E-Book Overview
What does it mean, and what should it mean to be human?
In this collection of essays, scholars place the philosophies and theories of animal studies and posthumanism into conversation with biblical studies. Authors cross and disrupt boundaries and categories through close readings of stories where the human body is invaded, possessed, or driven mad. Articles explore the ethics of the human use of animals and the biblical contributions to the question. Other essays use the image of lions animals that appear not only in the wild, but also in the Bible, ancient Near Eastern texts, and philosophy to illustrate the potential these theories present for students of the Bible. Contributors George Aichele, Denise Kimber Buell, Benjamin H. Dunning, Heidi Epstein, Rhiannon Graybill, Jennifer L. Koosed, Eric Daryl Meyer, Stephen D. Moore, Hugh Pyper, Robert Paul Seesengood, Yvonne Sherwood, Ken Stone, and Hannah M. Strømmen present an open invitation for further work in the field of posthumanism.
Features:
- Coverage of texts that explore the boundaries between animal, human, and divinity
- Discussion of the term posthumanism and how it applies to biblical studies
- Essays engage Derrida, Foucault, Wolfe, Lacan, i ek, Singer, Haraway, and others
E-Book Content
What does it mean to be human? We are poised somewhere in between animality and divinity, aided, enhanced, and altered by technology, changing and changed by our environment. The Bible begins with men and women created in the image of the divine and given dominion over the rest of creation. However, the Bible also contains multiple moments of disruption, boundary crossing, and category confusion: animals speak, God becomes man, and spirits haunt the living. At the end, monsters confound. Pointing beyond humancentric ideologies, the essays in this collection explore biblical texts from Genesis to Revelation in conversation with the critical theories of posthumanism. The contributors include George Aichele, Denise Kimber Buell, Benjamin H. Dunning, Heidi Epstein, Rhiannon Graybill, Jennifer L. Koosed, Eric Daryl Meyer, Stephen D. Moore, Hugh Pyper, Robert Paul Seesengood, Yvonne Sherwood, Ken Stone, and Hannah M. Strømmen. JE NNIFER L. K OOSED is Chair and Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Albright College. She is the author of (Per)mutations of Qohelet: Reading the Body in the Book (Continuum, 2006) and Gleaning Ruth: A Biblical Heroine and Her Afterlives (University of South Carolina, 2011) and co-author of Jesse’s Lineage: The Legendary Lives of David, Jesus and Jesse James (T&T Clark, 2013).
Society of Biblical Literature
Koosed
Cover art: The Peaceable Kingdom by Edward Hicks. The Brooklyn Museum, Dick S. Ramsay Fund; courtesy Wikimedia Commons. Cover design: Kathie Klein.
The Bible and POSTHUMANISM
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THE BIBLE AND POSTHUMANISM
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The Bible and Posthumanism
Semeia Studies Gerald O. West, General Editor Editorial Board: Pablo Andiñach Fiona Black Denise K. Buell Gay L. Byron Steed Vernyl Davidson Jennifer L. Koosed Monica Jyotsna Melanchthon Yak-Hwee Tan
Number 74
The Bible and Posthumanism
Edited by
Jennifer L. Koosed
Society of Biblical Literature Atlanta
Copyright © 2014 by the Society of Biblical Literature
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