© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���4 | doi 10.1163/15700682-12341266 Method and Theory in the Study of Religion �6 (�0 �4) ��-43 brill.com/mtsr METHOD THEORY in the STUDY OF RELIGION & The Unanswered Question: Music and Theory of Religion Christopher I. Lehrich Department of Religion, College of Arts and Sciences Boston University 145 Bay State Road, Boston, MA 02215, USA clehrich@bu.edu Abstract Several of the great “founding fathers” of theory of religion discerned a deep connec- tion between religion and music, particularly Western “classical” music. Our relatively recent acceptance that “religion” as universal category was an early modern European invention should prompt suspicion that this connection is historically specific. Yet while scholars in many disciplines have recognized the importance of music in Western imagination, modern scholars of religion have largely ignored it. This article surveys three important discussions of music and religion, in Rudolf Otto, Johan Huizinga, and Max Weber, to provide groundwork for rethinking an important, unanswered ques- tion. In conclusion, some preliminary remarks are made about reconstituting this question in contemporary theory, using a brief discussion of Igor Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring to suggest the potential value of treating Western music as a discourse of imagining religion. Keywords music – Otto – Huizinga – Weber – Stravinsky … Perhaps this is the way of all outdatedness. It is to be explained not only by mere temporal distance, but by the verdict of history. Its expression in things is the shame that overcomes the descendant in face of an earlier possibility that he has neglected to bring to fruition. Theodor W. Adorno, Minima Moralia