Religious phenomena, such as prayer, have more or less always interested and engaged people, but most likely for different purposes. Since the early 20th century, starting notably with Edmund Husserl and especially Martin Heidegger, phenomenologists have taken an interest in understanding and expounding the meaning of religious phenomena. The attention of such a discourse have not ceased but is rather current, and also of importance seeing that religious themes, such as prayer, still occupy a great extent of human life and practice.Phenomenology of religion is not a science of religion: the former approaches religion in terms of its meaningfulness, whereas the latter as an object of inquiry and in the same manner as an economist approaches economical indicators in order to understand and explain how the whole economy functions. In other words, phenomenology of religion expounds religion, as it were, from within, while science of religion does it from without or externally.When approaching prayer phenomenologically, it shows itself to be a process or structure through which the one praying empty himself in order to be able to receive the valuable presence of the other. The value that is received from the other will also be reflected by the one praying and in that sense effect his surroundings and fellow humans..

Denna uppsats är en studie i divination som användes i fornnordisk, samisk, irländsk-keltisk, grekisk och romersk religion. Syftet med uppsatsen har varit att undersöka om det finns något som kan sägas vara typiskt inom den fornnordiska divinationsformen. De teman jag koncentrerat mig på för att besvara dessa frågor är status, roll, genus, metod och plats. De metoder jag använt mig av är deskriptiv och komparativ litteraturstudie. Dessutom tillämpas hermeneutisk metod.

This essay is a work on Mircea Eliades's interpretation of the religious human understood as "homo religiosus" and the role of the shaman from the Eliade perspective. In Eliade human existence consists of a dichotomy between the sacred and the profane. The question is whether one can understand the concept of Eliades ?axis mundi?, center of the universe? Can we create an understanding of human existence with Eliade? Can one use  phenomenology of religion as perspective for the exploration of ?reality?? Furthermore, this paper aims to understand the role of the shaman has religious worldviews. Shamaism  is through an ecstatic technique traveling to other cosmic plane, in order to gain knowledge that would otherwise not be reached.