. 2002, PG 132) This is the primary reason why Durkheim studied religion in a mechanical society, of Australian Aborigine's, because all members's of the Aboriginal tribe would have had similar views on religion and of the world in general, with few differences between individuals.
             Durkheim claims that religious world is divided into two parts the profane and the sacred. The sacred is what the socio-religious community would worship or praise in some way, the profane items that are non-religious. As Durkheim writes in the Elementary Forms of Religious Life (published in 1912) the sacred can be anything "By sacred things one must not understand simply those things which are called God's or spirits; a rock, a tree, a spring, a pebble, a piece of wood, a house, in a word anything can be sacred."(Cited in cited in Haralambos & Holborn PG 432) For Durkheim it's not the actual material object that is sacred but the spiritual value put on it by the socio-religious community
             Aborigines would believe in what Durkheim classes as Totemism or a primitive religion, this is a major flaw on Durkheim's part as there is no simple religion, reducing an individual's faith or indeed that of an entire creed, into a few social functions and not taking into account spirituality, and thus is reducing the complexity of religion to suit his own hypothesis. Durkheim, was not interested in the spiritual side of Totemism of the Aboriginal people, he viewed that religion serves a function of social cohesiveness, bringing people together. This can still be viewed today, when after a Catholic ceremony on a Sunday, members of the congregation meet outside the church fo
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