Religious phenomenology and absolute historicism
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5380/cra.v24i1.86414Keywords:
religion, history, ritual, technique.Abstract
Through a interpretation of the work of the Dutch theologian Gerardus van der Leeuw
(1890-1950), the text analyzes phenomenology as a theoretical strategy for understanding religion. While recognizing the existential foundation of religion, phenomenology aims an intuitive synthesis of the researched essences, describing such phenomena as mysteries to be contemplated and reproducing, to the researcher, a reality
analogous to the experience of the sacred. Absolute historicism, inspired by the work of
Benedetto Croce (1866-1952), seeks, on the contrary, the human reasons that produce religious experience. The historical process described by such historicism is that of the crisis of presence – the risk of not being present in a human history through values, retreating to natural vitality – and that of its rescue through ritual techniques of de-historification and mediation that transform critical moments of existence (related to material and psychological survival) into culturally conquered and established realities.
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