The Learned Practice of Religion in the Modern University

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In these essays, Donald Wiebe unveils a significant problem in the academic study of religion in colleges and universities in North America and Europe - that studies almost always exhibit a religious bias. To explore this issue, Wiebe looks at the religious and moral agendas behind the study of religion, showing that the boundaries between the objective study of religion and religious education as a tool for bettering society have become blurred. As a result, he argues, religious studies departments have fostered an environment where religion has become a learned or scholarly practice, rather than the object of academic scrutiny. This book provides a critical history of the failure of 20th- and 21st-century scholars to follow through on the 19th-century ideal of an objective scientific study of religious thought and behaviour. Although emancipated from direct ecclesiastical control and, to some extent, from sectarian theologizing, Wiebe argues that research and scholarship in the academic department of religious studies has failed to break free from religious constraints. He shows that an objective scientific study of religious thought and practice is not only possible, but the only appropriate approach to the study of religious phenomena.

Reviews

Wiebe has done it again! In this collection he offers a framework for what should be the appropriate study of religion in the modern university. Providing a refreshing antidote to the irenic and the interfaith, Wiebe maintains that the study of religion must be a scientific endeavor unencumbered by religious or moralizing agendas. A science of religion is about knowledge pure and simple, and not about slogans that invoke the betterment of individuals and society. * Aaron W. Hughes, Philip S. Bernstein Professor of Religion, University of Rochester, USA *
Donald Wiebes work rightfully remains at the center of debates on the study of religions shape and its limits, making it required reading for anyone concerned with how the study of and the practice of ought to relate to one another; the unrelenting rigor of his advocacy for a truly scientific study of religion keeps the field honest by preventing readers from ever forgetting what was and remains at stake when scholars study religion. * Russell T. McCutcheon is University Research Professor and Chair of the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Alabama; among his recent books are Fabricating Religion (2018) and the co-edited Reading J. Z. Smith (2018). *

Author Bio

Donald Wiebe is Professor of Philosophy at Trinity College, University of Toronto, Canada.