The phenomenological method revisited: towards comparative studies and non-theological interpretations of the religious experience
In recent last decades, two major and interrelated themes have dominated the study of religion: (a) the theme claiming that the long taken-for-granted so-called “secularization” thesis was all wrong, and (b) the theme of the so-called “return” or “resurgence of religion”. This global revival of religion has been chronicled lately in a number of important books, referred to in this paper. Nowadays, comparative religion can, very broadly, be conducted using two types of data: texts or living human beings. In this paper I will argue that the best way to conduct comparative studies of lived religion is the method of a Husserlian based phenomenology of religion in the sense of a “de-theologized” interpretative approach to religious consciousness and experience, which make no claims concerning the sui generis or the essential nature of religion.
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