Download or read book Objects of Devotion written by Peter Manseau and published by Smithsonian Institution. This book was released on 2017-05-23 with total page 261 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Objects of Devotion: Religion in Early America tells the story of religion in the United States through the material culture of diverse spiritual pursuits in the nation's colonial period and the early republic. The beautiful, full-color companion volume to a Smithsonian National Museum of American History exhibition, the book explores the wide range of religious traditions vying for adherents, acceptance, and a prominent place in the public square from the 1630s to the 1840s. The original thirteen states were home to approximately three thousand churches and more than a dozen Christian denominations, including Anglicans, Baptists, Catholics, Congregationalists, Lutherans, Methodists, Presbyterians, and Quakers. A variety of other faiths also could be found, including Judaism, Islam, traditional African practices, and Native American beliefs. As a result, America became known throughout the world as a place where, in theory, if not always in practice, all are free to believe and worship as they choose. The featured objects include an 1814 Revere and Sons church bell from Salem, the Jefferson Bible, wampum beads, a 1654 Torah scroll brought to the New World, the only known religious text written by an enslaved African Muslim, and other revelatory artifacts. Together these treasures illustrate how religious ideas have shaped the country and how the treatment and practice of religion have changed over time. Objects of Devotion emphasizes how religion can be understood through the objects, both rare and everyday, around which Americans of every generation have organized their communities and built this nation.

Download or read book Dissimilar Similitudes written by Caroline Walker Bynum and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2022-03 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From an acclaimed historian, a mesmerizing account of how medieval European Christians envisioned the paradoxical nature of holy objects Between the twelfth and the sixteenth centuries, European Christians used a plethora of objects in worship, not only prayer books, statues, and paintings but also pieces of natural materials, such as stones and earth, considered to carry holiness, dolls representing Jesus and Mary, and even bits of consecrated bread and wine thought to be miraculously preserved flesh and blood. Theologians and ordinary worshippers alike explained, utilized, justified, and warned against some of these objects, which could carry with them both anti-Semitic charges and the glorious promise of heaven. Their proliferation and the reaction against them form a crucial background to the European-wide movements we know today as “reformations” (both Protestant and Catholic). In a set of independent but interrelated essays, Caroline Bynum considers some examples of such holy things, among them beds for the baby Jesus, the headdresses of medieval nuns, and the footprints of Christ carried home from the Holy Land by pilgrims in patterns cut to their shape or their measurement in lengths of string. Building on and going beyond her well-received work on the history of materiality, Bynum makes two arguments, one substantive, the other methodological. First, she demonstrates that the objects themselves communicate a paradox of dissimilar similitude—that is, that in their very details they both image the glory of heaven and make clear that that heaven is beyond any representation in earthly things. Second, she uses the theme of likeness and unlikeness to interrogate current practices of comparative history. Suggesting that contemporary students of religion, art, and culture should avoid comparing things that merely “look alike,” she proposes that humanists turn instead to comparing across cultures the disparate and perhaps visually dissimilar objects in which worshippers as well as theorists locate the “other” that gives religion enduring power.

Download or read book Islam and the Devotional Object written by Richard J. A. McGregor and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2020-05-28 with total page 283 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A new history of Islamic practice told through the aesthetic reception of medieval religious objects.

Download or read book Islam and the Devotional Object written by Richard J. A. McGregor and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2020-05-28 with total page 283 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this book, Richard J. A. McGregor offers a history of Islamic practice through the aesthetic reception of medieval religious objects. Elaborate parades in Cairo and Damascus included decorated objects of great value, destined for Mecca and Medina. Among these were the precious dress sewn yearly for the Ka'ba, and large colorful sedans mounted on camels, which mysteriously completed the Hajj without carrying a single passenger. Along with the brisk trade in Islamic relics, these objects and the variety of contested meanings attached to them, constituted material practices of religion that persisted into the colonial era, but were suppressed in the twentieth century. McGregor here recovers the biographies of religious objects, including relics, banners, public texts, and coverings for the Ka'ba. Reconstructing the premodern visual culture of Islamic Egypt and Syria, he follows the shifting meanings attached to objects of devotion, as well as the contingent nature of religious practice and experience.

Download or read book Lent in Plain Sight written by Jill J. Duffield and published by Westminster John Knox Press. This book was released on 2020-01-14 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: God is often at work through the ordinary: ordinary people, ordinary objects, ordinary grace. Through the ordinary, God communicates epiphanies, salvation, revelation, and reconciliation. It is through the mundane that we hear Gods quiet voice. In this devotion for the season of Lent, Jill J. Duffield draws readers attention to ten ordinary objects that Jesus would have encountered on his way to Jerusalem: dust, bread, the cross, coins, shoes, oil, coats, towels, thorns, and stones. In each object, readers will find meaning in the biblical account of Jesus final days. Each week, readers encounter a new object to consider through Scripture, prayer, and reflection. From Ash Wednesday to Easter, Lent in Plain Sight reminds Christians to open ourselves to the kingdom of God.

Download or read book Advent in Plain Sight written by Jill J. Duffield and published by Westminster John Knox Press. This book was released on 2021-09-14 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: At Christmas, God came into our ordinary world in the form of a child, and still today, God is at work through the ordinary stuff of life, if we train our eyes to see. In this daily devotional for Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany, Jill J. Duffield draws readers' attention to ten ordinary objects that appear in the biblical narratives of messianic prophesy and incarnation—objects we encounter in our own lives. Through objects such as gates, trees, cloth, light, and water, readers will find new meaning in the biblical account of Jesus’ coming. By connecting everyday objects with biblical texts, Advent in Plain Sight prompts readers to see the near kingdom of heaven on earth and ponder what that divine proximity enables and asks them to do and be. Each daily devotional features a Scripture reading, prayer, and reflection, reminding Christians that God still dwells among us, even in the most ordinary places.

Download or read book Devotional Fanscapes written by Shalini Kakar and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2023-01-09 with total page 299 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Devotional Fanscapes examines the practices and materiality of fans who worship film stars as divine figures. This book is an analysis of visual culture and star temples that bring cinema, fandom, religion, and politics into undocumented negotiations in national and transnational contexts.

Download or read book Devotional Visualities written by Karen Pechilis and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2023-09-21 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is the first to focus on material visualities of bhakti imagery that inspire, shape, convey, and expand both the visual practices of devotional communities, as well as possibilities for extending the reach of devotion in society in new and often unexpected ways. Communities of interpreters of bhakti images discussed in this book include not only a number of distinctive Hindu bhakti groups, but also artisans, diaspora women, South Asian Sufis, businessmen, dancers, and filmmakers. This book's identification of devotional practices of looking, such as materializing memory, mirroring and immaterializing portraits, and shaping the return look, connect material and visual cultures as well as illustrate modes of established and experimental image usage. Bhakti is one of the most-studied aspects of Indic devotionalism on account of its expression through emotive poetry, song, and vivid hagiographies of saints. The diverse devotional visualities analyzed in this book meaningfully circulate bhakti images in past and present, generating their renewed relationship to contemporary concerns.

Download or read book Religious Objects in Museums written by Crispin Paine and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2013-08-29 with total page 187 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the past, museums often changed the meaning of icons or statues of deities from sacred to aesthetic, or used them to declare the superiority of Western society, or simply as cultural and historical evidence. The last generation has seen faith groups demanding to control 'their' objects, and curators recognising that objects can only be understood within their original religious context. In recent years there has been an explosion of interest in the role religion plays in museums, with major exhibitions highlighting the religious as well as the historical nature of objects. Using examples from all over the world, Religious Objects in Museums is the first book to examine how religious objects are transformed when they enter the museum, and how they affect curators and visitors. It examines the full range of meanings that religious objects may bear - as scientific specimen, sacred icon, work of art, or historical record. Showing how objects may be used to argue a point, tell a story or promote a cause, may be worshipped, ignored, or seen as dangerous or unlucky, this highly accessible book is an essential introduction to the subject.

Download or read book Devotional Interaction in Medieval England and its Afterlives written by and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2018-06-05 with total page 429 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Devotional Interaction in Medieval England and its Afterlives examines the interaction between medieval English worshippers and the material objects of their devotion. The volume also addresses the afterlives of objects and buildings in their temporal journeys from the Middle Ages to the present day. Written by the participants of a National Endowment for the Humanities-funded seminar held in York, U.K., in 2014, the chapters incorporate site-specific research with the insights of scholars of visual art, literature, music, liturgy, ritual, and church history. Interdisciplinarity is a central feature of this volume, which celebrates interactivity as a working method between its authors as much as a subject of inquiry. Contributors are Lisa Colton, Elizabeth Dachowski, Angie Estes, Gregory Erickson, Jennifer M. Feltman, Elisa A. Foster Laura D. Gelfand, Louise Hampson, Kerilyn Harkaway-Krieger, Kathleen E. Kennedy, Heather S. Mitchell-Buck, Julia Perratore, Steven Rozenski, Carolyn Twomey, and Laura J. Whatley.

Download or read book Sewing Basket Devotional written by Joy Neon and published by . This book was released on 2018-12-06 with total page 26 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Have you ever wanted to feel closer to God? Do you long for a better relationship with him but just don't know how to relate or where to start? Or, do you feel a distance because even though you know God loves you, he is an extraordinary God and you just don't quite know how to relate?You probably have never thought about looking in your sewing basket to find God, but that just might be the answer!Throughout the Old Testament God used ordinary objects to reveal himself. Author Joy Elizabeth Neon guides you through an examination of your sewing basket to see how God can continue to be revealed through common, ordinary objects if we just look for him. As you examine your sewing basket you will understand God more deeply as those items to point you towards him. You want to be closer to God, so take a chance on finding him where you least expect him; in your sewing basket. Take a closer look at some of those ordinary objects and you may instead see our extraordinary God. Take a look in your basket, let the ordinary show you the extraordinary.

Download or read book Domestic Devotions in Early Modern Italy written by and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2018-11-01 with total page 468 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Domestic Devotions in Early Modern Italy illuminates the vibrancy of spiritual beliefs and practices which profoundly shaped family life in this era. Scholarship on Catholicism has tended to focus on institutions, but the home was the site of religious instruction and reading, prayer and meditation, communal worship, multi-sensory devotions, contemplation of religious images and the performance of rituals, as well as extraordinary events such as miracles. Drawing on a wide range of sources, this volume affirms the central place of the household to spiritual life and reveals the myriad ways in which devotion met domestic needs. The seventeen essays encompass religious history, the histories of art and architecture, material culture, musicology, literary history, and social and cultural history. Contributors are Erminia Ardissino, Michele Bacci, Michael J. Brody, Giorgio Caravale, Maya Corry, Remi Chiu, Sabrina Corbellini, Stefano Dall’Aglio, Marco Faini, Iain Fenlon, Irene Galandra Cooper, Jane Garnett, Joanna Kostylo, Alessia Meneghin, Margaret A. Morse, Elisa Novi Chavarria, Gervase Rosser, Zuzanna Sarnecka, Katherine Tycz, and Valeria Viola.

Download or read book Instruments of Devotion written by Henning Laugerud and published by Aarhus Universitetsforlag. This book was released on 2007-11-22 with total page 223 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Redigeret af Henning Laugerud og Laura Katrine Skinnebach.Sekulariseringen af den vestlige kultur er om ikke en myte, sa betydeligt overvurderet. I dagens aktuelle debatter om religiositet, anerkender langt de fleste kristendommens indflydelse pa Europas historie, filosofi og kultur.Instruments of Devotion er en tvAerfaglig antologi skrevet af internationalt anerkendte forskere fra The European Network on the Instruments of Devotion, ENID, og i 11 artikler fokuseres specifikt pa de instrumentielle aspekter af andagt og fromhedspraksis i perioden fra det 14. arhundrede og frem til i dag. Artiklerne diskuterer relationen mellem den materielle kultur og det religiose liv; hvordan musik, bonneboger, litteratur og billeder har udtrykt og intensiveret fromhed og pietet i den kristne kultur i et historisk perspektiv.Antologiens mange forskelligartede indgangsvinkler spAender fra middelalderens visuelle teorier til postmodernismens perspektiver pa katolicismen og illustrerer saledes det komplekse monster af Aendringer, kontinuitet og sammenhAenge i den europAeiske kultur- og pietetshistorie.

Download or read book Museum Collections to Illustrate Religions History and Ceremonials written by Cyrus Adler and published by . This book was released on 1895 with total page 24 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Devotional Portraiture and Spiritual Experience in Early Netherlandish Painting catalogue written by Ingrid Falque and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2019-11-04 with total page 659 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the first exhaustive catalogue of paintings with devotional portraits produced in the Low Countries between c. 1400 and 1550. This catalogue is an appendix to the book Devotional Portraiture and Spiritual Experience in Early Netherlandish Painting. The catalogue can be accessed and downloaded for free as well as be purchased in hardback.

Download or read book Annual Report of the Board of Regents of the Smithsonian Institution written by Smithsonian Institution and published by . This book was released on 1895 with total page 1262 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Report of the Assistant Director and of the Curators of the U S National Museum written by United States National Museum and published by . This book was released on 1895 with total page 1132 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: