It is doubtful that one could encounter a more impressive work of
scholarship and insight in the field of primitive religion than the
present work. An excellent translation of a work composed by a
foremost authority in the field of comparative religion, who is a
member of the Orthodox Church, this volume aims to acquaint the
reader with "the labyrinthine complexity of religious data, their
basic patterns and the variety of cultures they reflect". In
preparation for another work dealing with further developments,
this book restricts itself to a study of hierophanics at different
cosmic levels (sky, water, earth, stones), biological hierophanics,
local hierophanics and myths and symbols. They are not studied in
any isolated fashion, however, nor is there any trace of positivism
or rationalism implicit in the author's treatment. He insists that
religious phenomena must be studied primarily on their own plane of
reality and not reductively in terms of economics or psychoanalysis
if the study is to be truly scientific. The presentation is a model
of scholarship, clarity and order. Bibliographies are appended to
each chapter and Indices at the end. The information contained in
the book about sky gods, sun worship, water symbolism, fertility
rites, sacred places and the like is in itself a reason for reading
the book. More important, however, is the brilliant insight into
the nature of religious phenomena afforded by the author's
approach. All serious students of religion would derive enormous
profit from the reading of this work. (Kirkus Reviews)
In this era of increased knowledge the essence of religious
phenomena eludes the psychologists, sociologists, linguists, and
other specialists because they do not study it as religious.
According to Mircea Eliade, they miss the one irreducible element
in religious phenomena—the element of the sacred. Eliade
abundantly demonstrates universal religious experience and shows
how humanity’s effort to live within a sacred sphere has
manifested itself in myriad cultures from ancient to modern times;
how certain beliefs, rituals, symbols, and myths have, with
interesting variations, persisted.
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