Faith and Existential Security: Making Deuteronomy 8 Respond to a Current Sociological Theory

Abstract

Pippa Norris and Ronald Inglehart, two well-known and influential sociologists, suggest that there is an inverse relationship between religiosity and existential security. The higher existential security a society can offer, the less likely its members will be religious. This Norris–Inglehart theory has been fiercely criticized by other sociologists. Many claim that it presupposes an impoverished picture of what religion does because it suggests that religion is only a crutch for the vulnerable. The aim of this essay is to offer a biblical reflection on the Norris–Inglehart secularization theory. Although many biblical passages address the relationship between faith and existential security, in this article I concentrate only on Deuteronomy 8. I find that this biblical passage can be taken as affirming many observations of Norris and Inglehart. However, the text’s interpretations of these observations are sometimes markedly different from that of Norris and Inglehart.