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Historical Methodology for the Study of Religion

Introduction
The contemporary study of religion covers a wide range of interests and methods
which often complement each other. A special difficulty of the methodological debate is the
question whether all methods are equally important, whether some are indispensable than
others, whether any particular methodology is crucial than others. However in this essay, we
are going to look how history approaches the study of religion.

Scope of this Methodology

It is necessary to understand that plurality of religions in the present world and the
variety of cultures moulded by different religious traditions cannot be adequately understood
without a thoroughly historical study of the origin, growth and development of particular
religions, affected by the ongoing dynamic of continuity and change. At an early stage, the
sharp emphasis on the knowledge of historical facts arose perhaps from the need to counter
act the general ignorance of non-western religious and cultural traditions in the west. It was
not only the concern for historical truth but also the need to free the study of religion from the
dominance of a theological and philosophical speculation which required a strong insistence
on the use of the historical method.

Different Historical Approaches to Religion

Brelich Model
One of the most lucid and conceptually clear statements about the objects and
methods of the historical approach to religion is found in Angleo Brelich’s works. By first
asking what religion is, he highlights some inherent difficulties in the cross cultural use of
this historically and culturally conditioned concept. For him, a historian can neither accept
the objective existence of the sacred as pre-given nor postulate a religious dimension as
innate to man, as is usually done in the phenomenology of religion. Brelich rightly
emphasizes, that our concept of religion is a societal and cultural one; thus, religion has no
eternal meaning but is a historic product of one’s own culture, subject to change throughout
history.

In terms of procedure, Brelich pleads for an initially empirical investigation of what is

included under the term ‘religion’ followed by a critical collection of the data in order to
obtain a functional definition of religion which can serve further scientific investigation. In
fact, he admits that religion can never be exactly defined but rather its field can only be
circumscribed. He also emphasizes that religion must always be discussed with reference to a
particular ‘human group’ and ‘society’, for empirically there exists no individual religion but
only the religion of groups to which individuals belong.

Jean Bottero Model

This model initiated by Jean Dean Bottero pays close attention to the use of a strictly
historical method in the study of religions significantly, he refers to histories of religions
rather than to history of religions for there can only be a multiplicity of histories dealing with
specific religious systems through which above the ‘phenomenon of religion’ finds
expression. If Brelich primarily emphasizes the social dimension of religion, Bottero’s
emphasis is quite opposite by giving priority to the individual religious experience or feeling,
which leads to social expression.
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Geowidengren Model
Geowidengren, one of the best known champions of a strictly historical approach,
regards the phenomenology of religion as the systemic counterpart of the history of religions.
In his presidential address to the IAHR (International Association for the History of
Religions) congress at Stockholm in 1970, he re-affirmed the pre-dominantly historical
character of the study of religion ever since the beginning of the discipline.

In reflecting on the problems of historical methodology in the study of religions,

Frederick strong has written:
“In order to deal significantly with religions data, then, as religions it is a false procedure to
interpret the phenomenon of religion simply in terms of that which is not religious. On the
basis of this assumption, I would say that one cannot even begin to write a history of religions
that is based on positivistic pre supposition. The fact that the historian deals with human
phenomena rather than simply physical phenomena requires him to use interpretive
techniques that permit the humanness – and in terms of religious history, the religions
character – to be expressed.

Because the ‘facts’ of the historian are different from the empirically provable
evidence of the physical scientist, the assertions made by the historian are capable only of
degrees of probability. The historian’s facts are the products of human existence; his aim is to
understand people through these products rather than to dissert objective events.”

Robert Baird Model

The analysis undertaken by Robert Baird in his book ‘category formation and the
history of Religions’ have demonstrated that a close examination of basic categories can
produce greater clarity and distinction in the orientation of research. For Baird, the history of
religions is neither normative nor merely descriptive. It cannot be isolated from other
disciplines on whose work it depends but it is not to be equated with or subsumed under them
for it possesses its own distinct methodology. Thus for Baird, the history of religions is
concerned with both historical and religions questions. The history of religions is systematic
in that it asks the religious question at various points in history. The religious question,
involving intimacy, involves a systemic answer. But the answer will be rooted in the cultural
setting at various times and places.

Ugo Bianche Model

The most vigorous defence and illuminating analysis of a strictly historical –
comparative method, comes from the scholar Ugo Bianchi. According to Bianchi, the
historical–comparative method establishes and compares historical critical settings and
complexes and investigates historical processes linked to the categories of genesis and
development. For this, the historian of religions has to be in constant contact with the
concrete data of religion and religions. Only then will he be able to perceive ‘those real’
continuities which provide the basis for a general concept of religion.

The three essential qualifications of the historical comparative approach are for him 1)
the concept of a historical typology which allows for the development of types of beliefs in
terms of a series of concrete affinities derived from the study of the historical process rather
than being abstract ‘ideal types’ 2) the concept of ‘analogy’ to bring out the comparative
similarities and differences between phenomena and 3) the concept of the concrete or
historical universal applied to the continuity of religion in a historical succession proven by
facts.
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H. I. W. Drijvers Model
Drijvers object to the view of the history of religions as an autonomous subject but
see it instead as one of the branches of the science of religion which does not differ from
other subdivisions of the science of history in its methods of working. Theoretically he
distinguishes four stages of progression in the application of historical methods.

1) Examination of the facts on the basis of the available data

2) Formulating an explanatory hypothesis
3) Analysis of the implications of this hypothesis
4) Checking these implications by means of additional data

Conclusion
To sum up the many issues raised in the historical approach to religions, the following
questions seem to recur more frequently. Should the discipline be understood in a narrow
sense and be restricted to historical/ factual/ descriptive matters or should it be interpreted in
the wider sense? Should it include a systematic hermeneutic which might elucidate the
meaning of religion and relate past religions history to the contemporary self-understanding
of human beings?

Even when the immense historical diversity of religious traditions is acknowledged,

there remains the different question whether religions are fully theoretically accounted for if
they are solely taken as historical phenomena. It must be noted that historical method is one
of the disciplines of science of religion which needs co-operation from other disciplines to
understand religion in a more conceptual and precise way.

Bibliography

King, Ursula. Historical and Phenomenological Approaches, in Contemporary Approaches

to the Study of Religion Ed by Frank Whaling, Berlin: Mouton Publishers, 1984.

Raju, Swami T. The Study of Religion: Methods and perspectives, BTESSC/SATHRI

Toynbee, Arnold. An historian’s approach to Religion, Britain: Oxford University Press,

1979.