ABSTRACT
The religion that Religious Studies scholars study is, to put it mildly, of ample scope. Religion encompasses just about every feature of human existence, and the scholars who study it draw upon every imaginable approach within the humanities. Cohen's configuration of ancient Judaism as religion relies on a number of themes: adoptability/disposability and individualization, which differentiate it from earlier Israel, and an orientation toward practice rather than belief, which differentiates it from Christianity, Islam, and medieval Judaism. Restrictive approaches to religion can be found also in the recent scholarly debates over whether Jews and Judaism existed in antiquity. The starting point for these debates is a translation question that scholar Steve Mason faced as he was editing a new edition of the works of Josephus. On the ancient Judaism side, the scholars reconstructing little religion need to be reminded that religion is not an ontological entity whose emergence and development they can track within Jewish history.
