IPRA Geneses conference, Nantes, May 2017

Our conference brought together specialists in Jewish, Christian and Muslim studies, from across Europe, North American and the Middle East.  Together we explored the construction (and deconstruction) of narratives of the creation of religious communities, analyzed how legal norms and institutions were crafted in connection with sacred texts, and looked at some of the important echoes that these questions have today.  The scholars present challenge received wisdom about what “religions” are and how they are formed, in particular the three “Abrahamic” monotheisms.  Putting in perspective recent scholarship on the formation of these religions and the relations between them, we call into question the standard narratives of the rise of Rabbinic Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

The acts of the conference are scheduled to be published in 2018.  The program and a summary of the papers are to be found below.