Mircea Eliade's Phenomenological Analysis of Religious Experience

Author(s): Douglas Allen

Source: The Journal of Religion , Apr., 1972, Vol. 52, No. 2 (Apr., 1972), pp. 170-186
Published by: The University of Chicago Press

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Mircea Eliade's Phenomenological Analysis
of Religious Experience

Douglas Allen

INTRODUCTION

It seems possible to make the distinction between

for separating religious from nonreligious phenom
criteria for interpreting the meaning of a religi
is analogous to the distinction between formulatin
tinguishing a work of art and supplying the crit
the meaning of the work of art.
In terms of this distinction, it is my thesis tha
notions in Mircea Eliade's methodology: the dialec
the profane' and the central position of symbolis
tures. Eliade's interpretation of the dialectic of th
distinguish religious phenomena; his interpretati
vides the theoretical framework in terms of whi
stand the meaning of most of these sacred m
general view of symbolism establishes the phenom
his structural hermeneutics; the dialectic of the
with Eliade's analysis of symbolism, conveys the
"sense" evidenced throughout his approach.
In this study we shall focus upon the first o
Eliade's attempt to provide criteria for disting
nomena. For the sake of analysis, we shall abst
from his methodology. Such an approach migh
order in Eliade's hermeneutics: first Eliade insi
bility of the sacred, which involves the phenomen
sympathetic effort to participate in the experien
next he attempts to recreate imaginatively the co
manifestation and captures the intentionality of

1 We shall use "the dialectic of the sacred," "the dialec

profane," and "the dialectic of hierophanies" interchang

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 Mircea Eliade's Phenomenology

tion in terms of the dialectic of the sacred; then he attempts to under-

stand the meaning of the sacred manifestation in terms of a structural
hermeneutics grounded in his interpretation of religious symbolism.
It is imperative that we clearly recognize that such an interpretation,
suggesting this temporal sequence in Mircea Eliade's methodology, will
not do. For example, we shall describe Eliade's methodological in-
sistence upon suspending one's own interpretation and seeing just what
one's data reveal. But surely even the most conscientious phenomenol-
ogist cannot simply "perform" or "invoke" the epoche'. The phenomeno-
logical epoche' must involve some explicit method of self-criticism,
intersubjective check, factual (as well as "free") variations. Conse-
quently, we could not possibly understand the nature of Eliade's
phenomenological epochi until we had elucidated the additional
methodological principles and hermeneutical framework in terms of
which one can suspend his own normative judgments, grasp the mean-
ing of the experiences of homo religiosus, etc.
In short, we cannot overemphasize that the following hermeneutical
principles, along with the structuralistic principles not elucidated in
this study, must be viewed as functioning together in Mircea Eliade's
methodology. Any illusion of temporal order is an unfortunate con-
sequence of the need for an analytic exposition.
According to Eliade, the historian of religions2 "uses an empirical
method of approach" and begins by collecting religious documents
which need to be interpreted.3 Unlike Miiller, Tylor, Frazer, and other
early investigators, the modern scholar realizes that he works "exclu-
sively with historical documents."4 Consequently, Eliade's point of
departure is the historical data which express the religious experiences

2 By " history of religions" we mean the entire discipline of Religionswissenschaft,

within which we may distinguish such "branches" as history, psychology, sociology,
and phenomenology of religion (see Joachim Wach, Sociology of Religion [Chicago:
University of Chicago, Phoenix Books, 1964], pp. 1-2). Within this context we take
Eliade to be a historian of religions, and, more specifically, a phenomenologist of
religion.
3 Mircea Eliade, "Methodological Remarks on the Study of Religious Sym-
bolism," in The History of Religions: Essays in Methodology, ed. Mircea Eliade and
Joseph M. Kitagawa (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1966), p. 88. See
Eliade, The Myth of the Eternal Return, trans. Willard R. Trask (New York: Pantheon
Books, 1954), PP. 5-6; and Patterns in Comparative Religion, trans. Rosemary Sheed
(New York: Meridian Books, 1966), pp. xiv-xvi.
4 Eliade, "The Quest for the 'Origins' of Religion," History of Religions 6, no. I
(1964): 169. With slight modifications, this article is reproduced in Eliade's The
Quest: History and Meaning in Religion (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, I969),
PP- 37-53 (cf. Patterns, pp. 2-3).

'7'

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The Journal of Religion

of mankind. Through his phenomenological approach, Eliade attempts

to decipher these data, to describe and interpret the religious phenomena
which constitute the Lebenswelt of homo religiosus.
We have asserted that Mircea Eliade collects religious documents
which need to be interpreted, attempts to describe the religious
phenomena, etc. But how does one know which documents to collect,
which phenomena to describe and interpret? To answer these and
similar questions we need to introduce several methodological principles
in terms of which Eliade can distinguish the religious manifestations.

THE IRREDUCIBILITY OF THE SACRED

The methodological assumption of the irreduci

be seen as arising from Eliade's criticism of pa
In fact, it seems to me that this antireduction
reason for Eliade's rejection of previous app
formulate Eliade's detailed criticism, and we
of his salient points.6
The early ethnologists and philologists, uti
norms (rationalist, positivist, etc.), usually for
linear evolutionary schemes. There was little p
understand what a religion meant for its belie
act of description were the evaluative prin
triumph of the modern scientific spirit.
The twentieth-century sociologist, such as Du
chologist, such as Freud, opened up new dimen
Eliade criticizes them for reducing the meanin
sociological or psychological analysis. Similarly
edges his debt to the diffusionist and the funct
diffusion or determining the function of a re
not exhaust its meaning.
The upshot of Eliade's criticism may be expre
antireductionist claim which he frequently

5 After completing this study I came across David Rasmussen's "Mircea Eliade:
Structural Hermeneutics and Philosophy," Philosophy Today 12, no. 2/4 (1968):
138-46. This excellent article led me to several revisions in the order of my presenta-
tion. More specifically, I have adopted Rasmussen's order of beginning with "the
irreducibility of the sacred" as Eliade's first hermeneutical principle.
6 Eliade formulates many of these criticisms in "The History of Religions in
Retrospect: 1912-1962," Journal of Bible and Religion 21, no. 2 (1963): 98-Io9. This
article appears in an expanded version in The Quest, pp. 12-36.

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 Mircea Eliade's Phenomenology

religions must attempt to grasp the religious phenomena "on their own
plane of reference," as something religious.7 To reduce our interpretation
to some other plane of reference is to neglect their full intentionality.
"To try to grasp the essence of such a phenomenon by means of
physiology, psychology, sociology, economics, linguistics, art or any
other study is false; it misses the one unique and irreducible element in
it-the element of the sacred." 8 Here we have the point made by Rudolf
Otto, Wach, van der Leeuw, and many others: The historian of
religions must respect the fundamentally irreducible character of the
religious experience.
Over and over again Eliade expresses his antireductionist stance in
terms of the following principle: "the scale creates the phenomenon." He
frequently quotes the following ironical query of Henri Poincard:
" Would a naturalist who had never studied the elephant except through
the microscope consider that he had an adequate knowledge of the
creature ?" "The microscope reveals the structure and mechanism of
cells, which structure and mechanism are exactly the same in all multi-
cellular organisms. The elephant is certainly a multicellular organism,
but is that all that it is ? On the microscopic scale, we might hesitate to
answer. On the scale of human vision, which at least has the advantage
of presenting the elephant as a zoological phenomenon, there can be no
doubt about the reply."9
Eliade's methodological assumption of the irreducibility of the sacred
can be seen as arising from his view of the role of the historian of
religions. His justification for such an assumption seems to be that the
task of the phenomenologist, at least in the beginning, is to follow and
attempt to understand an experience as it is for the person who has had
that experience. Unlike earlier investigators who superimposed their
own normative standards upon their data, Eliade wants to deal faith-
fully with his phenomena as phenomena, to see just what his data
reveal. What his data reveal is that certain people have had experiences
which they have considered religious. Thus, the phenomenologist must

7 For example, see Eliade, Myths, Dreams and Mysteries, trans. Philip Mairet (New
York: Harper & Bros., i96o), p. 13; and "History of Religions and a New Human-
ism," History of Religions I, no. I (1961). With some additions, this article is reproduced
in The Quest, pp. I-I I.
8 Patterns, p. xiii.
9 Eliade, "Comparative Religion: Its Past and Future," in Knowledge and the
Future of Man, ed. WalterJ. Ong, S.J. (New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1968),
p. 251 (cf. Patterns, p. xiii; and Myths, Dreams and Mysteries, p. 131).

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The Journal of Religion

first of all respect the original intentionality expressed by his data; he

must attempt to understand such phenomena as something religious.
In short, Eliade's methodological principle of irreducibility is really
an insistence upon a phenomenological epoche'. One recalls that Husserl's
phenomenological epoche was directed against reductionism. By "brack-
eting" or suspending the interpretations we normally place upon
phenomena, the phenomenologist attempts to consider phenomena
"just as phenomena," "to disclose and clarify the meaning of phenom-
ena, that is of whatever presents itself." 10
If there are certain irreducible modes by which religious experiences
and their expressions are given, then our "method of understanding
must be commensurate with the givenness of the mode." 11 Homo
religiosus experiences the sacred as something sui generis. If we are to
participate in and sympathetically understand the religious phenomena
of the other, our scale must be commensurate with the scale of the other.
Consequently, Eliade insists upon an irreducibly religious scale of
understanding in order to have an adequate knowledge of the irre-
ducibly religious phenomena.
To illustrate the paramount significance of this hermeneutical prin-
ciple, consider the following question: How are we to understand the
shaman's strange imitation of animal cries? It has been customary to
interpret this phenomenon as manifesting a pathological "possession,"
clear evidence of the shaman's mental aberration. However, suppose we
suspend our normative judgments and first attempt to understand the
religious meaning which such experiences have had for the other.1'2
Understood in terms of such a scale, Eliade finds that the shaman's
friendship with animals and knowledge of their language reveal a
10 Nathaniel Lawrence and Daniel O'Connor, "The Primary Phenomenon:
Human Existence," Readings in Existential Phenomenologyv, ed. Nathaniel Lawrence and
Daniel O'Connor (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1967), p. 7 ("Preface").
11 Charles H. Long, "The Meaning of Religion in the Contemporary Study of the
History of Religions," Criterion 2, no. 2 (1963): 25 (cf. Joachim Wach, The Compara-
tive Study of Religions [New York: Columbia University Press, 1961], p. 15).
12 Eliade does go on to deny that shamanism can be assimilated to a kind of psycho-
pathological condition: "one becomes a shaman only if he can interpret his patho-
logical crisis as a religious experience and succeeds in curing himself"; "there is
always a cure, a control, an equilibrium brought about by the actual practice of
shamanism"; the shamanic initiation includes "a course of theoretical and practical
instruction too complicated to be within the grasp of a neurotic"; etc. (see his
Shamanism: Archaic Techniques of Ecstacy, trans. Willard R. Trask [New York: Pantheon
Books, 1964], pp. 14, 23-32; From Primitives to Zen [New York: Harper & Row, 19671,
pp. 423-24; "Recent Works on Shamanism: A Review Article," History of Religions
I, no. I [I961]: 155).
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 Mircea Eliade's Phenomenology

"paradisal" syndrome. Communication and friendship with animals is

one means of partially recovering the "paradisal" situation of primor-
dial man; this blessedness and spontaneity existed in illo tempore, before
the "fall," and is inaccessible to man's profane state. From this perspec-
tive Eliade begins to understand that the "strange behavior" is
"actually part of a coherent ideology, possessing great nobility." In
terms of this ideology, this "yearning for Paradise," Eliade is able to
interpret many shamanic phenomena and to relate the shaman's
ecstatic experience to other religious phenomena throughout the history
of mankind. '3
Eliade has insisted upon the irreducibility of the sacred but has not
provided the hermeneutic framework for perceiving the irreducible
manifestations. He must now recreate imaginatively the conditions
for the manifestations of the sacred; in doing this he seems to adopt
a phenomenological approach by focusing upon the intentionality of his
data.

In assuming the irreducibility of the sacred we have recognized the

need to participate in the life-world of homo religiosus, the sympathetic
effort to understand the experiences of the other. Stephan Strasser
remarks, "In this authentically phenomenological attitude the world
no longer appears to us as a whole of objective data, but as an 'inten-
tional configuration' [Sinngebilde] which is born and becomes meaning-
ful in the course of an existential movement of orientation." 14
When Eliade examines his data, they do reveal a certain intention-
ality. He will attempt to recreate imaginatively the conditions for the
"intentional configuration" which expresses the specific existential
orientation of homo religiosus. "The attempt to understand the sacred as
an irreducible form is accompanied by the technical attempt to capture
its intentional mode ... Eliade's second hermeneutic principle, the
dialectic of the sacred and the profane, is introduced precisely to cap-
ture this intentional characteristic of the sacred modality.'5

RELIGION AND THE SACRED

In order to understand more fully the structur

sacred we shall first clarify Eliade's concepti
13 Eliade, "The Yearning for Paradise in Primitive Trad
258, 261-66.
14 Stephan Strasser, The Soul in Metaphysical and Empirical Psychology (Pittsburgh:
Duquesne University Press, 1962), p. 3.
15 Rasmussen, p. 14o.

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The Journal of Religion

sacred. He tells us that "in the title of the 'history of religions' the
accent ought not to be upon the word history, but upon the word
religions. For although there are numerous ways of practising history-
from the history of technics to that of human thought-there is only one
way of approaching religion-namely, to deal with the religious facts.
Before making the history of anything, one must have a proper under-
standing of what it is, in and for itself." 16 An obvious question arises:
what is religion ? Indeed, C. J. Bleeker has listed this very question as
the first "contribution to the clarification of present religious questions"
which the history of religions can make."7
Following Roger Caillois, Eliade begins by asserting that "all the
definitions given up till now of the religious phenomenon have one
thing in common: each has its own way of showing that the sacred and
the religious life are the opposite of the profane and the secular life."
Caillois admits that this sacred-profane distinction is not always suf-
ficient to define the phenomenon of religion, but such an opposition is
involved in every definition of religion.is " The dichotomy of sacred and
profane is the invariable par excellence in the religious life of man." 19
In Eliade's conception, religion "does not necessarily imply belief in
God, gods, or ghosts, but refers to the experience of the sacred." The
sacred and profane are "two modes of being in the world, two existen-
tial situations assumed by man in the course of history."20 What is
most characteristic of religion is its being occupied with the sacred,
which it distinguishes from the profane. The sacred may be described
as that which is experienced as "power" (van der Leeuw), as "wholly
other" (Otto), as "ultimate reality" (Wach). In other religious con-
texts it is described by such terms as "absolute reality," "being,"

16 Eliade, Images and Symbols, trans. Philip Mairet (New York: Sheed & Ward,
1961), p. 29.
17 C. J. Bleeker, "The Future Task of the History of Religions," Numen 7, fasc. 3
(1960): 232.
18 Patterns, p. I; Eliade, The Sacred and the Profane, trans. Willard R. Trask (New
York: Harper Torchbooks, I96I), p. o; Roger Caillois, Man and the Sacred, trans.
Meyer Barash (Glencoe, Ill.: Free Press, 1959), pp. I3, 19.
19 Eliade, "Structure and Changes in the History of Religion," trans. Kathryn
Atwater, in City Invisible, ed. Carl Kraeling (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
I960), p. 353. Winston L. King has written in his Introduction to Religion: A Phenomeno-
logical Approach (New York: Harper & Row, 1968), p. 32: " Classically speaking what
is not sacred is profane; but in our time 'profane' connotes the antisacred rather than
the merely nonsacred." Although we must guard against this connotation of "pro-
fane," we shall continue to use this term since it appears throughout Eliade's writings.
20 "Preface," in The Quest, p. i; and The Sacred and the Profane, p. 14.

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 Mircea Eliade's Phenomenology

"eternity," "divine," "metacultural and transhistorical," "trans-

human," "transmundane," "source of life and fecundity." 21
By citing several illustrations we shall comprehend more fully the
relationship between religion and the sacred. In interpreting experi-
ences of "mystic light," Eliade seems to feel that these experiences are
religious because "they bring a man out of his worldly Universe or
historical situation, and project him into a Universe different in quality,
an entirely different world, transcendent and holy." Yoga preserves "a
religious value" by reacting against "the 'normal,' 'secular,' and
finally 'human' inclination," by thirsting "for the unconditioned, for
freedom, for 'power'-in a word, for one of the countless modalities of
the sacred." The myriad expressions of the "coincidentia oppositorum"
reveal religious experiences because they may be deciphered as dis-
closing man's attempt to transcend his "natural" or "human" situa-
tion in the world by transcending "the opposites" and thus reaching
a mode of "total" being.22
If we consider all of the descriptions of the sacred, Eliade seems to be
indicating that religion always entails some aspect of transcendence. This
sense of transcendence is expressed in such terms as "absolute bliss and
power," "transhistorical and transmundane," etc. But Eliade intends
this sense of transcendence to be viewed as a universal structure of
religion: to restrict it to any particular description or content is to
relativize it. All expressions are too specific. Eliade's universal charac-
terization of religion in terms of this transcendent structure is meant to
include, but not be exhausted by, the definitions offered by van der
Leeuw, Otto, Wach, and others.
One immediately realizes that the above claim is not sufficient to
define religion. Countless examples can be cited where a completely
nonreligious individual, say, some scientist expounding his conception
of space, presents us with a purely descriptive and secular sense of
transcendence.

What differentiates the religious sense of transcendence is its special

normative basis for homo religiosus. This will become apparent in our
treatment of the structure of "evaluation and choice" in the dialectic

21 For example, see Eliade, Rites and Symbols of Initiation, trans. Willard R. Trask
(New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1965), P. 130; Toga: Immortality and Freedom, trans.
Willard R. Trask (New York: Pantheon Books, I958), p. 165; The Sacred and the
Profane, p. 28.
22 Eliade, Mephistopheles and the Androgyne, trans. J. M. Cohen (New York: Sheed &
Ward, I965), PP. 76, 78-I24; Yoga, p. 96.

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The Journal of Religion

of the sacred. At this point let us simply note that religion involves a
radical break with all of the secular or profane modalities. It invariably
points man "beyond" the relative, historical, "natural" world of
"ordinary" experience. Indeed, Eliade goes so far as to assert that
"the principal function of religion" is to render human existence
"open" to a "superhuman" world of "transcendent" values.23
In a frequently quoted passage from The Sacred and the Profane,
Eliade contrasts religion with the mode of being in the world of
nonreligious man:

The nonreligious man refuses transcendence, accepts the relativity of

"reality," and may even come to doubt the meaning of existence....
Modern nonreligious man assumes a new existential situation; he regards
himself solely as the subject and agent of history, and he refuses all appeal to
transcendence. In other words, he accepts no model for humanity outside the
human condition as it can be seen in the various historical situations. Man
makes himself, and he only makes himself completely in proportion as
desacralizes himself and the world. The sacred is the prime obstacle to h
freedom. He will become himself only when he is totally demysticized.
will not be truly free until he has killed the last god.24

Eliade must not be confused with the numerous scholars who hold
metaphysical positions concerning transcendence. He is not claimin
that "the value of the religious phenomena can be understood only
we keep in mind that religion is ultimately a realization of a trans
cendent truth." 25 At this stage his empirical approach is clearly
descriptive. His religious documents reveal the sacred-profane dichot-
omy and the attempt by homo religiosus to experience the sacred by
transcending the profane.

THE DIALECTIC OF THE SACRED

To recreate the conditions for the intention

festations, we must carefully explicate the s

23 In "Structure and Changes in the History of Religion," in City Invisible, p. 366,

Eliade formulates "the principle function of religion [as] that of maintaining an
'opening' toward a world which is superhuman, the world of axiomatic spiritual
values."

24 The Sacred and the Profane, pp. 202-3.

25 Bleeker, n. 17 above, p. 227. His normative claim was rejected in a state
submitted by Professor Werblowsky, with which Eliade and many other histor
religions were willing to associate themselves (see Annemarie Schimmel, "Sum
of Discussion," Numen 7, fasc. 3 [December I96o]: 237).

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 Mircea Eliade's Phenomenology

the sacred. We shall divide our analysis into three parts: the separation
of the hierophanic object and the sacred-profane distinction; the para-
doxical relationship between the sacred and the profane; the evaluation
and choice implied in the dialectic.

I. The Separation and Distinction

According to Eliade, the man who has the religious experience believes
that something comes from somewhere else and shows itself to him.
That which appears from somewhere else is the sacred; that through
which it appears is the profane. "To denote the act of manifestation of
the sacred, we propose to use the term hierophany. This word is con-
venient because it requires no additional specifications; it means
nothing more than is implied by its etymological content-namely, that
something sacred is shown to us, manifests itself. One may say that the
history of religions-from the most elementary to the most developed-
is constituted by a number of important hierophanies, manifestations
of sacred realities." 26

What interests homo religiosus are hierophanies. These manifestations

of the sacred are never unmediated: the sacred is always revealed
through something natural, historical, ordinarily profane. The profane
alone has no significance for homo religiosus, but only insofar as it reveals
the sacred.

The process of sacralization involves the "radical ontological separa-

tion" of the thing which reveals the sacred from everything else. We
find the singularization of a certain stone because of its size or shape or
heavenly origin, because it protects the dead or is the site of a covenant,
because it represents a theophany or is an image of the "center." A
medicine man has been singularized because he has been chosen by
gods or spirits, because of his heredity, because of various physical
defects (an infirmity, nervous disorder, etc.), or because of an unusual
accident or event (lightning, apparition, dream, etc.).27
What is important is that there is always something else, something
other; that which is singularized is "chosen" because it manifests the
sacred. If a large rock is singled out it is not simply because of its

26 Myths, Dreams and Mysteries, p. 124 (cf. Patterns, pp. 7 ff.). Of course we hav
already presented a partial analysis of the sacred-profane distinction in our discussi
of Eliade's view of religion and the sacred.
27 Patterns, pp. 216-38; The Myth of the Eternal Return, p. 4; Shamanism, pp. 31-
and passim.

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The Journal of Religion

impressive natural dimensions, but rather because its imposing appear-

ance reveals something transcendent: a permanence, a power, an
absolute mode of being, which is different from the precariousness of
human existence. If the medicine man is singled out, it is because his
unusual accident or event is a "sign" of something transcendent: he is
a "specialist of the sacred"; he has the capacity to transcend the human
and profane, to have contact with and manipulate the sacred.
It is often difficult for the historian of religions to recognize hieroph-
anies. We tend to see natural objects where our ancestors saw
hierophanies. Eliade has observed that "to the primitive, nature is
never purely 'natural."' We may understand that the sky would reveal
a sense of transcendence or infinity, but it often seems incomprehensible
that a simple gesture, a normal physiological activity, or a dreary
landscape would manifest the sacred. Yet we must be sensitive to the
fact that all phenomena are potentially hierophanic.

We must get used to the idea of recognizing hierophanies everywhere, in

every area of psychological, economic, spiritual and social life. Indeed, we
cannot be sure that there is anything-object, movement, psychological
function, being or even game-that has not at some time in human history
been somewhere transformed into a hierophany. It is a very different matter
to find out why that particular thing should have become a hierophany, or
should have stopped being one at any given moment. But it is quite certain
that anything man has ever handled, felt, come in contact with or loved can
become a hierophany.28

At this point we may note that Eliade's doctrine of hierophanies

challenges the naturalistic interpretations of religious phenomena.
Because we tend to see natural objects where homo religiosus saw
hierophanies, there is the tendency to interpret the dialectic of the
sacred as a "natural" mode of manifestation. But to do this would be
to fail to grasp the true intentionality of the sacred manifestation.
We must now examine the relationship which exists between the
sacred and the profane as disclosed by the dialectic of hierophanies
This dialectical relationship has been the source of much confusion and
misinterpretation.
28 Patterns, pp. I I, 38. In several contexts Eliade has asserted that Judaeo-
Christianity contributed greatly to the process by which we (modern, secular,
Western, scientific) tend to see natural objects were "archaic" religions saw hieroph-
anies. The "cosmic religiosity" of earlier religions was criticized: a rock was "only"
a rock and should not be worshiped. "Emptied of every religious value or meaning,
nature could become the 'object' par excellence of scientific investigation" ("The
Sacred and the Modern Artist," Criterion 4, no. 2 [Spring 19651: 23).

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 Mircea Eliade's Phenomenology

II. The Paradoxical Relationship

Thomas J. J. Altizer seizes upon the point " that the sacred is the oppo-
site of the profane" as Eliade's "cardinal principle" and the key to
interpreting Eliade's phenomenological method. This opposition is
taken to mean that the sacred and the profane are mutually exclusive
or logically contradictory. From this "cardinal principle" Altizer sees
the key to Eliade's approach in terms of a "negative dialectic": "a
single moment cannot be sacred and profane at once." An under-
standing of religious myth, for example, is possible "only through a
negation of the language of the profane." The "meaning of the sacred
is reached by inverting the reality created by modern man's profane
choice." In short, to observe the sacred one must totally negate the
profane and vice versa.29 Unfortunately this interpretation destroys the
dialectical complexity of the religious mode of manifestation and leads
to an oversimplification and distortion of Eliade's phenomenological
method. 30

Eliade's religious data reveal that in the process of sacralization the

sacred and the profane coexist in a paradoxical relationship. This proc-
ess is the intention of the hierophany, an intention which constitutes
the structure and lies at the foundation of the hierophany. A series of
illustrations from Eliade will clarify this point.
" One must remember the dialectic of the sacred: any object whatever
may paradoxically become a hierophany, a receptacle of the sacred,
while still participating in its own cosmic environment." "One need
only recall the dialectic of hierophany: an object becomes sacred while
remaining just the same as it is." The dialectic of the sacred consists of
the fact that "the sacred expresses itself through something other than
itself," that "in every case the sacred manifests itself limited and
incarnate." It is "this paradox of incarnation which makes hierophanies
possible at all." 31

In fact, this paradoxical coming-together of sacred and profane, being and

non-being, absolute and relative, the eternal and the becoming, is what every
hierophany, even the most elementary, reveals.., .every hierophany shows,
makes manifest, the coexistence of contradictory essences: sacred and profane,

29 Thomas J. J. Altizer, Mircea Eliade and the Dialectic of the Sacred (Philadelphia:
Westminster Press, 1963), PP. 34, 39, 45, 65, and passim.
30 After completing this section, I came across a similar criticism of Altizer's inter-
pretation of Eliade's sacred-profane relationship in Mac Linscott Ricketts, " Mircea
Eliade and the Death of God," Religion in Life 36 (Spring 1967): pp. 43-48.
31 Images and Symbols, pp. 84, 178; Patterns, p. 26.

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The Journal of Religion

spirit and matter, eternal and non-eternal, and so on. That the dialectic
of hierophanies, of the manifestation of the sacred in material things, should
be an object for even such complex theology as that of the Middle Ages seems
to prove that it remains the cardinal problem of any religion.... In fact,
what is paradoxical, what is beyond our understanding, is not that the
sacred can be manifested in stones or in trees, but that it can be manifested
at all, that it can thus become limited and relative.32

Thus we observe the paradoxical coexistence revealed by the dialectic

of the sacred and the profane. What is paradoxical is that an ordinary,
finite, historical thing, while remaining a natural thing, can at the same
time manifest something which is not finite, not historical, not natural.
What is paradoxical is that something transcendent, wholly other,
infinite, transhistorical, limits itself by manifesting itself in some
relative, finite, historical thing.

III. The Evaluation and Choice

Our religious data do not simply reveal a distinction between sacred

and profane, as seen in their paradoxical coexistence in every hieroph-
any. The dialectic of hierophanies shows that homo religiosus is involved
in an "existential crisis": in experiencing a hierophany he is called
upon to evaluate the two orders of being and to make a choice. Charles
H. Long describes this sense of evaluation in the following manner:
"The world of man exists as a limitation or qualification of his environ-
ment, and this qualification or limitation is at the same time a criticism.
Man's world is an ordered world of meaning, but the organizing prin-
ciple is interpreted as a revelation which comes from a source outside
of his ordinary life. It is the source which is given (revealed) and (it)
defines any future possibility of man's existence." 33
In experiencing the dialectic of hierophany, homo religiosus faces an
"existential crisis"; indeed, his very existence is called into question.
Because of the dichotomy of sacred and profane, as revealed in their
paradoxical coexistence, distinction, differentiation, value, and even
meaning are all introduced into one's existence.34 In short, one dimen-

32 Patterns, pp. 29-30.

33 Charles H. Long, Alpha: The Myths of Creation (New York: George Braziller, Inc.,
1963), pp. 'I0-II.
34 Eliade, Myth and Reality, trans. Willard R. Trask (New York: Harper & Row,
1963), P. 139; and G. Richard Welbon, "Some Remarks on the Work of Mircea
Eliade," Acta philosophica et theologica 2 (1964): 479.

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 Mircea Eliade's Phenomenology

sion of being is seen as more significant, as "wholly other" and "power-

ful" and "ultimate," as containing a surplus of meaning, as para-
digmatic and normative in judging one's existence.
Eliade usually describes man's choice and evaluation "negatively."
The dialectic of hierophanies throws the realm of natural ordinary
existence into sharp relief. After the "rupture" of the sacred and the
profane, man evaluates his natural existence as a "fall." He feels him-
self separated from what is now evaluated as "ultimate" and "real."
He longs to transcend his "natural" and "historical" mode of being
and to live permanently in the sacred.
The upshot of the above discussion seems to be the following. Through
the dialectic of hierophanies, the profane is set off in sharp relief; homo
religiosus "chooses" the sacred and evaluates his "ordinary" mode of
existence negatively. At the same time, through his evaluation and
choice, man is given the possibility for meaningful judgments and
creative human action and expression. The "positive" religious value
of man's "negative" evaluation of the profane, I would submit, is
expressed in the intentionality toward meaningful communication with
the sacred and toward religious action which now appears as a structure
in the consciousness of homo religiosus.
At this point a brief digression may be useful in clarifying one of the
main sources of misconceptions in interpreting Eliade's phenomenology:
most interpreters do not endeavor to understand Mircea Eliade on his
own grounds. We may cite an example from our above discussion: homo
religiosus evaluates his natural existence as a "fall."
Many interpreters have seized upon Eliade's personal doctrine of a
"fall" as being a pivotal notion in his thought. It is only because of
Eliade's "theological assumptions" that he considers modern secu-
larization to be a "fall." Eliade is a "romantic" who believes that his-
tory is a "fall" and who "insists upon the reality of man's prefallen
state." 35

It seems to me that the problem with these interpretations is that

Altizer and Hamilton do not take Eliade seriously enough on his own
grounds. They are theologians and criticize Eliade's theological position
on a "fall." But Eliade at least purports to be a historian of religions;

35 See Kenneth Hamilton, "Homo Religiosus and Historical Faith," The Journal of
Bible and Religion 33, no. 3 (July 1965): 212, 214-16; and Altizer, Mircea Eliade and
the Dialectic of the Sacred, pp. 84, 86, 88, I61. The following discussion would also
apply to Eliade's point that "from the Christian point of view" it could be said that
modern nonreligion is equivalent to a new or second "fall."

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The Journal of Religion

his claim is not that Mircea Eliade is committed to these diverse themes
of a "fall" but that homo religiosus has entertained such beliefs.
To give but one illustration, Eliade finds that "the paradisiac myths"
all speak of a "paradisiac epoch" in which primordial man enjoyed
freedom, immortality, easy communication with the gods, etc. Unfor-
tunately he lost all of this because of "the fall"-the primordial event
which caused the "rupture" of the sacred and the profane. These
myths help homo religiosus to understand his present "fallen" existence
and express his "nostalgia" for that "prefallen" Paradise.36 If history
is a "fall" for homo religiosus, it is because historical existence is seen as
separated from and inferior to the "transhistorical" (absolute, eternal,
transcendent) realm of the sacred.

IV. Summary

We may now summarize the structure of the process of sacralization

which is revealed to us in the dialectic of hierophanies:
I. There is always the separation of the hierophanic object and the
distinction between the sacred and the profane. From our earlier
analysis we recall that religion exists where the sacred-profane dichot-
omy has been made, and the sacred always entails some sense of
transcendence.

2. This dichotomy is experienced in terms of a certain dialectical

tension: the sacred and the profane coexist in a paradoxical relation-
ship. What is paradoxical is that the sacred, which is transcendent
(wholly other, ultimate, infinite, transhistorical, etc.), limits itself by
incarnating itself in something profane (relative, finite, historical,
natural, etc.). Or, we may express this paradoxical coexistence as
follows: what is profane (finite, natural, etc.), while remaining a
natural thing, at the same time manifests what is sacred (infinite,
transcendent, etc.).
3. Homo religiosus does not simply distinguish the sacred and the
profane, a distinction revealed to him through their paradoxical
coexistence in every hierophany. Implied in the dialectic of the sacred
is an evaluation and a choice. The sacred is experienced as powerful,
ultimate, absolute, meaningful, paradigmatic, normative. It is in terms
of the sacred that man interprets his mode of being in the world and
defines the future possibilities of his existence.

36 Myths, Dreams and Mysteries, pp. 59 ft.

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 Mircea Eliade's Phenomenology
A METHODOLOGICAL DIFFICULTY

Mircea Eliade's attempt to re-create the univers

ess of sacralization seems to involve him in
difficulty, which illustrates what is probably th
of his phenomenological approach. This general
tends that Eliade, while investigating particu
tions, arrives at his universal structures by m
uncritical generalizations; thus he "reads int
data all kinds of "sophisticated" universal stru
It seems to me that underlying most of thes
cisms is the assumption that Eliade proceeds by
inference, not unlike the "classical" formulatio
and other philosophers. Critics submit that th
inductive procedure: they do not find it possib
particular examples to his "profound" universa
experience.
How does Eliade arrive at the universal structure of religious
experience revealed through his analysis of the dialectic of the sacred ?
At the beginning of Patterns in Comparative Religion, he tells us that he
will dispense "from any a priori definition of the religious phenomenon."
He will simply investigate his data in order to see "just what things are
religious in nature and what those things reveal." 37 It would then seem
that Eliade has examined many religious manifestations and has
detected certain common characteristics found in each particular
phenomenon: a sacred-profane dichotomy, a sense of transcendence,
etc.

A characterization of religious experience arrived at in this manner

would be open to modification; Eliade's conception of religion could
change depending upon the nature of the future documents he investi-
gates. It would seem that he might be able to claim varying degrees of
probability for his generalized conclusions.
But Eliade has granted these universal structures of religious ex-
perience a sense of necessity, as if they had some synthetic a priori status.
His generalized conclusions are supposedly dependent upon the nature
of the religious documents he has investigated, but they are not open
to falsification: in the future one could not examine a religious datum
which was without any of these structures.38 It does not seem possible
37 Patterns, pp. xvi, xiv.
38 We may simply note that this is the source of Altizer's major criticism of Eliade.
For Altizer, modern religiosity is defined by its very denial of transcendence. Hence

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The Journal of Religion

for Eliade to grant these structures such a universal necessary status if

they are arrived at by some inductive process of generalization.
We would like to suggest that the phenomenologist of religion does
not grasp his fundamental structures through some "classical" induc-
tive method of generalization. Such a method is not commensurate
with the status he grants his conclusions.
Our suggestion is that if Eliade can formulate universal religious
structures, such as those of the sacred and the profane, sacred space,
sacred time, ascension, initiation, etc., he may grasp such meanings
through a procedure similar to the general (philosophical) phenomeno-
logical method for gaining insight into meaning. The status of Eliade's
structures, which are dependent upon the empirically examined data,
yet universal and not open to change, seems similar to the status of a
phenomenological "essence" as the concept is used by most philo-
sophical phenomenologists. Our suggestion is that Eliade may in fact
grasp religious structures through induction, but this may be a kind of
induction which involves eidetic variation and bears some similarity to
the phenomenological Wesenshau. To pursue this suggestion would take
us far beyond the limits of this study and would entail elucidating many
additional concepts both from Eliade's phenomenology of religion and
from philosophical phenomenology.

he argues that Eliade's analysis of religious experience does justice to archaic but not
to modern religion. Eliade would counter that such modern experiences are either
not religious or do have a religious aura because they reveal a transcendent structure
which is not lived consciously. Much of Eliade's analysis is devoted to deciphering the
transcendent structure which is expressed in the myths, rituals, ideologies, nostalgias,
dreams, fantasies, and other unconscious or imaginary experiences of modern man.

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