Religion and beliefs Books

Book SynopsisExamines the attitudes of Greek writers of the Hellenistic period toward the Jewish people, their religious, social, and political views; their literary and stylistic methods; ethnographic stereotypes current at the time; and more.Trade Review"Surely the crown of [Bar-Kochva's] career... One cannot imagine this magisterial volume ever being, or needing to be, replaced." The Henoch "Gives innovative readings of almost all the texts it considers... The result is invigorating and challenging." Bryn Mawr Classical Review (BMCR) "A major reference work on an important aspect of ancient Judaism." International Review Of Biblical Stds "Bar-Kochva ... provides erudite reinterpretations of many of the texts, showing that Greek views of Jews in this period are a complicated issue." -- Mark W. Chavalas Near East Archaeological Society Bltn

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Book SynopsisThe most prominent Christian theologian and exegete of the third century, Origen was also an influential teacher. In the famed Thanksgiving Address, one of his students delivered an emotionally charged account of his tutelage in Roman Palestine. This analysis of the text sheds new light on higher education in the early Church.Trade Review"Satran’s book is laudable for its important contribution to studies of late antique education and rhetoric, to scholarship on Origen and Gregory and, one would like to hope, to contemporary discussions on the nature of education and the vital role of teachers as intellectual and moral guides to a truly liberating way of life." * Journal of Ecclesiastical History *"[L]ocates [value] in contemporary Origen literature as a helpful resource for those who want to delve deeper into a learned, loving ancient tribute . . ." * Reading Religion *Table of ContentsAcknowledgments Introduction 1. Providence, Eros, and Constraint 2. Dialectic and the Training of the Mind 3. Moral Formation and the Path to Scripture 4. Paradise and the Cave 5. Paideia, Loss, and Prospect Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisThe connection between popular culture and religion is an enduring part of American life. This multifaceted collection provides greater religious diversity in its topics and addresses critical developments in the study of religion and popular culture. It also includes pedagogical tools of discussion questions and key term glossaries.Table of ContentsPreface to the Third Edition Introduction: Finding Religion in Unexpected Places Bruce David Forbes PART I. RELIGION IN POPULAR CULTURE 1. The Origin(s) of Superman: Reimagining Religion in the Man of Steel Dan W. Clanton Jr. 2. The Oriental Monk in American Popular Culture Jane Naomi Iwamura 3. Adventure Time and Sacred History: Myth and Reality in Children's Animated Cartoons Elijah Siegler 4. Monstrous Muslims: Historical Anxieties and Future Trends Sophia Rose Arjana 5. The Weight of the World: Religion and Heavy Metal Music in Four Cases Jason C. Bivins PART II. POPULAR CULTURE IN RELIGION 6. Christmas Is Like a Snowball Bruce David Forbes 7. Mipsterz: Hip, American, and Muslim Kristin M. Peterson Nabil Echchaibi 8. Megachurches, Celebrity Pastors, and the Evangelical Industrial Complex Jessica Johnson 9. People of the Picture Book: PJ Library and American Jewish Religion Rachel B. Gross 10. Meditation on the Go: Buddhist Smartphone Apps as Video Game Play Gregory Price Grieve PART III. POPULAR CULTURE AS RELIGION 11. It's About Faith in Our Future: Star Trek Fandom as Cultural Religion Michael Jindra 12. Shopping, Religion, and the Sacred "Buyosphere" Sarah McFarland Taylor 13. Losing Their Way to Salvation: Women, Weight Loss, and the Religion of Thinness Michelle M. Lelwica 14. The "Godding Up" of American Sports Joseph L. Price 15. Celebrity Worship as Parareligion: Bieber and the Beliebers Pete Ward PART IV. RELIGION AND POPULAR CULTURE IN DIALOGUE 16. Yoga in Popular Culture: Controversies and Conflicts Shreena Niketa Gandhi 17. Mirror, Mirror on Ourselves: Disney as a Site of Religio-Cultural Dialogue Stephanie Brehm and Myev Rees 18. Can Watching a Movie Be a Spiritual Experience? Robert K. Johnston 19. Rap Music and Its Message: On Interpreting the Contact between Religion and Popular Culture Anthony B. Pinn 20. Broadswords and Face Paint: Why Braveheart Still Matters Curtis D. Coats and Stewart M. Hoover Contributors Index

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Book SynopsisChristian communities flourished during late antiquity in a Zoroastrian political system, known as the Iranian Empire. In placing the social history of East Syrian Christians at the center of the Iranian imperial story, this book helps explain the endurance of a culturally diverse empire across four centuries.Trade Review"An expertly conceived and beautifully written counterpoint to earlier studies of Christian history in the Sasanian Empire... In his meticulous reading of East Syriac sources and the Middle Persian literatures and histories that underlie them, Payne has substantially contributed to a new body of scholarly studies that is quickly revising our understanding of the place of Christianity in the Sasanian period." Marginalia "Overall, A State of Mixture is an important contribution to the religious situation in the Sasaniden Kingdom and the structural development of the relations between Christians and Zoroastrians prior to Islamic expansion; this research merits close attention." PlekosTable of ContentsA Note on Names, Translations, and Transliterations Acknowledgments Introduction 1. The Myth of Zoroastrian Intolerance: Violence and the Terms of Christian Inclusion 2. Belonging to a Land: Christians and Zoroastrians in the Iranian Highlands 3. Christian Law Making and Iranian Political Practice: The Reforms of Mar Aba 4. Creating a Christian Aristocracy: Hagiography and Empire in Northern Mesopotamia 5. The Christian Symbolics of Power in a Zoroastrian Empire Conclusion Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisProvides an account of the role of the Torah in ancient Judaism, exploring key moments in its history, beginning with the formation of Deuteronomy and continuing through the Maccabean revolt and the rise of Jewish sectarianism and early Christianity.Trade Review"Collins has here laid the levelheaded and thorough groundwork for anyone wanting to explore Jewish identity in antiquity." * Reading Religion *"A tour de force by one of today’s leading scholars... Summing Up: Highly recommended." * CHOICE *"Collins’ masterful elucidation of the many and diverse materials he mobilizes on behalf of his argument makes this book a valuable resource for readers mulling the semantics of Jewish identity during the Second Temple period. . . . a necessary call to common sense as to the misguided premise that Judaism was born of Christianity rather than Christianity of Judaism." * Horizons: The Journal of the College Theology Society *"The Invention of Judaism is well worth one's time, particularly if one wants to familiarize oneself with the lay of the land in the Second Temple period or is well-versed in Greco-Roman customs and literature behind the NT but need a refresher over debates in Jewish tradition from the same time period." * Restoration Quarterly *Table of ContentsPreface Introduction: Jews, Judeans, and the Maccabean Crisis 1. Deuteronomy and the Invention of the Torah 2. Torah in the Persian Period 3. The Persistence of Non-Mosaic Judaism 4. Torah as Narrative and Wisdom 5. Torah as Law 6. Torah and Apocalypticism 7. The Law in the Diaspora 8. Paul, Torah, and Jewish Identity Epilogue Notes Bibliography Index of Scripture and Other Ancient Sources Index of Modern Authors

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Book SynopsisProvides an overview of the history and development of Islam in Afghanistan. Looking beyond the unifying rhetoric of theology, this book reveals the disparate and contested forms of Afghanistan's Islam.Trade Review"This book helps . . . better understand different facets of Islamic values and practices in Afghanistan through the ages. More importantly, unlike most works on Afghanistan, the chapters in this volume are based on primary and native-langauge sources." * Reading Religion *Table of ContentsList of Illustrations Preface and Acknowledgments Introduction. Afghanistan's Islam: A History and Its Scholarship Nile Green Part one. from conversions to institutions (ca. 700-1500) 1. The Beginnings of Islam in Afghanistan: Conquest, Acculturation, and Islamization Arezou Azad 2. Women and Religious Patronage in the Timurid Empire Nushin Arbabzadah 3. The Rise of the Khwajagan-Naqshbandiyya Sufi Order in Timurid Herat Jurgen Paul Part two. the infrastructure of religious ideas (ca. 1500-1850) 4. Earning a Living: Promoting Islamic Culture in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries R.D. McChesney 5. Transporting Knowledge in the Durrani Empire: Two Manuals of Naqshbandi-Mujaddidi Sufi Practice Waleed Ziad Part three. new states, new discourses (ca. 1850-1979) 6. Islam, Shari'a, and State Building under 'Abd al-Rahman Khan Amin Tarzi 7. Competing Views of Pashtun Tribalism, Islam, and Society in the Indo-Afghan Borderlands Sana Haroon 8. Nationalism, Not Islam: The "Awaken Youth" Party and Pashtun Nationalism Faridullah Bezhan Part four. holy warriors and (im)pious women (1979-2014) 9. Glossy Global Leadership: Unpacking the Multilingual Religious Thought of the Jihad Simon Wolfgang Fuchs 10. Female Sainthood between Politics and Legend: The Emergence of Bibi Nushin of Shibirghan Ingeborg Baldauf 11. When Muslims Become Feminists: Khana-yi Aman, Islam, and Pashtunwali Sonia Ahsan Afterword Alessandro Monsutti Notes Glossary of Islamic Terms List of Contributors Index

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Book SynopsisDebunking myths behind what is known collectively as the new cosmology-a grand, overlapping set of narratives that claim to bring science and spirituality together-Lisa H. Sideris offers a searing critique of the movement's anthropocentric vision of the world. In Consecrating Science, Sideris argues that instead of cultivating an ethic of respect for nature, the new cosmology encourages human arrogance, uncritical reverence for science, and indifference to nonhuman life. Exploring moral sensibilities rooted in experience of the natural world, Sideris shows how a sense of wonder can foster environmental attitudes that will protect our planet from ecological collapse for years to come.Trade Review"Lisa Sideris’s Consecrating Science: Wonder, Knowledge, and the Natural World is a rich and deeply insightful analysis of a family of ambitious historical narratives, each of which is vying to become the new myth everyone lives by. Through careful textual study, Sideris convincingly argues that despite their stated goal of promoting a deep respect and care for the natural world, these narratives may inadvertently undermine development of the environmental ethic they seek to foster." * Reading Religion *"The argument of Consecrating Science is clearly articulated, carefully organized, and impeccably substantiated. Sideris’s analysis is consistently generous, nuanced, level-headed, and good-humored. Perhaps most impressively, the book integrates religious studies, science studies, ethics, and critical naturalism into a methodology that somehow remains coherent even in its multivalence." * Journal of the American Academy of Religion *"Consecrating Science is valuable reading for a number of academic audiences. . . . It is an obvious fit for scholars of religion and science, religion and environment, and environmental ethics (particularly environmental virtue ethics, given the book’s focus on the cultivation of attitudes and dispositions). It could also prove useful for higher education administrators thinking through general education curriculum design." * Worldviews *Table of ContentsAcknowledgments Introduction: The Return of Mythopoeic Science 1. Seeking What Is Good in Wonder 2. The Book of Nature and the Book of Science: Richard Dawkins on Wonder 3. E. O. Wilson’s Ionian Enchantment: A Tale of Two Realities 4. Evolutionary Enchantment and Denatured Religious Naturalism 5. Anthropic and Anthropocene Narratives of the New Cosmology 6. Genesis 2.0: The Epic of Evolution as Religion of Reality 7. Making Sense of Wonder Notes Glossary of Terms References Index

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Book SynopsisArchaeological discoveries in Jerusalem capture worldwide attention in various media outlets. Bridging the ever-widening gap between popular coverage and specialized literature, this title provides a comprehensive tour of the politics of archaeology in the city.Trade Review"[Finding Jerusalem] should . . . hold wide appeal among multi-disciplinary scholars from a range of fields." * Arab Studies Quarterly *

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Book SynopsisAfter centuries of near silence, Latin poetry underwent a renaissance in the late fourth and fifth centuries CE evidenced in the works ofkey figures such as Ausonius, Claudian, Prudentius, and Paulinus of Nola. This period of resurgence markeda milestone in the reception of the classics of late Republican and early imperial poetry. In Classicism and Christianity in Late Antique Latin Poetry, Philip Hardie explores the ways in which poets writing on non-Christian and Christian subjects used the classical traditions of Latin poetry to constructtheir relationship with Rome's imperial past and present, and with the by now not-so-new belief system of the state religion, Christianity. The book pays particular attention to the themes of concord and discord, the cosmic sense of late antiquity, novelty and renouatio, paradox and miracle, and allegory. It is also a contribution to the ongoing discussion of whether there is an identifiably late antique poetics and a late antique practice of intertextuality. Not since Michael Robert's classic The Jeweled Style has a single book had so much to teach about the enduring power of Latin poetry in late antiquity. Trade Review"As always, Hardie’s work is erudite and articulate, displaying the author’s extensive knowledge of both early and late Latin poetic corpora. This recent work advocates for the uniqueness and vitality of late antique Latin poetry against the still-widespread stereotype of the period as one marked by decadence and degeneration. It should be widely appreciated by specialists in Latin poetry, late antiquity, and anyone interested in the complex interactions between ‘classical’ and Christian culture in the later Roman world. It is highly recommended." * The Society of Biblical Literature *Table of ContentsPreface Introduction 1. Farewells and Returns: Ausonius and Paulinus of Nola 2. Virgilian Plots: Public Ideologies and Private Journeys 3. Cosmos: Classical and Christian Universes 4. Concord and Discord: Concordia Discors 5. Innovations of Late Antiquity: Novelty and Renouatio 6. Paradox, Mirabilia, Miracles 7. Allegory 8. Mosaics and Intertextuality References General Index Index Locorum

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Book SynopsisAlthough scholars have long studied how Muslims authenticated and transmitted Muhammad's sayings and practices (hadith), the story of how they interpreted and reinterpreted the meanings of hadith over the past millennium has yet to be told. Joel Blecher takes up this charge, illuminating the rich social and intellectual history of hadith commentary at three critical moments: classical Andalusia, medieval Egypt, and modern India. Weaving together tales of public debates, high court rivalries, and colonial politics with analyses of contemporary field notes and fine-grained arguments adorning the margins of manuscripts, Said the Prophet of God offers new avenues for the study of religion, history, anthropology, and law.Trade Review"In his marvelous new book, Said the Prophet of God: Hadith Commentary Across a Millennium, Joel Blecher, engages with tremendous lucidity and brilliance the topic of Hadith commentaries in Muslim intellectual and social history across time and space. Traversing the pre-modern and modern periods in sites ranging from the Middle East to South Asia, this book presents in remarkable detail and with considerable nuance the intellectual, social, and material stakes of the discipline and performance of the Hadith commentarial tradition." * New Books Network *"Blecher’s text will come in handy as classroom reading for courses on a range of topics, and it will open doors for new scholars to further explore the uses and limits of hadith collections and the scholarship of Hadith glossators." * Reading Religion *"Historians regularly trace the ways in which some argument or practice unfolds in a given tradition—that's just what Joel Blecher's (2017) book Said the Prophet does in relation to hadith commentary. The book spans centuries and continents to tell us something extraordinarily illuminating not only about the figures it treats but about the tradition that helps define them." * Religious Compass *“With an admirable expertise and impressive knowledge of minute detail, Blecher traverses the exegetical reception and commentarial reenactment of al-Bukhari’s Sahih across space and time.... Blecher’s treatment of hadith commentary by a combination of methods from the fields of social history, intellectual history, and social theory is commendable, as is his aspiration to foreground the performative and interactional aspects of the commentator’s activity. This approach yields excellent results.” * Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies *"The temporal and geographic breadth of Blecher's canvas is supported both by his rigorous textual study and by ethnographic work in both the Middle East and South Asia. . . . This is certainly a foundational study in the field of Islamic social and intellectual history." * Religious Studies Review *“​"This is certainly a foundational study in the field of Islamic social and intellectual history." * Reading Religion *Table of ContentsList of Illustrations Note on Transliteration and Conventions Introduction I. ANDALUSIA IN THE LAST DAYS OF THE UMAYYADS 1. The Perils of Public Commentary 2. The Inner World of the Interpretive Tradition II. EGYPT AND SYRIA UNDER THE MAMLUKS 3. For Sultans, Students, and Scholars 4. Rivalry and Revision in the Manuscript Age 5. Oratory in the Shade of the Sultan’s Garden 6. Gatekeepers of the Law 7. Mysteries of the Thresholds 8. The Art of Concision III. EARLY MODERN INDIA AND BEYOND 9. Trustees across the Ocean: Gujarat to Deoband to Bhopal 10. Lost in Translation: Arabic to Urdu to English Epilogue: Islamism, ISIS, and the Politics of Interpretation Acknowledgments Notes Works Cited Index of Names and Titles Index of Subjects and Terms

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Book SynopsisBeing Christian in Vandal Africa investigates conflicts over Christian orthodoxy in the Vandal kingdom-the successor to Roman rule in North Africa, ca. 439 to 533 CE. Exploiting neglected texts, author Robin Whelan exposes a sophisticated culture of disputation between Nicene (Catholic) and Homoian (Arian) Christians and explores their rival claims to political and religious legitimacy. These contests-sometimes violent-are key to understanding the wider and much-debated issues of identity and state formation in the post-imperial West.Trade Review"This is a remarkable first book by a young scholar.... it skillfully analyzes Christian texts from Vandal North Africa that have not received enough attention but which, as Whelan masterly shows, nevertheless constitute a significant contribution to the understanding of the period. * Bryn Mawr Classical Review *With nuanced argument, methodological sophistication, and sensible judgment, Being Christian in Vandal Africa provides a welcome corrective to the polemical rhetoric of the sources that have unduly shaped the judgments of scholarship. Robin Whelan is to be commended for producing an exemplary study that will appeal to a variety of readers including scholars of the Vandal Kingdom, the post-imperial West, and late antiquity more generally. * Reading Religion *"Being Christian in Vandal North Africa offers a fresh view of the vital, and sometimes violent, competition between rival Christian groups in the Vandal kingdom that dismantles long-held presumptions about the relationship between the Vandal court and its Christian subjects, both Nicene and Homoian. In doing so it contributes in important ways to the rewriting of the history of Vandal North Africa. Whelan argues convincingly that being Christian in this period was clearly not as straightforward as we have been led to believe." * Journal of Ecclesiastical History *"Well-written, well-organized, and well-argued, this book is a necessary read for anyone interested in the transition from Roman late antiquity to the successor states of the early medieval period." * Augustiniana *"Whelan’s work is consistently of high quality and a welcome addition to the literature." * Journal of Church and State *"This book is well-written, well-argued, and an important contribution—it is not an exaggeration to say that it immediately becomes one of the most important books available on Christianity on Vandal Africa." * Journal of the Conference on Faith and History *"Highly recommended for anyone interested in problems evolving from the intersection of religious contests and post-imperial politics." * Early Medieval Europe *"Whelan’s deft handling of episcopal rhetoric is one of many strengths in this well-written and persuasive book. . . . The implications of Whelan’s observations are enormous." * Journal of Orthodox Christian Studies, *"Whelan provides an exhaustive and convincing analysis of doctrinal conflicts under Vandal rule in Roman Africa, contributing greatly to our understanding of the post-Roman West. . . .With great elegance and methodological acuity, Whelan succeeded in writing a study that provides a more nuanced picture of the societies in question." * Journal of Early Christian Studies *Table of ContentsList of Illustrations and Tables Acknowledgments Time Line Introduction PART I. CONTESTING ORTHODOXY 1. African Churches 2. In Dialogue with Heresy: Christian Polemical Literature 3. “What Th ey Are to Us, We Are to Them”: Homoian Orthodoxy and Homoousian Heresy 4. Ecclesiastical Histories: Reinventing the Arians PART II. ORTHODOXY AND SOCIETY 5. Exiles on Main Street: Nicene Bishops and the Vandal Court 6. Christianity, Ethnicity, and Society 7. Elite Christianity, Political Service, and Social Prestige Epilogue: Homoian Christianity in the Post-Imperial West Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisThis provocative work provides a radical reassessment of the emergence and nature of Christian sexual morality, the dominant moral paradigm in Western society since late antiquity. While many scholars, including Michel Foucault, have found the basis of early Christian sexual restrictions in Greek ethics and political philosophy, Kathy L. Gaca demonstrates on compelling new grounds that it is misguided to regard Greek ethics and political theory--with their proposed reforms of eroticism, the family, and civic order--as the foundation of Christian sexual austerity. Rather, in this thoroughly informed and wide-ranging study, Gaca shows that early Christian goals to eradicate fornication were derived from the sexual rules and poetic norms of the Septuagint, or Greek Bible, and that early Christian writers adapted these rules and norms in ways that reveal fascinating insights into the distinctive and largely non-philosophical character of Christian sexual morality. Writing with an authoritative command of both Greek philosophy and early Christian writings, Gaca investigates Plato, the Stoics, the Pythagoreans, Philo of Alexandria, the apostle Paul, and the patristic Christians Clement of Alexandria, Tatian, and Epiphanes, freshly elucidating their ideas on sexual reform with precision, depth, and originality. Early Christian writers, she demonstrates, transformed all that they borrowed from Greek ethics and political philosophy to launch innovative programs against fornication that were inimical to Greek cultural mores, popular and philosophical alike. The Septuagint's mandate to worship the Lord alone among all gods led to a Christian program to revolutionize Gentile sexual practices, only for early Christians to find this virtually impossible to carry out without going to extremes of sexual renunciation. Knowledgeable and wide-ranging, this work of intellectual history and ethics cogently demonstrates why early Christian sexual restrictions took such repressive ascetic forms, and casts sobering light on what Christian sexual morality has meant for religious pluralism in Western culture, especially among women as its bearers.Trade Review“Gaca’s ability to navigate confidently across both the Greek philosophical tradition and the Septuagint is as rare as it is valuable. An eye-opener.” * Times Literary Supplement *“Learned and well-argued, this book is bound to revolutionize our thinking about an important subject of religious and cultureal history.” * International Review of Biblical Studies *“On almost every page close reading repays the effort.” * Journal of Biblical Literature *“Gaca’s book makes a valuable contribution to the history of sexual ethics in antiquity and will be indispensable reading for all scholars and students interested in that topic.” * Journal of Early Christian Studies *“With lucidity and a sustained examination of a synthetic Christian ethical concept, Gaca’s fine book supplements social histories." * CHOICE *“Rich. . . . Gaca’s detailed analysis of the several traditions, and her incorporation of the Septuagint, NT, and Philo in the argument, mark a significant advance over Foucault’s analysis in The History of Sexuality. Indispensable to future research on the subject and should be in every university library.” * Religious Studies Review *Table of ContentsAcknowledgments Abbreviations 1. Introduction: Ancient Greek Sexual Blueprints for Social Order Part I. Greek Philosophical Sexual Reforms 2. Desire's Hunger and Plato the Regulator 3. Crafting Eros through the Stoic Logos of Nature 4. The Reproductive Technology of the Pythagoreans Part II. Greek Biblical Sexual Rules and Their Reworking by Paul and Philo 5. Rival Plans for God's Sexual Program in the Pentateuch and Paul 6. From the Prophets to Paul: Converting Whore Culture into the Lord's Veiled Bride 7. Philo's Reproductive City of God Part III. Patristic Transformations of the Philosophical, Pauline, and Philonic Rules 8. Driving Aphrodite from the World: Tatian and His Encratite Argument 9. Prophylactic Grace in Clement's Emergent Church Sexual Ethic 10. The Fornicating Justice of Epiphanes 11. Conclusion: The Demise of Greek Eros and Reproduction Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisWritten in an engaging and accessible tone, Religion in America probes the dynamics of recent American religious beliefs and behaviors. Charting trends over time using demographic data, this book examines how patterns of religious affiliation, service attendance, and prayer vary by race and ethnicity, social class, and gender. The authors identify demographic processes such as birth, death, and migration, as well as changes in education, employment, and families, as central to why some individuals and congregations experience change in religious practices and beliefs while others hold steady. Religion in America challenges students to examine the demographic data alongside everyday accounts of how religion is experienced differently across social groups to better understand the role that religion plays in the lives of Americans today and how that is changing. Table of ContentsList of Figures, Tables, and Text Boxes Acknowledgments Introduction 1. Racial and Ethnic Variation in Religion and Its Trends 2. Complex Religion in America 3. A Demographic Perspective on Religious Change 4. Change in America’s Congregations 5. The Long Arm of Religion in America Conclusion Notes References Index

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Book SynopsisConversion to Islam is a phenomenon of immense significance in human history. At the outset of Islamic rule in the seventh century, Muslims constituted a tiny minority in most areas under their control. But by the beginning of the modern period, they formed the majority in most territories from North Africa to Southeast Asia. Across such diverse lands, peoples, and time periods, conversion was a complex, varied phenomenon. Converts lived in a world of overlapping and competing religious, cultural, social, and familial affiliations, and the effects of turning to Islam played out in every aspect of life. Conversion therefore provides a critical lens for world history, magnifying the constantly evolving array of beliefs, practices, and outlooks that constitute Islam around the globe. This groundbreaking collection of texts, translated from sources in a dozen languages from the seventh to the eighteenth centuries, presents the historical process of conversion to Islam in all its variety anTrade Review"The volume…will greatly help anyone who teaches premodern Islamic history using sources in translation and should stimulate further research into the fascinating topic of conversion." * DER ISLAM *

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Book SynopsisTrade Review"Although the book is in many ways a textbook, Chidester has conceived something far more imaginative than a standard introduction to the world’s religions. Instead, Chidester has chosen to critically analyze the emergence of “religion” as a category, not just once, but in multiple contexts and registers. Specifically, Chidester sets out to develop this critical approach to religion together with the themes and concerns of material culture. So the question becomes not just what religion is and how it is defined, but how the intellectual coordinates out of which “religion” emerges are organized by “material dynamics.” * Reading Religion *" . . . Chidester’s analysis of the dynamic materiality of religion is a valuable corrective. In short, Religion demonstrates that all religion—no matter how world-denying—is material religion." * Nova Religio *" . . . reflect[s] a healthy shift in the study of religions." * Journal of Religion *"Chidester . . . successfully describe[s] the current state of the material turn in religious studies, which gives the book significant value." * Studies in Religion *"I would warmly recommend the book as a well-informed and creative resource for approaching the study of religion." * Religion *"[Chidester's] broad reading in global history and his deep understanding of the historiography of the academic study of religion will make this book very useful for students and scholars far beyond the modern era." * Journal of Contemporary Religion *"The book offers many interesting and important insights of how we creatively – and with a sense of humor – can think of and understand religion in its diversity as intertwined with materiality." * Anthropology Book Forum *Table of ContentsPreface Introduction: Material Dynamics PART I CATEGORIES 1. Animism 2. Sacred 3. Space 4. Time 5. Incongruity PART II FORMATIONS 6. Culture 7. Economy 8. Colonialism 9. Imperialism 10. Apartheid PART III CIRCULATIONS 11. Shamans 12. Mobility 13. Popular 14. Touching 15. Oceans Conclusion: Dynamic Materiality Notes Index

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Book SynopsisA free ebook version of this title is available throughLuminos, University of California Press's Open Access publishing program. Visitwww.luminosoa.orgto learn more. In Mountain, Water, Rock, God, Luke Whitmore situates the disastrous flooding that fell on the Hindu Himalayan shrine of Kedarnath in 2013 within a broader religious and ecological context. Whitmore explores the longer story of this powerful realm of the Hindu god Shiva through a holistic theoretical perspective that integrates phenomenological and systems-based approaches to the study of religion, pilgrimage, place, and ecology. He argues that close attention to places of religious significance offers a model for thinking through connections between ritual, narrative, climate destabilization, tourism, development, and disaster, and he shows how these critical components of human life in the twenty-first century intersect in the human experience of place.Trade Review"This book is a very impressive contribution to the growing scholarship on the relationship between human society and nature, not only in the context of the Himalayan region and Indian society, but also more globally." * Journal of Contemporary Religion *"Whitmore’s analysis gives readers a nuanced and informed perspective on the pilgrimage to Kedarnath. . . . highly recommended for upper-level undergraduate and graduate-level courses in religious studies, sociology of religion, eco-politics, nature and the sacred, sustainability issues, and sacred pilgrimage." * Nova Religio *"We are indebted to Whitmore for providing a glimpse of [Kedarnath]." * Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture *"Whitmore is the only scholar to have studied Kedarnath in such depth, and this book makes an indispensable contribution to the study of Hinduism. . . . Whitmore resists the temptation to sensationalize what defies description, providing instead a serious, sobering, and holistic analysis of the power attributed to this great Himalayan shrine." * International Journal of Hindu Studies *Table of ContentsList of Illustrations Acknowledgments Note on Transliteration Introduction: In the Direction of Kedar 1. In Pursuit of Shiva 2. Lord of Kedar 3. Earlier Times 4. The Season 5. When the Floods Came 6. Nature’s Tandava Dance 7. Topographies of ReinventionGlossary Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisA cutting-edge introduction to contemporary religious studies theory, connecting theory to data. This innovative coursebook introduces students to interdisciplinary theoretical tools for understanding contemporary religiously diverse societiesboth Western and non-Western. Using a case-study model, the text considers: A wide and diverse array of contemporary issues, questions, andcriticalapproaches to the study of religionrelevant to students and scholarsA variety of theoretical approaches, including decolonial, feminist, hermeneutical, poststructuralist, and phenomenological analysesCurrent debates on whether the term religionis meaningfulMany key issues about the study of religion, including the insider-outsider debate, material religion, and lived religionPlural and religiously diverse societies, including the theological ideas of traditions and the political and social questions that arise for those living alongside adherents of other religionsUnderstanding Religion is designed to provide a strong foundation for instructors to explore the ideas presented in each chapter in multiple ways, engage students in meaningful activities in the classroom, and integrate additional material into their lectures. Students will gain the tools to apply specific methods from a variety of disciplines to analyze the social, political, spiritual, and cultural aspects of religions. Its unique pedagogical design means it can be used from undergraduate- to postgraduate-level courses.Trade Review"Understanding Religion is a lucid, creatively structured, and nearly jargon-free introduction to theories and methods for studying religious communities and traditions in diverse societies, bold in scope, and presented in a manner that is undergraduate-friendly, yet sophisticated enough for use in a graduate-level course." * Journal of Interreligious Studies *"Explores themes one might expect in a textbook as well as ones welcomely added, emphasizing a 'deeply political' approach that continually draws the reader’s attention back to whose voice gets expressed in scholarship, and whose does not." * Religious Studies Review *Table of ContentsList of Illustrations List of Boxes Acknowledgments and Dedications Introduction PART I. WHAT IS RELIGION AND HOW TO APPROACH IT? 1. Religion: Language, Law, and Legacies Case Study 1A: Falun Gong: Religion or Self-Cultivation Practice? Case Study 1B: Christians and Ancestor Veneration: Religion or Culture? 2. Method: Insider-Outsider Debates, Phenomenology, and Reflexivity Case Study 2A: Living between Religious Worlds: Conversion and Reconversion Case Study 2B: Hindu and Christian? Multiple Religious Identities 3. Life: Lived Religion, Syncretism, and Hybridity Case Study 3A: Mexican American Catholicism and Our Lady of Guadalupe Case Study 3B: Thai Buddhism as Lived Religion and Syncretic Practice PART II. THEORIES, METHODOLOGIES, AND CRITICAL DEBATES 4. History: Historical Methodology and the Invention of Tradition Case Study 4A: The Historical Jesus and the Christ of Faith Case Study 4B: Laozi, the Daodejing, and the Origins of Daoism 5. Power: Social Constructionism, Habitus, and Authority Case Study 5A: Mosques, Minarets, and Power Case Study 5B: Individual (New Age/Alternative) Spirituality as Modernity's Ideology 6. Identity: Social Identity Theory, In-Groups, Out-Groups, and Conflict Case Study 6A: Shiv Sena, Hindu Nationalism, and Identity Politics Case Study 6B: Race, Religion, and the American White Evangelical 7. Colonialism: Postcolonialism, Orientalism, and Decolonization Case Study 7A: Beyond "Inventing" Hinduism Case Study 7B: Magic, Superstition, and Religion in Southeast Asia and Africa 8. Brains: The Cognitive Science of Religion and Beyond Case Study 8A: Religion, Non-Religion, and Atheism Case Study 8B: Ancestors, Jesus, and Prosocial Behavior in Fiji 9. Bodies: Material Religion, Embodiment, and Materiality Case Study 9A: Weeping Gods and Drinking Statues Case Study 9B: Embodied Practice at a Christian Shrine 10. Gender: Feminism, Sexuality, and Religion Case Study 10A: Priests, Paul, and Rewriting Texts Case Study 10B: Buddhist Feminisms and Nuns 11. Comparison: Comparative and Contrastive Methodologies Case Study 11A: Comparing Hinduism and Judaism Case Study 11B: A Comparison of Zen Buddhist and Protestant Christian Sitting Practices 12. Ritual: Ritualization, Myth, and Performance Case Study 12A: The Zen Tea Ceremony and Protestant Eucharist as Performance and Ritual Case Study 12B: Buddhist Ordination Rites PART III. RELIGIOUS DIVERSITY AND SOCIETY 13. Diversity: Religious Borders, Identities, and Discourses Case Study 13A: The Memory of Al-Andalusia Case Study 13B: Dominus Iesus and Catholic Christianity in Asia 14. Dialogue: Interreligious Discourse and Critique Case Study 14A: Christian and Muslim Women Reading Scriptures Case Study 14B: Buddhist-Christian Dialogue: History and Discourse 15. Violence: Fundamentalism, Extremism, and Radicalization Case Study 15A: The Invention of Islamic Terrorism Case Study 15B: Buddhism and Violence 16. Secularism: Secularization, Human Rights, and Religion Case Study 16A: Laïcité and the Burkini Ban Case Study 16B: Singapore's Common Space 17. Geography: Place, the Lived Environment, and Environmentalism Case Study 17A: Trees as Monks? Case Study 17B: Protestant Christian Understandings of the "Holy Land" 18. Politics: Governance, the Colonial Wound, and the Sacred Case Study 18A: Ethnicity and Religion: The Singaporean Malay-Muslim Identity Case Study 18B: Saluting the Flag: The Case of Jehovah's Witnesses in the United States Glossary Who's Who Notes Index

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Book SynopsisWhat is the relationship between caste and gender in the narratives of Rajput woman? During a year and a half of fieldwork in Rajasthan, a parched land dominated by the great Indian Desert, Lindsey Harlan interviewed more than a hundred women from all levels of Rajput society. She wanted to understand why certain religious practices were so important to Rajput women, and how they justified these to themselves. During the course of her interviews, the women described their religious practiceschief among them the worship of the family kuldevi (the goddess who exemplifies the ideal wife by staving off sickness, poverty, and infertility) and the veneration of satimatas (women who have immolated themselves on their husband's funeral pyre). As the women discussed these rituals, many of them also told Harlan religious myths and stories, drawing parallels between their behavior and that of various Indian heroines. These narratives and the role they play in the women's self-perception are the fascinating and enlightening subject of this book.This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press's mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1992.Table of ContentsList of Figures Note on Transliteration and Pronunciation Acknowledgments Introduction 1. Rajasthan and the Rajputs 2. Kuldevi Tradition: Myth, Story, and Context 3. Kuldevi Tradition: Interpretation and Intention 4. Satimata Tradition: The Transformative Process 5. Satimata Tradition: The Role of Volition 6. The Heroic Paradigm: Padmini 7. The Bhakt Paradigm: Mira Bai 8. Conclusion Appendix A: Interview Background Appendix B: Interview Glossary Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisEphrem the Syrian was one of the founding voices in Syriac literature. While he wrote in a variety of genres, the bulk of his work took the form of madrashe, a Syriac genre of musical poetry or hymns. In Bible and Poetry in Late Antique Mesopotamia, Jeffrey Wickes offers a thoroughly contextualized study of Ephrem's magnum opus, the Hymns on Faith, delivered in response to the theological controversies that followed the First Council of Nicaea. The ensuing doctrinal divisions had tremendous impact on the course of Christianity and led in part to the development of a uniquely Syriac Church, in which Ephrem would become a central figure. Drawing on literary, ritual, and performance theories, Bible and Poetry shows how Ephrem used the Syriac Bible to construct and conceive of himself and his audience. In so doing, Wickes resituates Ephrem in a broader early Christian context and contributes to discussions of literature and religion in late antiquity. Trade Review"Wickes is an astute guide through the often-heated scholarly debates about the relationship between Syriac and Greek, and about the place of Syriac Christianity in the eastern Mediterranean world. His command of the scholarship is as solid as his mastery of the texts; he is deft, incisive, and original in his discussions. This is work of exceptional substance and significance." * Journal of Orthodox Christian Studies *"Bible and Poetry demonstrates once again the potential of Syriac literature to reshape and deepen our historiog-raphy of the formative centuries of Christianity." * Journal of Early Christian Studies *"Wickes has guided the reader securely with a light through the labyrinthine paths and icons of Ephrem’s poetry, revealing the poet’s mind and personality, along with imaginative biblical landscapes and interpretations unparalleled in late antique Christian literature." * Biblical Literature *"Wickes’s study contains many helpful and good insights into the way Ephrem works as a poet, interweaving different biblical allusions for a particular purpose, and also into the ways in which he relates himself and his audience to the biblical text." * Journal of Theological Studies *Table of ContentsAbbreviations Acknowledgments Note to the Reader Introduction PART ONE. EPHREM AND THE LATE ANTIQUE WORLD 1. Ephrem’s Madrashe on Faith in Context 2. Investigation PART TWO. THE BIBLICAL POETICS OF THE MADRASHE ON FAITH 3. Bible, Polemics, and Language 4. The Poet’s “I” 5. Audience and the Vision of the Text 6. A Divine Son Conclusion Notes Bibliography Index of Bible References General Index

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Book SynopsisLate antiquity was a perilous time for children, who were often the first victims of economic crisis, war, and disease. They had a one in three chance of dying before their first birthday, with as many as half dying before age ten. Christian writers accordingly sought to speak to the experience of bereavement and to provide cultural scripts for parents who had lost a child. These late ancient writers turned to characters like Eve and Sarah, Job and Jephthah as models for grieving and for confronting or submitting to the divine. Jephthah's Daughter, Sarah's Son traces the stories these writers crafted and the ways in which they shaped the lived experience of familial bereavement in ancient Christianity. A compelling social history that conveys the emotional lives of people in the late ancient world, Jephthah's Daughter, Sarah's Son is a powerful portrait of mourning that extends beyond antiquity to the present day. Trade Review"Theologically astute yet ably interacting with gender theory and social history, this book will interest scholars of early Christianity and biblical interpretation." * CHOICE *"This book is not only beautiful to hold and a pleasure to read, but also it has rare intellectual clarity and high scholarly relevance." * Bryn Mawr Classical Review *"A powerful study. . . . This is a book that belongs on the bookshelf of all who study . . . late antiquity." * Church History and Religious Culture *"Doerfler’s outstanding merit is the use of a large and well-mastered corpus of sources. . . . This very well-written volume on the reception of selected biblical figures concerning the death of children will be worthwhile to students and experts in the fields of theology, religious sciences, classical literature, ancient history, Near Eastern studies, psychology, and social studies." * Reading Religion *"Rich and engaging. . . . Jephthah’s Daughter, Sarah’s Son offers profound material with which to think about liturgy and liturgical action." * Journal of Orthodox Christian Studies *Table of ContentsAcknowledgments (Premature) Death as a Good: An Introduction 1. Children’s Deaths in Late Antiquity in Ritual and Historical Perspective 2. East of Eden: The First Bereaved Parents 3. Mourning Sarah’s Son: Genesis 22 and the Death of Children 4. Echoes of the Akedah: Jephthah’s Daughter and the Maccabeans’ Mother 5. Death, Demons, and Disaster: Job’s Children 6. Children and the Sword: The Holy Innocents and the Death of Children Conclusion: Children in the Quicksand Abbreviations Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisAndrew N. Palmer's vivid translation of the Syriac Life of Barsauma opens a fascinating window onto the ancient Middle East, seen through the life and actions of one of its most dramatic and ambiguous characters: the monk Barsauma, ascetic hero to some, religious terrorist to others. The Life takes us into the eye of the storm that raged around Christian attempts to define the nature of Christ in the great Council of Chalcedon, the effect of which was to split the growing Church irrevocably, with the Oriental Orthodox on one side and Greek Orthodox and Roman Catholic on the other. Previously known only in extracts, this ancient text is now finally brought to readers in its entirety, casting dramatic new light on the relations among pagans, Jews, and Christians in the Holy Land and on the role of religious violence, real or imagined, in the mental world of a Middle East as shot through with conflict as it is today.Table of ContentsIntroduction Overview of the Life of Barsauma The Life of Barsauma

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Book SynopsisTrade Review"Stewart provides rich insights into the nature of fiction in the context of premodern forms of storytelling. His analysis is conceptually rich and offers abundant opportunities to think about the directions that the study of similar narratives can take in the scholarship of other Indian languages." * Marginalia Review of Books *"The book will be of interest to scholars who work on Islam in South Asia, as well as those who engage in literary studies, while the stories translated here will be a great resource for courses that engage in South Asian Islam." * New Books Network *"With its elegant translations and careful literary analysis, Witness to Marvels allows non-Bengali-speaking scholars to enter the long-overlooked narrative world of the fictional Sufi saints of Bengal. Stewart’s masterful work makes a tremendous contribution to the fields of religious studies and comparative literature." * Reading Religion *"An essential book that illuminates Bengali Islam and challenges scholars of Islam to expand the vision of their field." * Religious Studies Review *

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Book SynopsisWith remarkably original formulations, Naomi Seidman examines the ways that Hebrew, the Holy Tongue, and Yiddish, the vernacular language of Ashkenazic Jews, came to represent the masculine and feminine faces, respectively, of Ashkenazic Jewish culture. Her sophisticated history is the first book-length exploration of the sexual politics underlying the marriage of Hebrew and Yiddish, and it has profound implications for understanding the centrality of language choices and ideologies in the construction of modern Jewish identity.Seidman particularly examines this sexual-linguistic system as it shaped the work of two bilingual authors, S.Y. Abramovitsh, the grand-father of modern Hebrew and Yiddish literature; and Dvora Baron, the first modern woman writer in Hebrew (and a writer in Yiddish as well). She also provides an analysis of the roles that Hebrew masculinity and Yiddish femininity played in the Hebrew-Yiddish language wars, the divorce that ultimately ended the marriage between t

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Book SynopsisIt is widely believed that the Emperor Constantine's conversion to Christianity politicized religious allegiances, dividing the Christian Roman Empire from the Zoroastrian Sasanian Empire and leading to the persecution of Christians in Persia. This account, however, is based on Greek ecclesiastical histories and Syriac martyrdom narratives that date to centuries after the fact. In this groundbreaking study, Kyle Smith analyzes diverse Greek, Latin, and Syriac sources to show that there was not a single history of fourth-century Mesopotamia. By examining the conflicting hagiographical and historical evidence, Constantine and the Captive Christians of Persia presents an evocative and evolving portrait of the first Christian emperor, uncovering how Syriac Christians manipulated the image of their western Christian counterparts to fashion their own political and religious identities during this century of radical change.Trade Review"By examining Constantine through the lens of the Sasanian world...[Kyle Smith] manages to break free of Eusebius and his domineering narrative. This will pay dividends for our understanding of this major figure in world history, as well as the history of Christianity in Late Antiquity more broadly. That Smith’s book is so clearly written, well organized, and tightly argued further ensures its impact on the field." * Pleket *"A welcome contribution to an important field of study." * Plekos *"Kyle Smith has written a provocative, engaging, and elegant book. . . .[in which] Smith critiques previous historiography and demonstrates new possibilities and avenues for constructing the history of Persian Christians in the fourth century and their relationship to Constantine and the Roman Empire." * Studies in Late Antiquity *Table of ContentsAcknowledgments Abbreviations Introduction: Constantine and the Writing of Fourth-Century History PART I: THE ROMAN FRONTIER AND THE PERSIAN WAR 1 • Patronizing Persians: Constantine’s Letter to Shapur II 2 • Constantine’s Crusade: The Emperor’s Last Days and the Persian Campaign 3 • Rereading Nisibis: Narrating the Battle for Roman Mesopotamia PART II: ROMAN CAPTIVES AND PERSIAN ENVOYS 4 • On War and Persecution: Aphrahat the Persian Sage and the Martyrdom and History of Blessed Simeon bar Sabba?e 5 • The Church of the East and the Territorialization of Christianity 6 • Memories of Constantine in the Acts of the Persian Martyrs Appendix A. Constantine’s Letter to Shapur: Eusebius’s Life of Constantine IV.8–14 Appendix B. Martyrdom of the Captives of Beth Zabdai Appendix C. Martyrdom of Abbot Barshebya, Ten Fellow Brothers, and One Magus Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisThis title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Pressâs mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1963.

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Book SynopsisTwo academics, one Jewish and one Muslim, come together to show how much their faiths have in commonparticularly in America. This book provides a braided portrait of two American groups whose strong religious attachments and powerful commitments to ritual observance are not always easy to adapt to American culture. Orthodox Jews and observant Muslims share many similarities in their efforts to be at home in America while holding on to their practices and beliefs. As Samuel Heilman and Mucahit Bilici reveal, they follow similar paths in their American experience. Heilman and Bilici immerse readers in three layers of discussion for each religious group: historical evolution, sociological transformation, and a comparative understanding of certain parallel beliefs and practices, each of which is used as a window onto the lived reality of these communities. Written by two sociologists, one a religiously observant American Jew and the other an American Muslim, Following Similar Paths

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Book SynopsisTrade Review"Posits that polytheism, and Roman polytheism in particular, can help societies navigate political, social, and religious diversity." * Publishers Weekly *"This small book is excellent for high school and college students, enthusiasts of the history of religions, and anyone who is curious about interreligious dialogue and its difficulties. This book is highly recommended. One will find none better." * World History Encyclopedia *"A valuable and long-overdue work." * Reading Religion *Table of ContentsContents Introduction: The Gods in Exile 1. Sacrificing the Nativity Scene and Bombing the Mosque 2. Festivity Figurines: Animals, Shepherds, Three Kings 3. End of the Year Figurines: Sigilla, Sigillaria, and Compitalia 4. A Life Through Figurines: The Lararium 5. Thou Shalt Have No Other God Before Me 6. Translating the Gods, Translating God 7. Grammatical Paradoxes: The Name of God 8. The Interpretatio of the Gods 9. Polytheism, Curiosity, and Knowledge 10. What If Monotheisms Were Just Polytheisms in Disguise? 11. Tolerance vs. Interpretatio 12. Polytheism as Language 13. Giving Citizenship to the Gods 14. The Long Shadow of Words 15. The Twilight of Writing, the Sunset of Scripture Appendix A. Religious Tolerance and Intolerance in the Ancient World Appendix B. The Ups and Downs of Paganus Notes Bibliography

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Book SynopsisTrade Review"Reading this book conveys the feeling of bouncing over bumps at high speed on a sunny day in an all-terrain sports utility vehicle. How can such lugubrious topics provide so much fun? The tale is animated by the telling. With sly wit, subtle humour, agile prose and empathetic imagination, Kyle Smith narrates the growth of one of Christianity’s defining traditions." * Times Literary Supplement *"Cult of the Dead is the rare academic book that shows empathy; for the martyrs themselves and for those with devotion to them. . . . Smith does our dearly departed the ultimate favor: He allows the dead to speak once more." * National Catholic Reporter *“For a topic that encompasses millennia of fascinating history, Smith’s digestible book offers a compelling and comprehensive introduction to the role of the lives and afterlives of Christianity’s martyrs in Western society from late antiquity to the present day.” * New Criterion * "In this beautifully produced book...Kyle Smith brings alive devotion to the martyrs over the centuries and demonstrates how it helped to shape Christian devotional life, art, architecture, literature, and spirituality." * Journal of Religious History *"Carefully researched and accessible." * CHOICE *"The great accomplishment of Smith’s book is that it manages to both revel in the macabre appeal of the martyrs, and, at the same time, take the Christian cult of the dead sympathetically and seriously." * Reading Religion *Table of ContentsList of Illustrations Preface Introduction 1. The First of the Dead 2. The Names of the Dead 3. The Remains of the Dead 4. The Feasts of the Dead 5. The Living Dead 6. The Miracles of the Dead 7. The War for the Dead 8. The Legends of the Dead Postscript Acknowledgments Notes for Further Reading Bibliography Index

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a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.

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Book SynopsisThis title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press's mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1969.

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Book SynopsisTransformational festivals, from Burning Man to Lightning in a Bottle, Bhakti Fest, and Wanderlust, are massive events that attract thousands of participants to sites around the world. In this groundbreaking book, Amanda J. Lucia shows how these festivals operate as religious institutions for spiritual, but not religious (SBNR) communities. Whereas previous research into SBNR practices and New Age religion has not addressed the predominantly white makeup of these communities, White Utopias examines the complicated, often contradictory relationships with race at these events, presenting an engrossing ethnography of SBNR practices. Lucia contends that participants create temporary utopias through their shared commitments to spiritual growth and human connection. But they also participate in religious exoticism by adopting Indigenous and Indic spiritualities, a practice that ultimately renders them exclusive, white utopias. Focusing on yoga's role in disseminating SBNR values, Lucia offers new ways of comprehending transformational festivals as significant cultural phenomena.Trade Review"Lucia’s sharp analysis and enthusiasm for historical and theoretical context dominates the book." * High Country News *"Being highly engaging and informative, this book is a valuable read for all scholars interested in contemporary questions of religion and spirituality." * Religious Studies Review *"Lucia’s work brings an important and timely perspective on the racialised power dynamics of [‘spiritual but not religious’] communities to the study of contemporary yoga." * Religion *Table of ContentsList of Illustrations Acknowledgments Author Note Introduction 1. Romanticizing the Premodern: The Confluence of Indic and Indigenous Spiritualities Interlude: Cultural Possession and Whiteness 2. Anxieties over Authenticity: American Yoga and the Problem of Whiteness Interlude: “White People Are on the Journey of Evolution” 3. Deconstructing the Self: At the Limits of Asceticism Interlude: Sculpting Bodies and Minds 4. Wonder, Awe, and Peak Experiences: Approaching Mystical Territories Interlude: Producing Wonder / Branding Freedom 5. The Cathartic Freedom of Transformational Festivals: Neoliberal Escapes and Entrapments Conclusion Appendix 1: @Instagram Data for Public Figures Cited Appendix 2: Methodology Notes References Index

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Book SynopsisIn This Place Called Prison offers a vivid account of religious life within an institution designed to punish. Rachel Ellis conducted a year of ethnographic fieldwork inside a U.S. state women's prison, talking with hundreds of incarcerated women, staff, and volunteers. Through their stories, Ellis shows how women draw on religion to navigate lived experiences of carceral control. A trenchant study of religion colliding and colluding with the state in an enduring tension between freedom and constraint, this book speaks to the quest for dignity and light against the backdrop of mass incarceration, state surveillance, and American inequality.Trade Review"This book is highly valuable as an experience that helps readers build a mental schema of some of the women inmates’ realities of incarceration." * Affilia: Feminist Inquiry in Social Work * "Ellis’ piercing study, beautifully written, vividly demonstrates the double-edged sword of religion in prison – its capacity to liberate and its equal power to subjugate." * Criminal Law and Criminal Justice Books *"Ellis’ contributions are significant to a plethora of academic fields, while her writing style is easily digestible as she recalls the lived experiences of the women at Mapleside Prison." * Gender and Society *"Ellis develops three-dimensional, nuanced portrayals of the interiority of women’s lives, recognizing women’s full and complex humanity in ways neither the carceral nor religious discourses that are the object of her study do. Ellis is an exceptionally skilled, ethical, and transparent ethnographer. Her methodological appendix should be required reading in sociological research methods classes." * Interdisciplinary Journal of Research on Religion *Table of ContentsContents Introduction 1. Thou Shalt Not: A Day in Prison 2. Let There Be Light: Religious Life Behind Bars 3. The Lord Is My Shepherd: Protestant Messages of God’s Redemptive Plan 4. Blessed Is The Fruit Of Thy Womb: Gender, Religion, and Ideologies of the Family 5. For Many Are Called, But Few Are Chosen: Status and Dignity in the Prison Church Conclusion Epilogue: Out of the House of Bondage Acknowledgments Methodological Appendix Notes References Index

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Book SynopsisA gripping study of how religiously motivated violence and militant movements end, from the perspectives of those most deeply involved. Mark Juergensmeyer is arguably the globe's leading expert on religious violence, and for decades his books have helped us understand the worlds and worldviews of those who take up arms in the name of their faith. But even the most violent of movements, characterized by grand religious visions of holy warfare, eventually come to an end. Juergensmeyer takes readers into the minds of religiously motivated militants associated with the Islamic State (ISIS) in Iraq, the Sikh Khalistan movement in India's Punjab, and the Moro movement for a Muslim Mindanao in the Philippines to understand what leads to drastic changes in the attitudes of those once devoted to all-out ideological war. When God Stops Fighting reveals how the transformation of religious violence manifests for those who once promoted it as the only answer. Trade Review"When God Stops Fighting is an excellent introductory work. . . .[its] brevity, its smooth readability and its lively descriptions make it both a thought-provoking and an enjoyable read." * Medicine, Conflict, and Survival *"Anyone, be they theologians, religious studies majors, sociologists, psychologists, historians, politicians, lawyers, those entrusted with the arts of conflict resolution, or just a member of the public, should read this book. In doing so, they will come to understand more about the many subtle (and not so subtle) processes by which men (usually) can steer situations either towards tragic disasters or in the direction of those more promising situations When God Stops Fighting." * Reading Religion *"A valuable read for all those interested in militant violence." * Religion *Table of ContentsPreface 1. The Trajectory of Imagined Wars 2. The Apocalyptic War of the Islamic State 3. The Militant Struggle of Mindanao Muslims 4. The Fight for Khalistan in India's Punjab 5. How Imagined Wars End Notes Interviews Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisEpiphanius, Bishop of Constantia on Cyprus from 367 to 403 CE, was incredibly influential in the last decades of the fourth century. Whereas his major surviving textthe Panarion, an encyclopedia of heresiesis studied for lost sources, Epiphanius himself is often dismissed as an anti-intellectual eccentric, a marginal figure of late antiquity. In this book, Andrew S. Jacobs moves Epiphanius from the margin back toward the center and proposes we view major cultural themes of late antiquity in a new light altogether. Through an examination of the key cultural concepts of celebrity, conversion, discipline, scripture, and salvation, Jacobs shifts our understanding of late antiquity from a transformational period open to new ideas and peoples toward a Christian Empire that posited a troubling, but ever-present, otherness at the center of its cultural production.Trade Review"A creative, valuable contribution to scholarship on Epiphanius particularly, and fourth-century Christianity generally. Jacobs’s 'cultural biography' idea is noteworthy, and while his bridge between Epiphanius and his culture could be more explicit, this volume manageably realizes that method. Good scholarship merits critical scrutiny, but this reviewer wholeheartedly recommends this book—ingenious, analytic, and readable—to today’s generation of ancient Christian scholars." * Reading Religion *"This is a well-written and well-argued book which all scholars of Late Antiquity and Early Christianity can read with benefit." * Studies in Late Antiquity *"Jacobs offers a theoretically sophisticated cultural biography that places this maligned figure at the center of late antiquity rather than (comfortably) at its margins." * Church History *"In his study of the fourth-century bishop and ascetic Epiphanius, Andrew Jacobs makes another illuminating intervention into the history of ancient Christianity. . . . Exemplary and brilliant." * Bryn Mawr Classic Review *Table of ContentsAcknowledgments List of Abbreviations Introduction: Epiphanius, Now and Then 1. Celebrity 2. Conversion 3. Discipline 4. Scripture 5. Salvation 6. After Lives Conclusion Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisRabbis, Sorcerers, Kings, and Priests examines the impact of the Persian Sasanian context on the Babylonian Talmud, perhaps the most important corpus in the Jewish sacred canon. What impact did the Persian Zoroastrian Empire, as both a real historical force and an imaginary interlocutor, have on rabbinic identity and authority as expressed in the Talmud? Drawing from the field of comparative religion, Jason Sion Mokhtarian addresses this question by bringing into mutual fruition Talmudic studies and ancient Iranology, two historically distinct disciplines. Whereas most research on the Talmud assumes that the rabbis were an insular group isolated from the cultural horizon outside their academies, this book contextualizes the rabbis and the Talmud within a broader sociocultural orbit by drawing from a wide range of sources from Sasanian Iran, including Middle Persian Zoroastrian literature, archaeological data such as seals and inscriptions, and the Aramaic magical bowl spells. MokhtariaTrade Review"Recommended for scholars and students of both Jewish and Iranian literature." * Theologische Literaturzeitung *Table of ContentsList of AbbreviationsNote on Translations, Transcriptions, and ManuscriptsAcknowledgmentsIntroduction1. The Sources and Methods of Talmudic and Iranian Studies2. Comparing Sasanian Religions3. Rabbinic Portrayals of Persians as Others4. Rabbis and Sasanian Kings in Dialogue5. Rabbis and Zoroastrian Priests in Judicial Settings6. Rabbis, Sorcerers, and PriestsConclusion: Rabbis, Sorcerers, Kings, and Priests in Sasanian IranNotesBibliographyIndex

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Book SynopsisCerebral subjectivitythe identification of the individual self with the brainis a belief that has become firmly entrenched in modern science and popular culture. In The Care of the Brain in Early Christianity, Jessica Wright traces its roots to tensions within early Christianity over the brain's role in self-governance and its inherent vulnerability. Examining how early Christians appropriated medical ideas, Wright tracks how they used these ideas for teaching ascetic practices, developing therapeutics for the soul, and finding a path to salvation. Bringing a medical lens to religious discourse, this text demonstrates that rather than rejecting medical traditions, early Christianity developed by creatively integrating them.Trade Review"This book makes two important contributions: it illuminates early Christian engagements with ancient medicine and shows how these medical theories shaped early Christian theological anthropology. Scholars of early Christianity and the history of medicine will find this an engaging read." * CHOICE *"Highly original... [a] beautifully written study of the concept of the brain as a powerful and multi-functional tool." * Bryn Mawr Classical Review *Table of ContentsContents Acknowledgments Introduction 1. The Circulation and Performance of Medical Knowledge in Late Antiquity 2. The History of the Brain in Ancient Greek Medicine and Philosophy 3. The Invention of Ventricular Localization 4. The Governing Brain 5. The Rhetoric of Cerebral Vulnerability 6. Insanity, Vainglory, and Phrenitis 7. Humanizing the Brain in Early Christianity Conclusion Notes Works Cited Index

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Book SynopsisBlood for Thoughtdelves into a relatively unexplored area of rabbinic literature: the vast corpus of laws, regulations, and instructions pertaining to sacrificial rituals. Mira Balberg traces and analyzes the ways in which the early rabbis interpreted and conceived of biblical sacrifices, reinventing them as a site through which to negotiate intellectual, cultural, and religious trends and practices in their surrounding world. Rather than viewing the rabbinic project as an attempt to generate a nonsacrificial version of Judaism, she argues that the rabbis developed a new sacrificial Jewish tradition altogether, consisting of not merely substitutes to sacrifice but elaborate practical manuals that redefined the processes themselves, radically transforming the meanings of sacrifice, its efficacy, and its value.

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