In the “Religion and ritual” reading, Emile Durkheim addresses the origin of religion from two perspectives. The first one is the need to understand, and the second one is sociability. The need to understand is concerned with the urge of human beings wanting to know where they originated from and find out facts about God. Men based their origins on the things they got used to, or those that they suffered from, hence creating history out of them.
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Religious theories came into man’s history much later, and it transformed many men, making them believe in spiritual stories, which remain with them up to the present day. These beliefs led men to realize that there are natural powers, hence rising to be known as gods. Then men developed sentiments, which helped them in communicating with each other, and these sentiments included honour, respect, affection, and fear.
Further readings explain how these sentiments affect and impact human beings and their lives. For example, fear of the unknown can cause a healthy person lack proper esteem to behave himself in an expected manner. Unless one is assisted in overcoming these effects, he may end up in messing with his life. Therefore, it is essential to counterbalance people’s beliefs and their real lives to survive in this world. In the sense of religion, it is evident from the readings that some individuals may have elements of Protestantism, as opposed to Catholicism. This is determined by their beliefs in relation to freedom, as far as religion is concerned.