Robin Horton and J. D. Y. Peel on Religious Syncretism

Replying to Ifeka-Moller's criticism, both Robin Horton and J. D. Y. Peel point out, at the root of Ifeka-Moller’s muddles, she “is the misleading antithesis between ‘social-structural’ and ‘intellectualist’ approaches, which vitiated her analysis in both directions. Moreover, they assert that her social-structural approach was in error, because it “is the direct result of failure to take serious account of the intellectual basis of the institution concerned.”  Like Ifeka-Moller who questions intellectualist theory without hesitation, both Horton and Peel defend their arguments and actively respond to their criticism.                     

It is hard to say which approach is much better. However, it is undeniable a fact that both social structural and intellectualist theories could help us renew our understandings of religious change. The social structural approach pays more attention to the structural factors and its impact on people’s inner minds, while the intellectualist approach focuses on the internal factors and its influences in shaping people’s religious proselytization. It seems that Ifeka-Moller overestimates the incompatibilities of these two methods and underestimates their compatibilities in helping us to explain religious conversion. While in fact, there is no need to put them in an antithesis relationship with each other.