Reframing the Religious Studies/Religious Practice Binary in the Academic Study of Religion: Insights from Baha'i Thought and Practice

The purpose of this paper is to examine religious studies’ constitutive theoretical dichotomy between social scientific study and religious practice from a Baha’i perspective and propose possible paths towards its reframing. Specifically, I argue that the prevailing preoccupation with the boundary between religious studies and practice stems from a contingent conception of religion inherited from the epistemic categories of modern secularism. The questions we ask of an object of study and the approaches we employ to answer them are rooted in what we think that object is. This paper offers an analysis then of the theoretical and methodological implications of a Baha’i conception of religion. In particular, I discuss how the Baha’i concept of religion as a system of knowledge and practice, analogous in some ways with science, invites distinct questions about religious actors and phenomena, as well as distinct methodological approaches to answering them.