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This chapter examines the renderings of religion and dance which van der Leeuw generates through his own practice of understanding. From his perspective, phenomena that appear as “religion” appear as expressions of “power” or “holiness”, while phenomena that appear as “dance” appear as impressions and expressions of “beauty” through movement. With these perceptions, van der Leeuw sets the stage for identifying coincidences of religion and dance in the historical record as conveyed by historians of religion and evaluated by theologians. It asks under what conditions does a phenomenon conduct at once an experience recognized as both “dance” and “religion”.

This chapter presents van der Leeuw's braided methodological approach to the study of religion as one that casts a role for theology in the study of religion. It advocates incorporating theology as a critical, contested voice in the project of understanding religion. In his fluid and dynamic model, the disciplines of theology, phenomenology, and history of religions appear as distinct yet interdependent projects. They check and balance, compel and constrain, fund and correct one another. In the process, the relationships among the disciplines enact a dynamic, dialectical relationship between reason and experience that preserves moments of affirmation and critique as comprising a paradox which is generative of “religion”.

This chapter focuses on the first of five “structural relations” or conceptual nets van der Leeuw employs in order to capture coincidences of religion and dance. Here, dance appears as religion in so far as dance appears to enact the “unity of life.” The discussion explores the numerous paradoxes or rhythms nested in this claim along two axes: dance as body and dance as culture.

This chapter examines four other appearances of dance and religion van der Leeuw identifies: transition, antithesis, influences, and harmony. It assesses their implications for scholars in religious studies. In identifying these structural relations, van der Leeuw rejects the idea that a unity of religion and dance is ever possible, in practice or in theory. He animates the differences among the various structural relations in order to argue that there is no moment of recognizing a phenomenon as either dance or religion in which that recognition does not presuppose both the inevitability and the incomprehensibility of their simultaneous appearance.

This article examines the life and works of Joachim Wach (1898–1955) during his career in Germany (1922–35). Aspects examined include his homosocial participation in youth movements (Jugendbewegung) and in the Stefan George Circle, the development of his conceptions of the Master, interpretation (Verstehen), and the science of religion (Religionswissenschaft), and his personal relationships with members of the so-called Conservative Revolution. These aspects are examined in an effort to illuminate the strengths and weaknesses of his thought in its American versions, especially during his time at the University of Chicago (1945–55). His flight from Nazi Germany, his self-understanding of his own Jewish ancestry and of his Mendelssohn heritage, and his establishment of an Americanized history of religions are also applied toward an integrated interpretation of his life and works.

This chapter presents a conclusion to Part 2 of this book. By approaching coincidences of religion and dance through his mediating phenomenological practice, van der Leeuw is able to comprehend the apparent antithesis of dance and religion embedded in the study of religion as a function of a “structural” or “comprehensible” association connecting those phenomena that appear as “dance” and those appearing as “religion.” In the process, he resists both the theological bias against dance fuelled by a lingering Protestant paradigm, and the anti-theological ignorance of dance as a nonverbal and naive medium of religious life. His work suggests that writing and dancing are interdependent modes of knowledge, equally implicated in the study of religion. Through these expositions, the value of van der Leeuw's method for the contemporary study of religion appears.

This chapter discusses why attention to dance as an expression of religion is important for scholars of religion, and what implications such attention may have on the evolution of theory and method. Where the perception of dance as an adversary of religion may have facilitated the formation of the field, the continuing vitality and relevance of the study of religion requires attention to the concept as dance as religion. In this process, dance is both a phenomenon to consider and a resource in the development of theory and methods capable of attending to it. The chapter concludes with an agenda for future projects in the philosophy of religion and dance.

The previous chapters enable a reader to see how violence, the demonic, language, and forms of play are all intertwined with power and contribute to a broader understanding of the nature of power and asceticism. This final chapter begins with a review of four scholarly theories of power, which are subjected to a pragmatic test as a prelude to offering an alternative way to look at the nature of power by performing a thought experiment. It is argued that power is an elusive, diverse, and ubiquitous phenomenon that is uncanny, making it difficult to define. It is also argued that power needs to be grasped within the context of its numerous associations with phenomena such as violence, the demonic, language, and playful elements such as eroticism, the comic, and miracles.

This chapter situates H.D.’s friendship with Silvia Dobson, who shared her passion for astrology. Dobson had a romantic interest in H.D., who flirted, only to reject her. Rescuing analysts driven from Berlin made it logical for Bryher to finance troubled friends in analysis in London; Dobson was the first victim. Demeter-like, Bryher created Trenoweth Farms in Cornwall with her friend Doris Banfield for roots, bulbs, vegetables, while warning that the Nazis inched toward Austria. H.D. wrote a tortured portrait of herself in Nights. Coping with Sir John’s death and hearing of the airplane crash of the man whom she had regularly passed in Freud’s waiting room, H.D. returned to Freud, who thought she might carry on this patient’s quest. J. J. van der Leeuw, a pilot and scholar, had sought to bridge science and mysticism. During this course of analysis, H.D. had a major breakthrough, understanding herself as the “perfect-bi.”

This chapter examines how sacred space is socially constructed in an urban context in different types of buildings from historic churches to former commercial buildings adapted for religious purposes. “Sacralization” is a social process in which a physical space becomes sacred (inviolable) and a vehicle for spiritual transcendence. This process occurs both within a faith community and in correspondence with context. Two congregations from very different traditions on one intersection are described as they have created sacred space in a former ironworks store and funeral home.