Professional shunning for an outdated methodology embittered a major orientalist.

Evidence

One more episode accounts for the venom with which he wrote against his fellow Jews in his diary. In 1876, he published Mythology Amongst the Hebrews. Because he applied to the Bible what was already the outmoded solar mythology theory of Max Müller—namely, that all Aryan myths were stories about natural phenomena—Goldziher’s work was harshly criticized by professional scholars. In addition, among the Jews of Budapest, employing such a methodology to sacred Scripture was seen as blasphemous. As a result, when the Rabbinical Seminary of Budapest opened in 1877, much to his bitter disappointment, Goldziher was shunned, and not invited to join the faculty. — Ivan Davidson Kalmar, Derek Penslar, Orientalism and the Jews, 404

Categorization

• XREF: Goldziher’s solar mythology application parallels how scholars penalize those who apply a field’s once-reputable methods past their sell-by date.