Religion and Its Monsters

by Beal,Timothy K.

• ISBN13: 9780415925884
• ISBN10: 0415925886
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2001-11-05
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

Religion's great and powerful mystery fascinates us, but it also terrifies. So too the monsters that haunt the stories of Jewish and Christian scriptures 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 reveals how monsters and religion are irrevocably entwined. Most of us do not go to monster movies or read Gothic tales in search of religion, at least not consciously. Nor do we go to religious services in search of monsters. Yet, horror and faith, it seems, are inextricable. According to Beal, we can learn something about religion by getting to know its monsters, and we can learn something about monsters by investigating their religious roots. As Timothy Beal follows monsters throughout religious texts and traditions, he also discovers religion lurking in the modern horror genre, from classics likeFrankensteinandDraculato thecontemporary spookiness of H.P. Lovecraft's short stories and theHellraiserfilms. Drawing upon a broad range of ancient texts and popular culture, from rabbinic lore to Goth counterculture, he explores the fascinating and often disturbing ways in which monsters haunt religion and religion haunts the monstrous. Learned and witty,Religion and Its Monstersis a captivating look at how we imagine good and evil--and what lies beyond.

Author Biography

Timothy K. Beal is Harkness Associate Professor of Biblical Literature at Case Western Reserve University

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	ix
Introduction	1	(12)
Genesis 1, Take Two
Religion and Its Monsters, Monsters and Their Religion
Paradox of the Monstrous
Demonizing and Deifying
Monstrum Tremendum, Mysterium Tremendum
PART ONE RELIGION AND ITS MONSTERS
Chaos Gods	13	(10)
Fragments from the Ancient Near East
To Order and Back
Chaos Mother
The Cloudrider and the Warrior Goddess
No Rest
The Bible and Horror	23	(12)
Biblical Monsters and Mad Professors
Water Play or Water Fight
Disorientation and Theological Horror
Monstrous Enemies
Conjuring
The Sleep of Wisdom	35	(12)
Job and the Abyss of Suffering
Absence of All Refuge
Desiring Chaos
Lyricism of Terror
From the Whirlwind	47	(10)
Rousing God Rousing Leviathan
Diapered Monster
Behold Behemoth
Drawing Out Leviathan
Wholly Other
Divine Abyss
Dinner and a Show	57	(14)
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
To the Devil	71	(18)
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 TWO MONSTERS AND THEIR RELIGION
New Monsters in Old Skins	89	(14)
Modern Chaos Battles
Hobbes' Mortall God
Theophany
But Why Leviathan?
Awe and Order
Hellraiser
Other Gods	103	(20)
Orientalism and Its Monsters
The Witch's Monkeys
Rama's Monkeys
Horrid Chambers of Imagery
Diabolical Monsters
Sublime Monsters
Disoriental Monsters
The Blood Is the Life	123	(18)
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
Screening Monsters	141	(18)
Movie Time, Sacred Time
Monstrous Revelations (Nosferatu and Shadow of the Vampire)
Stage Rite (Dracula)
Exorcism (Metropolis)
Ecomonster	159	(14)
I Am Become Death
Ecohorror on Screen
Demythologizing the Monster
Shooting the Monster
These Are Ourselves
Our Monsters, Ourselves	173	(20)
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	(4)
Here Be Monsters
Warning
Notes	197	(32)
Index	229