Religion and the Body : Modern Science and the Construction of Religious Meaning

Cave, David and Rebecca Sachs Norris (compilers). Religion and the Body : Modern Science and the Construction of Religious Meaning
. Leiden: Brill, 2012. First edition. Octavo. viii, 277, (1)pp. Index and 15 page bibliography. Pictorial buckram with lilac/gray spine lettered in white. Illustrated with several photographs and drawings. A fine but ex-library copy (with minimal markings; i.e. rubber stamps on title page & bottom of text block).

This book reflects on the implications of neurobiology and the scientific worldview on aspects of religious experience, belief, and practice. Just as interest in the neurosciences and related fields has burgeoned in contemporary society, interest in the fields of neuroscience and cognitive studies is also growing within the religious studies academy, and reflection on these shifts is well overdue. How do religious practitioners negotiate the interconnection of science and religion? What can the neurosciences add to scholars’ understanding of religion and to how humans construct religious meaning? Chapters address these questions by investigating religious experience and authority, the cultural construction and deconstruction of the body, and cross-cultural appropriations of the body. (Publisher)

Contents: Neurobiology and sources of religious experience and authority.; Reading the body, reading scripture : the implications of neurobiology on the study and interpretation of scripture /; David Cave –; De/Constructing transcendence : the emergence of religious bodies /; James W. Haag,; Whitney A. Bauman –; Tongues of men and angels : assessing the neural correlates of Glossolalia /; John J. McGraw –; Synchronized ritual behavior : religion, cognition and the dynamics of embodiment /; Sebastian Schüler –; Culture and the de- and re-construction of the body –; Religion, neuroscience and emotion : some implications of consumerism and entertainment culture /; Rebecca Sachs Norris –; Every story is a ghost : Chuck Palahniuk and the reenchantment of suffering /; Eric Repphun –; Attaining transcendence : transhumanism, the body, and the Abrahamic religions /; Arthur Saniotis –; (Cross) culture appropriations of the body.; Magnetism and microwaves : religion as radiation /; Deana L. Weibel –; scientific approaches to the body in the spiritual-physical marketplace /; Mira Karjalainen –; Sleep deprivation : Asceticism, religious experience and neurological quandaries /; Núria M. Farré-i-Barril –; Sikhism and mental illness : negotiating competing cultures /; Jagbir Jhutti-Johal. (OCLC)

Volume 138 in the Brill’s series, “Numen Book Series. Studies in the History of Religions.” near fine. Hardcover. (52987) $95