A Study On Religious Thoughts Of Rodney Stark

Rodney Stark is a famous contemporary scholar of the sociology of religion in America and one of the most prolific authors in the field of religious studies.Chinese researches on stark mainly focus on the Rational Choice Theory and the study of religious economy,but there are few researches on the main structure of his view,construction method of his theory and influence of his religious thoughts.This research analyzes and inspects Stark's life,publications,papers and the domestic and foreign research literature,starting from the basic concept,analysis model,theory construction method and other elements,in order to This make a detailed and clear study of the sociology and history of religion in Stark.Further more,the author discusses the influence of Stark's thoughts on the academia.The main issue of Stark's sociology of religion research is religious market theory.The microcosmic foundation of this theory is the theory is Rational Choice Theory,Stark's thought of rational choice originates from Smith's rational man hypothesis,Homans'rational proposition and Coleman's rational choice thoughts.The core concept of Stark's exchange theory of religious behavior is the Compensators.The nature of the compensator gives space for the rational choice of religion and is used to define the concept of religion.From the perspective of medium-level,Stark studies religious commitment,and on the basis of Iannaccone's Religious Human Capital Theory,discusses how social capital constituted by interpersonal attachment affects reaffiliation and conversion.In addition,a dynamic model of the religious organizations was constructed in a pioneering way,and the dynamic process of the transition from sect to church was explained by the research on the relationship between the tension and religious commitment.At the macroscopic level,the religious economy consists of all religious activities in the society,including the believer market,religious organizations and religious culture.In the religious economic model,the supply side is the driving force of change,the demand side is the foundation,and the general background is the relatively stable niches in the society.The key of the model is the interaction between religious organizations and market niches within different state control conditions.The unregulated religious economy tends to be pluralistic,while the emergence of monopolized religious economy is more dependent on national forces.From the perspective of theoretical construction.Stark started from the breaking of the old theory,using the writing method logically,the author has completed the huge theoretical system of micro-middle-macro and combined sociological concepts and theories with economic hypotheses and models to explain religious phenomena.Stark also achieved great achievements in the field of religious history research.His thoughts on religious history research are mainly reflected in the form of methodology,that is,using historical data for research,applying sociological research methods and theories in the study of religious history,and reconstructing and interpreting history with the model of social science.Works represented by The Rise Of Christianity are important cases of his research method of scientific abstraction and historical reconstruction.In the study of conversion in the early history of Christianity,Stark proposed that the core factor of conversion was emotional attachment.The successful conversion movement is based on the organization of social networks and the social framework built by intimate relationships.In the early Christian class foundation research,Stark believed that the dominant group of Christians was the people with higher status in big cities,and Jewish Christians played an important role in the rise and persistence of Christianity.From the perspective of social environment,the plague,poverty and social environment of the Roman Empire caused the end of paganism,which was the social condition for the rise of Christianity.From the perspective of gender structure,the gender advantages enjoyed by early Christian women could easily be converted into advantages in the family and religious subculture,and the high degree of commitment provided extremely superior conditions for the spread of Christianity among families.From the perspective of social network,the exclusive mode,high-tension structure,valuable return and social network relationship of Christian groups make Christianity occupy a very favorable position in the market competition.At the same time,what stark emphasizes most is that christians perfectly practiced the doctrine of mutual love in the social environment at that time.The core doctrine of Christianity stimulated and maintained attractive,liberating and efficient social relations and organizations,which is the most important reason for the rise of Christianity.Last part combed the theory's inheritance,criticism and development.elaborated the main influence of religious studies such as the effects of contemporary Christian religious thought research field and perspective,set off an empirical study of contemporary religious social phenomenon boom and opens the way for subsequent theory,the transformation of the paradigm of religious sociology research,has opened up a new possible and religious research methods on the new way.Then it also points out that the core of the main controversies and doubts in Stark's religious thoughts are the concept of rationality,the guidance of valuing secularism rather than spirituality,the negative influence of pluralism on religious participation,and the applicability of the theories in the study of non-christian areas and non-christian issues.