Antiquity (for example, several contributions in Whitehouse & Martin, 2004;
Martin & Sørensen, 2011), as well as Jewish and Christian traditions (Luomanen
et al., 2007; Shantz, 2009; Czachesz & Biró, 2011; Kazen, 2012; Levy, 2012;
Shantz & Werline, 2012; Czachesz & Uro, 2013; Uro, 2016).
The question can be raised as to what students of the New Testament (as
well as scholars of ancient cultures and religions in general) can do to adapt
and improve the methodological repertoire developing in other disciplines.
After all, ancient subjects are not available for experimental studies, thus we
are not in a position to test any new hypotheses about their cognition. Let us
consider three ways of addressing this problem. First, scholars of historical
religious traditions can turn to areas of cognitive science that have not been
(extensively) used by cognitive theorists of religion. For example, cognitive
research on and models of oral communication, literacy, reading, memory,
and related topics, are directly relevant to the study of textual transmission
and can be integrated with other cognitive approaches. Research on empathy
and morality are further examples that can be mentioned here, as well. Second,
biblical scholars can pose interesting research questions for experts in experi-
mental studies. Any experimentalfield needs input from other domains, since
we can design experimental tests only if we have hypotheses, in thefirst place.
Empirical work can also shed more light on the relationship of cross-cultural
and culture-specific elements in religious traditions. Third, the use of com-
puter modeling, a traditional tool of cognitive science, provides textual and
historical scholars with opportunities to gain new insights about historical
data. For example, biblical texts can be analyzed with the help of network
theory, highlighting semantic structures that are difficult to discover by the
close reading of the sources only (Czachesz, 2016a). Other models address the
social structures and growth patterns of the Christian movement (Czachesz &
Lisdorf, 2013; Chapter 9 below).
Generally speaking, there are two ways of thinking about the potential
impact of the cognitive turn in New Testament Studies. First, the cognitive
approach sheds new light on classical research problems, such as the oral
transmission of texts, where the new approach supplements already well-tried
methods. In a joint article (Czachesz & Theissen, 2016a), Gerd Theissen and
myself identifiedfive areas of New Testament Studies, in which insights from
the Cognitive Science of Religion can contribute to the study of classical
problems:
1.What is the relation between texts and cognition?Are texts changing
expressions of cognitive patterns, which remain more or less unchanged,
while being realized in always new forms? How do texts influence our
cognition? What kind of role do texts play in religious practice?
2.Cognitive factors at the diachronic analysis of texts.How can we account
for stability and change in texts as they are transmitted? Texts are subject22 Cognitive Science and the New Testament