!"##$%&'()&*+ ,"#-./0+12'3.4*/#'56'7$8-9*:+*% 5."/8*2';."/%9:'.<'#-*',=*/$89%',89)*=>'.<'3*:$&$.%?'@.:6'AB?'C.6'D'05E/$%&?'DBBD1?'EE6'DFGH DIJ K"4:$+-*)'4>2'LM<./)'N%$O*/+$#>'K/*++ 5#94:*'N3P2'http://www.jstor.

org/stable/1465438 ,88*++*)2'QGRSARQSSB'DF2IJ
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=oup. Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed page of such transmission. JSTOR is a not-for-profit organization founded in 1995 to build trusted digital archives for scholarship. We work with the scholarly community to preserve their work and the materials they rely upon, and to build a common research platform that promotes the discovery and use of these resources. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

Oxford University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Journal of the American Academy of Religion.

http://www.jstor.org

LIX/1 Journalof the American Academy of Religion.

ESSAY

Cutting Edges
Robert S. Michaelsen

THE PURPOSEOF the AmericanAcademyof Religion, accordingto the 1990 annual meeting program, is to foster "teaching, research, awareness about the studyof religionas a humanscholarshipand critical istic field of learning"(AAR/SBL1990:18). The applicationfor membership states that the purpose is to "stimulate scholarship, foster research,and promotelearningin the subdisciplinesthat constitutereligious studies as an academic discipline" (4). Much food for thought there. Leaving aside possible probings about "religious studies," "humanisticfield," "subdisciplines,"and "academicdiscipline," I want to focus on: teaching, research, scholarship, learning, and "critical awareness"-all within the context of "American,""Academy,"and "Religion." I begin with the last-religion. I understandthe practiceof religion in the same way that Tip O'Neal understandsthe practice of politics: It's all local. I also affirmthe corollarythat flows from this: Success in the scholarlystudy of religion as in the practiceof politics requiresthat you stay close to your base. In other words, I understandthe scholarly study of religion to be significantly concerned with what some have called "religionon the ground." I also take it as elementary,however, that that study requires the development and use not only of tools and methods, but also of constructsand theories that will lead to accuratedescription,criticalanalysis, and even plausible explanation. I don't want to call that "religionin
RobertS. Michaelsenis Professorof ReligiousStudiesEmeritusat the Universityof California,Santa CA 93106. Santa Barbara, Barbara,

137

138

Journalof the American Academyof Religion

the air," as contrastedwith "religionon the ground." But I do want to suggest that scholarship in religion can best be done both "on the ground" and "from the air." (Note the prepositions.) That's where academycomes in. I understandto be more descriptiveof AAR membership American than of orientation,even thoughthe marksof our environmentare heavy upon us. There is some reason to rejoice, however, at increasing evidence of transcendenceof national parochialism. I take as my texts two recently published books: Omer Call Stewart's PeyoteReligion:A Historyand James Samuel Preuss's Explaining and Theory Religion:Criticism from Bodinto Freud. These two exemplify what I understandto be necessaryto the systematic,scholarlystudy of religion. Stewart'swork significantlyrounds out studies of peyotism in this country. It is impressivein its thoroughness. Basedon more than a half centuryof first-handstudy as well as familiaritywith the considerable literatureon the subject, Stewart amply documents and convincingly portraysthe role that peyotism has played as a unifying and stabilizing influence in Indian life. (It is regrettablethat Supreme Court Justice Scalia and his co-conspirators were not exposed to it or did not take its message seriously before they decided that the criminalizingof peyote use in a serviceof the Native AmericanChurchdoes not violate the free exercise clause of the First Amendment [Employment Divisionv. Smith, 110 S.Ct. 1595, 1990].) Stewart'swork is a model study of an importantAmericanreligious movement. I cite that work, however, not only as a model but also for the author'sprofessedlack of interestin theory. He makes it quite clear that he is concernedonly with "religionon the ground." His fifty-page bibliography,itself worth the price of the book, includes only two or three referencesto works concernedwith such generalsubjectsas nativism or new religions. "[M]y considerationof peyotism,"he writes in the Preface, "rests primarily on ethnographic interviews and participant observationsand not on theories"(xiii). Who needs theories? There is somethingadmirableabout Stewart'sattachmentto his data and his single-minded commitment to description. His book exemplifies one meaning of the word "monograph."It's like a first-classletterin a plain envelope. (Since I've retired I seem to be receivingmore second class mail. It has occurredto me that in an effort to stay afloat Medicareis selling addresses. In any case, I am inundated with smiling seniors, cures for irregularity, and sure-fireoffers of immortality. All very glossily packagedbut all froth and no substance.)

Michaelsen: Cutting Edges

139

If Stewart is a first-class letter, Preuss is an urgent electronic and explanation message: Understanding requiremore than description, however full that description may be. If we are to develop "critical awareness,"we must move from the particularto the general, or, more both in its own and a largercontext. Sam accurately,see the particular Preuss reminds us that the scholarly study of religion is rooted in the criticism of religion, an attemptto look at the subject from a distance, from outside it, from anotherperspective. The early critics, aware of a varietyof particular religions,raisedthe question,which is true? Subsequent criticsmoved from a quest for the true religion to explaining relior scientificframework. Preussunderlinesthe gion within a naturalistic importanceof this historyto our enterprisetoday. "What,"he asks, "is the fittest way to study religion? What are the most significantsorts of questions to be tackled? The stakes are enormous,"he correctlypoints out, "becausebasic decisions are involved about how the next generation of scholar-teachers ought to be trained"(xix). I would add that the way these questions are answered will decisively determine the wellbeing if not the very survivalof the scholarly study of religion in the considered,tested for academy. Who needs theories? We do. Carefully plausibility,employed without reservation-other than that they make sense. Religionand the studyof religion,Preussarguesin advancinghis own answers,enjoy or should enjoy no privilegedstatusin the academy. Jim Wiggins reachedme last spring in the El Rancho Motel outside of Sacramento with his requestthat I try to see some orderin the chaos of the AAR annual meeting program. (I hasten to add that I was at the El Rancho enjoying a couple of days with my grandchildren-another kind of chaos.) I was flatteredand honored to be asked to follow my friend and one-time colleague, the distinguished "inaugurallecturer," Jonathan Z. Smith, in undertakingthis cosmic task. (Read "cosmic," not "comic,"althoughthe lattermight also be appropriate.)AfterI read Jonathan's admirable statement on "Connections," delivered in Anaheim last year, I wasn't sure there was anything more to be said. "Connections II?" Followed by "Connections III," etc. From somewhere in the recesses of my brain came that overused cliche, "cutting edges." Why not? It is a metaphor with a variety of possible uses: "Raggededges?" "Thin edge?" "Over the edge?" "Edged out?" A "cuttingedge" must be sharp. Further,to have a "cuttingedge" there must be a center. PerhapsJonathanprovidedthat center last year? But to give you some idea of "whereI'm coming from"in this regardI have briefly stated my view in the prolegomenon to these remarks. And to give you some idea of where I'm going; I regardas "cutting

140

Journalof the American Academyof Religion

edges": 1) expanding attention to "religion on the ground";2) more concentration on theory, doing religious studies from the air, so to of the undergraduate and the study of religion speak;3) the rediscovery in the general curriculumof college and university;and 4) increasing focus on the Academy'spublic responsibilityand role. In preparation for this speech I perusedannual meetingprogramsof the Academysince the late 1960s. The predominantimpression is that we have become more and more like the DemocraticParty-a collection of interestgroups strung togetheron a slender thread. A second impression is that our roots in theological and biblical studies are still clearlyevident. As we have continuedto join forceswith the SBLthe amountof attentionto biblical studies as such has declined. was dropped in the early '80s.) But (The section on Biblical Literature the interestin theologyand theologicalthemes is impressivelypervasive. The Theologyand ReligiousReflectionsection has continued as a hardy perennialsince its creationout of the Philosophyof Religionand Theology section in 1979. Perhapsthe Nineteenth-Century Theology Group takes the prize for longevity. (Will it be succeeded or augmentedby a twentieth-centurytheology group?) Other theological foci include: Scandinavian,Evangelical,Liberation,and, from early in our history, Radical Theology; Theology and Process, Currents in Contemporary Chistology, Theology of Catastrophe,Theology and Science, Theology and the Phenomenological Movement. In addition there are various groups, seminars, etc. on individual theologians such as Bonhoeffer, Rahner,and Tillich. A session in 1980 on "Doing Theology in the University"called to mind a national conference at the Universityof Michigantwo decades earlier at which serious doubts were expressed by scholars about the legitimacyof doing theology at all in the university. Is doing theology now a "cuttingedge" in the university?Has that marginalization of theology in the academy,which began in this countryalmost two centuries ago, been significantlyreversedin our time? Clearlytheologicalsystems are among the data of religiousstudies and relatedfields. Has God also become a datum for study, analysis, explanation? Or is theology more akin to poetry,dramaand other creativeartsthan to the analyticaldisciplines of the sciences? Does the constructiveor creativetheologian,like the artist,have the capacityto perceiveshadows, "the power to see what other people do not see, to jump to conclusions and to be right?" (Davies: 18). Is doing theology in the university a "cutting edge"? One would suppose that that depends on what kind of theologyand who is doing it.

Michaelsen:CuttingEdges

141

Certainlythe theologians are addressingimportanthuman issues. And perhaps that is sufficient to the university. But nagging questions remain: Where is the center? Where the substantiveevidence? What the context of inquiry? What is authoritative?One is impressed with the experientialand ideologicalrootageof much of contemporary theology. Attentionto "currentissues" abounds. But as someone has said, he or she who marries the spirit of the times is soon to be widowed. (When he made the transitionfrom seminaryto universitysome twenty Protestanttheology, paryears ago Van Harveynoted: "Contemporary ticularly,flits from one new frontierto anotherin ever shorteningspans of time. The 'death-of-god'occurs in 1967 but is superceded by the 'theologyof hope' in 1968-69 which, in turn, will probablygive way to 'black theology' in the early '70s." This acceleratingmovement from issue to issue, Harveypropheticallyobserved,may come full circle when someone proposes "a truly radical theology: a theology of the past" [21]). In contrastto or beyond this freneticseizing on currentissues, Robert Neville seeks "to renew theologyas a discipline for the development, clarification, understanding, explanation, and critical assessment of of divine matters." Such a theology,he argues,can be both interpretants and "public,"and it can transcendthe confinementsof the "objective" Christiancommunity (2). One assumes that Neville would claim that such a way of doing theology belongs in the universityand that it may even be a "cuttingedge." Clearly,on this subject,I have more questions than answers. A third impression from review of past annual meeting programsis that there has been a significantbroadeningin areasof interestor "coverage." Indeed, it is gratifyingto note the increasing breadth in the Academy. Once heavily Protestant,even liberal Protestant,in orientation, the Academyprogramgraduallybroadenedto include Catholicism and Judaism, then "Asian Religions," and more recently, increasing attention has been given to Islam, Zoroastrianism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Chinese religions,Japanesereligions,Koreanreligions,and religion in modem India. (It is particularly gratifyingto note, for example, that systematicattention to Islam within the AAR, after a checkered career which included some status within the History of ChristianitySection followed by separategroup statusin 1977, finally achievedsection status in 1986.) Breadthof interestif not coverageis also evident in the topics of the 75th anniversarylectures in 1984: one on Indian experience, one on Black Africa,one on MesoAmerica,one with an Asian perspective,five

142

Joumal of the American Academyof Religion

on theology and/or philosophy and theology, two of which presented nature. distinctivelyEuropeanperspectives,and two of a programmatic The geographicinclusiveness was impressive: all continents excepting Australiaand Antarctica. Hence, while we areAmericans and while elements of tribalismsurviveamong us, our range of vision has extended well beyond North America, and our focussed energies have tended to transcenda confining regionalism. The recent awards for Excellence in Religious Studies, given annuin the field, also reflect the breadth ally to books deemed pathbreaking of the Academy'sinterest: FourTheories of Mythin the Twentieth Century andRevolutions (Strenski); Paradigms (Gutting);TheFirstUrbanChristians in the NineteenthCentury (Meeks);Altarity(Taylor);ProtestantThought (Welch); Models of God: Theology for an Ecological,Nuclear Age St.Jeromein the Renaissance (Rice);Zen and Western (McFague); Thought Paul: Philemon and the Sociology (Abe); Rediscovering of Paul'sNarrative World and Suicide:An Interpretation (Pedersen);Salvation ofJimJones,the andJonestown (Chidester); People'sTemple, Defenders of God: TheFundamentalist Revolt the Fall: againstthe ModemAge (Lawrence);and Breaking Fiction(Detweiler). Religious Reading of Contemporary Parallel with the broadening scope in subject-foci is a welcome increase in the diversityof religious, ethnic, and general representation in the membershipand leadershipof the Academy. So there is great variety. And why not "let a hundred flowers bloom" or, as a more recent sage put it, "a thousand points of light shine?" Come one, come all. Who is to say what belongs other than the individuals who have an interest in belonging-and the Program Committee? (One who wishes to study trends with real thoroughness should get into the minutes of that group.) "Cuttingedges"? 1. Why not make a virtueof our varietythen? It suggests that increasing light is being shed on the local, that we are learning more and more about "religion on the ground." This is our primaryraisond'etre. 2. But what, other than an expanding pluralism, is our common bond? We do pay lip serviceto some connectinglinks, such as comparative, cross-cultural,and interdisciplinary studies; yet these areas have not flourished. Two decades ago Claude Welch discerned an identitycrisis among us. Splitpersonality puts it more bluntly. Jonathan Smith spoke about our "bilocality,"representingseminaryand university,and the resultant "duality"in the Academy (1990:3). Yet the bifurcation is not just due to our different localities. It

Michaelsen:CuttingEdges

143

wherever we are, to be protective of the springsfromour propensity, sanctities.We wantto be scholarly; we wantto be analytical; we want to be critical; we wantto be integral to the academy.Yetwe continue to see or wantto see the sacredas given,the heartof the subjectas offlimitsto the ordinary of scholarly methods over inquiry.(Seethe debate as "sui We want to assume that to understand relireligion generis.") gion or a religion you mustget insideor be an insider. It is encouraging to notethateventhough attention to theory is not a some devotedsouls are engagedin lively big seller in the Academy, debateof these kindsof issues. Theory forcesor can forceorderon a field. It can help sensitizeus to how muchor how littlewe disparate attenreallyknowaboutreligion.Onehopes,then,formoresystematic tionto the kindsof issuesdealtwithby Preuss in his Explaining Religion, Smithin Imagining and by otherssuch as Ivan by Jonathan Religion, DonaldWiebe,and HansPenner. Strenski, of linguistics as a model,Penner statesconfiUsingthedevelopment has yet to dentlythata similarscienceof religionis "a possibility [but] be constructed. The firstchallenge is to presenta well-formed theory whichwill defineand describe the objectof religion. .. The goal . . . would be nothingshort of a theoretical of the universal description structure of religion" I (174-175). I'dlike to sharePenner's confidence; he is But a caveat or two: R. A. out hope Jonesskillfully right. points thattheory, like history, can be but " 'a bag of trickswe playupon the dead'" (137;citedby Strenski:5). theorists Or,to changethe metaphor, can be engagedin a floatingcrapgame which seldomdocks. To be adequate, theorymust be tied to context. It must be relatedto such dimensionsas the historical, the phenomenological, the sociological, andthe psychological. fieldof scientific as a Or,to use another inquiry distant model: The "hunches" of the theoretical mustbe put physicists to the test in the laboratories of the experimentalists. 3. I am delighted with the rediscovery of the undergraduate. The of the TaskForceon Study members in Depthin Religion-The Underwill bringa report to use at thismeeting.Copiesof their graduate Major written Liberal and havebeendistribreport, Learning The Religion Major, utedto the membership. and comprehensive, it is Incisive, perceptive, well worthreading.As a prologue to theirconsideration of the underthe Committee whatis involved in the graduate major nicelydescribes of is madethereto "cross-cultural" study religionin depth. Reference and "interdisciplinary" studiesin religion, "without sectarian bias,"and to the "experimental which "has continued to enliventhe buoyancy" academicstudy of religion"(Crites:3,4). Some forms of buoyancy

144

Journalof the American Academyof Religion

involve air;but clearly the Committeehad in mind that kind of excitement which can be elicited by a lively studyof "religionon the ground." That attractsundergraduates.While discerning increasing maturityin the field, the Committee also, in a statement reminiscent of Preuss' monition, underlines as "the most serious problem" the "disparity between the undergraduate Departmentof Religion and most of the availablegraduateprogramsthat trainits faculty" (5). One notes attention to that challengingconcern in a general session in the 1986 annual meeting and in the NEH SantaBarbara Colloquy(see Normanand Larwill be pleased to learn that in son.) Finally, many an undergraduate addition to being one way of "joining the human race" the study of religion can also be fun! (17) And that's no joke. Unless the subjectis taught well it cannot compete in a budget race where it is clearly an underdog. Rigoris in, but it's rigorvitalis, not rigor mortis. 4. My fourth edge involves evidence of increasing concern about the public role and responsibilityof the Academyand the professionthe Studyof Religionin Public,"as MartinMartyput it in "Committing his presidentialaddress two years ago. Although it may seem obvious, this is a daunting task. Most of us in academic communities tend to preferthe relativeisolation affordedby such communitiesto the hurlyburly of the public arena. Even if we wish to break out of that isolation we may not be sure how to go about it. And when we have exposed ourselves, so to speak, we may be surprised at how few people take notice. Ours is but a side show which is not even granteda place under the big top. What, e.g., have we contributedto a betterunderstanding of the intimateinvolvementof religionin affairsof the PersianGulfand the Near East generally? On another public front, while Academy interest in religion in the public schools has been sporadic, it has increased in recent years-as seen, e.g., in the work of the Committeeon Educationand the Studyof Religion and in general sessions on the subject at the last two annual meetings. It is an importantand difficultareain which thereis no quick fix. This was broughthome to me forcefullyduringthis past year when I served on one of the instructionalmaterialsevaluationpanels of the CaliforniaStateBoardof Education. It was ourjob to examine materials which had been submitted to the Boardof Educationby publishers in for Califomia response to the Board'sHistory-Social ScienceFramework PublicSchools,adopted by the Boardin 1987. The Framework sets the patternfor what needs to be included in texts if they are to receiveBoard Framework is a remarkably incluapproval. This History-SocialScience sive document and one that is especially noteworthy in this context

Michaelsen:CuttingEdges

145

becauseof its specification that adequateattentionbe given to the of in importance religion historyand culture.
My particulartask involved examination of instructionalmaterials for world history courses in grades six and seven. The materialswhich we recommendedfor adoption include attentionto the beginnings and subsequentdevelopmentof such majorhistoricalreligionsas Buddhism, Hinduism,Islam and Judaism,as well as to the religionsof Christianity, ancient Aryan civilization, China, Egypt, Greece, Israel, Sumer, and Rome, religion in Byzantium,among the Aztecs, Incas, and Mayans,in the OttomanEmpire,in medievaland modem Japan, and in the Reformation and the Renaissance(see Armento,et al.). No lack of attention here to "religionon the ground." The Californiaadoption process has stirredup much debate. Several interestgroups have protestedthat the materialsare inadequateor Christiansand just plain wrong in some of theirentries. Fundamentalist of some Jewish and Muslimgroups have criticizedvarirepresentatives ous treatmentsof religion in the texts. Some Jews have arguedthat the and that sixth-gradetext is more criticalof Judaismthan of Christianity it tends in places to depict Judaism as primarilypreparatory to Christianity. Muslimshave expressedconcern about the treatmentof the roots of Islam in the seventh-gradetext and some have even suggested that only a Muslim author could write an accurate account. Some Black, Chicano,Asian, and Native Americancriticshave arguedthat the books are too Eurocentric,and some of them go on to assert that a common culture is neither possible nor desirable. To which argumentthe Los Angeles Timesresponded: "Oh, really? In a state as diverse as California, some common culturehad betterbe possible or we're all lost." (1011-90:B6). What has the Academy to say about such issues? Clearlywe can underlineand reinforcethe importanceof knowledge of detail, of accuracy in description. But can we be an arbitratorbetween competing interests? And what about common ground? Norman Learwas sketching some kind of common ground when, in his speech to the annual meeting in 1989, he dramatically portrayeda "typicalAmerican"who wondered all where the values had gone. Lear advocates poignantly about the core values that bind our society together while teaching stress on those attitudes and beliefs which separate us (see avoiding Michaelson). There'spunch in such an approach,but is it ours to give? Or can we, while urging accuracyin their treatment,only point at and possibly celebratethe differencesamong groups? Do we have some role as informed critics? And if so, what?

146

Journal of Academy of Religion of theAmerican

Can we, in keeping with the hopeful projectionof Hans Penner and others,develop a scienceof religion?Are we or can we become a community of scholars and scholarshipthat can offer a perspectiveon the academic study of religion that might gain increasing acceptance? That advances the importance of knowledge to understanding,that offers accurate description and critical awareness? That can provide an Archimedianplatformor point that is less and more than the ultimate, the sacred? Drawingupon her researchon conversational style, linguist Deborah Tannen has written a best-seller which apparently helps men and women understandbetterwhy they have difficultycommunicatingwith each other. It's a problem that has bedeviled human relationssince the expulsion of the original male and female from the Garden, an expulsion which resulted, no doubt, from a misunderstanding!Will one of our own scientists of religion one day achieve a similar breakthrough which will help increase our understandingof why people of differing each other that religiousorientationsso disagreewith or misunderstand they seek to destroy each other? It's a naive question perhaps. But I would regardsuch a breakthroughas both a possibility and a cutting edge.

REFERENCES
1969-1990

AAR/SBL Annual Meeting Programs

Honolulu: Universityof HaAbe, Masao Zen and Western Thought, 1985 waii Press Anonymous Editorial,LosAngelesTimesOct. 11: B6. 1990 BosArmento, BeverlyJ., A Messageof Ancient Days and Acrossthe Centuries, et al. ton: Houghton Mifflin Co. 1991 and Suicide:An Interpretation Chidester,David Salvation ofJimJones, The 1988 Peoples Temple,and Jonestown,Bloomington: Indiana UniversityPress.

Cutting Edges Michaelsen:

147

and the Religion Crites, Stephen, LiberalLearning Major A Reportto the scribe Profession, AmericanAcademy of Religion. 1990 and MoralPurpose."FirstThings.A Monthly Davies, Robertson "Literature 1990 Journalof Religious and PublicLife November: 15-23. the Fall: Religious FicDetweiler, Robert Breaking Readings of Contemporary 1989 tion. Basingstroke:MacMillan. Gutting,Gary,ed. 1980 and Revolutions: andApplications Appraisals Paradigms of Thomas Kuhn's Philosophy of Science. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press.

Harvey,Van "Reflectionson the Teaching of Religion in America." 1970 Journalof the American 38: 17-29. Academy of Religion Science Framework History-Social History-Social for CaliforniaPublic Science Curriculum Schools, GradeTwelve. SacramenKindergarten Through Frameworkand to: CaliforniaState Departmentof Education. CriteriaCommittee, CaliforniaState Boardof Education, 1988 Jones, R.A. "On Merton's'History'and 'Systematics'of Sociologi1983 cal Theory." In Functions and Usesof Disciplinary Histories. Ed. by L. Graham,W. Lepenies,and P. Weingart. Dordrecht: Reidel. Larson,GeraldJ., Norman, Ralph, et al. 1988 Lawrence,Bruce B. 1989 Marty,MartinE. 1989 "The Santa Barbara Colloquy: Religion within the Limits of Reason Alone." Soundings:An InterdiscipliJournalLXXI:2-3. nary TheFundamentalist Revolt Againstthe ModemAge. New York: Harper& Row. "Committingthe Study of Religion in Public." Journal Academy of the American of ReligionLVII 1:1-22.

NuclearAge. McFague,Sallie Modelsof God: Theology for an Ecological, 1987 Philadelphia: FortressPress.

148

Journal Academy of theAmerican of Religion TheSocialWorld Meeks, Wayne TheFirstUrbanChristians: of theApos1983 tle Paul. New Haven: Yale UniversityPress.

Michaelson,Judith "Diviningthe New Lear." LosAngelesTimes/Calendar: 1990 "Television,"Dec. 2: 3. Neville, RobertC. 1988 "The Depths of God." Journalof theAmerican Academy LVI/1: 1-24. of Religion

and the Sociology Paul: Philemon Pedersen, Norman Rediscovering of Paul's R. Narrative World. Philadelphia: FortressPress. 1985 Penner, Hans "Criticismand the Development of a Science of Reli1986 gion." Studiesin Religion15/2: 165-175. and Theory Preuss,J. Samuel Explaining Religion:Criticism from Bodinto 1987 Freud. New Haven: Yale UniversityPress. Rice, Eugene F., Jr. SaintJeromein the Renaissance.Baltimore: The Johns 1985 Hopkins UniversityPress. Smith, JonathanZ. 1982 1990 toJonestown.Chicago: Imagining Religion:FromBabylon The Universityof Chicago Press. "Connections."Journalof theAmerican Academy of Religion LVIII/1:1-15.

Stewart,Omer Call PeyoteReligion:A History. Norman: The Universityof 1987 OklahomaPress. Strenski,Ivan FourTheories of Mythin Twentieth Century History:Cas1987 sirer, Eliade, Levi-Strauss and Malinowski. Iowa City: The Universityof Iowa Press. Tannen, Deborah YouJust Don't Understand:Talk BetweenSexes. New 1990 York: Morrow. TaylorMarkC. Altarity. Chicago: The Universityof Chicago Press. 1987 Welch, Claude ProtestantThoughtin the NineteenthCentury,II. New 1988 Haven: Yale UniversityPress. Wiebe, Donald "The Failure of Nerve in the Academic Study of Reli1984 gion." Studiesin Religion13:401-422.