Hello to all

[pocaracas]

Welcome aboard caveman.
Picking up on that definition of theology, how much of it do you suppose overlaps with sociology?

Thanks, pocaracas. Interesting question. Thanks for asking.

Not being either a theologian or a sociologist, I’d be hard pressed to say how the practice of the fields overlap. Are you very experienced in either of these fields?

However, I can give you my layman’s perspective with very little research into the question (isn’t that the best way to be discussing these questions? :-) I’m open to correction (with evidence) on anything I say that is incorrect.

I would say that there could be some overlap between the two, but if one stays true to the fields, then probably not much. They might look at the same thing, e.g. how we worship God, but from different perspectives.

It does seem that since the 19th century, people have been trying to reduce theology to a subset of sociology. This fits with the other ways that skeptics have tried to reduce religion, Scripture, etc. to a mere human endeavor, rather than a gift from God.

On the other hand, even if the overlap is, in my thinking, minimal, we can see a clear connection and complementarity between the two such as the different perspectives on some things mentioned earlier.

I think also of the two greatest commandments in the OT, love of God (leading to theology) and love of neighbor (leading to sociology). I’m not saying that the OT was intended as a scientific study. Obviously not. However, the connection between these two commands does show a connection between the fields.

I think the Bible itself is a connection, as well. If we consider that the Nature of God is revealed to us, in large part, in the Bible, and that the Bible is about people, the growth and structure of their society (again, obviously not in a systematic way for either), then there could be some interesting ways to think about the overlap between the two with respect to the Bible as a resource.

Those are my initial thoughts. We can break each field down, if you’d like, and see where possible overlaps, contrasts and complementarities might occur. I suppose that would be in a separate thread. Can I start threads yet? I'll have to see.

Have a great day,

SimpleCaveman

Awesome!
We might be going a bit off from the purpose of an intro thread, but I really like your answer, so I hope the mods/admins will forgive me.

Personally, I think that society somehow birthed religion, so the reduction of Theology to a subset of sociology kinda makes sense. If you think back to a time when mankind was living in small communities/tribes, with lots of oral tradition, it makes sense that some stories would evolve in the shared imaginarium into something akin to lore, or legend, where the distinction between reality and fantasy is very blurry, where unexplainable phenomena would be seen as paranormal, where death of loved ones would be wished to be a simple passing to another realm, the realm of that paranormal.

Of course, those being societies with no writing means that we have no real way to verify this hypothesis, so it must remain in the realm of possibilities.
I see the bible as a late comer, but one that gained a lot of influence.


Perhaps we should continue this in a new thread?