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Creating Religion(s) by Historiography

Creating Religion(s) by Historiography To narrate one’s past is one of the most important tools to define one’s identity. This holds true for individuals in genealogies or conversion narratives as well as for groups and nations, bolstering their coherence and claims by national histories. Religious groups use similar tools, as recent research has stressed.1Otto, Rau, Rüpke 2015. Given the lack or rudimentary state of religious organization, the lack of membership concepts, the contested character of orthodoxy and heresy, phenomena of ‘civil religion’ or widely shared practices and beliefs in many regions and epochs, the definition of the subject of a history is of paramount importance. A history of religion of the people living in the Netherlands is different from a history of Christianity in the Netherlands and much more so from the history of the religious groups based on the confession of Dordrecht (1632, Mennonites); a history of Christendom is different from a history of religion in the West – and much more so from a history of the one and holy Church. It is by the very narrating of origins, conflicts, exclusions and alliances that the identity of the narratives’ subjects, their characteristics and boundaries are defined. This is as crucial in http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Archiv für Religionsgeschichte de Gruyter

Creating Religion(s) by Historiography

Archiv für Religionsgeschichte , Volume 20 (1): 4 – Mar 28, 2018

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Publisher
de Gruyter
Copyright
© 2018 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
ISSN
1868-8888
eISSN
1868-8888
DOI
10.1515/arege-2018-0001
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

To narrate one’s past is one of the most important tools to define one’s identity. This holds true for individuals in genealogies or conversion narratives as well as for groups and nations, bolstering their coherence and claims by national histories. Religious groups use similar tools, as recent research has stressed.1Otto, Rau, Rüpke 2015. Given the lack or rudimentary state of religious organization, the lack of membership concepts, the contested character of orthodoxy and heresy, phenomena of ‘civil religion’ or widely shared practices and beliefs in many regions and epochs, the definition of the subject of a history is of paramount importance. A history of religion of the people living in the Netherlands is different from a history of Christianity in the Netherlands and much more so from the history of the religious groups based on the confession of Dordrecht (1632, Mennonites); a history of Christendom is different from a history of religion in the West – and much more so from a history of the one and holy Church. It is by the very narrating of origins, conflicts, exclusions and alliances that the identity of the narratives’ subjects, their characteristics and boundaries are defined. This is as crucial in

Journal

Archiv für Religionsgeschichtede Gruyter

Published: Mar 28, 2018

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