Plutarch in the Sorbonne : Biographical discourse and collective work in religious studies. Critical notes

The republication of the obituaries devoted to the scholars of the IVth and Vth sections of the Ecole pratique des hautes etudes is the occasion for an investigation on the practices of eulogy in the field of religious sciences in France. It examines the limits set to the narrative of a scholarly life and the "utterable" character of extra-scientific experiences. Thanks to the publication of the correspondence between Mauss and Hubert, the question of the role played by the Durkheimians in the Parisian academic world can be asked anew does their acerbic criticism of positivist scholars have any significance other than rhetorical ? Finally, the summa published for the fiftieth anniversary of the "Laboratoire d'etudes sur les monotheismes" allows us to consider the origins of the contemporary structuring of religious research and its possible reunion with the spirit cultivated by the common father of the field : Renan.