Science, Relgion, and the Powers of Observation

Yet another reason why I like to consider the detective genre in light of religion is because of the tremendous paradigm shift it reflects. One of the major shifts in Western consciousness took place during the period known as the "Enlightenment." This period became one of the major watersheds in delineating the ways in which "religion" would be studied, dissected, discussed, and explained. Texts would be analyzed in light of the newly found documents produced by archeology, comparative linguistics, and speculative theory. Eventually, sociological, anthropological, and psychological theories of religion would abound, abundantly dipping into political and economic theories as well. In fact, one way to think of textual interpretation henceforth is to think of it as detective work. And, indeed, Biblical texts have been fine-tooth combed under the magnifying glasses of both lower and higher criticism. The current "Quest for the Historical Jesus", now in full swing for the third time, delights in comparing its participants to detectives in the field, hot on the trail of smoking-gun arguments to clinch the case. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle came right at the cusp of such a paradigm shift engendered by the growing confidence in the powers of empirical observation though still under the sway of the lingering power of the tenacious Semitic sense of justice and the Christian social ethic. As well, there was the growing influx and presence of the ubiquity of Transcendence renewed by the discovery of the powerful, and highly exportable spiritualities of Eastern religions, most notably Hinduism and Buddhism. Given Sir Arthur's theosophical leanings, it should come as no surprise that after Sherlock Holmes' resurrection from a near-death struggle with the systemically evil genius Professor Moriarty, that Holmes finds release from his historically-conditioned, London-based cocaine addiction by a sojourn to Tibet and an extended period of study under the Dalai Lama. (Something to which folk like Richard Gere, Stephen Segal, and a growing number of our contemporaries can no doubt relate.)

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