Formulation of the Claim
The social sciences reveal some of the dark areas in the history of societies, but they remain limited before obscure parts of this history.
Explanation
Arkoun holds that the tools of social and human analysis illuminate aspects of the history of groups, but do not encompass it in its entirety. They help in understanding some structures and representations, without making history fully exposed.
This limitation appears especially when the matter concerns the formation of knowledge and belief, since social analysis alone is not sufficient to explain what remains obscure or resistant to complete comprehension.
Its Place in the Book’s Argument
This atom falls within Arkoun’s critique of modern knowledge’s confidence in its ability to assimilate religious and cultural history completely. It approaches other places in the book that stress that the study of Islam requires more than one tool, and that some fields, however precise they may be, reveal only part of the scene.
Limits of the Claim
This claim does not mean rejecting the social sciences or diminishing their value; rather, it only defines their domain and limits in reading history. Nor does it turn their limitation into absolute incapacity, or claim that a single alternative is sufficient on its own to fill this gap.
Brief Evidence
The text raises the limitedness of historical psychology and cultural anthropology, and makes this shortcoming an entry point for understanding what remains obscure in the history of groups.