Furthering the Dialogue Between Religious Studies and Theology: An Apophatic Approach as a Heuristic Tool for Methodological Agnosticism

Abstract

Debates on the relation between theology and religious studies ultimately revolve around epistemological questions: What are the respective limits of religious and academic knowledge and reasoning, and along what boundaries can they meet? This contribution argues that the “reality of religion” is the shared subject matter of these disciplines. For methodological purposes, a distinction is made between two poles: the “transcendent frame” of theology, which defines the reality of religion with reference to transcendence, and the “immanent frame” of religious studies, which defines the reality of religion with reference to the empirical or immanent and in which transcendence is “bracketed.” A qualified methodological agnosticism that considers the bounds of knowledge can further the dialogue between theology and religious studies on the status of transcendence. The theological apophatic method, which departs from a sense of not-knowing and the limits of human knowledge, can serve as a heuristic tool.