The Problem of the Holy/the Sacred in Historiography

Abstract

The article discusses how the category of the holy / the sacred (the central notion of religion) is identified in cultures and how this category is reflected in historiography. For the mentioned purposes the discussion is unfolded in some basic concepts and theories associated with this problem, which are considered to be significant for the further development of the theories on the problem.

As is known, the terms used by different authors in different contexts over the time are covered with various  layers and change in that degree  that it becomes necessary to reconsider them and set boundaries between them.

Nowadays the discussion has been renewed on the concept of the sacred in different scientific centers of the world considering the fact that  religion has not exhausted its nourishing sources in modernity yet.

The article focuses on the questions of how the basic ideas and terms associated with the concept of the sacred are once again understood in religious studies and how significant they are for the social life of humans.