Abstract

Joas revisits certain moments in the reception of his work, specifies the overall project to which The Power of the Sacred belongs - conceived as the first part of a triptych - and regrets that the live discussion could not take place due to the pandemic. He agrees with the overall perspective and the content of what Tétaz puts forward in the introduction to the dossier. He expresses his interest in Gonzalez's text, while stressing that what Gonzalez points out is not, for him, a central issue. At the same time, he specifies that his field of work is historical sociology - or a historiography of religions informed by sociology - which is also, as such, an empirical research, and returns to the Royce and Durkheim comparison to mark some inflections to what Gonzalez writes. Joas then turns to Gisel's contribution, underlining the part of misunderstandings, but also the part of real differences, while reaffirming his objective: to put forward a history of moral universalism. Joas goes on to comment on Scholl's text, regretting that the author treats “disenchantment” and “secularization” in the same way, which are, for him, two clearly distinct fields of phenomena. As for Scholl's thesis - that secularisation has also been implemented by religious actors - Joas approves of it, especially as he has defended it elsewhere. Finally, Joas addresses Ullern's text, while emphasizing what the author called "not reading", which, in turn, makes a confrontation on the substance fail.