To The Editor:
Anyone aspiring to distinguish meticulously between fact and fancy cannot but endorse Professor Goodenough’s proposal in his article, “Needed: Scientific Study of Religion,” in the March COMMENTARY. The professor correctly notes that the domain of religion is among the domains in which imagination tends to become confused with reality and wishful thinking substituted for scientific procedure. . . .
However, by and large, Dr. Goodenough appears to identify religion with theology. His article takes no cognizance of such factors as sacred music, sacred painting, poetry, sculpture, architecture, drama, or fiction or the activities of religiously motivated persons in the field of social betterment. Dr. Goodenough is not likely to deprecate one’s enjoying an oratorio by Handel or a painting by Michelangelo even if one does not wait for a scientific analysis of that oratorio or painting or for an accurate history of music or art or for a precise definition of the psychological processes underlying one’s enjoyment; just as Dr. Goodenough would hardly wish people to defer eating until science has ascertained all the facts about nutrition. What if certain activities in the form of prayer, ritual, sacred readings and the like should fall within the category of artistic satisfaction? Would we ask people to forego those satisfactions until they have been scientifically probed?
In brief, Dr. Goodenough’s frame of reference is entirely theological. He ignores those reaches of religion which extend beyond the theological. One may reasonably surmise that the more devoted people are to religion in its non-theological phases, the less likely will they be to prove so governed by theological prepossessions as to obstruct scientific scrutiny. . . .
Abraham Cronbach
The Hebrew Union College
Cincinnati, Ohio
To The Editor:
As one who has read COMMENTARY from its first issue, I have a feeling that I could not well do without it. Its quality improves.
The article in March issue—“Needed: Scientific Study of Religion”—by Prof. Erwin R. Goodenough, is superb in content and in scholarly objectivity. What an idea! God speed it.
Harry M. Wilson
First Christian Church
Artesia, New Mexico
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