Lecture 3 2014 Religion James

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    Announcements

    Study Guide Lecture pdfsAudio Thursday:

    Gethin Part 1 andPart 2

    Religious study vsacademic study

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    Sources of Modern Religion

    The three primary forcesdriving our modernconcept of religion

    1. Reformation thinking

    2.The negotiation of

    difference1.Wars of religion

    2. The New World

    3. world religions

    3. Scientific naturalism

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    William James (1842 1910)

    Biography Harvard Anatomy Psychology Philosophy

    Pragmatism C. S. Pierce The problem of problems without

    solutions For some questions, truth is

    unimportant

    Essence to effect Stream of Consciousness

    Where we actually reside Against the science of

    religion Not Bad Science

    Origins

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    The will to believe 1897) Willing to believe (not

    assessing truth of a belief) The Sick Man facts and values

    We reside in the stream. Itshould be our guide

    The problem of belief and thepassional nature

    Sometimes there is no why towhy we believe

    Genuine Choices (whatmatters is religion as achoice)

    Be live Be forced Be momentous

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    Varieties of Religious Experience (1902)

    Circumscription of the topic Phenomenology Uselessness of origins

    the feelings, acts, andexperiences of individual men intheir solitude, so far as theyapprehend themselves to stand in

    relation to whatever they mayconsider divine. 36 feelings, acts, and experiences individual men in their solitude whatever they may consider divine

    What is lost and gained here Critique of science of religion WHY? WHY? Why THIS

    definition?

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    Reformation Martin Luther (1483-1546)

    "95 Theses

    " How am I justified?

    " On Faith and Works (1519)You must get used to the idea that it isone thing to do the works of the law andquite another to fulfill it!That is why faithalone makes someone just and fulfillsthe law; it is faith that brings the HolySpirit through the merits of Christ. TheSpirit, in turn, renders the heart gladand free, as the law demands. Then

    good works proceed from faith itself.Martin Luther

    Faith and the personalrelationship with the sacred

    (especially post 1950)

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    Natural religion and the ordering of the world

    Descartes (1596-1650)

    Higher Biblical CriticismDavid Humes critique of miracles andthe argument by design

    Natural v. Revealed ReligionReligion as an intuition of the Universe as awhole and of Oneself as part of it Schleiermacher(1799)

    The EnlightenmentReligion: a gang of ruthless zealots,intent upon aggrandizing themselves, no

    matter what cost to social peace. Gibbon

    Social Scientific Study of religionWorld ReligionsBeliefs and Practices

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    Religion outside Europe Columbus, the apocalypse, and

    the restoration of Jerusalem

    The Requirement (1510) God our Lord gave charge [of all peoples] to

    one man named St. Peter, so that he was lordand superior of all the men of the world

    We will not compel you to turn Christians.

    With the help of God, I will enter forcefullyagainst you, and I will make war everywhereand I will take your wives and children,and I will make them slavesand I will takeyour goods, and I will do to you all the eviland damages that a lord may do to vassals.

    Debates of Las Casas andSeplveda, or the origin ofHuman rights