• DOI:10.1086/596070
• Corpus ID: 155116101

The Universal and the Particular: Mary Douglas and the Politics of Impurity*

@article{Lemos2009TheUA,
  title={The Universal and the Particular: Mary Douglas and the Politics of Impurity*},
  author={T. M. Lemos},
  journal={The Journal of Religion},
  year={2009},
  volume={89},
  pages={236 - 251}
}

• T. M. Lemos
• Published 1 April 2009
• History
• The Journal of Religion

Since the inception of modern biblical scholarship, the book of Leviticus has served as a theological battleground for scholars of varying religious persuasions. Julius Wellhausen, the most influential biblical scholar of the nineteenth century, thought none too highly of Leviticus and the purity regulations found therein. To him, both exemplified the degenerative tendencies of the priestly writers, who led the Israelites down the path of legalistic nit-picking and prurient body obsessiveness that of course culminated in Judaism, that wayward faith. Naturally, Jewish scholars were not overly enthusiastic about this characterization. Most notably, Yehezkel Kaufmann reacted against it by painting Leviticus as a text exemplifying instead the revolutionary nature of Israelite monotheism, which contrasted with the paganistic worldview of not only all other ancient religions but all religions not deriving ultimately from Judaism, that unique and incomparable faith. Apart from being