Product Description: Why do human beings believe in divinities? Why do some seek eternal life, while others seek escape from recurring lives? Why do the beliefs and behaviors we typically call "religious" so deeply affect the human personality and so subtly weave their way through human society? Revised and updated in this second edition, Eight Theories of Religion considers how these fundamental questions have engaged the most important thinkers of the modern era...read more

A critical study of the role of religion in human life and culture brings together seven divergent views by such philosophers as Karl Marx, Sigmund Freud, James Frazer, Mircea Eliade, E. E. Evans-Prichard, Clifford Geertz, and E. B. Tylor. UP. (view table of contents)