- Torino, Piemonte, Italy
Until quite recently questions about the role of innovation, inventiveness and invention in the emergence and development of religions were rarely addressed. Scholarship in the academic study of religions initially focused on the ancient... more
Until quite recently questions about the role of innovation, inventiveness and invention in the emergence and development of religions were rarely addressed. Scholarship in the academic study of religions initially focused on the ancient and well-established “world religions,” and while the approach taken was critical and eschewed overtly theological readings of religious history and texts, there were certain assumptions that went unchallenged. These include a presumption that religious texts were produced in good faith, as a result of experiences that founders and reformers of religions construed as revelations and instructions from the divine realm (Smart 1998). The tremendous authority that written texts acquired in societies that had fully shifted from orality to literacy reinforced this respectful approach to scriptures (Graham 1987).
