Religion and Its Monsters / Edition 1

by Timothy Beal

Overview

Religion's great and powerful mystery fascinates us, but it also terrifies. So too the monsters that haunt the stories of the Judeo-Christian mythos and earlier traditions: Leviathan, Behemoth, dragons, and other beasts. In this unusual and provocative book, Timothy K. Beal writes about the monsters that lurk in our religious texts, and about how monsters and religion are deeply entwined. Horror and faith are inextricable. Ans as monsters are part of religious texts and traditions, so religion lurks in the modern horror genre, from its birth in Dante's Inferno to the contemporary spookiness of H.P. Lovecraft and the Hellraiser films. Religion and Its Monsters is essential reading for students of religion and popular culture, as well as any readers with an interest in horror.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780415925884
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	11/05/2001
Pages:	248
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Timothy K. Beal holds the Harkness Chair of Biblical Literature at Case Western Reserve University. He is author of The Book of Hiding and co-editor of Reading Bibles, Writing Bodies, both published by Routledge.

Table of Contents

	Acknowledgments	ix
	Introduction	1
	Genesis 1, Take Two
	Religion and Its Monsters, Monsters and Their Religion
	Paradox of the Monstrous
	Demonizing and Deifying
	Monstrum Tremendum, Mysterium Tremendum
Part 1	Religion and Its Monsters
1.	Chaos Gods	13
	Fragments from the Ancient Near East
	To Order and Back
	Chaos Mother
	The Cloudrider and the Warrior Goddess
	No Rest
2.	The Bible and Horror	23
	Biblical Monsters and Mad Professors
	Water Play or Water Fight
	Disorientation and Theological Horror
	Monstrous Enemies
	Conjuring
3.	The Sleep of Wisdom	35
	Job and the Abyss of Suffering
	Absence of All Refuge
	Desiring Chaos
	Lyricism of Terror
4.	From the Whirlwind	47
	Rousing God Rousing Leviathan
	Diapered Monster
	Behold Behemoth
	Drawing Out Leviathan
	Wholly Other
	Divine Abyss
5.	Dinner and a Show	57
	Watching and Eating Monsters in Rabbinic Tradition
	Seafaring Tales of the Rabbis
	Fresh, Frozen or Salt-cured
	Is This Monster Kosher?
	Jonah's Undersea Adventure
6.	To the Devil	71
	Apocalypse
	It's the Edge of the World as We Know It
	Diabolical Dragon
	The Monster-maker's Bible's Bible
	From Beowulf to Dracula to Harry Potter
Part 2	Monsters and Their Religion
7.	New Monsters in Old Skins	89
	Modern Chaos Battles
	Hobbes' Mortall God
	Theophany
	But Why Leviathan?
	Awe and Order
	Hellraiser
8.	Other Gods	103
	Orientalism and Its Monsters
	The Witch's Monkeys
	Rama's Monkeys
	Horrid Chambers of Imagery
	Diabolical Monsters
	Sublime Monsters
	Disoriental Monsters
9.	The Blood Is the Life	123
	Ritual Purity and Danger in Dracula
	The Count's Religion
	Laws Pertaining to Blood
	Flesh of My Flesh, Blood of My Blood
	Rituals of Resacralization
	Transfusion
	One Wedding and a Funeral
	Last Battle
10.	Screening Monsters	141
	Movie Time, Sacred Time
	Monstrous Revelations (Nosferatu and Shadow of the Vampire)
	Stage Rite (Dracula)
	Exorcism (Metropolis)
11.	Ecomonster	159
	I Am Become Death
	Ecohorror on Screen
	Demythologizing the Monster
	Shooting the Monster
	These Are Ourselves
12.	Our Monsters, Ourselves	173
	Island of the Misfit Boys
	Bela's Hideous Progeny
	Cthulhu Mythos
	Lovecraft's Hideous Progeny
	From Scholars to the Campus Crusade for Cthulhu
	Homesickness
	Conclusion	193
	Here Be Monsters
	Warning
	Notes	197
	Index	229

Editorial Reviews

This brilliant, twisted, imaginative book explores religion's dark side, from the predictable monsters of sacred texts (Leviathan, Behemoth, Tiamat and Rama's monkeys) to more startling choices from popular culture: one section applies religion's laws of ritual purity and danger to the novel Dracula, for example. Beal sees religion everywhere; Frankenstein, he asserts, is "a profoundly theological horror" about creator-figures playing God, while contemporary teen Goths inhabit "a counterculture infused with a mix of monstrosity and pre-modern Christian religious iconography and architecture." When Beal concludes the book by explaining that "our monsters are ourselves," it comes not as a cultural indictment from a self-satisfied pundit but an astute observation by a witty and wise fellow traveler. (Nov. 15)n Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.

Publishers Weekly

According to Beal (biblical literature, Case Western Reserve Univ.; The Book of Hiding), "monsters bring on a limit experience that is akin in many respects to religious experience, an experience of being on the edge of certainty." Here he dissects the interface of popular culture and religion, which meet in the personification of evil, that is, monsters. Characters like Tiamat, Leviathan, Dracula, and Oz's Winged Monkeys, as well as horror writers like Lovejoy, Stephen King, and Bram Stoker all fit into Beal's two-pronged approach: religion as horror and horror as religion. He finds that the combination of the Gothic and the theological reveals deep insecurities in our faith in ourselves "the unplumbed abyss of unknowing" inside us. Thus, he argues, these frightening specters of chaos and disorientation within order and security are psychic markers of our endangered sense of self and stability. An informal, chatty style makes this more accessible than academic, although it is well researched. Recommended for religion and popular culture collections. Sandra Collins, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary Lib. Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.

Library Journal

"Imaginatively written, entertaining, and well researched, this work of creative scholarship is a fascinating read." — CHOICE, R.L. Massanari, Alma College
"Wit and a style worthy of a novelist makes this foray into the turgid side of religions well worth a read; as entertaining as it is informative, and it is even rhetorically well grounded." — Word Trade
"...well researched. Recommended for religion and popular culture collections." — Library Journal
"...this is a fine, readable and often intriguing book." — The Plain Dealer
"Historically informed, theologically astute, culturally savvy. This monstrously provocative book demonstrates that religion is never more fascinating than when it is most disturbing." — Mark C. Taylor, author of The Moment of Complexity: Emerging Network Culture
"In his new volume, Religion and Its Monsters, as in his previous books, Timothy K. Beal demonstrates that erudition and knowledge can go together and find their way to readers everywhere." — Elie Wiesel, author of Night
"Timothy Beal has let the monsters out of our cultural and religious basement and allowed them to roam freely - to our great benefit, distress, and delight. His is a detailed, learned, and engrossing book, and our understanding of religious disorientation bounds forward because of it." — Frederick J. Ruf, author of The Creation of Chaos: William James and the Stylistic Making of a Disorderly World
"Ranging from the lair of Leviathan to the mosh pit of The Misfits, Beal's exhumation and dissection of religious monstrosity and monstrous religiosity is as entertaining as it is incisive." — Stephen D. Moore, author of God's Gym: Divine Male Bodies of the Bible
"This is scholarship in cultural analysis at its best: well-documented, thought-provoking, and funny. Its crisp writing almost fools you into thinking it's simple. But it does what it says: it raises profound questions that survive their answers. Critical of the devastating prejudices that underlie the religious imagination, it stops short of moralizing. A bravura piece of what binds the cultural disciplines together." — Mieke Bal, author of Quoting Caravaggio: Contemporary Art, Preposterous History
"This brilliant, twisted, imaginative book explores religion's dark side, from the predictable monsters of sacred texts to more startling choices from popular culture...When Beal concludes the book by explaining that 'our monsters are ourselves,' it comes not as a cultural indictment from a self-satisfied pundit but an astute observation by a witty and wise fellow traveler." — Publishers Weekly
"In the course of this wide-ranging survey, Beal generates a diverse collection of textual studies that strongly support his thesis...He contributes strongly to the growing dialogue between biblical studies and horror studies...This book is thoroughly readable and engaging—it is truly hard to put down. Beal's use of humor is admirable. This book should be accessible to any reasonably well-educated adult, and even high school students, and it would be excellent for use in either college classes or church study groups. I highly recommend it to anyone with interests in this area." — George Aichele, Adrian College
"The sophisticated thesis will please the scholar of religion; the accessibility of the volume will delight the student. Highly recommended." — Religious Studies Review

From the Publisher