犹太人的宗教选择:“宗教市场论”的视角

Religious Choices of Jews:Perspective of “Theory of Religious Market”

一般认为犹太民族历尽磨难而始终能够实现新的发展,得益于其坚定的犹太教信仰,但是犹太历史上不同处境下确实客观存在一些犹太人被迫或主动改教、改宗的行为。运用"宗教市场论"这一宗教社会学理论可以对这种现象给出合理解释。通过对犹太教历史相关史实的分析,揭示出社会资本与宗教资本之间存在一种张力,而且这种张力表现为此消彼长的关系,并贯穿于犹太人进行宗教选择的整个过程。犹太人正是基于对这种张力的消长判断,来做出"理性"的宗教选择。相较之下,传统犹太教更为看重宗教资本,而近代以来的犹太人则偏向社会资本。纠结于二者之间的现代犹太人往往选择折中处理,从而推动了保守派犹太教的发展。

It is generally believed that thanks to its strong Jewish faith, the Jewish nation has gone through many hardships and been able to achieve new developments. However, in Jewish history, some Jews were forced or actively proselytized under different circumstances. The religious sociological terminology of ＂ Theory of Religious Market＂ may give a reasonable explanation for this phenomenon. By analyzing the relevant facts through the Jewish history, we can reveal the presence of a tension between social capital and religious capital. This tension manifested as reciprocal relationship and went throughout the entire selection of religions by Jews. Jews made ＂rational＂ religious choices just based on the judgment of this ebb-and-flow tension relationship. In contrast, the traditional Judaism valued more religious capital, while the Jews in modern times biased the social one. Tangled between the two, the modern Jews often choose the middle way, promoting the development of conservative Judaism.