Religious Sociology

Author: Dai Kangsheng
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2000-06-01
Features: Religious sociology is both an ancient and young discipline. It is a branch of sociology that explores the social factors of the origin and development of religion and its social functions. However, as a social science in the modern sense, it has only had a history of about a hundred years. The earliest use of the term "religious sociology" was by the founder of sociology, Emile Durkheim from France. He first explicitly regarded religion as "something with particularly prominent social characteristics." Marxism also played a significant role in the formation and development of religious sociology.