The Paradoxes of the Spiritual Self: Disidentification as a Marker of Identity.
This study examines how practitioners of self‐spirituality conceptualize their spiritual identity. On the basis of 62 in‐depth interviews with secular Jewish Israelis engaged in various spiritual practices, we find that spiritual identity is constructed through a distinctive cultural logic we term d...
| Published in: | Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion (John Wiley & Sons, Inc.) Vol. 65; no. 2; pp. 427 - 439 |
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| Main Authors: | , |
| Format: | Article |
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John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Jun2026
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| Online Access: | View this record in EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=hlh&AN=194610098&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: hlh uiTerm: 194610098 longDbName: Humanities International Complete uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: jinfo: jid: 00218294 NRNN jtl: Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion (John Wiley & Sons, Inc.) issn: 00218294 maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: Jun2026 vid: 65 iid: 2 pid: 52269 pub: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. artinfo: ui: 194610098 10.1111/jssr.70050 ppf: 427 ppct: 12 formats: fmt: – @attributes: type: T – @attributes: type: P size: 432KB tig: atl: The Paradoxes of the Spiritual Self: Disidentification as a Marker of Identity. aug: au: Zaidman, Nurit Pagis, Michal affil: Department of Business Administration, Guilford Glazer Faculty of Business & Management, Ben‐Gurion University of the Negev, Beer‐Sheva, Israel Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Bar‐Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel su: Spirituality Identity (Psychology) Religious identity Social alienation Israeli Jews Group identity sug: subj: Spirituality Identity (Psychology) Religious identity Social alienation Israeli Jews Group identity keyword: fluidity identity Israel late modernity self spirituality ab: This study examines how practitioners of self‐spirituality conceptualize their spiritual identity. On the basis of 62 in‐depth interviews with secular Jewish Israelis engaged in various spiritual practices, we find that spiritual identity is constructed through a distinctive cultural logic we term disidentification—a systematic resistance to conventional markers of identity. Although participants affirm spirituality as central to "who I am," they simultaneously reject understandings of identity as stable, coherent, socially anchored, constant, or distinctive. Each dimension involves a paradox: Practitioners find stability in commitment to remain unstable, achieve constancy through embracing intermittence, and construct coherent self‐narratives around the refusal of coherence. We show how disidentification intersects with other salient identities, and how its paradoxical structure provides practical resources for navigating between spiritual aspirations and social demands. Contributing to debates on spiritual fluidity versus coherence, we demonstrate that fluidity itself constitutes the shared cultural logic of spiritual identity. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: Article src: R language: English refInfo: copyright: @attributes: flag: Y custom: Copyright of Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion (John Wiley & Sons, Inc.) is the property of John Wiley & Sons, Inc. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites without the copyright holder's express written permission. Additionally, content may not be used with any artificial intelligence tools or machine learning technologies. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. item: Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion (John Wiley & Sons, Inc.) holder: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. dt: @attributes: year: 2026 holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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