In his writings, Max Weber brought into focus the increasing tension between modern salvation religions and secular spheres ranging from the economic and political to the esthetic. Weber argued that divergent perspectives on religious “brotherliness” bred a tension with autonomous secular spheres and also suggested compromise between spheres in an absolute sense would be impossible but was necessary and pervasive given the state of humanity in the modern world.
It is necessary first to establish how Weber distinguished these redemption religions from others and established them as an ideal type. Fundamentally, “the rational aim of redemption religion has been to secure for the saved a holy state, and thereby a habitude that assures salvation” (Religious Rejections, p. 327). This metaphysical holy state away from suffering, as characterized by Weber, is unique in its permanence. Weber acknowledged that other behaviors, outside salvation religion, were capable of providing such a state for a temporary period but could not promise eternal salvation. These other behaviors came into conflict with religion as providing alternative, albeit transitory pathways to inner-worldly salvation for the individual. A distinction is also made between salvation religion and “magic religiosity or for the religion of functional deities” (Religious Rejections, p. 333). In such systems, the various gods were conceived to overlap with worldly norms and behaviors. In essence, just as humans interacted on earth, deities representing war, agricultural production, commerce and countless other domains of human life were said also to be interacting and competing. In such systems, gods functioned as little more than a mechanism for explaining and, in a sense,...
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...pes, such compromise between economic and religious spheres would seem to be irresoluble. Viewed through the lens of modern humanity and practicality, however, such a compromise is almost logical as a means for religion to cement its own social status, and thus its popular efficacy as a mechanism for salvation.
The relationship between the esthetic sphere and religion provides yet another contrasting image of ideal types and of reality. Like the threats to religion posed by politics and economics, the inner-worldly salvation of art should seem to be “in a realm of irresponsible indulgence and secret lovelessness.”(Religious Rejections, p. 342) As ideal types, the world-denying salvation of religion and transient inner-worldly salvation of art could not coexist. Once form and not religious meaning became the reason for appreciation of art, religion and art became
Solomon, Norman. "New House Rules: Christianity, Economics, and Planetary Living."Subverting Greed: Religious Perspectives on the Global Economy. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 2002. 96-117. Print.
“Who gets to Narrate the World?” by Robert E. Webber focuses on responding to challenges by understanding and practicing the fullness of God’s narrative. Christians must acknowledge that the gates of hell cannot prevail against the church. They must also remember that not only are they to relearn God’s story in the biblical times, but also remember how God’s story was formed in pagan Rome. Similarly, they must be aware of contenders to the faith and they must demonstrate to all nations how God’s story can transform lives as they once again seek to narrate the world through a Christian standpoint. Currently, Western Christianity is in a weakened state because of cultural accommodation to consumerism, pragmatism, narcissism, and other secular
The growth of religious ideas is environed with such intrinsic difficulties that it may never receive a perfectly satisfactory exposition. Religion deals so largely with the imaginative and emotional nature, and consequently with such an certain elements of knowledge, the all primitive religions are grotesque to some extent unintelligible. (1877:5)
Van Eyck’s work of the Ghent Altarpiece was not simply a representation of symbols that alluded to Christianity. Van Eyck’s vivid sense of the actual world allowed him to be able to reconstruct reality along with its endless limitations. His audience was so extensively involved with his paintings that it may seem almost esoteric. T...
Max Weber’s outlines his views on religion and capitalism in his book, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. Weber held the important theory that an individual’s views are significant in promoting social change, not material things as believed by former theorists. In his work, Weber compares two waves of “the calling” as preached by different Protestant leaders and describes the teaching and spread of ascetic beliefs in followers. This paper considers the context of the calling, explores the outward signs of grace which helped develop capitalism and, lastly, how capitalism, through rationalization, transformed Calvinist ideals for its advancement.
What we see in our country today is a perfectly good economic process -- the mechanisms for producing and consuming goods -- made into a religion. Production is good: How could humans live without producing food, clothing, housing? Consumption is good: How could we live without consuming food, wearing clothes, living in dwellings? The means by which we produce such abundance are good: Who would argue against making human toil easier by means of machines? But taken together, they constitute America's other religion. The struggle between consumer religion and the Christian faith is a battle at least as old as that of the prophets against Baalism or the early church against the divinized Roman Empire.
Smart, Ninian. "Blackboard, Religion 100." 6 March 2014. Seven Dimensions of Religion. Electronic Document. 6 March 2014.
Max Weber’s work The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism is arguably one of the most important works in all of sociology and social theory, both classical and modern. In the decades since its inception, this work has gone on to influence generations of social scientists with its analysis of the effect of Protestantism on the development of modern industrial capitalism. This work, examining such broad topics as religion, economics, and history, is not only an interesting and insightful look into the history of the development of capitalism, but a major work in laying a foundation for future works of social theory.
William H. Swatos, Jr., ed. Twentieth-Century World Religious Movements in Neo-Weberian Perspective. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen Press, 1992.
In The Sacred & The Profane: A Nature of Religion, Mircea Eliade attempts to define the sacred by stating it is “the opposite of the profane” (pg. 10). Through out the book he tries to explain this statement through the concept of hierophany (the idea that one can experience, sensorily, the manifestation of the holy/sacred), however his main explanation of the sacred being “the opposite of the profane” is the comparison of a modern religious man and a modern non-religious man (a profane man). Eliade compares the two by explaining how each would react to space, time, nature, and life. This essay will explain the idea of sacred space, how a religious and a profane man would experience it, and how the idea of sacred space might be applied to the study of medieval art and architecture.
The artistic inheritance of the west is strongly identified with Catholic images that were brought upon heavily by the Church’s influence. The eighth and ninth centuries witnessed the growth of a destructive heresy called iconoclasm. Iconoclasm rejected the veneration of images of religious figures, and went as far as to reject the depiction of Christ and the saints in art at all. (115) This idea however, could not take hold, since it ran directly counter to the Catholic understanding of and appreciation for the created world. Woods provides this information to describe the influence and importance of the church in artwork, in which, as I strongly agree, sparked a period that created beautiful paintings, sculptures, stained glass, and illuminated manuscripts; which were major parts during the growth of Western civilization. Theologians referred to Catholic theological in defense of art that depicted Christ, the saints, and the religious scenes that have defined so much of Western artistic life, and broadly, Western Civilization. Woods is describing the influence of the Church, overcoming iconoclasm and having an enormous influence on the arts, which sparked the g...
Weber saw religion from a different perspective; he saw it as an agent for change. He challenged Marx by saying that religion was not the effect of some economical social or psychological factor. But that religion was used as a way for an explanation of things that cause other things. Because religious forces play an important role in reinforces our modern culture, Weber came to the conclusion that religion serves as both a cause and an effect. Weber didn’t prose a general theory of religion but focused on the interaction between society and religion. Weber believed that one must understand the role of religious emotions in causing ideal types such as capitalism. He explained the shift in Europe from the other worldliness of Catholicism to the worldliness of early Protestantism; according to Weber this was what initiated the capitalist economic system.
For thousands of years, religion has exerted a great influence over economic and political life. Even today religion is called upon to support rulers, contacts and other legal procedures.
When the religious art leaks out of the religious community and into the broader world of culture, it is one of the ways the meaning of the art can evolve. This is also an opportunity for the art to draw the world to religion. Moreover, artistic reinterpretation of sacred imagery can help keep religion honest. The church has always been enriched by the tension that comes with diversity in art. Art is communication and effective art communicates effectively to any group at any level.
The doctrine of salvation contains various aspects. The intent of this research paper is to provide a general overview of salvation from the angle of justification, propitiation, grace, redemption, and sanctification.