Definitions of Magic Sample Clauses

Definitions of Magic. Defining “magic” is notoriously difficult. Complicating factors include the tendentious oppositions posed by numerous scholars between magic and religion and between magic and science.68 A number of features have been posited as the crucial criterion for identifying magic. These range from magic’s individual focus vs. religion’s focus on the collective,69 to the presumed guaranteed effectiveness of magical words,70 to an attitude toward the deity as coercive rather than supplicatory.71 Xxxxx X. Xxxxxx and Xxxxxx X’Xxxxx argue instead for a “family resemblance” model in defining magic.72 Xxxxx X. Xxxxxx, Xxxxxxx Xxxxxxx, and others argue for an emic approach.73 Xxxxxx 68 Numerous overviews of these battles exist. See, for example, Xxxxxxx X. Xxxxxxx, Magic, Science, Religion, and the Scope of Rationality (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990); and Xxxxx X. Xxxxxx, “What is a Magical Text? Methodological Reflections Aimed at Redefining Early Jewish Magic,” in Officina Magica: Essays on the Practice of Magic in Antiquity (ed. Xxxxx Xxxxxx; IJS Studies in Judaica 4; Leiden: Xxxxx, 2005), 69 Cf. the views of Xxxxxxxxx Xxxxx and Xxxx Xxxxxxxx. 70 Cf. the discussion in Xxxxx Xxxx Xxxxxxxx, “Magic,” in Religions of the Ancient World: A Guide (ed. S. I. Xxxxxxxx; Cambridge: Xxxxxxx Press of Harvard University Press, 2004), 139-52. 71 One of the first proponents of this view was Xxxxxx. Cf. the discussions in Xxxx Xxxxxxx, “Some Reflections on the Relationship Magic—Religion,” Numen 38 (1991): 177-97 and in Xxxxx Xxxx, Magic in the Ancient World (trans. F. Xxxxxx; Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1997), 222-27. 72 Xxxxxx X'Xxxxx, Stolen Lightning: A Social Theory of Magic (New York: Continuum, 1982), 10-14; Xxxxxx, “Magical Text.” The notion of “family resemblance” comes from Wittgenstein (Philosophical Games); he argues that certain complex phenomena are best defined according to a group of criteria since no one criterion is present in all exemplars. 73 Xxxxx X. Xxxxxx, Xxxx X. Xxxxxx and Xxxxxxx X. Xxxxxxx, “Introduction” in Prayer, Magic, and the Stars in the Ancient and Late Antique World (Magic in History; University Park, Pa.: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2003), 2-17; Xxxxxxx Xxxxxxx, Magie im Alten Testament, (AOAT 313; Münster: Ugarit- Verlag, 2004), 62-66; Xxxxxxxx, “Magic.” Xxxxxxxx and Xxxxx Xxxxxx claim that scholars “know magic when they see it.”74 This last claim is particularly telling in that recent studies in cognitive science sug...