The Essential Max Müller: On Language, Mythology, and Religion

by J. Stone (Editor)

Overview

Max Müller is often referred to as the 'father of Religious Studies', having himself coined the term 'science of religion' (or religionswissenschaft) in 1873. It was he who encouraged the comparative study of myth and ritual, and it was he who introduced the oft-quoted dictum: 'He who knows one [religion], knows none'. Though a German-born and German-educated philologist, he spent the greater part of his career at Oxford, becoming one of the most famous of the Victorian arm-chair scholars. Müller wrote extensively on Indian philosophy and Vedic religion, translated major sections of the Vedas, the Upanisads, and all of the Dhammapada, yet never visited India. To be sure, his work bears the stamp of late Nineteenth-Century sensibilities, but as artifacts of Victorian era scholarship, Müller's essays are helpful in reconstructing and comprehending the intellectual concerns of this highly enlightened though highly imperialistic age.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780312293093
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan US
Publication date:	05/02/2003
Edition description:	2003
Pages:	367
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.25(h) x 0.03(d)

About the Author

JON R. STONE is Professor of Philosophy and Religious Studies at the California University in Bakersfield. Stone is the author and editor of numerous books, including Latin for the Illiterati, Expecting Armageddon, On the Boundaries of American Evangelicalism (Palgrave), and The Craft of Religious Studies (Palgrave).

Table of Contents

Introductory Essay 'Semitic Monotheism' (1860) 'Lecture on the Vedas' (1865) 'Buddhist Nihilism' (1869) 'On False Analogies in Comparative Theology' (1870) 'The Migration of Fables' (1870) 'On the Philosophy of Mythology' (1871) 'Introduction to the Science of Religion' (Chapter 1, 1874) 'The Perception of the Infinite' (1878) 'Is Fetishism a Primitive Form of Religion?' (1878) 'Metaphor as a Mode of Abstraction' (1886) 'Physical Religion' (1890) 'Religion, Myth, and Custom' (1890) 'Discovery of the Soul in Man and in Nature' (1891) 'Funeral Ceremonies' (1891) 'What was Thought about the Departed' (1891) 'The Divine and the Human' (1891) Appendix: notes and translated addenda Index

Editorial Reviews

Praise for Stone s On the Boundaries of American Evangelicalism:

"...Stone s study is an excellent introduction to the history of American evangelicalism." - Publishers Weekly

From the Publisher