Contemporary Theories of Religion: A Critical Companion

320 Pages·2016·1.7 MB·English

by  Stausberg Michael.

Contemporary Theories of Religion
Interest in theories of religion has never been greater. While anthropologists,
archaeologists, classicists, evolutionary biologists, philosophers, psychiatrists and
scholars of religion have presented new theories in academic publications, ‘New
Atheists’ such as Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett have brought the debate
to wider audiences. For everyone eager to understand the current state of the field,
Contemporary Theories of Religion surveys the neglected landscape in its totality.
Michael Stausberg brings together leading scholars in the field to review and
discuss seventeen contemporary theories of religion. Each chapter provides students
with background information on the theoretician, a presentation of the theory’s
basic principles, an analysis of basic assumptions and a review of previous critiques.
In a concluding section entitled ‘Back and forth’, Stausberg compares the different
theories and points to further avenues of discussion for the future.
Michael Stausberg is Professor of Religion at the University of Bergen (Norway).
Recent publications include Zarathustra and Zoroastrianism (2008) and Theorizing
rituals (co-editor, 2 vols, 2006–7). He is the European editor of the journal
Religion.

Contemporary Theories
of Religion
A critical companion
Edited by
Michael Stausberg
First published 2009
by Routledge
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Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada
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© 2009 Michael Stausberg for selection and editorial materials.
The contributors for their contributions.
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Contents
List of figures vii
List of contributors viii
1 There is life in the old dog yet: an introduction to contemporary
theories of religion 1
Michael Stausberg
2 Religion as superhuman agency: on E. Thomas Lawson and
Robert N. McCauley, Rethinking religion (1990) 22
Steven Engler and Mark Quentin Gardiner
3 Anthropomorphism and animism: on Stewart E. Guthrie,
Faces in the clouds (1993) 39
Benson Saler
4 From need to violence: on Walter Burkert, Creation of
the sacred (1996) 53
Gustavo Benavides
5 Religion as ritual: Roy Rappaport’s changing views from Pigs
for the ancestors (1968) to Ritual and religion in the making
of humanity (1999) 66
Robert A. Segal
6 Religious economies and rational choice: on Rodney Stark and
Roger Finke, Acts of faith (2000) 83
Gregory D. Alles
7 Religion as communication: on Niklas Luhmann,
The religion of society (2000) 99
Peter Beyer
8 Exotic experience and ordinary life: on Andrew Newberg,
Eugene D’Aquili and Vince Rause, Why God won’t
go away (2001) 115
Matthew Day
vi Contents
9 Religion as the unintended product of brain functions in the
‘standard cognitive science of religion model’: on Pascal Boyer,
Religion explained (2001) and Ilkka Pyysiäinen,
How religion works (2003) 129
Jeppe Sinding Jensen
10 Religion as evolutionary cascade: on Scott Atran,
In gods we trust (2002) 156
Joseph Bulbulia
11 Religion as superorganism: on David Sloan Wilson,
Darwin’s cathedral (2002) 173
Joseph Bulbulia and Marcus Frean
12 Roots in the brain: on David Lewis-Williams and David Pearce,
Inside the Neolithic mind (2005) 195
Donald Wiebe
13 Boundary maintenance: religions as organic-cultural flows:
on Thomas Tweed, Crossing and dwelling (2006) 209
Aaron W. Hughes
14 Theory of religion as myth: on Loyal Rue, Religion
is not about God (2005) 224
Hubert Seiwert
15 New Atheistic approaches in the cognitive science of
religion: on Daniel Dennett, Breaking the spell (2006) and
Richard Dawkins, The God delusion (2006) 242
Armin W. Geertz
16 Interventionist practices and the promises of religion:
on Martin Riesebrodt, Cultus und Heilsversprechen (2007) 264
Michael Stausberg
17 Back and forth 283
Michael Stausberg
Index 296
Richard Bartholomew
Figures
9.1 Boyer’s ‘catalogue of the supernatural’ 142
10.1 Standard view 159
10.2 Guthrie’s wager 162
10.3 Religious culture as cognitive noise 167
10.4 Reformed model 169
11.1 The standard cognitive picture 174
11.2 Religion as cognovirus 175
11.3 Darwin’s cathedral 175
11.4 The natural selection of altruistic groups 178
11.5 Coordination problem 180
11.6 Developmental processes 183
11.7 Evolution: utility versus accuracy 185
11.8 Zeus commands: ‘Woe unto ye who run instead of fight!’ 186
11.9 Zeus commands: ‘Hunt stags with thy brethren!’ 187
Contributors
Gregory D. Alles is Professor of Religious Studies at McDaniel College,
Westminster, MD, USA. His publications include The Iliad, the
Ramayana, and the work of religion (1994) and the edited volume Reli-
gious studies: a global view (2008).
Gustavo Benavides teaches at the Department of Theology and Religious
Studies at Villanova University, Pennsylvania, USA. His research and
publications deal with the theory and historiography of religion. He is
co-editor of Numen: International Review for the History of Religions
and of the series Religion and society and Religion and reason.
Peter Beyer is Professor of Religious Studies in the Department of Classics
and Religious Studies at the University of Ottawa, Canada. His research
specializations include religion and globalization, social theory of reli-
gion, religion and transnational migration and religion in Canada. His
books include Religions in global society (2006). He is the co-editor of
Religion, globalization and culture (2007) and The world’s religions:
continuities and transformations (2009).
Joseph Bulbulia is a Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Humanities and Social
Sciences at Victoria University in Wellington, New Zealand. His research
considers the place of religious culture and cognition in the evolution of
large-scale cooperative society. He is a co-editor of The evolution of reli-
gion: studies, theories and critiques (2008).
Matthew Day teaches at the Department of Religion at Florida State Univer-
sity, Florida, USA. He is editor of the journal Method & Theory in the
Study of Religion.
Steven Engler teaches at the Department of Humanities, Mount Royal
College, Calgary, and is adjunct at the Department of Religion, Concordia
University, Montreal, Canada. He is the North American editor of the
Contributors ix
journal Religion, co-editor of the Numen book series Studies in the
history of religions and editor of the Key thinkers in the study of religion
book series. He is the co-editor of Historicizing ‘tradition’ in the study of
religion (2005).
Marcus Frean is a Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Engineering and
Computer Science at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand.
He has longstanding interests in the evolution of cooperation.
Mark Quentin Gardiner is a Philosophy Instructor in the Department of
Humanities, Mount Royal College, Calgary, Canada. He works primarily
in the area of philosophical semantics and in contemporary metaethics. He
is the author of Semantic challenges to realism: Dummett and Putnam
(2000).
Armin W. Geertz is Professor in the History of Religions at the Depart-
ment of the Study of Religion, the University of Aarhus, Denmark. His
main interests are cognitive theory in the study of religion, the religions
of indigenous peoples, recent developments in contemporary religiosity
and method and theory in the comparative study of religions. His books
include The invention of prophecy: continuity and meaning in Hopi
Indian religion (1992). He is a co-editor of Perspectives on method and
theory in the study of religion (2000), New approaches to the study of
religion (2 vols, 2004) and of the series Religion, cognition and culture.
Aaron W. Hughes is Associate Professor of History and the Gordon and
Gretchen Gross Professor of Jewish Studies at the University at Buffalo,
SUNY, USA. He works in the areas of Jewish thought and critical
discourses in religion. His books include Jewish philosophy A–Z (2005),
Situating Islam: the past and future of an academic discipline (2007),
The art of dialogue in Jewish philosophy (2008) and Defining Judaism
(forthcoming).
Jeppe Sinding Jensen is Associate Professor, Department for the Study of
Religion, Aarhus University. His research interests include semantics
and cognition in religious narrativity, myth and cosmology and method,
theory and the philosophy of science in the study of religion. He is the
author of The study of religion in a new key: theoretical and philosoph-
ical soundings in the comparative and general study of religion (2003)
and the co-editor of Rationality and the study of religion (2003). He is
the co-editor of the series Religion, cognition and culture.
Benson Saler is Professor Emeritus of Anthropology at Brandeis University,
Massachusetts, USA. He is the author of Los Wayú (Guajiro) (1988),