonymous, impersonal force, immanent in the world and diffused among its various material objects.

I.e. Society

Society Divinized

1) totemic emblem – essential to totemic belief– a design that represents the clan’s totemic entity

– confers sacredness to whatever it is marked on

– marks the sacred away from the profane (cannot be touched etc)

2) totemic entity – animal or plant species– dietary prohibitions

3) human clan members– use of blood and bodily parts in the rituals

sources of the sacred

• totemism not essentially about the totemic entity or the emblem but about the clan itself

• the experience of the social group alone can generate in people intense feelings that sustain religion

• totemic religion arose from collective tribal life style

ritual events - generate a heightened emotional state -> “delirium” or “collective effervescence”

The function of rituals – to strengthen the bonds attaching the believer to god

– to strengthen the bonds attaching the individual to the social group

Through ritual, the group becomes conscious of itself.

Ritual

collective worship creates a feeling of effervescence, invigorates the individual and produces energy and power in people

Too rigid separation between the sacred and the profane many hunter-gatherers like the Andamanese lack

corporate kin groups and totems but do have religion “religion establishes and reaffirms group solidarity” and

has symbolic significance for a society. – But society is not a homogeneous entity but divided into social

categories based on sex, class, ethnic affiliation etc. religious beliefs may have an ideological function

legitimating the domination of one group or class over another

Critique

"If religion has given birth to all that is essential in society, it is because the idea of society is the soul of religion."(Durkheim 1912: Elementary Forms of the Religious Life)