Mike Pope

Belief and Unbelief in the Ancient World

World Religions

“This new volume is a welcome contribution to current discussions of ancient religions, questions of belief and praxis, boundaries of admissible evidence, and methodologies for assessing what survives in language, symbol, and artefact. In the spirit of open dialogue and cross-pollination, the editors have granted contributors broad freedom to set both the material and parameters of their studies—inquiries spanning more than a thousand years of human experience across various cultures and periods. Various disciplines are represented, including philology, archaeology, theology, philosophy, hermeneutics, and art history. What results is a refreshingly nondogmatic collection of discrete character studies on the inner and external lives of people making sense of their world in the messy and not-so-distant past. Whether intended or by happy coincidence, a sequential reading of the essays will actively prevent audiences from drawing any convenient or safe conclusion, as is right in a conversation over belief and its opposites.”