Deep History, Secular Theory

Description

Over the course of his career, Luther H. Martin has primarily produced articles rather than monographs. This approach to publication has given him the opportunity to experiment with different methodological approaches to an academic study of religion, with updates to and different interpretations of his field of historical specialization, namely Hellenistic religions, the subject of his only monograph (1987). The contents of this collected volume represent Martin's shift from comparative studies, to socio-political studies, to scientific studies of religion, and especially to the cognitive science of religion. He currently considers the latter to be the most viable approach for a scientific study of religion within the academic context of a modern research university. The twenty-five contributions collected in this volume are selected from over one hundred essays, articles, and book chapters published over a long and industrious career and are representative of Martin's work over the past two decades. Foreword Acknowledgements Introduction 1. The Academic Study of Religion: A Theological or Theoretical Undertaking? 2. The Academic Study of Religions during the Cold War: A Western Perspective 3. Secular Theory and the Academic Study of Religion 4. Of Religious Syncretism, Comparative Religion and Spiritual Quests 5. To Use “Syncretism,” or Not to Use “Syncretism”: That is the Question 6. Comparison 7. Comparativism and Sociobiological Theory 8. Akin to the Gods or Simply One to Another? Comparison with Respect to Religions in Antiquity 9. Secrecy in Hellenistic Religious Communities 10. The Anti-Individualistic Ideology of Hellenistic Culture 11. Rationalism and Relativity in History of Religions Research 12. Evolution, Cognition, and History 13. Does Religion Really Evolve? (And What Is It Anyway?) 14. Religion and Cognition 15. The Promise of Cognitive Science for the Study of Early Christianity 16. Globalization, Syncretism, and Religion in Western Antiquity: Some Neurocognitive Considerations 17. What Do Rituals Do (and How Do They Do It)? Cognition and the Study of Ritual 18. The Deep History of Religious Ritual 19. Performativity, Narrative, and Cognition: “Demythologizing” the Roman Cult of Mithras 20. Cognitive Science, Ritual, and the Hellenistic Mystery Religions 21. Why Christianity Was Accepted by Romans but Not by Rome 22. Aspects of Religious Experience among the Hellenistic Mystery Religions 23. The Uses (and Abuse) of the Cognitive Sciences for the Study of Religion 24. The Future of the Past: The History of Religions and Cognitive Historiography Author Index Subject Index