Abstract

The history of religions is grounded in a hermeneutic situation, an interpretative framework that establishes possibilities of creative analysis. The situation of historians of religions often fails to permit an alien world of meaning to retain its integrity because the scholars' ultimate values are threatened. Methodological solipsism - the requirement that descriptions rest on the researcher's own observations - is common. Otto, van der Leeuw, Eliade, and Zaehner are examples of men whose conclusions are too clearly functions of what they assume to be limits of understanding; ultimacy situates scholarship and determines it