Producing Desire - Chapter 1: The Body Sexual

Reviews in history, 2014

As Ferngren explains in the opening pages: 'My purpose in this volume is to provide a concise but comprehensive survey that traces the history of the intersection of medicine and healing with religious traditions in the Western world from the earliest civilizations of Mesopotamia and Egypt to our own era'; a sizeable task to say the least. The chronological and geographical scope of work is striking, taking the reader on a journey through eight distinct eras: one, 'The ancient Near East'; two, 'Greece'; three, 'Rome'; four, 'Early Christianity'; five, 'The Middle Ages'; six, 'Islam in the Middle Ages'; seven, 'The early modern period'; and eight, 'The nineteenth and twentieth centuries'. Preceding these chapters, the author's 'acknowledgements' provides readers with helpful guidelines about what to expect along the way: 'I have not written a scholarly monograph but rather an introduction intended for non-specialists who wish to gain an understanding of the place of religion in the Western medical and healing traditions'. He duly explains his decision to avoid arcane language and technical medical terms, keep annotation to a minimum, and confine the notes chiefly to citations rather than to extended discussions. In addition, the author directs readers seeking to pursue subjects of special interest to an extensive bibliography of secondary literature on medicine and religion available at the publisher's website: www.press.jhu.edu [2] (p. ix-x).

Choice Reviews Online, 2014

As Ferngren explains in the opening pages: 'My purpose in this volume is to provide a concise but comprehensive survey that traces the history of the intersection of medicine and healing with religious traditions in the Western world from the earliest civilizations of Mesopotamia and Egypt to our own era'; a sizeable task to say the least. The chronological and geographical scope of work is striking, taking the reader on a journey through eight distinct eras: one, 'The ancient Near East'; two, 'Greece'; three, 'Rome'; four, 'Early Christianity'; five, 'The Middle Ages'; six, 'Islam in the Middle Ages'; seven, 'The early modern period'; and eight, 'The nineteenth and twentieth centuries'. Preceding these chapters, the author's 'acknowledgements' provides readers with helpful guidelines about what to expect along the way: 'I have not written a scholarly monograph but rather an introduction intended for non-specialists who wish to gain an understanding of the place of religion in the Western medical and healing traditions'. He duly explains his decision to avoid arcane language and technical medical terms, keep annotation to a minimum, and confine the notes chiefly to citations rather than to extended discussions. In addition, the author directs readers seeking to pursue subjects of special interest to an extensive bibliography of secondary literature on medicine and religion available at the publisher's website: www.press.jhu.edu [2] (p. ix-x).

Arc: The Journal of the Faculty of Religious Studies, McGill University, 40 (2012) s. 1–24

Religion, Medicine and the Body, , 2009

The object of scientific study of medicine is the physical body. As Ivan Varga points out, modernity has meant 'materialising' as well as 'scientificising' the body, which is studied as subject to the laws of nature: 'advances in biochemistry, genetics…dietetics, etc., together with their often watered down popularisation, spread the image of the scientifically determinable natural body. The healthy bodyin itself not a bad thing-is more and more associated with scientific advances'. 1 Varga underestimates the 'good' of a healthy body here, yet in medicine, such treatment of the body may limit our perspective and communication about who or what is being treated. We need to ask ourselves whether this treatment concerns only the disease, or the human being. To treat the human being is to recognise they way in which they make meaning of the illness, their values, and their world view. Often, however, a religious position is seen as contrary to 'obvious' scientific truth about health and well being.

Modern medicine has produced many wonderful technological breakthroughs that have extended the limits of the frail human body. However, much of the focus of this medical research has been on the physical, often reducing the human being to a biological machine to be examined, understood, and controlled. This book begins by asking whether the modern medical milieu has overly objectified the body, unwittingly or not, and whether current studies in bioethics are up to the task of restoring a fuller understanding of the human person. In response, various authors here suggest that a more theological/religious approach would be helpful or perhaps even necessary. Presenting specific perspectives from Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, the book is divided into three parts: "Understanding the Body," "Respecting the Body," and "The Body at the End of Life." A panel of expert contributorsincluding philosophers, physicians, and theologians and scholars of religion-answers key questions such as: What is the relationship between body and soul? What are our obligations toward human bodies? How should medicine respond to suffering and death? The resulting text is an interdisciplinary treatise on how medicine can best function in our societies. Offering a new way to approach the medical humanities, this book will be of keen interest to any scholars with an interest in contemporary religious perspectives on medicine and the body.

One guiding argument of Religion and the Body is that our individual and collective bodies are defined by, dependent on and constructed within and across an interrelated network of discourses that seek to protect, target, evaluate and optimize our bodies. In Religion and the Body, we seek to analyze the placement and significance of our bodies, which are located and shaped by and within a web of authoritative sources of knowledge that seek to promote the mastery, purification, transformation, and redemption of the body. Another assertion that guides this course is that the spheres of religion, sports, medicine and sexuality are mutually committed to the ordering, evaluating and controlling of our bodies. Religion and the Body is structured around three interrelated units: [1] Religion & Sports, which includes discussions on football; Zen and archery; racism and religion; baseball, purity and steroids; [2] Religion & Medicine; which includes units devoted to medicine in Early Christianity and Medieval Islam; contemporary theories and approaches towards the relationship between religion and medicine; medicine wizards in Myanmar; South Korean shamans; the healing way of Japanese Buddhist woman; the sacred use of peyote and the Native American Church; the COVID pandemic, medicine and religion [3] Religion & Sexuality, in addition to reading Michel Foucault's History of Sexuality in this final unit, we will discuss Buddhist approaches to sexuality; early Christian literature on marriage and sexuality; contemporary responses to sexual, gender, and racial diversity in the Christian and Muslim traditions. Committed to an interdisciplinary and integrative approach, we seek to employ a range of historical, analytical and theoretical frameworks, which generate questions with divergent and interrelated insights into the study of the body and embodied lives across.

A chapter in the Blackwell's Companion to Religion in Late Antiquity, edited by Josef Lossl and Nicolas J. Baker-Brian, 2018.

Medical history, 2015

in: Medical Ethics and Humanism. Intersections of Medicine and Philosophy, ed. by M. Gadebusch-Bondio- M. Neutmann, Franz Steiner Verlag, Stuttgart, 2014, pp. 29-46.