Abstract

Working with a definition of religion as the acknowledgement of a pervasive, authoritative reality through a self-constituting practice, I establish that Socrates, Spinoza and Dewey were religious in their practice of philosophy. ;In the first chapter I elucidate our intuition that philosophy and religion are conceptually distinct. I also specify a working definition of religion. In the central three chapters I set forth the philosophies of Socrates, Spinoza and Dewey, showing in what way they were religious. Socrates served his good god through dialectic. In this way he assisted the gods in their efforts to preserve the city-state of Athens. Spinoza's religion was a rational pantheism which was required by his understanding of Deus sive Natura. John Dewey's holistic philosophy was a quest for wholeness that shaped his life and thought. In the final chapter I identify the concept of philosophy-as-religion, devoting special attention to Dewey, who is the most problematic of the three. I also return to my working definition of religion, providing additional argumentation for its validity as an interpretative tool