Religious Responses Flashcards
The expression of the divine in human form-king, child, goddess; a mythic image of a mysterious power that helps people relate to abstract Being through earthly images.
Anthropomorphism
Carl Jung’s theory of a symbolic element of the collective unconscious-such as the hero, shadow evil, lover, or god-discovered in dreams and myths, whose stories shape the psyche and religions.
Archetypal image
The absolute, the depth, the foundation of existence glimpsed in experience, paradox, and images, not just in cognition; symbolized in many ways - gods, nature, stars, compassion.
Being, the ground of Being
The dynamic, heroic personality type set apart with superhuman qualities, positive or negative.
Charisma
Confession of faith that identifies a religious group.
Creed
The teachings of the Buddha.
Dharma
A statement of beliefs considered authoritative or absolute.
Dogma
The study of methodologies of interpretation; originally of religious scriptures, now of any principle of interpretation, such as literalism.
Hermeneutics
The study of the historical dimension of religion - texts and timelines, for example - sometimes reducing it to sociocultural events.
History of religion
A visual design, usually circular, symbolizing the divine.
Mandala
Belief in one supreme god only, in contrast with polytheism.
Monotheism
Symbolic narrative or a literary or religious event. In religious studies, not considered inherently untrue, but can reveal the depths of Being.
Myth
From the Latin numen, the spiritual experience of awesome mystery.
Numinous
The study of religious manifestations of Being that explore the general themes of spirituality, such as myth, ritual, initiation, compassion.
Phenomenology
Belief in many gods, in contrast with monotheism.
Polytheism
A wide-ranging critical approach to modern belief in the metaphysics of objective truth, technological progress, religious traditions, science, patriarchy, deconstructing cultural meta-narratives as social constructs, not rooted in absolute truth.
Postmodernism
Opposite of sacred, literally “outside the temple,” whatever is considered as impure or rejected by a group’s sense of what is sacred.
Profane
Theoretical concept of psychology; the externalization of unconscious material into the world, as in falling in love at first sight, or hating someone or something not really known. God in religious critique.
Projection
The study of the role in psychology in religion, sometimes reducing it to a byproduct of psychology.
Psychology of religion
A method of explaining one domain as a product of a lower domain, such as saying the Gods are projections of the psyche, as Sigmund Freud did. Basic to science, also applied to culture.
Reduction
Symbolic actions, individual or group, crude or refined, such as a fight, a funeral, wedding, meditation, or worship.
Ritual
Opposite of profane, the realm of ultimate reality, appearance of the infinite, Being.
Sacred
The study of the role of religion in society, sometimes reducing it to a byproduct of society.
Sociology of religion
Rising above common thought; exalted, mystical, ultimate.
Transcendent
