Introduction: Philosophy of Religion Goes to Court

Abstract

The introduction attempts to demonstrate that philosophers do have a distinctive contribution to make to the study of the role of religious symbols in the law of human rights. Court judgments often explicitly or implicitly make significant assertions concerning the role of religious symbols, for example that religious symbols exist merely to express antecedent religious beliefs. These assertions are properly philosophical rather than legal, and therefore should be subjected to philosophical scrutiny. Philosophers have the necessary training and knowledge of the discussion of assertions like these in order properly to evaluate them.