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Summary
A fresh interpretation of the work of Emile Durkheim, which argues that in addition to being a pioneer in sociological theory and research, Durkheim was also a major social philosopher concerned with religion, metaphysics, and knowledge.
"This is sociological scholarship at its best. This work goes to the head of the class in terms of an original work relating Durkheim to central philosophical questions and traditions." -- Edward A. Tiryakian, Duke University
Three Faces of God offers a new interpretation of Emile Durkheim's social philosophy. It challenges the current view of him as primarily a scientific sociologist who identified sociology with the study of collective representations. Nielsen argues that Durkheim was a sociological monist who developed a concept of social substance and a theory of society, religion and the categories of understanding strikingly similar to Spinoza's philosophy. The book provides a comprehensive examination of Durkheim's major and minor writings, especially his theory of religion and the categories, and compares his work with Aristotle, Bacon, Kant, and Renouvier. The author places Durkheim's thought in the context of an encounter between traditional religious ideals, especially Judaism, and modernizing scientific and philosophical currents.
"The author's command of the Durkheimian texts and of relevant secondary commentary is impressive. He makes his case in a careful and sustained way, building from one text to another, and in the process reveals a unifying philosophical orientation throughout the Durkheimian corpus." -- Peter Kivisto, Augustana College
Donald A. Nielsen is Associate Professor of Sociology at State University of New York College at Oneonta.
Table of Contents
Preface
Acknowledgments
1. Durkheim's Project: A Claim
2. Durkheim's Intellectual Development and the Durkheimian Theoretical Program
Durkheim's Social Philosophy and the Revelation of 1895
The Durkheimian Program of Theory and Research
3. Durkheim's Concept of Totality and the Philosophical Tradition: Selected Predecessors
Durkheim and Aristotle
Durkheim and Bacon
Durkheim and Spinoza
Durkheim, Kant and Renouvier
4. Durkheim's Early Writings and the Dissertation on Montesquieu
5. The First Approach to Totality: Wholes, Parts, and the Transformation of Social Substance in The Division of Labor in Society
6. The Problem of Totality in Durkheim's Transitional Period
Social Facts and the Whole/Part Problem in The Rules of Sociological Method
Religion, Totality and Society in Durkheim's Lectures on Socialism
Totality and Its Modes in Suicide
7. Between Revelation and Realization: The Developing Problem of Totality in Durkheim from 1898 to 1912
The Whole in Durkheim's Lectures on State, Society and Professional Ethics
The Problem of the Whole in Durkheim's Essays I: 1898–1905
Durkheim and Rousseau
The Problem of the Whole in Durkheim's Lectures on Education
Fragments of the Problem of Totality in Durkheim's Essays II: 1905–1912
8. The Problem of Totality in the Early Durkheim School: The Work of Durkheim, Mauss, Hubert, Hertz, and Bouglé
Durkheim and Mauss on Primitive Classification
Mauss on Social Morphology and Eskimo Society
Hubert and Mauss on Mentalities, Magic, and Society
Hubert on the Collective Representation of Time
Reason and Society: The Hubert and Mauss Preface to the Melanges d'Histoire des Religions
Robert Hertz on Religious Polarity
Bouglé on the Hindu Caste System
9. The Second Approach to Totality: Society, Religion, and the Categories in The Elementary Forms of Religious Life
Nature and Society
Totality and Society
The Categories, Totality, and Society
Society, Deity, Totality
10. The Problem of Totality in Durkheim's Last Writings
The Lectures on Pragmatism
The Dualism of Human Nature
11. Sociological Monism and the Encounter Between Tradition and Modernity
Durkheim's Sociological Monism: A Systematic Reconstruction
Sociological Monism in Civilizational Perspective: Toward the Historical Location of Durkheim's Thought
