Formulation of the Claim
Religious authorities help tip the balance in favor of the dominant doctrinal position and consolidate it.
Explanation
Arkoun links the rise of the doctrinal majority to the support it receives from religious authority. The dominant position does not emerge as the result of a purely epistemic debate, but because it finds institutional backing that reinforces its presence.
This backing has the effect of weakening minority positions and readings, not necessarily because they are refuted, but because the public sphere tends toward what authority endorses. Thus, doctrinal dominance appears as part of a historical and social structure rather than as an expression of an abstract inner superiority.
Its Place in the Book’s Argument
This atom falls within Arkoun’s critique of the mechanisms by which religious discourse is formed and hegemonic, where prevailing thought is not understood as natural or neutral, but as bound up with relations of power and institutions. It also aligns with the book’s theses that trace how doctrinal choice becomes a dominant position when authority supports it, thereby narrowing the space for plurality and independent reasoning.
Limits of the Claim
This atom should not be taken as a blanket judgment on all forms of religiosity or all religious authorities across all periods; it describes a relationship of support and consolidation for the dominant position within a specific context, not a fixed law governing every experience.