Reconstructing Eliade

Bryan S. Rennie is Assistant Professor in the Department of Religion and Philosophy at Westminster College.

"This is one of the very best overall defences of Eliade's ideas I have read. The outstanding scholarly value of this work is that Rennie has very well done for Eliade what the latter did not, or could not, do. Rennie 's treatment of the so-called 'Hidden Theological Agenda' and the 'Ontological Assumptions' of Eliade are of crucial significance to the distinction of this work among others. A ll this is especially important in light of what has seemed a parade of would-be jack-the-giant-killers over the past two decades. The author has not only shown Eliade to be hard to dismiss among the great thinkers of the age on the subject of religion. Rennie has also practically transformed 'the Eliade problem' into 'the Eliade prospect'." — Wendell Charles Beane, University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh

• Foreword by Mac Linscott RickettsAcknowledgments Part One. The Implicit Meaning of Religion Introduction 1. Hierophany 2. The Sacred 3. The Dialectic of the Sacred and the Profane 4. The Coincidentia Oppositorum 5. Homo Religiosus 6. Symbols and Symbolism 7. Myths and Mythology 8. Illud Tempus —Time by Any Other Name 9. History and the Historical 10. Some Initial Conclusions Part Two. Previous and Potential Criticisms Introduction 11. Relativism 12. The Retreat to Commitment 13. Eliade's Political Involvement 14. Scholarly Criticism of Eliade 15. Some More Specific Criticisms Part Three. Beyond Eliade Introduction 16. The Religious Creativity of Modern Humanity 17. Archaic, Modern, Postmodern 18. Some Final Conclusions Bibliography Author Index Subject Index