Sacrifice and Modern Thought

Sacrifice and Modern Thought PDF

Author: Julia Meszaros

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2013-09

Total Pages: 290

ISBN-13: 0199659281

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Leading specialists in theology, anthropology, religious studies and history elucidate the modern debate about sacrifice from interest shown in the sixteenth century through to the present day. Individual chapters discuss anthropological theories, theological controversies, philosophical interpretations, and literary uses of sacrifice.

Modern Carmelite nuns and contemplative identities

Modern Carmelite nuns and contemplative identities PDF

Author: Brian Heffernan

Publisher: Manchester University Press

Published: 2024-05-21

Total Pages: 353

ISBN-13: 1526177196

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Discalced Carmelite convents are among the most influential wellsprings of female spirituality in the Catholic tradition, as the names of Teresa of Avila, Therese of Lisieux and Edith Stein attest. Behind these ‘great Carmelites’ stood communities of women who developed discourses on their relationship with God and their identity as a spiritual elite in the church and society. This book looks at these discourses as formulated by Carmelites in the Netherlands, from their arrival there in 1872 up to the recent past, providing an in-depth case study of the spiritualities of modern women contemplatives. The female religious life was a transnational phenomenon, and the book draws on sources and scholarship in English, Dutch, French and German to provide insights on gendered spirituality, memory and the post-conciliar renewal of the religious life.

Religion, Ritual and Ritualistic Objects

Religion, Ritual and Ritualistic Objects PDF

Author: Albertina (Tineke) Nugteren

Publisher: MDPI

Published: 2019-04-23

Total Pages: 240

ISBN-13: 3038977527

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This is a volume about the life and power of ritual objects in their religious ritual settings. In this Special Issue, we see a wide range of contributions on material culture and ritual practices across religions. By focusing on the dynamic interrelations between objects, ritual, and belief, it explores how religion happens through symbolic materiality. The ritual objects presented in this volume include: masks worn in the Dogon dance; antique ecclesiastical silver objects carried around in festive processions and shown in shrines in the southern Andes; funerary photographs and films functioning as mnemonic objects for grieving children; a dented rock surface perceived to be the god’s footprint in the archaic place of pilgrimage, Gaya (India); a recovered manual of rituals (from Xiapu county) for Mani, the founder of Manichaeism, juxtaposed to a Manichaean painting from southern China; sacred stories and related sacred stones in the Alor–Pantar archipelago, Indonesia; lotus symbolism, indicating immortalizing plants in the mythic traditions of Egypt, the Levant, and Mesopotamia; lavishly illustrated variations of portrayals of Ravana, a Sinhalese god-king-demon; figurines made of cow dung sculptured by rural women in Rajasthan (India); and mythical artifacts called ‘Apples of Eden’ in a well-known interactive game series.

Ritual Sacrifice

Ritual Sacrifice PDF

Author: Brenda Ralph Lewis

Publisher: The History Press

Published: 2007-01-15

Total Pages: 89

ISBN-13: 0752494821

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The principle of sacrifice is as old as human life itself. This book provides an overview of sacrificial practices around the world since prehistoric times. It also examines the reasons behind these rituals, and in the case of human sacrifice an attempt is made to understand the mentality of the 'victims' who often willingly went to their deaths.

The Actuality of Sacrifice

The Actuality of Sacrifice PDF

Author: Alberdina Houtman

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2014-11-27

Total Pages: 494

ISBN-13: 9004284230

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Sacrifice is a well known form of ritual in many world religions. Although the actual practice of animal sacrifice was largely abolished in the later history of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, it is still recalled through biblical stories, the ritual calendar and community events. The essays in this volume discuss the various positions regarding the value of sacrifice in a wide variety of disciplines such as history, archaeology, literature, philosophy, art and gender and post-colonial studies. In this context they examine a wide array of questions pertaining to the 'actuality of sacrifice' in various social, historical and intellectual contexts ranging from the pre-historical to the post-Holocaust, and present new understandings of some of the most sensitive topics of our time.

Blood Sacrifice and the Nation

Blood Sacrifice and the Nation PDF

Author: Carolyn Marvin

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 1999-03-11

Total Pages: 424

ISBN-13: 9780521626095

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This compelling book argues that American patriotism is a civil religion of blood sacrifice, which periodically kills its children to keep the group together. The flag is the sacred object of this religion; its sacrificial imperative is a secret which the group keeps from itself to survive. Expanding Durkheim's theory of the totem taboo as the organizing principle of enduring groups, Carolyn Marvin uncovers the system of sacrifice and regeneration which constitutes American nationalism, shows why historical instances of these rituals succeed or fail in unifying the group, and explains how mass media are essential to the process. American culture is depicted as ritually structured by a fertile center and sacrificial borders of death. Violence plays a key part in its identity. In essence, nationalism is neither quaint historical residue nor atavistic extremism, but a living tradition which defines American life.

Reimagining the Bible for Today

Reimagining the Bible for Today PDF

Author: Bert Dicou

Publisher: SCM Press

Published: 2017-07-05

Total Pages: 249

ISBN-13: 0334055466

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This textbook seeks to reclaim the bible for a Christianity that is open to society and keen on participating in conversation about today's major issues.

Human Sacrifice and Value

Human Sacrifice and Value PDF

Author: Sean O'Neill

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2023-10-26

Total Pages: 432

ISBN-13: 100098186X

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The present volume was made possible by the Norwegian Research Council’s generous funding of the Human Sacrifice and Value project (FRIPROHUMSAM 275947). It explores concepts of human sacrifice. This volume explores concepts of human sacrifice, focusing on its value – or multiplicity of values – in relative cultural and temporal terms, whether sacrifice is expressed in actual killings, in ideas revolving around ritualized, sanctioned or sanctified violence or loss, or in transformed and (often sublimated) undertakings. Bridging a wide variety of interdisciplinary perspectives, it analyses a spectrum of sacrificial logics and actions, daring us to rethink the scholarship of sacrifice by considering the oft hidden, subliminal and even paradoxical values and motivations that underlie sacrificial acts. The chapters give needed attention to pivotal questions in studies of sacrifice and ritualized violence – such as how we might employ new approaches to the existing evidence or revise long-debated theories about what exactly ‘human sacrifice’ is or might be, or why human sacrifice seems to emerge so often and so easily in human social experience across time and in vastly different cultures and historical contexts. Thus, the volume will strike a chord with scholars of sociology, anthropology, archaeology, history, religious studies, political science and economics –wherever interest is focused on critically rethinking questions of sacred and sanctified human violence, and the values that make it what it is.

Post-Chineseness

Post-Chineseness PDF

Author: Chih-yu Shih

Publisher: State University of New York Press

Published: 2022-04-01

Total Pages: 452

ISBN-13: 143848772X

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There have been few efforts to overcome the binary of China versus the West. The recent global political environment, with a deepening confrontation between China and the West, strengthens this binary image. Post-Chineseness boldly challenges the essentialized notion of Chineseness in existing scholarship through the revelation of the multiplicity and complexity of the uses of Chineseness by strategically conceived insiders, outsiders, and those in-between. Combining the fields of international relations, cultural politics, and intellectual history, Chih-yu Shih investigates how the global audience perceives (and essentializes) Chineseness. Shih engages with major Chinese international relations theories, investigates the works of sinologists in Hong Kong, Singapore, Pakistan, Taiwan, Vietnam, and other academics in East Asia, and explores individual scholars' life stories and academic careers to delineate how Chineseness is constantly negotiated and reproduced. Shih's theory of the "balance of relationships" expands the concept of Chineseness and effectively challenges existing theories of realism, liberalism, and conventional constructivism in international relations. The highly original delineation of multiple layers and diverse dimensions of "Chineseness" opens an intellectual channel between the social sciences and humanities in China studies.