Just doing a bit of reading on Emile Durkheim’s sociological views on religion. He is yet another of these people whose work was done almost a hundred years ago, but who is still studied extensively today. I just don’t get it. This doesn’t seem to happen as much in other fields of scholarship. Everything is much more current.

Anyway, Durkheim’s ideas seems to have centered around the notion that religion is not divine, but social. That religion is basically a projected form of the power and importance of society, and that it’s primary function is to foment social cohesion. I agree with this, but only in part.

Recognizing the social origin of religion, Durkheim argued that religion acted as a source of solidarity and identification for the individuals within a society, especially as a part of mechanical solidarity systems, and to a lesser, but still important extent in the context of organic solidarity. Religion provided a meaning for life, it provided authority figures, and most importantly for Durkheim, it reinforced the morals and social norms held collectively by all within a society. Far from dismissing religion as mere fantasy, despite its natural origin, Durkheim saw it as a critical part of the social system. Religion provides social control, cohesion, and purpose for people, as well as another means of communication and gathering for individuals to interact and reaffirm social norms.

And here’s another one from somewhere else:

Religion, he argued, is not only a social creation, but it is in fact society divinized. In a manner reminiscent of Feuerbach, Durkheim stated that the deities which men worship together are only projections of the power of society. Religion is eminently social: it occurs in a social context, and, more importantly, when men celebrate sacred things, they unwittingly celebrate the power of their society. This power so transcends their own existence that they have to give it sacred significance in order to visualize it.

If religion in its essence is a transcendental representation of the powers of society, then, Durkheim argued, the disappearance of traditional religion need not herald the dissolution of society. All that is required is for modern men now to realize directly that dependence on society which before they had recognized only through the medium of religious representations.

Anyway, I think there are some important points here, but I essentially disagree with this sort of complete reductionist view of religion - that it’s “only” a social phenomenon. It is certainly that, but why can’t it be more?