Acts of prayer, collective effervescence, ritual action, ecstatic experiences have all left a mark in early Judaism and Christianity. However, despite the importance of religious experience to these historical movements, scholarship has been reluctant to explore these phenomena in their own right. The course explores various methodologies, and the theories underlying them, as they are relevant to religious experience. Topics include ritual, emotion, metaphor, and identity. Together we will consider the relationship between the methods and our research questions. Although the examples in the course readings will be drawn primarily from Biblical and contemporary material, students are welcome to explore sources from other historical periods.
SMB5961HF
Methods for Exploring Religious Experience
- Instructor: Dr. Colleen Shantz
- Day: Thursday
- Time: 11:00-13:00
- Location: TBA
Dr. Colleen Shantz
Associate Professor of New Testament
Teaching and Research Interests
- New Testament Social World
- Social Scientific Approaches
- Early Christian Religious Experience
- Cognitive Science of Religion
Dr. Colleen Shantz has held a teaching position in the Faculty of Theology since 2003 and is cross-listed to the Department for the Study of Religion in the University of Toronto. Her research explores the general category of experience as an important element in the texts of the New Testament, and in early Christianity and Mediterranean antiquity more generally. Her current research projects include, first, an analysis of the dynamics of emotion and affect in the earliest Christ groups and, second, application of evolutionary and systems theory to the enduring puzzle of the rapid development of Christianity.
For several years Dr. Shantz taught a required course for PhD students on pedagogy and course design. She remains interested in designing assignments that better prepare students for their future engagement with the Bible and the skills that facilitate effective scholarship. She is active in the Society of Biblical Literature and the Canadian Society of Biblical studies where she is President for 2020-21.
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SMB3603HS L0101
Interpreting the Passion Narratives
Winter 2023- Instructor: Dr. Colleen Shantz
- Day: Monday
- Time: 11:00-13:00
- Location: Regis College Classroom B
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Fall 2022
- Instructor: Dr. Colleen Shantz
- Day: Thursday
- Time: 11:00-13:00
- Location: TBA
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SMB2701HF
The Life & Letters of St. Paul
Fall 2022- Instructor: Dr. Colleen Shantz
- Day: Tuesday
- Time: 11:00-13:00
- Location: TBA
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SMB1501HS L0101
CANCELLED: Introduction to the New Testament
Winter 2023- Instructor: Dr. Colleen Shantz
- Day: Thursday
- Time: 14:00-16:00
- Location: TBA
- “Religious Experience.” In Ryan Schellenberg and Heidi Wendt, eds. T&T Clark Handbook to the Historical Paul. London: T&T Clark, forthcoming.
- “Who Saw any of this Coming?” Response to papers in Christopher Zeichman and John Egger, eds. Festchrift for Leif E. Vaage. McGill-Queens University Press, forthcoming.
- Co-authored with Rikard Riotto and Petri Luomanen. “The Contribution of Social and Cognitive Perspectives to the Interpretation of the Sermon on the Mount.” Introduction, Cognitive and Social Readings of the Sermon on the Mount. Sheffield, UK: Equinox, [projected for October, 2021].
- Co-edited with Rikard Roitto and Petri Luomanen. Social and Cognitive Perspectives on the Sermon on the Mount. Sheffield, UK: Equinox, 2021.
- Co-edited with Rodney A. Werline. Experientia: Volume 2: From Text to Experience. Atlanta, GA: Society of Biblical Literature, 2012.
- Paul in Ecstasy: The Neurobiology of the Apostle’s Life and Thought. New York, Cambridge University Press: 2009.
- Co-edited with Frances Flannery and Rodney A. Werline. Experientia: Volume 1. Atlanta, GA: Society of Biblical Literature, 2008.
- “It’s All in How You Look at It: The Eyes and Morality in Matt 6:22–23.” Chapter in Cognitive and Social Readings of the Sermon on the Mount. Sheffield, UK: Equinox, 2021.
- “Altered States of Consciousness.” In The Ancient Mediterranean Social World: A Sourcebook, edited by Zeba Crook, 207-221. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2020.
- “Ritual and Religious Experience.” In The Oxford Handbook of Early Christian Ritual, pp. 477-490, edited by Risto Uro, Juliette Day, Richard DeMaris, Rikard Roitto, 477-489. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2019.
- “In the Divine (Mental) Image: Theological Anthropology and the Structures of Cognition.” In Theology as Interdisciplinary Inquiry: Learning with and from the Natural and Human Sciences, edited by Robin W. Lovin and Joshua Mauldin, 50-67. Grand Rapids, Michigan: William. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2017.
- 2021 “Bio-cultural Explanations for Ritual Practices,” Religion in Ancient Judaism and Christianity Seminar, Canadian Society of Biblical Studies.
- 2020 “What the Body Knows,” keynote address for symposium, What the Body Knows: Embodied Senses & Meaning-Creation in the Biblical Imagination, sponsored by University of Sheffield Institute for Interdisciplinary Biblical Studies (Sheffield/virtual).
- 2020 “Constructing Heaven: The Cultural Adaptation of Afterlife Belief,” Cognitive Science of Religion section, American Academy of Religion and Mind, Society, and Religion section, Society of Biblical Literature section, Boston.
- 2019 Panelist, review of Handbooks on Ritual (Oxford and ) co-sponsored by Meals in the Greco-Roman World, Ritual in the Biblical World sections, Society of Biblical Literature (November, San Diego).
- 2019 “Take a Chance on Me: Trustworthy Initiation Rituals in Galatia,” Rituals, Emotions, and Identity, International Conference at the University of Rostock (June, Germany).
- 2019 Panelist, review of Handbooks on Ritual (Oxford and ) co-sponsored by Meals in the Greco-Roman World, Ritual in the Biblical World sections, Society of Biblical Literature (November, San Diego).
- 2019 “Take a Chance on Me: Trustworthy Initiation Rituals in Galatia,” Rituals, Emotions, and Identity, International Conference at the University of Rostock (June, Germany).
- 2019 “Did Early Christians Believe the Bible?,” 10th Annual Meagher Lecture, University of St. Michael’s College, Toronto.
- 2018 “Imagine There’s a Heaven: The Role of Imagination in Niche Construction,” keynote presentation in Future Directions on the Evolution of Rituals, Beliefs, and Religious Minds, Erice, Sicily. Sponsored by the Majorana Foundation (Sicily) and the Centre for the Study of Human Evolution, Cognition, and Culture (University of British Columbia).
- 2018 Panelist, “Computational Modeling at the Interface of Traditional Religious Studies and Cognitive Science of Religion,” Cognitive Science of Religion Unit, American Academy of Religion (November, Denver).
- 2018 “It’s All in How You Look at It: The Eyes and Morality in Matt 6:22-23,” Mind, Society, and Religion Section, Society of Biblical Literature (November, Denver).
- 2018 Respondent to panelists, “Comparative Forms of Religious Expertise,” Historical Paul Section, Society of Biblical Literature (November, Denver).
- 2018 Response to J.T. Lamoreaux, R.E. DeMaris, and S.C. Muir (eds.), Early Christian Ritual Life (Routledge, 2018), Canadian Society of Biblical Studies (Regina, May).
- 2018 “Phineas Gage Reads the Satirists: Emotion as Communication,” Canadian Society of Biblical Studies, Regina.