B) Using material from item A and elsewhere, briefly examine the extent to which religion can still be said to be functional for individuals and society (12)
As mentioned above, the functionalist perspective examined the religion in terms of society’s needs, though Durkheim argued that all societies divide the world into two categories - the sacred and the profane. Religion is based upon this division. It is a ‘unified system of beliefs and practices related to sacred things, that is to say things set apart and forbidden’.
‘By sacred things once must not understand simple those personals things which are called gods or spirits; a rock, a tree, a spring, a pebble, a piece of wood, a house, in a word anything can be sacred’ (Durkheim, 1961)
There is nothing about the particular qualities of a pebble or a tree that makes them sacred. Therefore sacred things must be symbols, they must represent something. To understand the role of religion in society, the relationship between sacred symbols and what they represents must be established.
Durkheim used the religion of various groups of Australian aboriginals to develop his argument.
Aboriginal society is divided into several clans. The clans have a rule of ‘exogamy’ – that is, members are not allowed to marry within the clan. Each clan has a totem, usually an animal or plant. This totem is represented by drawings made on wood or stone. The totem is a symbol. It is the emblem of the clan, ‘It is its flag; it is the sign by which each clan distinguishes itself from all others’. However, the totem is the most sacred object in aborigine ritual. The totem is ‘The outward and visible form of the totemic principle or god’.
Durkheim argues that is the totem ‘Is at once the symbol of god and of the society, is that not because the god and society are only one?’ Thus he suggested that in worshipping god, people are in fact worshipping society.
In worshipping society, sacred things are considered superior in dignity and power to profane things and particularly to man. In relation to the sacred, humans are inferior and dependent. This relationship between humanity and sacred things is exactly the relationship between humanity and society. Society is more important powerful than the individual. In his evaluation, Durkheim argued, it is easier for a person to ‘visualise and direct his feelings of awe toward a symbol than towards so complex a thing as a clan.
Durkheim further emphasized the importance of collective worship. The social group comes together in religious rituals full of drama and reverence. Together, its members express their faith in common values and beliefs. In this atmosphere of collective worship, the integration of society is strengthened. Members of society express, communicate, and understand the moral bonds which unite them.
Like Durkheim, Malinowski sees religion as reinforcing social norms and values and promoting social solidarity. Unlike Durkheim, however, he does not see religion as reflecting society as whole, nor does he see religious ritual as the worship itself. Malinowski identifies specific areas of social life with which religion is concerned, and to which it is addressed. These are situations of emotional stress that threaten social solidarity. Situations that produce these emotions include crises of life such as birth, puberty, marriage, and death. Malinowski notes that in all societies these life crises are surrounded with religious rituals.
Religion deals with the problem of death in the following manner. A funeral ceremony expresses the belief in immortality, which denies the fact of death, and so comforts the bereaved. Death is socially destructive since it removes a member from society. At a funeral company the social group unites to support the bereaved. This express of social solidarity reintegrates society.
As part of the cultural system, religious beliefs give meaning to life; they answer, in Parson’s words, ‘man’s questions about himself and the world he lives’. He argues that one of the major functions or religion is to ‘make sense’ of all experiences, no matter how meaningless or contradictory they appear.
A good example of this is the question of suffering: “Why must men endure deprivation and pain and so unequally and haphazardly, if indeed at all?” Religion provides a range of answers – suffering punishment for sins, and suffering with fortitude will bring its reward in Heaven. Suffering thus becomes meaningful.
Similarly, the problem of evil is common to all societies. It is particularly disconcerting when people profit through ‘evil actions’. Religion solves this contradiction by stating that evil will receive its deserts in afterlife.
To Marx, ‘religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the sentiment of a heartless world and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people’. Religion acts as an opiate to dull the pain produced by oppression. It is both ‘an expression of real suffering and a protest against suffering’, but it does little to solve the problem because it helps to make life more bearable and therefore dilutes demands for change.
From a Marxist perspective, religion can dull the pain of oppression in a number of ways:
It promised a paradise of eternal bliss in life after death. Engels argued that the appeal of Christianity to oppressed classes lies in its promise of ‘salvation from bondage and misery’ in the afterlife. The Christian vision of heaven can make life more bearable by giving people something to look forward to.
Some religions make a virtue of a suffering produced by oppression. In particular, those who bear deprivations of poverty with dignity and humility will be rewarded for their virtue. Religion thus makes poverty more tolerable by offering a reward for suffering and promising compensation for injustice in the afterlife.
Religion can offer the hope of supernatural intervention to solve problems on earth. Members of religious groups such as the Jehovah’s Witnesses live in anticipation of the day when the supernatural powers will descent from on high and create heaven on earth. Anticipation of this future can make the present more acceptable.
Religion often justifies the social order and a person’s position within it. God can be seen as creating and ordaining the social structure, evident in the hymn ‘All things bright and beautiful’. Religion not only cushions the effects of oppression but acts as a mechanism of social control, maintaining the existing system of exploitation and re reinforcing class relationships. Put simply, it keeps people in their place. By making unsatisfactory lives bearable, religion tends to discourage people from attempting to change their situation. By offering an illusion of hope in a hopeless situation, it prevents thoughts of overthrowing the system. By providing explanations and justifications for social situations, religion distorts reality. It helps produce a false class consciousness.
Sanjay Mistry Religion 09/02
