Editing Émile Durkheim (section)

===Religion===
In ''[[The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life]]'' (1912), Durkheim's first purpose was to identify the social origin and function of religion as he felt that religion was a source of camaraderie and solidarity.<ref name="Calhoun2002-10632" /> His second purpose was to identify links between certain religions in different cultures, finding a common denominator. He wanted to understand the empirical, social aspect of religion that is common to all religions and goes beyond the concepts of [[spirituality]] and [[God]].<ref name="Allan_1152">{{harvp|Allan|2005|pp=112-15}}</ref>

Durkheim defined ''religion'' as:<ref>Durkheim, Emile. 1964 [1915]. ''[http://www.gutenberg.org/files/41360/41360-h/41360-h.htm#Page_427 The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life]'', translated by J. W. Swain. London: [[George Allen & Unwin]]. – via [[Project Gutenberg]] (2012). [http://www.gutenberg.org/files/41360/41360-h/41360-h.htm#Page_47 p. 47].</ref> <blockquote>"a unified system of beliefs and practices relative to sacred things, i.e., things set apart and forbidden—beliefs and practices which unite in one single [[moral community]] called a [[Church body|Church]], all those who adhere to them."</blockquote>In this definition, Durkheim avoids references to [[supernatural]] or God.<ref name="Allan_115">{{harvp|Allan|2005|p=115}}</ref> Durkheim rejected earlier definitions by Tylor that religion was "belief in supernatural beings," finding that primitive societies such as the Australian aborigines (following the ethnologies of Spencer and Gillen, largely discredited later) did not divide reality into "natural" vs. "supernatural" realms, but rather into realms of the "sacred" and the "profane," which were not moral categories, since both could include what was good or evil.<ref>{{harvp|Pals|2006|pp=95-100, 112, 113}}</ref> Durkheim argues we are left with the following three concepts:<ref>{{harvp|Allan|2005|pp=116, 118, 120, 137}}</ref>

* The [[sacred]]: ideas and sentiments kindled by the spectacle of society and which inspire awe, spiritual devotion or respect;
* The [[belief]]s & [[ritual|practices]]: creating an emotional state of ''[[collective effervescence]]'', investing symbols with sacred importance;
* The [[moral community]]: a group of people sharing a common moral philosophy.

Out of those three concepts, Durkheim focused on the sacred,<ref name="Allan_116">{{harvp|Allan|2005|p=116}}</ref><ref>{{harvp|Lukes|1985|p=25}}</ref> noting that it is at the very core of a religion:<ref name=":2">Durkheim, Emile. 1964 [1915]. ''[https://www.gutenberg.org/files/41360/41360-h/41360-h.htm The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life]'', translated by J. W. Swain. London: [[George Allen & Unwin]]. – via [[Project Gutenberg]] (2012).</ref>{{Rp|322}}<blockquote>They are only collective forces [[Hypostasis (philosophy and religion)|hypostasized]], that is to say, moral forces; they are made up of the ideas and sentiments awakened in us by the spectacle of society, and not of sensations coming from the physical world.<ref group="lower-roman">Durkheim 1915, [https://www.gutenberg.org/files/41360/41360-h/41360-h.htm#Page_322 p. 322]: "They are not homogeneous with the visible things among which we place them. They may well take from these things the outward and material forms in which they are represented, but they owe none of their efficacy to them. They are not united by external bonds to the different supports upon which they alight; they have no roots there; according to an expression we have already used and which serves best for characterizing them, ''they are added to them''. So there are no objects which are predestined to receive them, to the exclusion of all others; even the most insignificant and vulgar may do so; accidental circumstances decide which are the chosen ones."</ref></blockquote>Durkheim saw religion as the most fundamental [[social institution]] of humankind, and one that gave rise to other social forms.<ref>{{harvp|Allan|2005|pp=112-13}}</ref> It was religion that gave humanity the strongest sense of [[collective consciousness]].<ref name="Allan_114">{{harvp|Allan|2005|p=114}}</ref> Durkheim saw religion as a force that emerged in the early [[hunter-gatherer]] societies, as the emotions collective effervescence run high in the growing groups, forcing them to act in a new ways, and giving them a sense of some hidden force driving them.<ref name="Allan_137" /> Over time, as emotions became symbolized and interactions ritualized, religion became more organized, giving a rise to the division between the sacred and the profane.<ref name="Allan_137" /> However, Durkheim also believed that [[religion]] was becoming less important, as it was being gradually superseded by [[science]] and the cult of an individual.<ref name="Allan_132-133" /><ref name="Allan_112">{{harvp|Allan|2005|p=112}}</ref><blockquote>Thus there is something eternal in religion which is destined to survive all the particular symbols in which religious thought has successively enveloped itself.<ref name=":2" />{{Rp|427}}</blockquote>However, even if the religion was losing its importance for Durkheim, it still laid the foundation of modern society and the interactions that governed it.<ref name="Allan_114" /> And despite the advent of alternative forces, Durkheim argued that no replacement for the force of religion had yet been created. He expressed his doubt about modernity, seeing the modern times as "a period of transition and moral mediocrity."<ref name="Allan_134" />

Durkheim also argued that our primary categories for understanding the world have their origins in religion.<ref name="Allan_113"/> It is religion, Durkheim writes, that gave rise to most if not all other social constructs, including the larger society.<ref name="Allan_114"/> Durkheim argued that categories are produced by the society, and thus are collective creations.<ref name="Calhoun2002-10632" /> Thus as people create societies, they also create categories, but at the same time, they do so unconsciously, and the categories are prior to any individual's experience.<ref name="Calhoun2002-10632" /> In this way Durkheim attempted to bridge the divide between seeing [[category of being|categories]] as constructed out of human experience and as logically prior to that experience.<ref name="Calhoun2002-10632" /><ref>{{harvp|McKinnon|2014}}</ref> Our understanding of the world is shaped by [[social fact]]s; for example the notion of [[time]] is defined by being measured through a [[calendar]], which in turn was created to allow us to keep track of our social gatherings and rituals; those in turn on their most basic level originated from religion.<ref name="Allan_114"/> In the end, even the most logical and rational pursuit of science can trace its origins to religion.<ref name="Allan_114"/> Durkheim states that, "Religion gave birth to all that is essential in the society."<ref name="Allan_114"/>

In his work, Durkheim focused on ''[[totem]]ism'', the religion of the [[Aboriginal Australians]] and [[Indigenous peoples of the Americas|Native American]]s. Durkheim saw this religion as the most ancient religion, and focused on it as he believed its simplicity would ease the discussion of the essential elements of religion.<ref name="Calhoun2002-10632" /><ref name="Allan_115"/> As such, he wrote:<ref name=":2" />{{Rp|220}}<blockquote>Now the totem is the flag of the clan. It is therefore natural that the impressions aroused by the clan in individual minds—impressions of dependence and of increased vitality—should fix themselves to the idea of the totem rather than that of the clan: for the clan is too complex a reality to be represented clearly in all its complex unity by such rudimentary intelligences.</blockquote>Durkheim's work on religion was criticized on both empirical and theoretical grounds by specialists in the field. The most important critique came from Durkheim's contemporary, [[Arnold van Gennep]], an expert on religion and ritual, and also on Australian belief systems. Van Gennep argued that Durkheim's views of primitive peoples and simple societies were "entirely erroneous". Van Gennep further argued that Durkheim demonstrated a lack of critical stance towards his sources, collected by traders and priests, naively accepting their veracity, and that Durkheim interpreted freely from dubious data. At the conceptual level, van Gennep pointed out Durkheim's tendency to press ethnography into a prefabricated theoretical scheme.<ref>{{harvp|Thomassen|2012}}</ref>

Despite such critiques, Durkheim's work on religion has been widely praised for its theoretical insight and whose arguments and propositions, according to Robert Alun Jones, "have stimulated the interest and excitement of several generations of sociologists irrespective of theoretical 'school' or field of specialization."<ref>Jones, Robert Alun. 1986. "[http://durkheim.uchicago.edu/Summaries/forms.html The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life (1912)]." Pp. 115–55 in ''Emile Durkheim: An Introduction to Four Major Works''. Beverly Hills, CA: [[SAGE Publishing|SAGE Publications]]. – via ''The Durkheim Pages'', [[University of Chicago]].  [http://durkheim.uchicago.edu/Summaries/forms.html#pgfId=5658 s. 7 "Critical Remarks"].</ref>