Book Note: Cognitive Science and the New Testament (István Czachesz)

István Czachesz. 2017. Cognitive Science and the New Testament. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Finally we have a introductory "textbook" that covers the main tenets of the cognitive science of religion as they are applied to the field of New Testament and early Christianity.  Czachesz argues that the human component with its mental and cultural constraints is essential to augment traditional biblical exegesis or even to change the conventional focus of biblical exegesis. 

Whenever I have spoken about this, I have talked about the missing link in biblical studies: the human factor.  That is, biblical exegesis has traditionally forfeited understanding the ways in which humans process information and make sense of the world through their bodies, their brains, their memories, and their emotions.  All of these impact the shape and character of the texts people write, and thus our understanding of these texts as historians. 

Czachesz further suggests that we are dinosaurs if we think that we can continue to operate as scholars by ignoring science and the scientific method.  He thinks that cognitive approaches help us to integrate scientific thinking (experimental research; computer modeling; naturalistic explanations) with our study of early Christianity.  He applauds the payoff, suggesting that the naturalistic explanations and materialistic mechanisms, some experimentally based, provide a securer foundation for our historical analyses than traditional methods have allowed.

István’s approach is to divide his subject (religion in the New Testament) into cognitive areas, after first giving a three chapter overview of the standard theories in the cognitive study of religion and the anatomy of the brain. 

He begins by asking what studies on memory and transmission of ideas and practices can do for us as biblical scholars.  After covering the standard analyses of memory and emotion, and how minds process and structure information, he argues that early Christian literature reflects these processes, here referring to studies of the passion narratives and martyrdom stories in the canonical and apocryphal gospels and acts, the sermon on the mount, and the synoptic problem. 

Second he covers ritual, with a nod toward some psychological models on compulsive behavior.  He discusses in this chapter baptism, communal meals, and prayer, in terms of cost benefits, modes of religiosity, efficacy and magical agency. 

Third, he takes on the intersection of magic and miracle in the Jesus stories, arguing that cognitive approaches can help us see these as two subjects that are interrelated phenomena.  He does so by applying studies on superstitious conditioning, mental intuitions about the mechanisms and effects of magic in terms of agency and contagion, and the attractiveness of miracle stories as counterintuitive.  He applies these cognitive insights to Paul’s magical practices in Ephesus according to the Book of Acts. 

Fourth, he covers what cognitive neuroscience and philosophy of mind have been saying about religious experience and altered states of consciousness, everything from subjectivity to cultural contexts, from the lobes of the brain theory, to extreme religious experience.  He applies these studies to the phenomena of speaking in tongues at Corinth, and the tour of heaven in the Ascension of Isaiah. 

Fifth, he looks at studies of morality and its origins in the domains of neurobiology, social cognition, group behavior, and moral emotions.  He argues that biblical morality is not an artifact created by theologians and philosophers, but rather it is an aspect of human cognition and behavior.  The application in this chapter is more broadly conceived in terms of religion, and less in terms of specific test cases within the New Testament. 

Sixth, he turns to social networks and computer models to explain the spread of early Christianity.

István’s book is the one that I wish I had a few years ago when I taught a course I designed on Cognitive Science of Religion and biblical studies called The Bible and the Brain.  I set up the course with similar thematic sections and then biblical applications.  So I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to familiarize themselves with Cognitive Science and Religion and biblical studies, or who wants to create a course on it.  It is a perfect learning and teaching tool.

Book Note: Who Do People Say That I Am? (Vernon K. Robbins)

There is a fantastic new book just published that covers Jesus and the gospels, canonical as well as extracanonical.  Vernon Robbins,

Who Do People Say I Am? Rewriting Gospel in Emerging Christianity

.

Professor Robbins' book is the best there is on the market in my opinion.  I highly recommend it to you, especially if you are looking for a book to teach this subject.

Robbins sets the more commonly known representations of Jesus in the Bible alongside lesser-well-known portraits of him found in texts like the Gospel of Thomas, the Gospel of Mary, the Gospel of Judas, and the Acts of John.  He does this, not simply as a rehash of general knowledge, but applying all of his years of accumulated knowledge of orality, rhetoric, cognition and the social fabric of Christianity to the material.  You are face-to-face with Robbins the veteran professor sharing generously his knowledge.

The book is very accessible in terms of style and yet very careful in terms of historical detail.  A perfect match for the non-specialist reader, and specialists from other areas of New Testament study who want to get a handle on the extracanonical material.

Book Note: Introduction to "Gnosticism" (Denzey Lewis)

I was delighted yesterday when Nicola Denzey's new textbook on Gnosticism arrived in my office mailbox.  I had the pleasure of reading the book while it was in preparation, and I am excited to see it finally in print.  The book covers all the main issues of the Nag Hammadi literature and will be a perfect compliment to the Nag Hammadi Library if you are considering teaching a course on this literature, or if you are studying the Nag Hammadi texts independently.  The textbook clearly is designed from Denzey's experience teaching a course on Nag Hammadi literature over many years, so it focuses around the main schools of Gnostics that are represented in the Nag Hammadi library, plus a discussion of the other Nag Hammadi texts like the Gospel of Thomas and the Hermetic literature.  The book contains maps, diagrams, timelines, and photos to illustrate the text.  At the end of each chapter are "Questions to Consider", "Key Terms" and "For Further Reading."

A new Coptic grammar by Johanna Brankaer

I have been meaning to alert you to a new Coptic grammar that has just been published. It is written by

Johanna Brankaer,

Coptic: A Learning Grammar

(Sahidic) (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz)

. The book is structured in five parts: the first three are concerned with learning Coptic grammar. Part four is exercises that apply what has been learned in the grammatical chapters. Part five includes a selection of texts to translate. A great feature is that the exercises and the texts have cross-references to the grammatical chapters.

Her organization and pedagogy is simple: Part 1 contains all the elements of Coptic language (pronouns; nouns; numerals; prepositions; adverbs; verbs); Part 2 addresses Coptic sentence structures (nominal articulation; nominal sentences; durative sentences; etc); Part 3 covers complex sentences (main clauses; subordinate clauses; relative clauses; cleft sentences). I really like the way the grammar is laid out like this because it shows you, even in the table of contents, what the language looks like as a system. So it approaches Coptic from a holistic perspective rather than presenting it as a series of disassociated grammar and syntax points. I think it might be possible to teach the basics of Coptic in one semester using this grammar.

Brankaer uses the terminology established by Bentley Layton in his

Coptic Grammar

, although she has a glossary where equivalent terms found in other grammars are explained.