The Insularity of the Study of Ancient Religions and “Religion”
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1558/bsor.34613Keywords:
Classics, Ancient History, theorizing about religion, origins, function of religion, the categoryAbstract
The article discusses the disciplinary gap between classics, ancient history, and religious studies when studying ancient religions. It addresses the lack of interdisciplinary work and collaboration which stems from a number of factors.
References
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Barton, Carlin A., and Daniel Boyarin. 2016. Imagine No Religion: How Modern Abstractions Hide Ancient Realities. New York: Fordham University Press.
Beard, Mary. 2013. Confronting the Classics: Traditions, Adventures and Innovations. London: Profile Books.
Bonnet, Corinne. 2017. “Review of Theologies of Ancient Greek Religion, edited by Esther Eidinow, Julia Kindt, and Robin Osborne.” Bryn Mawr Classical Review
http://bmcr.brynmawr.edu/2017/2017-06-13.html.
Bremmer, Jan N. 1994. Greek Religion. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Davies, Malcolm. 1989. “Sisyphus and the Invention of Religion (‘Critias’ TrGF 1 (43) F 19 = B25 DK).” Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies 36: 16–32.
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2041-5370.1989.tb00560.x.
Dodds, E. R. 1973. The Ancient Concept of Progress and Other Essays on Greek Literature and Belief. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Eidinow, Esther, and Julia Kindt, eds. 2015. The Oxford Handbook of Ancient Greek Religion. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199642038.001.0001.
Eidinow, Esther, Julia Kindt, and Robin Osborne, eds. 2016. Theologies of Ancient Greek Religion. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781316597811.
Erskine, Andrew. 2010. “Epilogue.” In The Gods of Ancient Greece: Identities and Transformations, edited by Jan N. Bremmer and Andrew Erskine, 505–10. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Harrison, Stephen, and Christopher Stray, eds. 2012. Expurgating the Classics: Editing Out in Greek and Latin. London: Bristol Academic Press.
Harrison, Thomas, 2015. “Belief vs. Practice.” In The Oxford Handbook of Ancient Greek Religion, edited by Esther Eidinow and Julia Kindt. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 21–28. https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199642038.013.3.
Hinnells, John R., ed. 2007. A Handbook of Ancient Religions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511488429.
Johnson, Dominic. 2016. God is Watching You: How the Fear of God Makes Us Human. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Johnston, Sarah Iles, ed. 2007. Ancient Religions. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Kindt, Julia. 2012. Rethinking Greek Religion. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511978500.
———. 2015. “Personal Religion: A Productive Category for the Study of Ancient Greek Religion?” Journal of Hellenic Studies 135: 35–50.
https://doi.org/10.1017/S0075426915000051.
Konaris, Michael D. 2016. The Greek Gods in Modern Scholarship: Interpretation and Belief in Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Century Germany and Britain. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Lincoln, Bruce. 2007. “Epilogue.” In Ancient Religions, edited by Sarah Iles Johnston, 241–52. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Martzavou, Paraskevi. 2014. “Julia Kindt, Rethinking Greek Religion.” Kernos 27: 445–448.
Masuzawa, Tomoko. 2015. “Regarding Origin: Beginnings, Foundations, and the Bicameral Formation of the Study of Religion.” In Writing Religion: The Case for the Critical Study of Religion, edited by Steven W. Ramey. 131–48.Tuscaloosa,: University of Alabama Press.
McCutcheon, Russell T. 2003. The Discipline of Religion: Structure, Meaning, Rhetoric. London: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203451793.
Mikalson, Jon D. 2016. New Aspects of Religion in Ancient Athens: Honors, Authorities, Esthetics, and Society. Leiden: Brill.
https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004319196
Morley, Neville. 2008. “‘Das Altertum das lässt such nicht übersetzen’: Translation and Untranslatability in Ancient History.” In Translation and the Classics: Identity as Change in the History of Culture, edited by Alexandra Lianeri and Vanda Zajko. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 128–47. https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199288076.003.0007
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Norezayan, Ara. 2013. Big Gods: How Religion Transformed Cooperation and Conflict. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
O’Sullivan, Patrick. 2012. “Sophistic Ethics, Old Atheism, and ‘Critias’ on Religion.” Classical World 105 (2): 167–85. https://doi.org/10.1353/clw.2012.0010
Ogden, Daniel, ed. 2007. A Companion to Greek Religion. Oxford: Blackwell. https://doi.org/10.1002/9780470996911
Petrovic, Andrej, and Ivana Petrovic. 2016. Inner Purity and Pollution in Greek Religion. Vol. I: Early Greek Religion. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Pirenne-Delforge, Vinciane. 2010. “Reading Pausanias: Cults of the Gods and Representation of the Divine.” In The Gods of Ancient Greece: Identities and Transformations, edited by Jan N. Bremmer and Andrew Erskine. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 375–87.
Price, Simon R. F. 1984. Rituals and Power: The Roman Imperial Cult in Asia Minor. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Raja, Rubina, and Jörg Rüpke, eds. 2015. A Companion to the Archaeology of Religion in the Ancient World. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118886809
Roubekas, Nickolas P. 2017a. An Ancient Theory of Religion: Euhemerism from Antiquity to the Present. London: Routledge.
———. 2017b. “Review of The Oxford Handbook of Ancient Greek Religion, edited by Esther Eidinow and Julia Kindt.” Revista Clássica 29 (2): 221–24.
———, ed. forthcoming. Theorizing “Religion” in Antiquity. Sheffield: Equinox.
Rüpke, Jörg, ed. 2007. A Companion to Roman Religion. Oxford: Blackwell. https://doi.org/10.1002/9780470690970
Segal, Robert A. 2005. “Theories of Religion,” in The Routledge Companion to the Study of Religion, edited by John R. Hinnells, 49–60. London: Routledge.
Sourvinou-Inwood, Christiane. 2000a. “What is Polis Religion?” In Oxford Readings in Greek Religion, edited by Richard Buxton. 13–37. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
———. 2000b. “Further Aspects of Polis Religion.” In Oxford Readings in Greek Religion, edited by Richard Buxton. 38–55.Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Spaeth, Barbette Stanley, ed. 2013. The Cambridge Companion to Ancient Mediterranean Religions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CCO9781139047784
Stausberg, Michael. 2009. “There is Life in the Old Dog Yet: An Introduction to Contemporary Theories of Religion.” In Contemporary Theories of Religion: A Critical Companion, edited by Michael Stausberg, 1–21. London: Routledge.
Sutton, Dana. 1981. “Critias and Atheism.” Classical Quarterly 31 (1): 33–38. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0009838800021054
Versnel, Henk S. 2011. Coping with the Gods: Wayward Readings in Greek Theology. Leiden: Brill. https://doi.org/10.1163/ej.9789004204904.i-594
Whitmarsh, Tim. 2014. “Atheistic Aesthetics: The Sisyphus Fragment, Poetics and the Creativity of Drama.” Proceedings of the Cambridge Philological Society 60: 109–26. https://doi.org/10.10/S1750270514000062
Wiebe, Donald. 1979. “The Role of ‘Belief’ in the Study of Religion: A Response to W. C. Smith.” Numen 26 (2): 234–49. https://doi.org/10.2307/3269722
Wright Knust, Jennifer, and Zsuzsanna Várhelyi, eds. 2011. Ancient Mediterranean Sacrifice. Oxford: Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199738960.001.0001
Barton, Carlin A., and Daniel Boyarin. 2016. Imagine No Religion: How Modern Abstractions Hide Ancient Realities. New York: Fordham University Press.
Beard, Mary. 2013. Confronting the Classics: Traditions, Adventures and Innovations. London: Profile Books.
Bonnet, Corinne. 2017. “Review of Theologies of Ancient Greek Religion, edited by Esther Eidinow, Julia Kindt, and Robin Osborne.” Bryn Mawr Classical Review
http://bmcr.brynmawr.edu/2017/2017-06-13.html.
Bremmer, Jan N. 1994. Greek Religion. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Davies, Malcolm. 1989. “Sisyphus and the Invention of Religion (‘Critias’ TrGF 1 (43) F 19 = B25 DK).” Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies 36: 16–32.
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2041-5370.1989.tb00560.x.
Dodds, E. R. 1973. The Ancient Concept of Progress and Other Essays on Greek Literature and Belief. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Eidinow, Esther, and Julia Kindt, eds. 2015. The Oxford Handbook of Ancient Greek Religion. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199642038.001.0001.
Eidinow, Esther, Julia Kindt, and Robin Osborne, eds. 2016. Theologies of Ancient Greek Religion. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781316597811.
Erskine, Andrew. 2010. “Epilogue.” In The Gods of Ancient Greece: Identities and Transformations, edited by Jan N. Bremmer and Andrew Erskine, 505–10. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Harrison, Stephen, and Christopher Stray, eds. 2012. Expurgating the Classics: Editing Out in Greek and Latin. London: Bristol Academic Press.
Harrison, Thomas, 2015. “Belief vs. Practice.” In The Oxford Handbook of Ancient Greek Religion, edited by Esther Eidinow and Julia Kindt. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 21–28. https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199642038.013.3.
Hinnells, John R., ed. 2007. A Handbook of Ancient Religions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511488429.
Johnson, Dominic. 2016. God is Watching You: How the Fear of God Makes Us Human. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Johnston, Sarah Iles, ed. 2007. Ancient Religions. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Kindt, Julia. 2012. Rethinking Greek Religion. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511978500.
———. 2015. “Personal Religion: A Productive Category for the Study of Ancient Greek Religion?” Journal of Hellenic Studies 135: 35–50.
https://doi.org/10.1017/S0075426915000051.
Konaris, Michael D. 2016. The Greek Gods in Modern Scholarship: Interpretation and Belief in Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Century Germany and Britain. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Lincoln, Bruce. 2007. “Epilogue.” In Ancient Religions, edited by Sarah Iles Johnston, 241–52. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Martzavou, Paraskevi. 2014. “Julia Kindt, Rethinking Greek Religion.” Kernos 27: 445–448.
Masuzawa, Tomoko. 2015. “Regarding Origin: Beginnings, Foundations, and the Bicameral Formation of the Study of Religion.” In Writing Religion: The Case for the Critical Study of Religion, edited by Steven W. Ramey. 131–48.Tuscaloosa,: University of Alabama Press.
McCutcheon, Russell T. 2003. The Discipline of Religion: Structure, Meaning, Rhetoric. London: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203451793.
Mikalson, Jon D. 2016. New Aspects of Religion in Ancient Athens: Honors, Authorities, Esthetics, and Society. Leiden: Brill.
https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004319196
Morley, Neville. 2008. “‘Das Altertum das lässt such nicht übersetzen’: Translation and Untranslatability in Ancient History.” In Translation and the Classics: Identity as Change in the History of Culture, edited by Alexandra Lianeri and Vanda Zajko. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 128–47. https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199288076.003.0007
Nongbri, Brent. 2013. Before Religion: A History of a Modern Concept. New Haven: Yale University Press. https://doi.org/10.12987/yale/9780300154160.001.0001
Norezayan, Ara. 2013. Big Gods: How Religion Transformed Cooperation and Conflict. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
O’Sullivan, Patrick. 2012. “Sophistic Ethics, Old Atheism, and ‘Critias’ on Religion.” Classical World 105 (2): 167–85. https://doi.org/10.1353/clw.2012.0010
Ogden, Daniel, ed. 2007. A Companion to Greek Religion. Oxford: Blackwell. https://doi.org/10.1002/9780470996911
Petrovic, Andrej, and Ivana Petrovic. 2016. Inner Purity and Pollution in Greek Religion. Vol. I: Early Greek Religion. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Pirenne-Delforge, Vinciane. 2010. “Reading Pausanias: Cults of the Gods and Representation of the Divine.” In The Gods of Ancient Greece: Identities and Transformations, edited by Jan N. Bremmer and Andrew Erskine. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 375–87.
Price, Simon R. F. 1984. Rituals and Power: The Roman Imperial Cult in Asia Minor. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Raja, Rubina, and Jörg Rüpke, eds. 2015. A Companion to the Archaeology of Religion in the Ancient World. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118886809
Roubekas, Nickolas P. 2017a. An Ancient Theory of Religion: Euhemerism from Antiquity to the Present. London: Routledge.
———. 2017b. “Review of The Oxford Handbook of Ancient Greek Religion, edited by Esther Eidinow and Julia Kindt.” Revista Clássica 29 (2): 221–24.
———, ed. forthcoming. Theorizing “Religion” in Antiquity. Sheffield: Equinox.
Rüpke, Jörg, ed. 2007. A Companion to Roman Religion. Oxford: Blackwell. https://doi.org/10.1002/9780470690970
Segal, Robert A. 2005. “Theories of Religion,” in The Routledge Companion to the Study of Religion, edited by John R. Hinnells, 49–60. London: Routledge.
Sourvinou-Inwood, Christiane. 2000a. “What is Polis Religion?” In Oxford Readings in Greek Religion, edited by Richard Buxton. 13–37. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
———. 2000b. “Further Aspects of Polis Religion.” In Oxford Readings in Greek Religion, edited by Richard Buxton. 38–55.Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Spaeth, Barbette Stanley, ed. 2013. The Cambridge Companion to Ancient Mediterranean Religions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CCO9781139047784
Stausberg, Michael. 2009. “There is Life in the Old Dog Yet: An Introduction to Contemporary Theories of Religion.” In Contemporary Theories of Religion: A Critical Companion, edited by Michael Stausberg, 1–21. London: Routledge.
Sutton, Dana. 1981. “Critias and Atheism.” Classical Quarterly 31 (1): 33–38. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0009838800021054
Versnel, Henk S. 2011. Coping with the Gods: Wayward Readings in Greek Theology. Leiden: Brill. https://doi.org/10.1163/ej.9789004204904.i-594
Whitmarsh, Tim. 2014. “Atheistic Aesthetics: The Sisyphus Fragment, Poetics and the Creativity of Drama.” Proceedings of the Cambridge Philological Society 60: 109–26. https://doi.org/10.10/S1750270514000062
Wiebe, Donald. 1979. “The Role of ‘Belief’ in the Study of Religion: A Response to W. C. Smith.” Numen 26 (2): 234–49. https://doi.org/10.2307/3269722
Wright Knust, Jennifer, and Zsuzsanna Várhelyi, eds. 2011. Ancient Mediterranean Sacrifice. Oxford: Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199738960.001.0001
Published
2018-09-24
Issue
Section
Articles
How to Cite
Roubekas, N. (2018). The Insularity of the Study of Ancient Religions and “Religion”. Bulletin for the Study of Religion, 47(2), 2-7. https://doi.org/10.1558/bsor.34613
