Toward a Definition of Folk Religion

Author(s): Don Yoder

Reviewed work(s):
Source: Western Folklore, Vol. 33, No. 1, Symposium on Folk Religion (Jan., 1974), pp. 2-15
Published by: Western States Folklore Society
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 of
Towarda Definition
FolkReligion
DON YOD.ER

The conceptof folkreligionin the academicworldhas at least

twomajorroots.The first rootis thestudyofwhatGermanscholar-
ship has named "religidseVolkskunde,"forwhichI have twotrans-
lations:thereligiousdimensionof folk-culture, or thefolk-cultural
dimensionofreligion.The secondrootis theanthropological study
of syncretisms betweentwo formsof religionon different levelsof
civilization,as forexamplethem6langeofAfricanprimitivism and
Roman Catholicismthatis in Haiti called "Voodoo," or thesyncre-
tismbetweenCatholicismand native Indian religiousbeliefsand
practicesin Centraland SouthAmerica.
The formatof thispaperwill involvea threefolddivision:
1. a briefreviewof the developmentof the conceptof folkre-
ligionfromthesetworoots;
2. a look at selectedproblemsin definingfolkreligion;and
3. an attemptto definefolkreligion.

1.
Accordingto German scholarshipthe term "religidseVolks-
kunde" was coined in 1901 by a Lutheranministernamed Paul
Drews.' In that year he published an articleentitled"Religi6se
Volkskunde,eine Aufgabeder praktischenTheologie." His con-
cernwas to investigate,
as he put it,"religiousfolklife"in its total-

1. For thehistory of the termand thescientificstudyof "religi6seVolkskunde,"see

particularly AlbrechtJobst,EvangelischeKircheund Volkstum:Ein Beitragzur
Geschichte der Volkskunde 1938),203-232;and HeinrichSchauerte,
(Stuttgart, "Ent-
wicklungund gegenwirtiger Standder religi6sen
Volkskundeforschung," Historisches
Jahrbuch72 (1953): 516-534.The only summaryin Englishthus far is Wolfgang
Brtickner, "Popular Pietyin CentralEurope,"Journalof the FolkloreInstitute5
(1968): 158-174.

[2]

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DEFINITION OF FOLK RELIGION 3

ity,itspsychologicaland sociologicaldimensionsand itsmanysided

expressions. The reason forhis concern:so thatyoungministers
freshfromseminaryeducationcould betterdeal withthepeople in
theirrural congregations, whose conceptionof the Christianre-
ligion was often radicallydifferent fromthe officialdoctrinalver-
sionsrepresentedby the clergy.The termthuscame out of an at-
tempt,withinorganizedreligion,to narrowtheunderstanding gap
betweenpulpitand pew,but has movedout ofreligionproperinto
thegeneralacademicworld,whereit has createda strongsubcate-
goryin the European disciplineof folk-cultural studies.
While thetermwas coined in 1901,thediscoveryof folkreligion
in Europe had come at the timeof theeighteenth-century Enlight-
enment,when rationalistclergyattackedfolk "superstitions"in
sermonsand ministerialperiodicals.2In the nineteenthcentury
the Germanfounderof scientific Volkskunde,Wilhelm Heinrich
Riehl, looked sympathetically at folk-religiouselementsin culture,
and Germanfolk-cultural scholarship came to include folkreligion
as a conceptin theoverarching concept ofVolkskunde. By the1930s
there were good theoreticalstudies of "religiase Volkskunde,"
amongthemthevolumesby JosefWeigert(1924), WernerBoette
(1925), and Max Rumpf (1932). All of these focusedon peasant
culture,and theGermanshaperof folkcommunitystudiesand the
functionalisticapproach to folkculture,Julius Schwietering, saw
in religiona creativeforcein thecommunity cultureoftheGerman
villages.
Scholars interestedin the religiousaspects of folk culture in
Europe createda massiveliteraturein the twentiethcentury.Ro-
man Catholicscholarsfocusedupon the pilgrimagesystemand the
practicesand folkartsassociatedwiththeshrines(the ex voto and
the geistlichesLied, forexample),upon hagiography, the studyof
the saints,and heortology, the studyof the churchyearincluding
its peasant-levelmanifestations. Among the scholarsin Germany
who led the fieldof Catholic folkreligionresearchwere Georg
2. For general perspectiveson the Enlightenmentand folk religion, see Hermann
Bausinger, Volkskunde: Von der Altertumsforschungzur Kulturanalyse (Berlin-
Darmstadt, [1970]), 17-30; Leopold Schmidt, "Volkskunde, Gegenreformation,Auf-
klirung," Deutsche Vierteljahrsschrift und Geistesgeschichte
fiirLiteraturwissenschaft
16 (1938): 75-94; and Josef Diinninger, "Volkstum und Aufklirung in Franken:
Beitrige zur frdinkischenVolkskunde im ausgehenden 18. Jahrhundert,"Bayerisches
Jahrbuchfiir Volkskunde1957, 29-42.

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4 WESTERN FOLKLORE

Schreiber3ofMiinster,who foundedan InstitutfiirreligidseVolks-

kunde; Heinrich Schauerte4of Paderborn,who has taughtmany
generationsofstudentsas docentand professor in thisarea of study
both at Paderbornand Miinster;and Rudolf Kriss,5the leading
Germanscholarof Wallfahrtsvolkskunde or theethnography of the
pilgrimage, the shrine,and related subjects.Principalamong the
theoristsin definingthe differences betweenCatholic and Protes-
tantfolk-cultures was the SwissscholarRichardWeiss.6
The mostthoroughregionalactivityin recordingfolkreligionin
a Protestantculturehas comein Sweden.At theUniversity ofLund
therewas foundedan InstituteforChurchHistorywithan Archive
forSwedishChurch History(Kyrkohistoriska Arkivet)headed by
Hilding Pleijel, which has over the yearsgatheredboth historical
and ethnographicaldocumentationon Swedishfolk-religious be-
liefsand practices.7
Pleijel's chapter,"Der Religions-und Kirchen-
geschichtlicheHintergrundder schwedischenVolkskultur,"pp.
64-86 in the symposiumedited by G*sta Berg et al., Schwedische
Volkskunde(Stockholm,1961),givesa basic overviewand a thor-
ough bibliography.See also his Das Luthertumim schwedischen
3. Georg Schreiber made massive contributions to the study of folk religion. His
instituteat Miinster was followed by a similar institutionat Salzburg founded by
Hanns Koren. Schreiber created the term "kirchlicheVolkskunde," edited Volk und
Volkstum:Jahrbuchfiir Volkskundeand the Forschungenzur Volkskunde,and aided
the studyof Auslandsdeutschtumwith his series,Deutschtum und Ausland, 65 num-
bers. For his books and contributions in general, see the estimate by Heinrich
Schauerte, "Georg Schreiberund die Volkskunde,"Rheinisch,- WestfdlischeZeitschrift
fiir Volkskunde9 (1962): 132-39.
4. For Schauerte's contributions,see Georg Wagner, "Heinrich Schauerte und sein
volkskundliches Schaffen," Rheinisch-WestfidlischeZeitschrift fiir Volkskunde 9
(1962): 278-280.
5. Kriss assembled the Sammlung Kriss,one of the largest collectionsof folk-religious
art and material culture in Europe, now housed in the BayerischesNationalmuseum,
Munich. For his publications, see Leopold Schmidt,comp., "Rudolf Kriss 70 Jahre:
Eine Bibliographie seiner Veroffentlichungenvon 1926 bis 1972," Osterreichische
Zeitschriftfiir Volkskunde,n.s. 27 (1973), 1-8; for a brief biography, see Leopold
Schmidt,"Rudolf Kriss," ibid., 243-45.
6. Richard Weiss' indispensable Volkskunde der Schweiz (Erlenbach-Ziirich, 1946)
contains basic theoryon folkreligion and folk religiosity,and analyzes the differences
between Catholic and Protestant folk-cultures,a subject which Swiss folk-cultural
scholars had to wrestlewith. For the latter,see his essay "Zur Problematik einer pro-
testantischenVolkskultur,"Beitriige zur Volkstumsforschung 14 (1964): 27-46.
7. For the historyof the instituteand its work,see the seriesMeddelanden frdnKyrko-
historiskaArkivet i Lund, ed. Hilding Pleijel. No. 1 is entitled Kyrkligfolklivsfor-
skning and includes the basic questionnaire on Swedish folk religion.

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DEFINITION OF FOLK RELIGION 5

Volksleben: Einige Entwicklungslinien(Lund, 1958), and his

monograph,The Devotional Literatureof the SwedishPeople in
Earlier Times (Lund, 1955),whichdeals withthe place the Bible,
catechism,and hymnbook,and otherdevotionalworkshad among
the Swedishpeasantry.
The othertributary strandin folkreligionstudiesis theworkof
culturalanthropologists, mostof themAmerican,in studyingthe
syncretisticcultures of theCaribbeanand Centraland SouthAmer-
ica. Redfieldwas herethepioneer,withhis Tepoztldn:A Mexican
Village(1930). His fruitful analysesof peasantcultureand his dis-
tinctionsbetweenlittle and great traditions,folk and urban so-
cieties,produced termsand conceptsthatare still being debated
and reshapedin Americanscholarship.The conceptof "folk re-
ligion" in tensionwith "officialreligion"grewout of the concern
of anthropologists to showthe interrelatedness of typesof culture
in a complexsociety,the relationshipsbetweenthe largersociety
withitsofficial and sophisticatedcultureand thelittlesocietiesthat
existedin partialisolation,in partialrelationshipto thelargerso-
cieties.Obviouslyreligionas a systemwas involvedin both levels
of theculturehierarchy, the "official"and the "folk."
While it is impossible thistimeto statedefinitively
at whereand
when the term"folkreligion"was firstused in English,I suspect
thatit may have been modeled on the German original Volksre-
ligion.Certainlythe conceptappears in the anthropologicalliter-
ature,as forexampleRedfield'sdistinctionbetween"formalCath-
olicism"and "folkCatholicism."8
One of the earliest"official"uses of the term"folk religion"
appearsto have been by JoshuaTrachtenberg,who used it in the
titleof his earlyworkon JewishMagic and Superstition:A Study
in Folk Religion (1939). It has becomea fairlywidespreadtermin
comparativereligionas well, forexample, the volume by Ichiro
Hori,Folk Religion in Japan: Continuityand Change(1968). Mar-
tin Nilsson'ssmall paperbackon GreekFolk Religion and Charles
Leslie's readerentitledAnthropologyof Folk Religion have like-

8. Cf. The Folk Culture of Yucatan (Chicago, 1941), 261, 267. Since there appears to
be no summaryof the developmentof the term"folk religion" in anthropologicaland
sociological scholarship,I will appreciate citations fromreaders on earlier uses than
Redfield's and Trachtenberg's.

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6 WESTERN FOLKLORE

wiseregisteredtheincreasedacademicacceptanceof theterm.And
in the academic world courses in Folk Religion have been taught in
various universities,John Messenger's at Indiana University and
my own (since 1957) at the University of Pennsylvania furnishing
two examples.
Two recent volumes, dealing with non-American contexts,have
used the term "folk religion" in their titles and both provide some
insight into the problems of defining the term. Hori's book sees
Japanese folk religion existing in special relationships with the
high-cultural formsof Japanese religion:

Japanesefolkreligion,unlike Buddhismor Confucianism,is ex-

tremelydiversein characterand difficult to defineprecisely.It is
made up of vague magico-religious beliefs,manyof which are sur-
vivals or successorsof archaic and primitiveelements;thesebeliefs
or primitiveelementsthemselvesremain unsystematized theoretic-
ally and ecclesiasticallybut in manywayshave penetratedand be-
come interrelatedwith institutionalizedreligions.9

And again Hori provides us with this insight: "I believe that the
essence of Japanese folk religion lies in the interaction of two be-
lief systems:a little tradition,which is based on blood or close com-
munityties; and a great tradition,introduced fromwithout, which
is adopted by individual or group choice. The belief patternsfound
everywhere in Japanese rural society are complex, multilayered,
and syncretistic."10
Leslie's AnthropologyofFolk Religion (1960) helps us particular-
ly in its chapterson India and Yucatan. In the sections dealing with
India (by McKim Marriott) we have folk religion as the interpreta-
tion by the little community of the religion of the great tradition
(what Toynbee refersto as the process of "parochialization" rather
than "universalization").11 In the chapters on Yucatan (from Red-
field) we have folk religion as the syncretizationof the religions of
two civilizations.12

9. Ichiro Hori, Folk Religion in Japan: Continuityand Change (Chicago, 1968), 1.

10. Ibid., 49.
11. Charles Leslie, Anthropologyof Folk Religion (New York, 1960), ch. 4: "Little
Communities in an Indigenous Civilization," by McKim Marriott.
12. Leslie, ch. 8: "Spanish and Indian: The Two Heritages," fromRedfield, The Folk
Culture of Yucatan.

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DEFINITION OF FOLK RELIGION 7

2.
The problems indefining folkreligionarefirst ofall conditioned
bythepreconceptions heldbyvariousdisciplines inrelationtonon-
standard religiousphenomena in culture. Two disciplines in the
UnitedStateswhosesubjectmatter shadesoverintotheareaoffolk
religion-folklore andreligiousstudies-have showncomparatively
lessinterestin theareathanhavetheirEuropeancounterparts, the
folk-culturaland history ofreligionfields.
In thefieldofreligiousstudiesin theUnitedStatestheinterest
in folk-religiousphenomena has been minimal.The teachingof
religious studiesin the United Stateshas concentrated largelyon
thetheological and institutional level,whicheitherneglectsfolk
practices and folk interpretations ofreligionas unimportant or it
neglects them because thediscipline has too rigid a framework to
includesuchphenomena. In thestandard church history journalfor
the UnitedStates,ChurchHistory,in contrast to the European
churchhistoriographical journals, therehasneverbeentheslightest
interestin practices or beliefswhichdepartfromthetheological
and liturgical norm.This wasgraphically displayedin thesober-
sidesprogram of theAmericanSocietyof ChurchHistorywhich
metseveralyearsago in Nashville, thecenterofcountry and gospel
musicwithitshandon thepulseofthebasicreligiouscharacter of
Mid-America. The papersofthesessionindicated no concern what-
soeverwithanyaspectsofeitherfolkor popularreligion.In con-
trastEuropeanjournalsof ecclesiastical history includeall levels
and typesofreligiousexpression.13
The tensions between"high"orofficial religionandfolkreligion
are ofcoursediscoverable in anycomplexsociety. E. R. Leach,in
his recentvolume,Dialecticin PracticalReligion(1968),distin-
guishesbetween"philosophical" and "practical"religion.14 The
first
is thereligionoftheintellectual elite,bywhichthereligionis
usuallyjudgedbyscholarship, thelatteris the"religious principles
whichguidethebehaviorofan ordinary churchgoer." In thefield
ofcomparative religionthecommonfailuretodistinguish between
philosophical and
religion practical religionhas often led toserious
misunderstanding. The Western of
interpretationBuddhism, for
13. Cf. the Bldtter fiir PfdlzischeKirchengeschichteund religi6se Volkskunde.
14. E. R. Leach, ed., Dialectic in Practical Religion (Cambridge, 1968), 1.

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8 WESTERN FOLKLORE

example, was almost entirelyderived fromthe Pali texts,with little

attention paid to the ordinaryeverydaypractice of Buddhism. This
is also true of Hinduism. Does one, for example, judge Hinduism
as a religious complex by the Upanishads or by what anthropology
calls "village Hinduism?"
I mentioned Joshua Trachtenberg's excellent study of Jewish
magic. In his forewordhe states the problem of formal versus folk
religion:
But alongside this formaldevelopment [legalism] there was a
constantelaborationof whatwe maycall "folkreligion"-ideas and
practicesthat never met with the whole-heartedapproval of the
religiousleaders,but whichenjoyedsuch wide popularitythat they
could not be altogetherexcluded fromthefieldof religion.Of this
sortwere the beliefsin demonsand angels,and the manysupersti-
tious usages based on thesebeliefs,which by more or less devious
routesactuallybecame a part of Judaism,and on the peripheryof
the religiouslife, the practicesof magic, which never broke com-
pletelywiththetenetsof the faith,yetstretchedthemalmostto the
breaking-point.If we call these "folk religion" it is because they
expressedthe commonattitudeof the people, as against the official
attitudeof the Synagogue,to the universe."5

The rabbis, representatives of officialreligion, attempted either

(1) to eradicate some of these practices, or (2) to transmute their
"offensivefeatures."
Trachtenberg admits the neglect of the folk level of belief in the
studyof Judaism in these words:

Everywherethe commonfolkhas existedon an intellectualand

spiritualplane all itsown,and it is onlyin themostrecentcenturies
that truescienceand religionhave made inroadsinto folkconcep-
tions of the universeand broughtthemcloser-if only a little-to
what we call our modern,rationalistviewpoint.In Jewishscholar-
ship this phase of folk religion and folk science has been sorely
neglected.The tendencyhas been to impute to the Jewishpeople
as a whole the ideas of a few advanced thinkers,to investigate
philosophyand mysticismand law, the cultural and religiouscre-
ations of the intellectualelite-valuable studies which, however,
provide no insightinto the inner life of the people themselves.'6
15. Joshua Trachtenberg,JewishMagic and Superstition:A Study in Folk Religion
(New York, 1939), vii-viii.
16. Ibid., viii. A similar note is struckby the French sociologistleBras: "The folklife
of Catholicism has been just as little observed by the historiansof the Middle Ages
and of the Ancien Regime as by our contemporaries.We have thousandsof studies on

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DEFINITION OF FOLK RELIGION 9

If religiousscholarshiphas neglectedthestudyofwhatTrachten-
bergcalls "theinnerlifeofthepeople themselves," so,unfortunate-
ly,has much of our folklorescholarship in this country.The chief
reasonfortheslowdevelopmentofthestudyoffolkreligionin this
countryby folklorists has been, as I see it, the thornyquestion of
definitionof the fieldof folklore.Most Americandefinitionsof
folkloreprovideno categoriesin which to include religiousphe-
nomena, unless it includes them under that impossiblesurvival
fromtheEnlightenment, theword"superstition," whichblocksany
sympathetic understanding of the belief elements in folkreligion.
is
"Religion" obviously not a "genre," and cannot be in-
therefore
cluded in the old-fashionedgenre-oriented definitions.With the
newer culture-oriented definitions.obviouslyreligion can be in-
cluded as it has been in Europe.
The term"superstition," as we all know,has itsdefenders.It was
even used in its Germanform,A berglaube,in the titleof the best
workon folkbeliefsproducedin Europe,theHandw6irterbuch des
deutschenA berglaubens,all tenvolumes,althoughit was minimal-
lyused in thetextitself.Europeanscholarswho opposeA berglaube
as a value judgment,understandablesolelyin relationto a system
of hard orthodoxywhichsees truthonlyin its own terms,have of
courseproposedtheneutralsubstitutetermVolksglaube,whichis
now also widelycurrentin its Englishform"folkbelief."'7

doctrines,on monuments,on illustrious men . . . but how many monographs are

there on the religious historyof the French people, on the Christian life or lack of it
of our forefathers, which meritsperhaps just as much attention as a syllogismor a
prehistoricflintstoneand which can explain so many apparent mysteries?"(Gabriel
leBras, "De l'6tat pr6sent de la pratique religieuse en France," Revue de folklore
franfais4 [1933]: 195).
17. One of the most recent attemptsto define the term scientifically, Karl E. Scheibe
and Theodore R. Sarbin, "Towards a Theoretical Conceptualisation of Superstition,"
British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 16 (1965): 143-158,ends on the curious
note: "A final point should be made that may seem surprising,in view of the title of
this paper. Instead of using the term superstition more frequently,as would be
necessaryif we were to apply the term at all consistently,it should be used less fre-
quently,and perhaps not at all. Accordingto the major points outlined earlier regard-
ing the psychological nature of superstitionsas a category of belief, it should be
apparent that theyare ubiquitous; that even scientistshave them though here they
are often clothed in the dignified fabric of irreproachable mathematical or verbal
symbolism.Moreover, superstitions,i.e. beliefs that are not inductivelyderived and
not empiricallychecked,are psychologicallynecessaryforexistence.Thus, even though
the categoryof beliefs called superstitionsis a distinct and meaningful category,it
turnsout to be too inclusive a class of beliefs to bear the socially reprehensiblelabel
of Superstition.For the sake of equity and fairness,the termshould be used not more,
but less."

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10 WESTERN FOLKLORE

The seconddifficulty in the term"folkreligion"is thatto some

mindsthe term"religion"suggestswhatwe normallymean by or-
ganizedreligion,or the officialreligiousinstitutionsof a culture.
Durkheimappearsto be the fatherof thisviewpoint.In differenti-
ating magic fromreligion,he suggeststhatreligionalwaysforms
what is sociologicallyknownas a "church,"an associationof be-
lievers;magicformsno "church"in thissense.Those wholimitthe
term"religion"to organizedformspreferthe term"folkbelief"to
designatethebodyof phenomenathatwe are attempting to define.
Olof Petterssonprovidesstrengthfor this argumentin a recent
essay.In analyzingan earlyattemptat "constructing" a "folkre-
ligion" (AlbrechtDieterich, Mutter Erde: Ein Versuch iiber Volks-
religion[1905]),Petterssoncomesto theconclusionthatit is more
advisableto speakof"folk-cultural elementsofa religion"thanofa
delimited,settledentitycalled "folkreligion."18
A finaldifficulty
in defining"folkreligion"is posed by the so-
ciologicaluse of the termas the oppositeof "universalreligion,"
as documented,for example, by the sociologistsSchneiderand
Mensching.'9"A folkreligion,as the name suggests,"writesLouis
Schneider,"is bound to a particularpeople, folkor tribe,just as
the particularpeople, folkor tribeis bound to the particularre-
ligion." Universalreligions,on theotherhand,are "detachedfrom
a folkbase. They addressthemselvesto individualmen anywhere
and everywhere."
In theemergence of universalreligiona processof structural
dif-
ferentiationis clearlyat work.Religionin thefolkcase has as it
wereonehouse,onedwelling, oneboxfromwhichit is inseparable.
In the universalcase,it comesout of the folkmatrixand may
theoretically"strike"anywhere-in anyfolk,or tribalor national
locus.It maythenbe saidtohavea houseofitsown-a distinctively
religioushouse.20
In generalI preferthe use of the terms"tribal" or "national"
religionto "folkreligion"forthisparticularconcept.These terms
will serveforlivingreligions;forthe now-defunctreligionswhich
18. Olof Pettersson,"Der Begriff'Volksreligion': ein religionsgeschichtlichesProb-
lem," Ethnologia Europaea 4 (1970): 62-66.
19. Gustav Mensching, Soziologie der Religion (Bonn, 1947), particularly 25-85.
20. Louis Schneider, Sociological Approach to Religion (New York, 1970), 73-74.

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DEFINITION OF FOLK RELIGION 11

influencedearlier stagesof European civilization(Greco-Roman,

Celtic,Germanic,and Slavic religions)perhapsthe term"archaic"
is adequate. The confusioninvolvedin the sociologicaluse of the
termas above outlinedis foundin otherinstitutions as well,stem-
mingfromthe secondary(primary?)usage in some European cul-
turesoftheterm"folk"for"national,"as in theScandinavianterm
"folkschool." The German term Volksreligionhas been used in
bothways:(1) as theoppositeof "universalreligion"in thesenseof
national religionof an entirepeople, and (2) as the folk-levelop-
positeof sophisticated, official,institutionalizedlevels of religion
(Hochreligion) in a complex society.21It is of course this second
senseof thewordthatwe are concernedwith.
In my own conceptualizationof folkreligionI differentiate it
fromorganizedreligion,primitivereligion,popular-levelreligion,
and sectarianreligion.Folk religionexistsin a complexsocietyin
relationto and in tensionwiththeorganizedreligion(s)of thatso-
ciety.Its relativelyunorganizedcharacterdifferentiates it fromor-
ganizedreligion.Its part-cultural it fromprim-
settingdifferentiates
itivereligionwhichas thereligionof a people is in a senseofficial
religion.Neitheris folkreligion"popularreligion"of theNorman
VincentPeale level,althoughtherehavebeen unsuccessful attempts
in Americanreligionto label suchphenomenaas Pealeismas "folk
religion,"obviouslya misnomerin the academic world.22Finally
folkreligioncan be differentiated fromsectarianreligion.The sects
and cults representorganizedand thereforeofficialreligionwith
churchesand congregations.Hence I feel it improperto referto
the religionof anyorganizedsectas a "folkreligion."We have to
speakinsteadoffolk-religious aspectsofsectarianreligion.Obvious-
ly sectsas small groupsand still more as counter-cultures achieve
and defenda cultureof theirown,and someof thecomponentele-
mentsin sectarianculturemaybe folkelements.

21. Alfred Bertholet, W6rterbuch der Religionen (Stuttgart, 1952), 508-9; Kurt
Goldammer,Die Formenweltdes Religi6sen: Grundrissder systematischenReligions-
wissenschaft(Stuttgart,1960), 14.
22. A. Roy Eckhart, The Surge of Piety in America: An Appraisal (New York, 1958),
deals with the "revival" of religion in the 1950s.Chapter 2 is entitled "Folk Religion:
Its Ways and Works." He "suggests" the term "folk religion" for this phenomenon
because the "return to religion" was "very much a popular movement." He seems to
know nothing of the term's prior use in religious and folk-culturalscholarship.

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12 WESTERN FOLKLORE

3.

Finally,how can we define"folkreligion"?Can we constructa

usable definitionthatwill fitthe Americansituation?As I see it,
thereare fivepossibilities.
1. Is folkreligion,in theEuropeancontext,as CharlesG. Leland
once definedit in the last century,"the old religion" (la vecchia
religione),23 thatis, survivalsin the presentof pre-Christian forms
of religion?This is the evolutionist,survivalist, "gesunkenesKul-
turgut"approach. According to this definitionfolk religion in
Catholicismwould be the acculturatedelementsfromthe pre-
Christianreligions,whilein Protestantism folkreligionwould con-
sistof survivalscarriedover by the people frommedievalCathol-
icism(includingthe healingcults,witchcraft, saints'days,and cal-
endriccustoms,as well as commonpeasantattitudessuchas the "do
ut des" contractualrelationshipwith God). If, accordingto San-
tayana,Catholicismwas paganismspiritualized,24 officialProtes-
tantismis a truncatedformofmedievalCatholicism.The austerity
and intellectuality ofmuchofofficial Protestantism forcedthepeo-
ple to develop in somecontextsa folkProtestantism of theirown,
and even officialProtestantism was forcedto develop Protestant
substitutes forCatholicvalues exscindedat the timeof the Protes-
tant Reformation.An example of the formeris the survivalin
Protestantcontextsof the medieval practiceof magico-religious
healing,an exampleofthelatteris thedevelopmentofthe personal
diaryand religiousautobiographyas substitutefor,among other
values,the Catholicelementof confession.25 To constructa defini-
tionfromthisapproach,folkreligionis essentiallythesurvivals,in
an official religiouscontext,of beliefsand behaviorinheritedfrom
earlierstagesof theculture'sdevelopment.
2. Is folkreligion,secondly,in theCaribbeanor Latin American
context,as definedby Metraux,28 the mixture(the milange) of an
official "high" religion(Catholicism)with"native"or "primitive"
religion(in thiscase eitherAfricanprimitivism or indigenousIn-

23. Charles GodfreyLeland, Etruscan Roman Remains in Popular Tradition (Lon-

don and New York, 1892), 2.
24. George Santayana, My Host the World (New York, 1953), 84.
25. Don Yoder, "The Saint's Legend in the Pennsylvania German Folk-Culture," in
Wayland D. Hand, ed., American Folk Legend: A Symposium (Berkeley and Los
Angeles, 1971), 157-183.
26. Alfred Metraux, Voodoo in Haiti (New York, 1959), or Leslie, ch. 9.

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DEFINITION OF FOLK RELIGION 13

dian religion)?This is the syncretist approach,growingout of ac-

culturationtheory.Obviouslythisis similarto the firstdefinition,
althoughas usually applied, the survivalistdefinitioninvolvesa
kindofstaticviewof"survivals"as identifiable, researchablethings,
whereasthisacculturationist viewor syncretist definitionis dynam-
ic, suggesting theprocesswherebythepresentformsof thereligion
came about. To construct,then,a definition:folkreligionis es-
sentiallya syncretistic systembuiltup throughtheinterpenetration
of twoor moreformsofreligionin a complexsociety.
3. Is folkreligion,thirdly, as folklorists
have largelydescribedit,
certain fringephenomenain religion,the unpermitted,the un-
sanctioned,that is, superstitions? This is an attemptto create a
genre out of the folkelements in religion,but unfortunately it can-
not do justice to the full range of folk-religious phenomenaand
attitudes.There has been someattemptto justifythisdefinitionon
a psychological basis,bysuggesting thattheindividual'sattitudeto
"superstition"is different fromhis attitudeto "religion,"but this
does notgetus veryfarfromtheold debateabout "magic" and "re-
ligion." In general,as suggestedabove, I preferto scrap the word
"superstition" and substitute"folkbelief."Certainlyin a function-
ing culturethe commonpeople's attitudesto a supposeddivision
of labor between"magic" and "religion"are verydifficult to pry
apart even for scientific
analysis. All of man's self-initiated ap-
proachesto the supernatural(prayer,blessing,conjuration,and
curse)as well as thosephenomenabelievedto be "invasions"of the
supernaturalinto thenatural(revelation,vision,dream,prophecy,
miracle,charisma,etc.) obviouslyoperatein a unifiedorganicsys-
tem of belief.One of the best recenttreatments of some of these
is
problems IrmgardHampp's Beschw6rungSegen Gebet (1961).
And Caro Baroja's diagramsin The World of the Witches(1964)
graphicallydisplaytheoverlappingof thecommonman's attitudes
to magicand religion,priestand shaman.Perhapswe can construct
a definitionherebyseeingfolkreligionas theinteractionofbelief,
ritual,custom,and mythology in traditionalsocieties.
4. Is folkreligion,fourthly, the "folkinterpretation and expres-
sionofreligion?"This is a definition whichinvolvesreligionamong
the expressiveelementsof a culture,and its applicationis partic-
ularlyplain in the area of the folkarts,religiousfolkmusic,fes-
tivals, calendar customs, and other similar creations. In each of
these areas the little community puts in its ingredient of self-

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14 WESTERN FOLKLORE

expression,adds its own local coloration,to universallyaccepted

forms.This definitionis particularlyapt forthe
official-religious
area of folkreligionforwhichthe Germanshave coined the term
"kirchlicheVolkskunde,"that is, those folk-cultural phenomena
whichare associatedwithor growout ofecclesiasticalphenomena.27
The recentworkby Latin Americanscholarson thefiestaas a total
communityeventinvolvingeveryaspectof culturefromcostume
to foodwaysis an exampleofwhatcan be done to studythispositive
or "creative"side of folkreligion.28
But can thisdefinitioninclude
also the passivesurvivalistelementsof folkbelief,the witchcraft
complexforexample?Perhapsone wayof reconcilingthisdichot-
omyis to invoketheterm"folkreligiosity."29 This would resultin
the followingdefinition:Folk religionis the depositin cultureof
folkreligiosity,the fullrangeof folkattitudesto religion.
5. Perhapsin thelastanalysiswe mustconstructa practicalwork-
ing definitionto include all thesecomponentelements.My orig-
inal translationsof "religidseVolkskunde"can serve here. Folk
religionis "the folk-cultural dimensionof religion,"or "the re-
ligious dimension of This can includeactive/creative
folk-culture."
as well as passive/survivalist
elements,it also certainlycan suggest
the elementof tensionwhichexistsbetweenfolkand official levels
of religionin the complex society.Thereforewe can phrasethis
practicaldefinitionin anotherway:Folkreligionis thetotality ofall
thoseviewsand practicesof religionthatexist among the people
apartfromand alongsidethestrictly theologicaland liturgicalforms
of the official
religion.30
27. For this area of folk religion, see Georg Schreiber, "Kirchliche Volkskunde,"
Deutsche Forschung:Aus der Arbeit der Notgemeinschaftder Deutschen Wissenschaft
6 (1928): 65-73; Will-Erich Peuckert, "Kirchliche Volkskunde," Zeitschriftfiir Kir-
chengeschichte58 (1939): 521-573; also Will-Erich Peuckert and Otto Lauffer,eds.,
Volkskunde: Quellen und Forschungenseit 1930 (Bern, 1951), 47-50.
28. Latin American folkloristsand ethnographershave writtenwidely on the fiesta
as a total communityevent. American scholars like Ralph Boggs, Americo Paredes,
Paulo Carvalho-Neto,and Robert J. Smithhave mediated thisvast body of scholarship
to the United States. See also Henry F. Dobyns, "The Religious Festival" (Ph.D.
diss., Cornell University,1960). For the larger aspects of the festival spirit within
Christianity,see the recent work by Harvey Cox, The Feast of Fools: A Theological
Essay on Festivityand Fantasy (Cambridge, Mass., 1970).
29. Again there appears to be German precedent in the terms Volksreligi6sititand
Volksfr6mmigkeit.
30. This is modeled on the broad-gauge definitionof folk medicine developed by
Hanns O. Miinstererin his article, "Grundlagen, Giiltigkeitund Grenzen der volks-
medizinischen Heilverfahren,"Bayerisches Jahrbuch fiir Volkskunde 1950, 9-20.

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DEFINITION OF FOLK RELIGION 15

We have had scholarlyprecedentforall fiveof theseviews.Some

howeverare narrowerand some are broader.The broadestof all
would appear to be no. 5. Under it could be included the passive
phenomenaof folkreligion (witchcraft and magic,for example)
as well as the activeor creativephenomena(religiousfolkmusic,
folkcostume,folkart,even folktheology),thereinterpretations or
expressions of the official
religionon the folk level. This definition
includes thereforeboth the "kirchliche"as well as the "neben-
kirchliche"phenomena,theelementsrelatedtoofficial ecclesiastical
formson theone handand on theotherthosewhichhavea partially
independentexistenceoutsidetheboundaryof orthodoxy.Finally
thisdefinitioncan be applied, as Richard Weiss and othershave
done withfolk-culture in general,to the componentsof the indi-
vidual mind,whererationalistic attitudes,orthodoxreligiousopin-
ions,and folk-religious reactionscan coexistin the same person.31

ofPennsylvania
University

31. Weiss, Volkskundeder Schweiz,6-9.

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