For John Dewey "Religion is a collective term and the collection it stands for is not even of the kind illustrated in textbooks of logic."[1] By this Dewey means that religions do not, logically speaking, have one characteristic by which the word "religion" can be defined. He would have appreciated Wittgenstein's terminology of "family resemblances" to have made this point.
The religious experience, however, still could be rescued from experiencing the same fate if it could be emancipated "from dependence upon specific types of beliefs and practices, from those elements that constitute a religion."[2] Part of those elements is the idea of the supernatural, "the idea of invisible powers."[3] Instead, by stressing the religious experience, "the conditions of nature and human association that support and deepen the sense of values which carry one through periods of darkness and despair, comes to the fore."[4]
The view thus described by Dewey is essentially that described by Berger as "some sort of psychotherapy."[5] In Dewey's view "The idea of a whole, whether of the whole personal being or of the world, is an imaginative, not a literal, idea."[6] So with Dewey, the individual's conception of himself and his world would be best not taken literally. The concern then, is primarily one of feeling fine despite the fact that warranted assertions can't always be trusted. But, this is not to say that there is no consistency upon which we can find religious support for our religious experience. "Religionists have been right in thinking of )the religious 'harmonizing of the self') as an influx from sources beyond conscious deliberation and purpose."[7] Still, what gives us that consistency, or our perspective, should not be understood as religion but the religious.[8] One possibility is the word "God."
On one score the word can mean only a particular Being.
On the other score, it denotes the unity of all ideal ends
arousing us to desire and actions.[9]
Yet this possibility still exists only as an object in the collective consciousness in the imagination of the individual. The word "God" would then mean:
The ideal ends that at a given time and place one acknowledges
as having authority over his volition and emotion, the values to which
one is supremely devoted, as far as these ends, through
imagination, take on unity.[10]
Dewey uses the word "imagination" in an imaginative sense because the imagination is much more powerful in his view than usual. In fact, for Dewey:
...the reality of ideal ends as ideals is vouched for by their undeniable
power in action. An ideal is not an illusion because imagination is
the organ through which it is apprehended. For all
possibilities reach us though the imagination.[11]
As a result "Aims, ideals, do not exist simply in a mind, they exist in character, in personality and action."[12] In other words:
The aims and ideals that move us are generated through imagination. But
they are not made out of imaginary stuff. They are made out of the
hard stuff of the world of physical and social experience.[13]
Dewey moves back and forth, now stressing the need to emancipate our religious conceptions from religions, now stressing the factors on which our religious conceptions should be considered dependent. The central problem here is Dewey's acceptance of the world as a social phenomena, that is as Geist. It is, once again, the problem with the concept of Geist in that the relationship between the collective and the individual is problematic. The collective presents the consistency, while the individual introduces the change. This problematic relationship is central to Dewey's concern with the consistency of knowledge. Organic structures are put forth by the collective. Each warranted assertion is only secure as long as it doesn't become problematic for an individual or group of individuals. This problematic relationship is central to Dewey's concern with the foundation of the religious. The concept of "God," separated from its connotation of a particular Being, stands as that unity through which our ideals and values act on the individual. But Dewey refuses to associate this concept with any particular religion's definition of God because he believes the ideals and values "God" represents should be free to change.
John Dewey's A Common Faith is an exposition in tune with the movement towards the secularization of religion. This movement is the primary concern of Peter Berger in The Sacred Canopy. By "secularization" Berger means "the process by which sectors of society and culture are removed from the domination of religious institutions and symbols."[14] The sociological perspective is itself considered part of this movement by Berger.
Berger sees the movement towards secularization as having tremendous impact on man and society. For the "man in the street" it results in a "'crisis of credibility' in religion."[15] For society it means the change of social structure in religious institutions to one of a marketing bureaucracy. It also means that "the 'supernatural' elements are de-emphasized or pushed into the background, while the institution is 'sold' under the label of values congenial to secularized consciousness."[16] Added to this is the pluralism, or denominationalism which has the effect "that religion can no longer be imposed but must be marketed."[17] This makes religions "susceptible to 'fashion' which makes it increasingly difficult to maintain them as unchangeable verities."[18]
In Berger's opinion this has serious consequences for religion as world-maintenance. Religion is important because an individual's socialization is never complete. That is, an individual Geist is not completely one with collective Geist. Since the individual is not one with the collective the social world is innately precarious. Collective Geist, or the socially constructed reality could "collapse into anomy."[19] To prevent this the socially constructed reality, or nomos, is projected as the nature of the universe. When this occurs, we have religion. "Religion is the human enterprise by which a sacred cosmos is established."[20] Religion, then, presents "legitimations" to maintain this socially constructed reality. It does so through the repetition of "legitimating formulas," that are "especially important on those occasions of collective or individual crisis when the danger of "forgetting" is most acute."[21] In order to be successful, however, a religion must be considered credible by the individuals. It is this credibility that is lost through the process of secularization.
Berger is particularly insightful in describing the movement towards secularization. He also points to many of the possible causes of this movement. But he does not recognize the fundamental change in perspective that is most obvious. That is, the adoption of Geist as the "thing-in-itself." He describes reality as socially constructed but makes no attempt to contrast this description of reality with the pre-Hegelian views. This change in perspective from the conception of reality as an objective material world, or a dual material - spiritual world, to the conception of reality as Geist, or as socially constructed, brings with it the feeling of incredulity. The correspondence theory of truth presents a model of consistency in the empirical world. The coherence theory of truth presents a model of consistency in the spiritual world. But with reality as socially constructed, or as Geist, both the correspondence and coherence theories are brought together. The result being confusion. Men make reality consistent but they also make reality inconsistent.
If collective Geist is stressed as the strongest side of the relationship, reality will be considered stable. If individual Geist is stressed as the strongest side of the relationship, reality will be considered unstable. The key to seeing which side of the relationship is stressed by any given thinker is how they handle the concept of God. The concept of God is the central concept for collective Geist. The greater the emphasis on the concept of God, the greater will be the stress on collective Geist.
Both Dewey and Berger are concerned with the concept of God, but neither emphasize it to the extent that Hegel does. With Hegel, God is not only existent as collective Geist but also as individual Geist.
Dewey claims God exists not as a particular Being, that is an individual Geist, but only as "the unity of all ideal ends arousing us to desire and actions."[22] Berger claims God exists, but along with Dewey, only as collective Geist.
...men produce their gods even while they apprehend themselves
as "totally dependent" upon these their products. But, by the
same token, the "other world" of the gods takes on a certain
autonomy vis-à-vis the human activity that ongoingly produces it.[23]
Using the concept of God as a measurement we can see why Dewey and Berger have more difficulty with consistency than Hegel does. But it remains that Hegel does not consider the relationships between collective Geist and individual Geist as problematic; Dewey and Berger do. Still Hegel may be right in thinking anything less than accepting God as an individual Geist leads to the cruel words, "God is dead."
[1] John Dewey. A Common Faith (New Haven, 1934) pp. 7 - 8
[2] Ibid. p. 14
[3] Ibid.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Berger. The Sacred Canopy p. 167
[6] John Dewey. A Common Faith p. 18
[7] Ibid. p. 19
[8] Ibid. p. 24
[9] Ibid. p. 42
[10] Ibid.
[11] Ibid. p. 43
[12] Ibid. p. 48
[13] Ibid. p. 49
[14] Berger. The Sacred Canopy p. 107
[15] Ibid. p. 127
[16] Ibid. p. 146
[17] Ibid. p. 145
[18] Ibid. p. 151
[19] Ibid. p. 23
[20] Ibid. p. 25
[21] Ibid. p. 31
[22] John Dewey. A Common Faith p. 42
[23] Berger. The Sacred Canopy p. 96