Download or read book Cultic and Further Orders Semiotics of a Kabbalistic Culture written by Maurizio Mottolese and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2022-01-31 with total page 239 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Through an unusual investigation of kabbalistic commentaries on prayer and ritual from the viewpoint of cultural semiotics, this book attempts to illuminate the features of a lasting Jewish tradition, showing in particular the relevance of ordering structures in Sephardi Kabbalah.
Download or read book Laws of the Spirit written by Ariel Evan Mayse and published by Stanford University Press. This book was released on 2024-05-28 with total page 522 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The compelling vision of religious life and practice found in Hasidic sources has made it the most enduring and successful Jewish movement of spiritual renewal of all time. In this book, Ariel Evan Mayse grapples with one of Hasidism's most vexing questions: how did a religious movement known for its radical views about immanence, revelation, and the imperative to serve God with joy simultaneously produce strict adherence to the structures and obligations of Jewish law? Exploring the movement from its emergence in the mid-1700s until 1815, Mayse argues that the exceptionality of Hasidism lies not in whether its leaders broke or upheld rabbinic norms, but in the movement's vivid attempt to rethink the purpose of Jewish ritual and practice. Rather than focusing on the commandments as law, he turns to the methods and vocabulary of ritual studies as a more productive way to reckon with the contradictions and tensions of this religious movement as well as its remarkable intellectual vitality. Mayse examines the full range of Hasidic texts from the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, from homilies and theological treatise to hagiography, letters, and legal writings, reading them together with contemporary theories of ritual. Arguing against the notion that spiritual integrity requires unshackling oneself from tradition, Laws of the Spirit is a sweeping attempt to rethink the meaning and significance of religious practice in early Hasidism.
Download or read book Hermes Explains written by Peter Forshaw and published by Amsterdam University Press. This book was released on 2019-05-28 with total page 337 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Few fields of academic research are surrounded by so many misunderstandings and misconceptions as the study of Western esotericism. For twenty years now, the Centre for History of Hermetic Philosophy and Related Currents (University of Amsterdam) has been at the forefront of international scholarship in this domain. This anniversary volume seeks to make the modern study of Western esotericism more widely known beyond specialist circles, while addressing a range of misconceptions, biases, and prejudices that still tend to surround it. Thirty major scholars in the field respond to questions about a wide range of unfamiliar ideas, traditions, practices, problems, and personalities that are central to the field. By challenging many taken-for-granted assumptions about religion, science, philosophy, and the arts, this volume demonstrates why the modern study of esotericism leads us to reconsider much that we thought we knew about the story of Western culture.
Download or read book The Spell of the Sensuous written by David Abram and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2012-10-17 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Winner of the International Lannan Literary Award for Nonfiction Animal tracks, word magic, the speech of stones, the power of letters, and the taste of the wind all figure prominently in this intellectual tour de force that returns us to our senses and to the sensuous terrain that sustains us. This major work of ecological philosophy startles the senses out of habitual ways of perception. For a thousand generations, human beings viewed themselves as part of the wider community of nature, and they carried on active relationships not only with other people with other animals, plants, and natural objects (including mountains, rivers, winds, and weather patters) that we have only lately come to think of as "inanimate." How, then, did humans come to sever their ancient reciprocity with the natural world? What will it take for us to recover a sustaining relation with the breathing earth? In The Spell of the Sensuous David Abram draws on sources as diverse as the philosophy of Merleau-Ponty, Balinese shamanism, Apache storytelling, and his own experience as an accomplished sleight-of-hand of magician to reveal the subtle dependence of human cognition on the natural environment. He explores the character of perception and excavates the sensual foundations of language, which--even at its most abstract--echoes the calls and cries of the earth. On every page of this lyrical work, Abram weaves his arguments with a passion, a precision, and an intellectual daring that recall such writers as Loren Eisleley, Annie Dillard, and Barry Lopez.
Download or read book Prognostication in the Medieval World written by Matthias Heiduk and published by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. This book was released on 2020-11-09 with total page 1039 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Two opposing views of the future in the Middle Ages dominate recent historical scholarship. According to one opinion, medieval societies were expecting the near end of the world and therefore had no concept of the future. According to the other opinion, the expectation of the near end created a drive to change the world for the better and thus for innovation. Close inspection of the history of prognostication reveals the continuous attempts and multifold methods to recognize and interpret God’s will, the prodigies of nature, and the patterns of time. That proves, on the one hand, the constant human uncertainty facing the contingencies of the future. On the other hand, it demonstrates the firm believe during the Middle Ages in a future which could be shaped and even manipulated. The handbook provides the first overview of current historical research on medieval prognostication. It considers the entangled influences and transmissions between Christian, Jewish, Islamic, and non-monotheistic societies during the period from a wide range of perspectives. An international team of 63 renowned authors from about a dozen different academic disciplines contributed to this comprehensive overview.
Download or read book A History of Jewish Muslim Relations written by Abdelwahab Meddeb and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2013-11-27 with total page 1153 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first encylopedic guide to the history of relations between Jews and Muslims around the world This is the first encyclopedic guide to the history of relations between Jews and Muslims around the world from the birth of Islam to today. Richly illustrated and beautifully produced, the book features more than 150 authoritative and accessible articles by an international team of leading experts in history, politics, literature, anthropology, and philosophy. Organized thematically and chronologically, this indispensable reference provides critical facts and balanced context for greater historical understanding and a more informed dialogue between Jews and Muslims. Part I covers the medieval period; Part II, the early modern period through the nineteenth century, in the Ottoman Empire, Africa, Asia, and Europe; Part III, the twentieth century, including the exile of Jews from the Muslim world, Jews and Muslims in Israel, and Jewish-Muslim politics; and Part IV, intersections between Jewish and Muslim origins, philosophy, scholarship, art, ritual, and beliefs. The main articles address major topics such as the Jews of Arabia at the origin of Islam; special profiles cover important individuals and places; and excerpts from primary sources provide contemporary views on historical events. Contributors include Mark R. Cohen, Alain Dieckhoff, Michael Laskier, Vera Moreen, Gordon D. Newby, Marina Rustow, Daniel Schroeter, Kirsten Schulze, Mark Tessler, John Tolan, Gilles Veinstein, and many more. Covers the history of relations between Jews and Muslims around the world from the birth of Islam to today Written by an international team of leading scholars Features in-depth articles on social, political, and cultural history Includes profiles of important people (Eliyahu Capsali, Joseph Nasi, Mohammed V, Martin Buber, Anwar Sadat and Menachem Begin, Edward Said, Messali Hadj, Mahmoud Darwish) and places (Jerusalem, Alexandria, Baghdad) Presents passages from essential documents of each historical period, such as the Cairo Geniza, Al-Sira, and Judeo-Persian illuminated manuscripts Richly illustrated with more than 250 images, including maps and color photographs Includes extensive cross-references, bibliographies, and an index
Download or read book Clothing Sacred Scriptures written by David Ganz and published by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. This book was released on 2018-12-03 with total page 321 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: According to a longstanding interpretation, book religions are agents of textuality and logocentrism. This volume inverts the traditional perspective: its focus is on the strong dependency between scripture and aesthetics, holy books and material artworks, sacred texts and ritual performances. The contributions, written by a group of international specialists in Western, Byzantine, Islamic and Jewish Art, are committed to a comparative and transcultural approach. The authors reflect upon the different strategies of »clothing« sacred texts with precious materials and elaborate forms. They show how the pretypographic cultures of the Middle Ages used book ornaments as media for building a close relation between the divine words and their human audience. By exploring how art shapes the religious practice of books, and how the religious use of books shapes the evolution of artistic practices this book contributes to a new understanding of the deep nexus between sacred scripture and art.
Download or read book Absorbing Perfections written by Moshe Idel and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2008-10-01 with total page 686 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this wide-ranging discussion of Kabbalah—from the mystical trends of medieval Judaism to modern Hasidism—one of the world’s foremost scholars considers different visions of the nature of the sacred text and of the methods to interpret it. Moshe Idel takes as a starting point the fact that the postbiblical Jewish world lost its geographical center with the destruction of the temple and so was left with a textual center, the Holy Book. Idel argues that a text-oriented religion produced language-centered forms of mysticism. Against this background, the author demonstrates how various Jewish mystics amplified the content of the Scriptures so as to include everything: the world, or God, for example. Thus the text becomes a major realm for contemplation, and the interpretation of the text frequently becomes an encounter with the deepest realms of reality. Idel delineates the particular hermeneutics belonging to Jewish mysticism, investigates the progressive filling of the text with secrets and hidden levels of meaning, and considers in detail the various interpretive strategies needed to decodify the arcane dimensions of the text.
Download or read book Life stowing from a Digital Media Perspective Past Present and Future written by and published by Alberto Frigo. This book was released on 2017-04-24 with total page 160 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: While both public opinion and scholars around the world are currently pointing out the danger of increasingly popular life-logging devices, this book articulates this debate by distinguishing between automatic and manual life-logging approaches. Since new definitions of life-logging have excluded the latter approach and have been mainly focused on effortless life-logging technologies such as Google Glass and Quantified Self applications in general, this book theoretically frames life-stowing. Through extensive etymological research, this book defines life-stowing as a manual and effortful practice conducted by life-stowers, individuals who devote their life to sampling reality in predefined frameworks. Also as part of this book, an historical overview introduces life-stowers and distinguishes between Apollonian and Dionysian varieties of these practitioners. Lastly, in order to understand the future reception of lifestowing, particularly in relation to digital media, this book discloses the author’s ongoing life-stowing project to a small audience.
Download or read book The Cambridge Companion to Judaism and Law written by Christine Hayes and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2017-02-17 with total page 439 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Cambridge Companion to Judaism and Law provides a conceptual and historical account of the Jewish understanding of law.
Download or read book Time and Eternity in Jewish Mysticism written by Brian Ogren and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2015-01-27 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Time and eternity are concepts that have occupied an important place within Jewish mystical thought. This present volume gives pride of place to these concepts, and is one of the first works to bring together diverse voices on the subject. It offers a multivalent picture of the topic of time and eternity, not only by including contributions from an array of academics who are leaders in their fields, but by proposing six diverse approaches to time and eternity in Jewish mysticism: the theoretical approach to temporality, philosophical definitions, the idea of time and pre-existence, the idea of historical time, the idea of experiential time, and finally, the idea of eternity beyond time. This multivocal treatment of Jewish mysticism and time as based on variant academic approaches is novel, and it should lay the groundwork for further discussion and exploration.
Download or read book Lenin s Jewish Question written by Yohanan Petrovsky-Shtern and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2010-08-31 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The grandson of a Jew, whose Jewish relatives converted to Christianity, whose allies played down his Jewish origins just as fervently as his enemies played them up, V.I. Lenin makes for a fascinating case study of the many complexities associated with 'Jewish question' in Russia.
Download or read book Kabbalah in Italy 1280 1510 written by Moshe Idel and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2011-01-01 with total page 394 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This survey of the history of Kabbalah in Italy represents a major contribution from one of the world's foremost Kabbalah scholars. Idel charts the ways that Kabbalistic thought and literature developed in Italy and how its unique geographical situation facilitated the arrival of both Spanish and Byzantine Kabbalah.
Download or read book The Enoch Metatron Tradition written by Andrei A. Orlov and published by Mohr Siebeck. This book was released on 2005 with total page 404 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Andrei A. Orlov examines the tradition about the seventh antediluvian patriarch Enoch, tracing its development from its roots in the Mesopotamian lore to the Second Temple apocalyptic texts and later rabbinic and Hekhalot materials where Enoch is often identified as the supreme angel Metatron. The first part of the book explores the imagery of the celestial roles and titles of the seventh antediluvian hero in Mesopotamian, Enochic and Hekhalot materials. The analysis of the celestial roles and titles shows that the transition from the figure of patriarch Enoch to the figure of angel Metatron occurred already in the Second Temple Enochic materials, namely, in 2 (Slavonic) Enoch, a Jewish work, traditionally dated to the first century CE. The second part of the book demonstrates that mediatorial polemics with the traditions of the exalted patriarchs and prophets played an important role in facilitating the transition from Enoch to Metatron in the Second Temple period.
Download or read book Everyday Aesthetics written by Katya Mandoki and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-04-22 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Katya Mandoki advances in this book the thesis that it is not only possible but crucial to open up the field of aesthetics (traditionally confined to the study of art and beauty) toward the richness and complexity of everyday life. She argues that in every process of communication, whether face to face or through the media, fashion, and political propaganda, there is always an excess beyond the informative and functional value of a message. This excess is the aesthetic. Following Huizinga's view of play as an ingredient of any social environment, Mandoki explores how various cultural practices are in fact forms of playing since, for the author, aesthetics and play are Siamese twins. One of the unique contributions of this book is the elaboration and application of a semiotic model for the simultaneous analysis of social interactions in the four registers, namely visual, auditory, verbal and body language, to detect the aesthetic strategies deployed in specific situations. She argues that since the presentation of the self is targeted towards participants' sensibilities, aesthetics plays a key role in these modes of exchange. Consequently, the author updates important debates in this field to clear the way for a socio-aesthetic inquiry through contexts such as the family, school, medical, artistic or religious traditions from which social identities emerge.
Download or read book Toward a Theology of Eros written by Virginia Burrus and published by Fordham Univ Press. This book was released on 2009-08-25 with total page 493 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What does theology have to say about the place of eroticism in the salvific transformation of men and women, even of the cosmos itself? How, in turn, does eros infuse theological practice and transfigure doctrinal tropes? Avoiding the well-worn path of sexual moralizing while also departing decisively from Anders Nygren’s influential insistence that Christian agape must have nothing to do with worldly eros, this book explores what is still largely uncharted territory in the realm of theological erotics. The ascetic, the mystical, the seductive, the ecstatic—these are the places where the divine and the erotic may be seen to converge and love and desire to commingle. Inviting and performing a mutual seduction of disciplines, the volume brings philosophers, historians, biblical scholars, and theologians into a spirited conversation that traverses the limits of conventional orthodoxies, whether doctrinal or disciplinary. It seeks new openings for the emergence of desire, love, and pleasure, while challenging common understandings of these terms. It engages risk at the point where the hope for salvation paradoxically endangers the safety of subjects—in particular, of theological subjects—by opening them to those transgressions of eros in which boundaries, once exceeded, become places of emerging possibility. The eighteen chapters, arranged in thematic clusters, move fluidly among and between premodern and postmodern textual traditions—from Plato to Emerson, Augustine to Kristeva, Mechthild to Mattoso, the Shulammite to Molly Bloom, the Zohar to the Da Vinci Code. In so doing, they link the sublime reaches of theory with the gritty realities of politics, the boundless transcendence of God with the poignant transience of materiality.
Download or read book The Alphabetic Labyrinth written by Johanna Drucker and published by Thames & Hudson. This book was released on 1995 with total page 324 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The letters of the alphabet have been the object of speculation since their invention. This book examines the many ways in which the letters of the alphabet have been assigned value in political, spiritual, or religious systems over two millennia.
