AUGUSTE COMTE’S THEORY AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR RELIGION
TAMUNOIBI ROGERS MILLER (2016)
revtr.miller@yahoo.com; revrandymiller66@gmail.com
INTRODUCTION
Religion is one word that does not have one generally accepted definition. It is defined differently from the perspective of the different disciplines. Considering it from the sociological point of view, religion con be considered from the substantive or functional approach. The substantive identifies and describes the essence or substance of religion, what the core of religion is. It can also be considered from the functional view, which considers what religion does to for people. Religion can still be considered as a group phenomenon from the Latin word ‘religare’. The characteristics of the group involve certain pattern of communication, common goal, shared norms roles to fulfil and with established status system. Beside the group phenomenon, religion involves a body of beliefs, set of practices moral prescription as well as involving the sacred (Johnson, 2011:9-12). Religion in the light of what has been said can be defined as the allegiance to the Supernatural with the participation of the prescribed norms.
Theories of religion no less than definitions can also be either substantive or functional in character. Theorist who advocate substantive dimension tend to explain religion intellectually in terms of the ideas that guide and inspire people. Those of the functional view attempt to look beyond or behind the conscious thoughts of religious people to find something deeper and hidden. They contend that some underlining social structures or unnoticed psychological pressures are the real cause of religious behaviour (Pals, 2006:14). A theory of religion is an answer to at least two questions: what is the origin and what is the definition of religion. It is equally true that a theory of religion as an expression of individual needs and tendencies (the socio-psychological question) is less likely misunderstood if it is part of a larger theoretical scheme that encompass social and cultural facts as well. It involved empirical observation (Yinger, 1971: 19)
Auguste Comte is one of the icons of modern sociology. He is said to have been the first to use the word sociology to refer to the study of society. Comte, sought to discover the laws that he believed to govern the evolution of the mind. This work will consider his theory on religion and the implication it has on religion.
AUGUSTE COMTE’S BIOGRAPHY
Comte was born in Montpellier France on January 20, 1798. His parents were eminent Catholic and Monarchical. In the display of his brilliance in school, he was admitted into the Ecole Polytchnique in Paris in 1814.. Two years later, the Bourbons closed the institution, and its students were dismissed. He set about filling in the gaps in his knowledge by reading up on subjects such as biology, history, and developed a strong interest in thinkers who have attempted to understand the history of human society. In August 1817, Auguste Comte was appointed as secretary by Henri de Saint-Semon, a French social reformer and one of the founders of socialism who was the first to clearly see the importance of economic organization in modern society. Comte was thus initiated into politics that placed him in the public eye.
In 1854, the articles he published were republished and remain the best introduction to his oeuvre as a whole. In April 1824, he broke with Saint-Simon. Shortly after wards, in a civil wedding, he married Caroline Massin, who had been living with him for several months. In 1826 Comte began teaching a course of positive Philosophy, whose audience included some of the most famous scientist of the time. He was then interrupted because of a ‘cerebral crisis’ due to over work and conjugal sorrow. He was then hospitalized but latter upon leaving, he was classified not cured. He recovered gradually due to the devotion of this wife. The following 12 years were devoted to his publications (in six volume) of his philosophy in a work entitled “The Philosophy of Auguste Comte” (Encyclopaedia Britannica 2010).
Comte’s particular ability was as a synthesizer of the diverse intellectual arguments. He took his ideas mainly from writers of the 18th and 19th centuries. From David Hume and Immanuel Kant he received the concept of positivism i.e The theory that theology and metaphysics are earlier imperfect modes of knowledge and that positive knowledge is based on natural phenomena and their properties and relations as verified by the empirical sciences. From various French clericalist thinkers Comte took the notion of a hypothetical framework for social organization that would imitate the hierarchy and discipline found in the Roman Catholic Church. From various Enlightenment philosophers he adopted the notion of historical progress (Oweh, 2015:133-143).
COMTE’S THEORY
Auguste Comte who may be considered as the first and foremost, sociologist of human and social unity, the father of sociology in his works we shall consider three major areas; the Law of three stages, Positivism and Religion of Humanity.
- Law of Three Stages
This law states that human thought as well as social progress pass through three important stages. These stages are;
- Theological or Fictitious State: In this stage, religious and superstitious beliefs would be dominant. The theological stage is starting point of human intelligence, when humans turn to supernatural agents as the course of all phenomenon. The human at this stage focuses on discovering absolute knowledge. In other words every action is caused by supernatural agents. To him there can be no real knowledge except that which rests upon observed facts and that the primitive mind could not have thought that way because it would have only created a vicious circle between observations and theories (Boudaeu, http://plato.stanford.ed/entries/comte, assessed on 08/09/2016).
- Metaphysical Stage: This stage is merely a modification of the theological state because a supernatural cause in replaced by an ‘abstract entity’. This state is intended to be a transitional stage, where there is the belief that abstract forces control the behaviour of human beings. To Comte, this stage is considered the least because the mind cannot jump from the theological stage to the positive stage. Human intelligence must be go through a gradual transition. The metaphysical stage is slightly a modification of the theological stage. The mind at this point becomes familiar with concepts, wanting to seek more, and thus is prepared to move into the positive stage.
- Positive Stage: At this stage, the mind stops looking for courses of phenomena, and limits itself strictly to laws governing them; likewise, absolute notions are replaced by relative ones. If one considers material development, the theological stage may also be called military; and the positive stage industry; the metaphysical stage is like the supremacy of the lawyer and jurists. This stage relies on science, rational thought and empirical laws. He considered the study of sociology as the final science because to him it must assume the task of coordinating the development of the whole of knowledge. It organises all of human behaviour. As a positivist, Comte believes that at this stage, humans realize that laws exist, and that the world can be rationally explained through science, rational, laws, and observation. It is believed that science alone would dominate human thinking and direct human behaviour (Haralambos and Holborn, 2004:436)
- Comte’s Positivism
Comte described the epistemological perspective of positivism in his work The Course in Positive Philosophy the first three volumes dealt with the physical sciences already in existence (mathematics, astronomy, Physics, Chemistry, biology). Comte in observing the circular dependence of theory and science as well as in classifying the sciences, he was considered as the first philosopher of science in the modern sense of the term. He separated the natural philosophy from science. His view of positivism thus was to define in more details, the empirical goals of sociological method. To Comte, sociology would eventually become the very pinnacle of a hierarchy of sciences. Comte also identified four methods of sociology. To this day in the, in their inquiries sociologists continue to use the methods of observation, experimentation, comparison and historical research. While Comte did write about methods of research, he often engage in speculation or theorizing in order to attempt to discover invariant laws of the social world (http://plato.stanford.ed/entries/comte)
- The Religion of Humanity:
While religion we can say has the different forms of deism that preserves the idea of God and hence expressing the religiosity, Comte proposes exactly the contrary. His proposition is a religion with neither God nor the supernatural. Comte defines religion as “the state of complete harmony peculiar to human life…when all the parts of life are ordered in their natural relations to each other” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, http://plato.stanford.ed/entries/comte. Accessed 08/09/2016. To him, religion is analogious to what health is for the body. Religion should enhance two functions, in its moral function, religion should govern each individual and in the political sphere it should unite all individuals. It also has three components corresponding to the threefold division of the cerebral table; doctrine, worship and moral rule (Wright, 2000:1986)
In his positivist religion, worship, doctrine and moral rule all have the same object, namely Humanity. The core of Comte’s religion centres in worship which is both private and public but the best known part is on public worship and particularly on the liturgical pattern or calendar. Humanity consist also of dead and the living, positivism designed a whole system of commemoration, which were to develop the sense of Humanity’s historical continuity. Thus the worship of Humanity takes the worship of great men.
AUGUSTE COMTE’S THEORY AND ITS IMPLICATION TO RELIGION.
Auguste Comte’s theory presented and prominent in the 18th and 19th century has some implications on religion even today. Some of the issues to consider are;
- His Theory Introduce Humanism.
This can be considered as any system or mode of thought or action in which human interests, values, and dignity predominate. It can also be considered as a Philosophy, a variety of ethical theory and practice that emphasizes reason, scientific inquiry, and human fulfillment in the natural world and often rejects the importance of belief in God (Humanity, http://www.dictionary.com/browse/ humanity. Accesses on 08/09/2016. Religious Humanism largely emerged out of Ethical Culture, Unitarianism, and Universalism. Today, many Unitarian Universalist congregations and all Ethical Culture societies describe themselves as humanist in the modern sense.
The most critical irony in dealing with Modern Humanism is the tendency for its advocates to disagree on whether or not this worldview is religious. Those who see it as philosophy are the Secular Humanists while those who see it as religion are Religious Humanists. This dispute has been going on since the beginning of the twentieth century when the secular and religious traditions converged and brought Modern Humanism into existence.
Secular and Religious Humanists both share the same worldview and the same basic principles. This is made evident by the fact that both Secular and Religious Humanists were among the signers of Humanist Manifesto I in 1933, Humanist Manifesto II in 1973, and Humanist Manifesto III in 2003. From the standpoint of philosophy alone, there is no difference between the two. It is only in the definition of religion and in the practice of the philosophy that Religious and Secular Humanists effectively disagree. The definition of religion used by Religious Humanists is often a functional one. Religion is that which serves the personal and social needs of a group of people sharing the same philosophical worldview (http://americanhumanist.org/Humanism/What_is_Humanism. Accessed on 08/09/2016)
To serve personal needs, Religious Humanism offers a basis for moral values, an inspiring set of ideals, methods for dealing with life’s harsher realities, a rationale for living life joyously, and an overall sense of purpose.
To serve social needs humanist religious communities (such as Ethical Culture societies and many Unitarian Universalist churches) offer a sense of belonging, an institutional setting for the moral education of children, special holidays shared with like-minded people, a unique ceremonial life, the performance of ideologically consistent rites of passage (weddings, child welcomings, coming-of-age celebrations, memorials, and so forth), an opportunity for affirmation of one’s philosophy of life, and a historical context for one’s ideas.
It is clear that the whole emphasis of humanism is the human being. The Supernatural has no place in their thought. Today, more and more people in the religion of today are developing that view that there is no need to trouble one deity with problems which humanity has created. Man o them has the capacity to solve their problems. The emphasis of the religions are gradually shifting from the things that will please the Supernatural to whom the religious adherents have pleadged their allegiance. Materialism, the things that will satisfy man in his need and give him maximum comfort is becoming the emphasis. Even when most of the different religious affiliation have not openly denied God, the emphasis is shifting from the spiritual things to the mundane things that do not have eternal value.
b. Relativism and Skepticism:
Relativism, roughly put, is the view that truth and falsity, right and wrong, standards of reasoning, and procedures of justification are products of differing conventions and frameworks of assessment and that their authority is confined to the context giving rise to them. More precisely, “relativism” covers views which maintain that—at a high level of abstraction—at least some class of things have the properties they have (e.g., beautiful, morally good, epistemically justified) not simpliciter, but only relative to a given framework of assessment (e.g., local cultural norms, individual standards), and correspondingly, that the truth of claims attributing these properties holds only once the relevant framework of assessment is specified or supplied. Relativists characteristically insist, furthermore, that if something is only relatively so, then there can be no framework-independent vantage point from which the matter of whether the thing in question is so can be established (plato.stanford.edu/entries/relativism. Accessed on 08/08/2016)
Although there are many different kinds of relativism, they all have two features in common.
(1) They all assert that one thing (e.g. moral values, beauty, knowledge, taste, or meaning) is relative to some particular framework or standpoint (e.g. the individual subject, a culture, an era, a language, or a conceptual scheme).
(2) They all deny that any standpoint is uniquely privileged over all others.
It is thus possible to classify the different types and sub-types of relativism in a fairly obvious way. The main genera of relativism can be distinguished according to the object they seek to relativize. Thus, forms of moral relativism assert the relativity of moral values; forms of epistemological relativism assert the relativity of knowledge. These genera can then be broken down into distinct species by identifying the framework to which the object in question is being relativized ( relativism, http://www.iep.utm.edu/relativi/ . Accessed on 08/08/2016)
Skepticism’s historical exemplar is Socrates. Why Socrates? Because after all this time he still stands alone among all the famous saints and sages from antiquity to the present. Every religion has its sage. Judaism has Moses, Zoroastrianism has Zarathustra, Buddhism has the Buddha, Christianity has Jesus, Islam has Mohammad, Mormonism has Joseph Smith, and Bahai has Baha-u-lah. Every one of these individuals claimed to know the absolute truth. It is Socrates, alone among famous sages, who claimed to know nothing. Each devised a set of rules or laws, save Socrates. Instead, Socrates gave us a method—a method of questioning the rules of others, of cross-examination. And Socrates didn’t die for truth, he died for rights and the rule of law. For these reasons Socrates is the quintessential skeptical humanist.
The point is that most people are becoming very skeptical because what sometime the leaders profess and teaches as the truth is not lived out by them. Many of the religious affiliations see themselves as being deceived and oppressed by the leaders who are expected to help in their liberation.
C. Hero Worship:
Hero worship is an excessive adulation for an individual. The religious system today is overwhelm with the pattern of venerating the religious leaders almost like above the divine. There is no doubt that we must give honour to whom honour is due, but when they are treated as gods because of the way they even behave and carry themselves, it becomes a problem. No individual irrespective of the charisma should be treated in such manner. Most religious adherents will rather hold on to what their master says not minding if it is right or not.
CONCLUSION
The theory of Auguste Comte like many other social or religious theories still has its influence in the religion of today. This work have attempted in identifying few of the areas of his theory’s influence on religion today which are the concept of Humanism, Relativism and Skepticism and Hero worship. These has to be checked because if man is considered as the focus of life, because he is a limited being, he cannot solve all his problem on his own, The spiritual issues cannot be avoided no matter how rational we may be. Religion that set aside the Supernatural, materialistic and worship human need to have a rethink.
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