university education existed neither during the period of
Communist rule nor prior to that time. It was only after
1990 that the scientific study of religion began to develop
in a dynamic fashion. In Hungary, there are three colleges
for religious studies: at the Catholic College in Vác, at the
University of Pécs, and at the University of Szeged, which
emerged as the center of Hungarian religious studies. The
Romanian Society for the History of Religion (RAHR) is a
member of the IAHR. The situation is also similar in Rus-
sia—although here the circumstances are in part unclear—
and in the former Soviet Union satellite states of Lithuania,
Estonia, Latvia, and the Ukraine, though swift academic ad-
vances occurred during the post-1989 era.
Professional journals in the field of religious studies are
published in almost all Eastern European countries. The
most traditional of these periodicals is the Polish publication
Euhemer. Przegla ̨d Religionznawczy (Euhemer. Representa-
tion of the scientific study of religion), which was founded
in 1957 and since 1991 has appeared under the title Przegla ̨d
Religionznawczy (Representation of the scientific study of re-
ligion). In 1991, the specialist publishing house NOMOS
was established in Krakow, Poland, to issue technical litera-
ture in the field of religious studies. The leading Czech jour-
nal is Religio. Revue pro religionistiku (Journal for the scientif-
ic study of religion), founded in 1939; it serves as the central
organ of the Czech Society for the Scientific Study of Reli-
gion, which is headquartered in Brno. At Masaryk University
in the same city, the periodical Religionswissenschaft (Reli-
gious Studies) is also published, which brings together the
most important religious-scientific works from both domes-
tic and foreign contributors. After the break-up of the former
Czechoslovakia into two independent states in 1993, the Slo-
vak Society for Religion Research—publisher of the periodi-
cal Hieron—became an independent entity. At the Universi-
ty of Szeged in Hungary, the journal Vallástudományi
periodika (Religious-Scientific Periodical) is available in an
online version (http://www.vallastudomany.hu/liminalitas/
index.php).
PERSPECTIVES. Religious-scientific cooperation in the east-
ern European countries—as in the whole of Europe—is
hampered by enormous linguistic and cultural differences. It
seems unlikely that a supra-national Eastern European reli-
gious-scientific organization could come into existence, and
the individual representatives of religious studies in the for-
mer Eastern bloc countries show no initiative in this direc-
tion. The IAHR and the European Association for the Study
of Religions (EASR) serve as the common foundation for co-
operation. The same diversity prevails in a thematic sense.
Over the course of time, the political differences that caused
academic progress in Eastern Europe to lag were remedied.
The research focuses on the history of religion, new religious
movements in Europe, enculturation of non-European reli-
gions in Europe, which include Buddhism, Islam, Asian reli-
gions, and new religious phenomena.
The significance attached to the theory of religious
studies is also constantly increasing; its identity problems,
which have to do with the deficient methodological equip-
ment; deductive procedures; object and meta-theory; princi-
ples of epistemological formalization; the logic of linguistic
means of expression, particularly in religious-scientific defi-
nition procedures; criteria-formation in the realm of the se-
mantic completeness of religious-scientific concepts; possi-
bilities for the creation of disciplinary, fundamental, and
practice-oriented religious-scientific axiomatics.
The question “What is the scientific study of religion?”
is pursued with the same seriousness as is the question “What
is religion?” Furthermore, the more recent history of West-
ern religious studies is being absorbed, and instruction con-
cerning methodological difficulties—and their possible reso-
lution—is being sought within it. It is possible to conclude
that there is no longer any significant difference between Eu-
ropean religious studies in the eastern and western halves of
the continent, or in any case that if differences do remain
they are few in number. This is true as regards topics and
the dynamics of development, as well as social resonance.
Few seem cognizant of these facts, however. For example, in
the most recent and modern introduction to religious
studies, written by Hans G. Kippenberg and Kocku von
Stuckrad (Munich 2003), not a single word is devoted to
Eastern European religious studies.SEE ALSO Comparative Religion; Marxism; Politics and Re-
ligion, article on Politics and Christianity; Positivism.BIBLIOGRAPHY
Bronk, Andrzej. Nauka wobec religii. Lublin, Poland, 1996. Sum-
marizes the theoretical foundations of conceptions of religion
in the history of religious studies; focuses on the epistemo-
logical foundations of religiology.
Dolezˇalová, Iva, Luther H. Martin, and Dalibor Papouˇsek, eds.,
The Academic Study of Religion During the Cold War: East and
West. New York, 2001. Conference book from the conven-
tion of the same name; contains important contributions
made to the field of religious studies in Eastern Europe dur-
ing the period 1948–1990, together with some new perspec-
tives that emerged after 1990.
Horyna, Bˇretislav. Úvod do religionistiky. Prague, 1994. The stan-
dard work on religious studies in the Czech Republic, with
an overview of the theories of religion, of the scientific study
of religion, of methodologies, and of technical history.
Horyna, Bˇretislav, and Helena Pavlincová. Dˇejiny religionistiky.
Antologie. Olomouc, Czech Republic, 2001. Anthology of
the most important among contemporary religious-scientific
contributions across all of Europe, including an analysis of
the methodological foundations of individual researchers.
Serves as the East European parallel to Waardenburg’s and
Whaling’s Approaches.
BRETISLAV HORYNA (2005)STUDY OF RELIGION: THE ACADEMIC STUDY
OF RELIGION IN JAPAN
The study of religion in Japan is probably best known to
Western people for D. T. Suzuki and the Kyoto School.STUDY OF RELIGION: THE ACADEMIC STUDY OF RELIGION IN JAPAN 8775