Daniel Gittelman- Hermeneutics (The Phenomenology of Prayer)

In The Phenomenology of Prayer: Heidegger and the Prospect of a Phenomenology of Prayer, Benjamin Crowe discusses Heidegger’s ideas about Hermeneutics, the methodology of interpreting religious texts, in relation to religion and prayer. 


Crowe outlines five main lessons about the principles of a hermeneutics of religion by using Heidegger’s theories. I believe that the most crucial lesson to expressing the strategy that Crowe states is “(5) the task, then, is to “explicate” this sense in a way that does justice to its context, a task that ultimately amounts to finding the meaning of religion in life” (125).


This strategy is very useful when realizing why religion and religious text are meaningful to people’s lives. Specifically relating this to hikers in the wilderness, we recognize this when Dr. Kip Redick states in “The Connection between Liminal Places and Hospitality in Manifesting Pilgrim Values and Identity” that “the wilderness not only provides the space/place of receiving God’s commandment, but the liminality through which the people of God find their responsibility one to another” (15). Utilizing this lesson, we recognize that some of the wilderness hikers find religious meaning in life because listening to God also helps them ‘find their responsibility to one another’. This responsibility can provide meaning to life because it provides a sense of being a part of something bigger than ourselves.

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