The article explores the complex relations between a phenomenological and a pragmatist approach to religion. This is done by considering two major conceptions in the history of philosophy of religion: Max Scheler's Vom Ewigen im Menschen and William James' The Varieties of Religious Experience. The study of these two documents proceeds as follows: Based on the important fact that both thinkers follow the common interest to understand religion on its own terms, the line of the argument focuses on the differences in their basic methodical choices and highlights the objective reasons that underlie these choices. It stresses that these differences result from a different account of the character and function of philosophical knowledge. In a last line of thought, the question is raised if one can make a productive use of this contrast.
