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Enligtening
I am writing on a paper on satanism in Norway(therefore badly written english). This essyes from good old Mirca, is a good phenomenological point of wiew. I think he sets things into context, but for my case it is a bitold. If you want a general introduction from the phenomenlogical school inthe occult tradiction you migth as well staert with this book. ... Read more

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This is an EXACT reproduction of a book published before 1923. This IS NOT an OCR'd book with strange characters, introduced typographical errors, and jumbled words.This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book. ... Read more

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Why are there religious beliefs in all cultures? Do they have features in common and why does religion persist in the face of science? Pascal Boyer shows how experimental findings in cognitive science, evolutionary biology and cultural anthropology are now providing precise answers to these general questions, and providing for the first time real answers to the question: why do we believe?Amazon.com Review
What's it all about? Though we might never answer the really big questions--with good reason--maybe we can understand why we ask them. Cognitive anthropologist Pascal Boyer tackles this topic in the unapologetically titled Religion Explained, and it is sure to polarize his readers. Some will think it's an impermissible invasion of mental territory beyond the reach of reason; others will see it as the first step toward a more complete understanding of human nature--and Boyer is acutely aware of the emotionally charged nature of his work. This knowledge informs his decision to proceed without caution, as he warns readers early on that most will risk being offended by some of his considerations. Readers who can lay aside their biases will find great rewards here; Boyer's wide scholarship and knack for elegant writing are reasons enough for reading his book.

That gods and spirits are construed very much like persons is probably one of the best-known traits of religion. Indeed, the Greeks had already noticed that people create gods in their own image.... All this is familiar, indeed so familiar that for a long time anthropologists forgot that this propensity requires an explanation. Why then are gods and spirits so much like humans?

Peppering his study with examples from all over the world, particularly the Fang people of Africa, Boyer offers plenty of evidence for his theory that religious institutions exist to maintain particular threads of social integrity. Though he uses the tools of evolutionary psychology, he is more careful than most EP proponents to avoid ad hoc and circular arguments. Best of all, at least to those unmortified at the idea of examining religion critically, his theories are potentially testable. Even if he turns out to be dead wrong, at least Religion Explained offers a new and powerful framework for thinking about our spiritual lives. --Rob Lightner ... Read more

Customer Reviews (68)

Cognitive pre-adaptations enabling religion explained - not religion itself
Reading Pascal Boyer trying to explain religion by explicating the cognitive pre-adaptations enabling the formation, spreading and transmission of religious concepts is like listening to a Hindu explaining goulash by citing in detail the content of a kitchen and the autonomy of a cow: not many factual mistakes, sprinkled with plenty of negative sentiment against the whole concept, roughly on target but misses the point almost completely. The tittle over-promised and the book underwhelms. Two stars for effort.

There is nothing wrong in itself with Religion Explained, as long as one takes it for what it does well: explaining the mind it takes for religion to be possible in the first place. The title however is not justified by the content.

For a far deeper and more enlightening exploration of the matter I highly recommend Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity (Cambridge Studies in Social and Cultural Anthropology). Not an easy read, not focusing on the cognitive aspects, but far far superior in wisdom, insight and much closer to 'the truth'.

Very thought provoking
One of my all time favorite books. I can't remember a book quite as thought provoking as this one (The Selfish Gene, maybe). The author explores evolutionary psychology as it pertains to religious belief, and he addresses, in my view, most of the right questions. What is really going on in people's mind as they formulate, accept, and propagate religious ideas? How and why did this evolve over time. Why has religion been so strongly connected with violence throughout history, and so on. The bottom line is that this book offers one of the most penetrating analyses of religious belief that I've come across and it opens up many new ways of looking at it.

I am the author of a novel, Kaleidoscope, in which I explore some of the ideas raised in this book.

Unconvincing
The book promises to view religion from a new perspective: that of cognitive processes in the human brain, shaped by evolution. It would be fascinating, if it fulfilled the expectations. Unfortunately, the valuable ideas are too few for such a lengthybook. The result is an over-elaboration of obvious concepts, and endless repetitions. The author dismisses too readily the 'traditional' explanations of religion, but fails to offer suitable substitutes. For example, according to the author, religion does not provide any comfort for the angst involving the inevitability of death. Maybe there are religious beliefs in the world that do not provide any hope of an afterlife, but they have not had much success. The author has the annoying habit of presenting well-established concepts about the origin and functions of religion, only to add immediately that they do not make much sense and offer his own explanation. Having said that, if you bear with the tiresome prose and slow progression, there are detours into cognitive science and descriptions of very primitive religious beliefs that you may find interesting.

Author needs writing lessons, but makes interesting points.
Holy cow. I have read numerous books on religion, atheism, evolution, physics etc. by a variety of authors including scholars and scientists. "Religion Explained" is without a doubt the most tedious read in memory. While I don't doubt Boyer's expertise in his field, he desperately needs to take a couple of writing classes if he wants to reach an audience of more than fellow anthropologists. In this book he gives us what he clearly feels is necessary background on various arenas of the evolution of the human mind to make his conclusions understandable. But he winds up using 320 pages of prep work in order to summarize his conclusions in the last five pages of the book. The groundwork needs to be there, certainly, but I was overwhelmed by the second chapter with repetition and anthropological jargon that continued throughout the entire book. Aside from that, I gleaned a few gems about the brain's innate needs concerning social interaction and evolution that make religion essentially a byproduct of psychology. I suspected this for many years, but Boyer explains - in longwinded fashion - HOW and WHY the mind produces lasting religious concepts that seem too counterintuitive to take root. If you believe, as I do, that all religions are manmade, this book will interest you if you learn to do some scanning and speed reading to wrestle the important points from the clutter.

thought-provoking yet very poorly written
This book is larded with thought-provoking ideas about religion and its foundations in the human mind. Unfortunately the style of its author makes it very difficult to read comfortably. It is composed of a succession of statements that, one hopes, are related to each other but that one must connect logically in order to make sense of the content of the book and appreciate the import of its thought-provoking ideas. Boyer does not feel the need to use conjunctions such as "but", "however","although", "and" etc. to organize his discourse. And this is really regrettable because the poor quality of the packaging may turn off many readers and render their jounney toward enlightening ideas very arduous if at all worth it. And yet i found myself plodding on because the content was just too compelling to ignore. Too bad Boyer is such a poor writer though. There is nothing particulary intellectually abstruse in his argument; it is just that his ponderous and ill-organized style makes the reading very frustrating. To remedy the problem it takes several readings sometimes. By the end of the book you are confronted with this paradox: the ideas expounded in the book have to have originated from anintelligent mind, and yet this very intelligent mind could not manage to express these ideas in a logical manner. It also raises the question of the role of editors.
To sum up: very interesting ideas about the foundations of religious thinking (in the human mind) written in a very illogical style that makes the reading needlessly frustrating.
P.S.: I chose not to dwell on the content since so many other reviewers had already done so beautifully. But too few addressed the issue of readability which i think should be treated. ... Read more

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From Islam to Confucianism to Voodoo, dress plays a pivotal role in religious expression. This book investigates how dress symbolically evidences both religious and social systems across a wide range of cultures--from Africa and South America to Asia, Indonesia, Malaysia and the Caribbean. In some of these cultures, dress is part of a system of social control. Gender issues feature prominently since the control of female sexuality is often of great importance to the world's religions. Members of each ethno-religious group actively construct their own lives, and use dress symbolically. A central tenet for many of these groups is that the soul is visually manifested on the body through dress. Drawing on rich ethnographic case studies, this wide-ranging and interdisciplinary volume represents a major contribution to the study of both religion and dress. ... Read more

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High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! A scarf is a piece of fabric worn on or near the head or around the neck for warmth, cleanliness, fashion or for religious reasons. They can come in a variety of different colors. Ancient Rome is one of the first origins of the scarf, not used to keep warm, but to keep clean. Called the ?sudarium? which translates from Latin to English as sweat cloth was use to wipe the sweat from neck and faces in the heat of the desert. Originally worn by men around their neck or tied to their belt. Soon women started using the scarves, which were made of cloth and not made of wool, pashimina or silk and ever since the scarf has been fashionable among women. ... Read more

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This scarce antiquarian book is a selection from Kessinger Publishing's Legacy Reprint Series. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment to protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature. Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone! ... Read more

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The 18th century was a wealth of knowledge, exploration and rapidly growing technology and expanding record-keeping made possible by advances in the printing press. In its determination to preserve the century of revolution, Gale initiated a revolution of its own: digitization of epic proportions to preserve these invaluable works in the largest archive of its kind. Now for the first time these high-quality digital copies of original 18th century manuscripts are available in print, making them highly accessible to libraries, undergraduate students, and independent scholars.
The Age of Enlightenment profoundly enriched religious and philosophical understanding and continues to influence present-day thinking. Works collected here include masterpieces by David Hume, Immanuel Kant, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, as well as religious sermons and moral debates on the issues of the day, such as the slave trade. The Age of Reason saw conflict between Protestantism and Catholicism transformed into one between faith and logic -- a debate that continues in the twenty-first century.
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The below data was compiled from various identification fields in the bibliographic record of this title. This data is provided as an additional tool in helping to insure edition identification:
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Bodleian Library (Oxford)

T148372

With a half-title.

[London?] : Printed in the year, 1778. viii,206p. ; 8° ... Read more

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This digital document is an article from First Things: A Monthly Journal of Religion and Public Life, published by Institute on Religion and Public Life on April 1, 2003. The length of the article is 2269 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Reading the old from the new.("Christian Figural Reading and the Fashion of Identity")(Book Review) (book review)
Author: Robert Louis Wilken
Publication: First Things: A Monthly Journal of Religion and Public Life (Refereed)
Date: April 1, 2003
Publisher: Institute on Religion and Public Life
Page: 64(4)

Article Type: Book Review

Distributed by Thomson Gale ... Read more

Product Description
The 18th century was a wealth of knowledge, exploration and rapidly growing technology and expanding record-keeping made possible by advances in the printing press. In its determination to preserve the century of revolution, Gale initiated a revolution of its own: digitization of epic proportions to preserve these invaluable works in the largest archive of its kind. Now for the first time these high-quality digital copies of original 18th century manuscripts are available in print, making them highly accessible to libraries, undergraduate students, and independent scholars.
The Age of Enlightenment profoundly enriched religious and philosophical understanding and continues to influence present-day thinking. Works collected here include masterpieces by David Hume, Immanuel Kant, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, as well as religious sermons and moral debates on the issues of the day, such as the slave trade. The Age of Reason saw conflict between Protestantism and Catholicism transformed into one between faith and logic -- a debate that continues in the twenty-first century.
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The below data was compiled from various identification fields in the bibliographic record of this title. This data is provided as an additional tool in helping to insure edition identification:
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British Library

T124022

The Shorter catechism of the Westminster Assembly of Divines.

London : printed in the year, 1718. 43,[1]p. ; 8° ... Read more

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The decoration of church vestments, which are the ceremonial garments worn by the clergy at the celebration of the Mass, has always been a matter of high fashion. In the first place the crafts of silk weaving and embroidery, which provide the technical means for the decoration of these garments, have held a prominent place in the changing fashions in the arts since the early Middle Ages, and since that time have been used in the service of the church as well as for secular purposes. Secondly in a narrower sense of the term, both these crafts have been at the heart of fashionable dress through the centuries. Many silks intended for this market have also been used by the vestment maker, with the result that the vestments have remained in the forefront of each successive trend. This therefore is a book about the changing aspects of art history; its aim is to show something of the origins and use of the vestments themselves, but principally to trace the development of their decoration in the context of the arts of any one period. High Fashion in the Church is richly illustrated, as its subject matter rightly demands. It also contains an index, glossary and bibliography. ... Read more