Durkheim: The Theory of Religion

1. To find what religion essentially is, study its simplest form. In a complex religion the essential elements are overlaid; in the simplest they are visible. He took Australian totemism as the simplest available, on the ethnographic understanding of his time.
2. In totemism the sacred object is the totem, an emblem, usually a plant or animal, representing the clan and borne on its ritual objects. What is treated as most sacred is not the animal itself but the emblem, the design, which is a striking fact and the hinge of the argument.
3. The totem is at once the emblem of the god and the emblem of the clan. If the same object represents both, then the god and the clan are the same thing.
4. The believer's experience is genuine and its object is misidentified. People do experience a force outside themselves, greater than themselves, which supports them and constrains them, and which outlives them. That description is exactly true of society, which is external to each member, sustains them, imposes obligations, and endures. The believer feels the force accurately and names it a god.
5. The mechanism is the assembly. Durkheim's account of collective effervescence is the empirical part: when a group assembles for ritual, the shared emotion generated among people acting in unison is qualitatively different from anything felt alone, and it is that experience which persuades participants of the reality of a power beyond them. The emblem present at the assembly then carries the feeling afterwards.

The functions of religion, in his account

They follow from the argument rather than being an addition to it.

Disciplinary, imposing restraint through prohibition and preparing people for social life. Cohesive, assembling members and renewing their attachment to the group. Revitalising, transmitting the tradition and reawakening it in each generation. Euphoric, sustaining people in loss and disappointment, especially in the rites surrounding death.

And the sociological conclusion: because what is worshipped is society, religion cannot simply disappear. A society will always generate occasions of assembly, shared emotion and collective sentiment, so the form may change while the function persists. Durkheim thought a modern society would find secular equivalents, and the standing examples offered are national ceremonies, sporting occasions and public mourning.

The criticisms

All of these must be given; the theory is important and is not accepted as it stands.

1. The ethnography was second-hand and is disputed. Durkheim never observed an Australian society and relied on the reports of others, some of which have not survived scrutiny.
2. Australian totemism may not be the simplest or the earliest religion, and the assumption that any surviving society represents an earlier stage of development is the evolutionary error described in [The Evolutionary Perspective].
3. Totemism is not universal, so a theory of religion built on it generalises from a special case.
4. It explains solidarity better than belief. Why people believe what they specifically believe, and why they hold it true rather than merely useful, is not addressed.
5. It is reductionist. Believers do not recognise the description, and telling them that the object of their worship is their own society is not an account they could accept, which is a problem for a method that elsewhere insists on understanding practices as participants understand them.
6. It cannot easily explain religious conflict and religious change, since a theory built on cohesion has little to say about religion dividing societies, which is [Religion: Definition, Characteristics and Functions] on dysfunctions.
7. The direction of causation is asserted rather than shown. That the ritual generates the sentiment is plausible and was not demonstrated.

Its importance, notwithstanding

It made religion a sociological subject. Before it, religion was studied as belief, as history or as error; after it, as a social institution with observable functions.

It supplied the sacred and profane distinction, which is used by writers who reject everything else in the theory.

It located the mechanism in ritual, which turned an untestable claim about origins into a claim about assemblies that can be observed.

It generalises beyond religion. Any object treated as sacred by a group, a flag, a constitution, a court, generates the same reactions, which is why an insult to a symbol produces a response out of all proportion to any material harm. For a law student this is the most useful part of the theory, and it explains both the ritual of legal proceedings, noticed in [Symbolic Interactionism], and the offences relating to religious feelings and to national symbols.

A worked example

Take a district courtroom. It has a raised bench, forms of address that are used nowhere else, robes, an order of precedence, rising when the judge enters, and a prohibition on ordinary behaviour within it.

Apply the sacred and profane distinction. The courtroom is set apart: it is not used for anything else, ordinary conduct is forbidden in it, and objects associated with it are treated with a respect their materials do not warrant.

Apply the argument. What is being treated as sacred is not the room or the furniture. It is the authority of the court, which is a collective thing: it exists because a community accepts it, it is external to every individual including the judge, it constrains everyone present, and it outlives them all. The awe is real, its object is social, and the ritual is what renews it.

And apply the mechanism. Remove the robes, the rising and the forms of address and authority does not vanish, but it thins, which is why every legal system that has tried to simplify its ritual has found that something was being done by it. Durkheim's claim is testable here in a way it is not among the Arunta, and that is the most useful thing this chapter can give a law student.

Quick revision

1. The Elementary Forms of Religious Life, 1912. Durkheim 1858 to 1917.
2. Definition: a unified system of beliefs and practices relative to sacred things, set apart and forbidden, uniting adherents into one single moral community.
3. Sacred and profane: nothing is sacred by nature; the division itself is what constitutes religion, which is why the definition covers religions without gods.
4. The argument: study the simplest form; the totem is the emblem of the clan; the same emblem stands for god and clan; the force believers experience is real and is society; the mechanism is the assembly and collective effervescence.
5. Functions: disciplinary, cohesive, revitalising, euphoric. Because the object is society, the form may change while the function persists.
6. Criticisms: second-hand and disputed ethnography; totemism is neither simplest nor universal; explains solidarity not belief; reductionist and unrecognisable to believers; weak on conflict and change; causation asserted rather than shown.
7. It generalises: any object a group treats as sacred produces the same reactions, which explains legal ritual and the offences protecting symbols.

Test yourself

1. Give Durkheim's definition of religion and explain the sacred and profane distinction. A unified system of beliefs and practices relative to sacred things, that is things set apart and forbidden, which unite into one single moral community all those who adhere to them. The sacred and profane distinction is his central move: religion does not consist in belief in gods or the supernatural, since some religions have neither, but in dividing the world into the sacred, treated with awe and surrounded by prohibitions, and the profane, which is the ordinary and everyday. Anything can be sacred and nothing is sacred by its nature.

2. Set out his argument that society is the object of religious worship. That the essential elements of religion are clearest in its simplest form, which he took to be Australian totemism; that in totemism the sacred object is the totem, the emblem of the clan; that the same emblem stands for the god and for the clan, so the two must be the same thing; that believers genuinely experience a force external to them, greater than them, which sustains and constrains them and outlives them, and that this description is exactly true of society; and that the mechanism is the assembly, where collective effervescence produces an emotion unlike anything felt alone, which the emblem then carries away.

3. What is collective effervescence? The heightened, shared emotional state generated when a group assembles and acts in unison in ritual, which is qualitatively different from anything the individual experiences alone. Durkheim treated it as the empirical mechanism of his theory: it is that experience which persuades participants of the reality of a power greater than themselves, and the emblem present during the assembly afterwards carries and revives the feeling.

4. Give four criticisms of the theory. That the ethnography was second-hand and parts of it have not survived later scrutiny, Durkheim never having observed an Australian society; that totemism is neither demonstrably the earliest form of religion nor universal, so the argument generalises from a special case and rests on the evolutionary assumption that a surviving society represents an earlier stage; that it explains solidarity but not belief, saying nothing about why people hold their particular beliefs to be true; and that it is reductionist, since believers could not recognise the description of their worship as directed at their own society.

5. Why is the theory useful to a law student even if its account of religion is rejected? Because its central mechanism generalises to anything a group treats as sacred. A courtroom is set apart, ordinary conduct within it is forbidden, and its objects and forms are treated with a respect their materials do not warrant; what is held sacred is the collective authority of the court, which exists because the community accepts it, constrains everyone present and outlives them all. It explains why legal ritual is not decoration but a means of renewing authority, and why insults to symbols produce reactions out of proportion to any material harm.