Religion

An Annotated Anthology of Hymns

Timothy Dudley-Smith

J.R. Watson (ed.)

This is an anthology of 250 hymns plus one, with a foreword by Timothy Dudley‐Smith, one of the greatest living hymn writers (the two hundred and fifty‐first hymn, which is a postscript ... More

This is an anthology of 250 hymns plus one, with a foreword by Timothy Dudley‐Smith, one of the greatest living hymn writers (the two hundred and fifty‐first hymn, which is a postscript to the anthology, is by him). It is intended in part as a sequel to the editor's The English Hymn (1997): some of the ideas in that book are here exemplified in hymns taken from the earliest Christian times to the present day. Each of the 250 hymns has a textual, critical, and historical annotation, indicating the circumstances of publication, the church history of the time, and the development of the text, and then drawing attention to special features of the work. The hymns are divided into sections, beginning with ‘Ancient and Medieval Hymns’ (in translation) and continuing through the centuries to the final section, ‘The Mid‐Twentieth Century, and the Hymn Explosion’. Some attention is also paid to the tunes to which each hymn has been set, and their composers, although the tunes are not printed. The foreword and the preface introduce the subject of hymns and hymn singing as a part of worship, and discuss hymns as sacred poetry. The conclusion of the introduction is that hymns are a valuable and underrated art form. The 250 hymns that follow attempt to demonstrate the truth of that argument. Less

The Apocryphal Adam and Eve in Medieval Europe: Vernacular Translations and Adaptations of the Vita Adae et Evae

Brian Murdoch

This book examines the development in medieval European literature of the story of Adam and Eve after the expulsion from paradise. The gaps in what the Bible records of their lives were ... More

This book examines the development in medieval European literature of the story of Adam and Eve after the expulsion from paradise. The gaps in what the Bible records of their lives were filled in early and medieval times to a great extent by apocrypha or pseudepigrapha such as the Latin Life of Adam and Eve (which merges at some points with a series of legends of the Holy Rood). It describes their attempt to return to paradise by undertaking penance whilst immersed in a river, Eve's second temptation, and the ways in which Adam and Eve cope with the novelties of childbirth and death. The Vita Adae et Evae is part of a broad apocryphal tradition, but is not a unified text, and there are very many variations within the substantial number of extant versions. It was translated and adapted in prose, verse, and drama (as tracts, in chronicles, or as literary works) in virtually all western and some eastern European languages in the Middle Ages, and survived sometimes beyond that. These adaptations are examined on a comparative basis. There is a limited iconographical tradition. The book argues that the study of the apocryphal tradition demands examination of these vernacular texts; and also brings to light a very widespread aspect of European culture that disappeared to a large extent—though it did not die out completely—at the time of the Renaissance and Reformation, with their renewed insistence on canonicity and on the establishment of a foundation text for works of antiquity. Less

Apophasis and Pseudonymity in Dionysius the Areopagite: "No Longer I"

Charles M. Stang

This book argues that the pseudonym, Dionysius the Areopagite, and the influence of Paul together constitute the best interpretive lens for understanding the Corpus Dionysiacum [CD]. ... More

This book argues that the pseudonym, Dionysius the Areopagite, and the influence of Paul together constitute the best interpretive lens for understanding the Corpus Dionysiacum [CD]. This book demonstrates how Paul in fact animates the entire corpus, that the influence of Paul illuminates such central themes of the CD as hierarchy, theurgy, deification, Christology, affirmation (kataphasis) and negation (apophasis), dissimilar similarities, and unknowing. Most importantly, Paul serves as a fulcrum for the expression of a new theological anthropology, an “apophatic anthropology.” Dionysius figures Paul as the premier apostolic witness to this apophatic anthropology, as the ecstatic lover of the divine who confesses to the rupture of his self and the indwelling of the divine in Gal 2:20: “it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.” Building on this notion of apophatic anthropology, the book forwards an explanation for why this sixth‐century author chose to write under an apostolic pseudonym. It argues that the very practice of pseudonymous writing itself serves as an ecstatic devotional exercise whereby the writer becomes split in two and thereby open to the indwelling of the divine. Pseudonymity is on this interpretation integral and internal to the aims of the wider mystical enterprise. Thus this book aims to question the distinction between “theory” and “practice” by demonstrating that negative theology—often figured as a speculative and rarefied theory regarding the transcendence of God—is in fact best understood as a kind of asceticism, a devotional practice aiming for the total transformation of the Christian subject. Less

Blake's Jerusalem As Visionary Theatre: Entering the Divine Body

Susanne M. Sklar

William Blake says Jerusalem is written to move readers from a solely rational way of being (called Ulro) to one that is highly imaginative (called Eden/Eternity), and that each word in ... More

William Blake says Jerusalem is written to move readers from a solely rational way of being (called Ulro) to one that is highly imaginative (called Eden/Eternity), and that each word in it is chosen to suit ‘the mouth of a true Orator’. Rational interpretation is of limited use when reading this multifaceted poem. But considering Jerusalem as visionary theatre — an imaginative performance in which characters, settings, and imagery are not confined by mundane space and time — allows readers to enjoy the coherence of its delightful complexities. With his characters, Blake's readers can participate imaginatively in what Blake calls ‘the Divine Body, the Saviour's Kingdom’, a way of being in which all things interconnect: spiritually, ecologically, socially, and erotically. This two‐part book first discusses the theological, literary, and historical antecedents of the poem's imagery, characters, and settings before presenting a scene‐by‐scene commentary of the entire illuminated work. Jerusalem tells the story of a fall, many rescue attempts, escalating violence, and a surprising apocalypse — in which all living things are transfigured in ferocious forgiveness. Less

C. S. Lewis on the Final Frontier: Science and the Supernatural in the Space Trilogy

Sanford Schwartz

This study of C. S. Lewis’s popular Space Trilogy—Out of the Silent Planet (1938), Perelandra (1943), and That Hideous Strength (1945)—departs from the prevailing emphasis upon Lewis’s ... More

This study of C. S. Lewis’s popular Space Trilogy—Out of the Silent Planet (1938), Perelandra (1943), and That Hideous Strength (1945)—departs from the prevailing emphasis upon Lewis’s affection for the “Medieval Model” of the universe and situates Lewis’s work in the context of modern intellectual, cultural, and political history. It demonstrates that Lewis did not simply dismiss the modern “Developmental Model,” as is often assumed, but discriminated carefully among different kinds of evolutionary theory and the manner in which they influenced modern thinking about human nature, social practice, and religious conviction. It also shows that the “unfallen” imaginary worlds that Lewis constructs on Mars and Venus are derived not only from classical and medieval sources but also from the transfiguration or “taking up” of the same modern evolutionary paradigm he is ostensibly putting down. This perspective on the Space Trilogy (an appendix is devoted to the abortive “Dark Tower”) brings out the enduring relevance of Lewis’s “scientific romances” to contemporary concerns on a wide variety of issues, including our relations to the natural world and the other species with whom we share Earth, the ethical and political problems surrounding the emerging revolution in bio-technology, and the seemingly intractable struggle between religious and naturalistic worldviews in the twenty-first century. Far from a simple struggle between an old-fashioned Christian humanism and a newfangled heresy, Lewis’s Space Trilogy is the searching effort of a modern religious apologist to sustain and enrich the former through critical engagement with the latter. Less

C.S. Lewis Then and Now

Wesley A. Kort

The argument of this book is that a primary goal in the work of C. S. Lewis is to articulate a Christian worldview. Lewis based this project on his positive view of culture, nature, and ... More

The argument of this book is that a primary goal in the work of C. S. Lewis is to articulate a Christian worldview. Lewis based this project on his positive view of culture, nature, and human relations. He addresses deficiencies in modern culture and the largely distorted relations of modernity to nature in order to restore culture as a supportive base for a Christian worldview. The book offers discussions of seven interests in Lewis's work: retrieval, reenchantment, houses, culture, character, pleasure, and celebration. The topics provide not only an analysis of Lewis's work but also a basis upon which readers who want to construct a worldview here and now can draw inspiration and direction from him. Less

Chesterton and the Romance of Orthodoxy: The Making of GKC, 1874-1908

William Oddie

When Orthodoxy was published in 1908, Wilfrid Ward hailed Chesterton as a prophetic figure, whose thought was to be classed with that of Burke, Butler, and Coleridge. This book provides ... More

When Orthodoxy was published in 1908, Wilfrid Ward hailed Chesterton as a prophetic figure, whose thought was to be classed with that of Burke, Butler, and Coleridge. This book provides a biographical study on Chesterton and draws on the wealth of letters and journalistic writings within the newly released ‘Chesterton Papers’ archive at the British Library. The book brings new biographical details to light that expand on existing Chesterton studies. When Chesterton died in 1936, T. S. Eliot pronounced that Chesterton's ‘social and economic ideas were the ideas for his time that were fundamentally Christian and Catholic’, elaborating that he attached significance also to his ‘development’. The book examines these ‘social and economic ideas’ but focuses on his ‘development’, both imaginative and spiritual — from his early childhood in the 1870s to his intellectual maturity in the first decade of the 20th century. It charts Chesterton's progression from his first story (composed at the age of three) to his masterpiece, Orthodoxy, in which he established the foundations on which the writing of his last three decades would build. Part One explores the years of Chesterton's obscurity — his childhood, his adolescence, his years as a young adult. Part Two examines his emergence onto the public stage, his success as one of the leading journalists of his day and his growing renown as a man of letters. Less

Critical Enthusiasm: Capital Accumulation and the Transformation of Religious Passion

Jordana Rosenberg

This book concerns itself with two major, interrelated phenomena of the long eighteenth century: the onset of capital accumulation and the loosening of religious discourse to describe ... More

This book concerns itself with two major, interrelated phenomena of the long eighteenth century: the onset of capital accumulation and the loosening of religious discourse to describe intellectual, aesthetic, and ethical experiences. Through this unusual pairing, the book shows that debates around religious radicalism are bound to the advent of capitalism at its very root: as legal precedent, as financial rhetoric, and as aesthetic form. As a result, we must contextualize the histories of religion and secularization in terms of the economic landscape of early modernity. The book contributes to new directions of scholarship in literary and legal history, secularization studies, and economic criticism. It is unique among other such projects, given that it produces a model for literary study that is simultaneously attuned to the history of capital accumulation and to the forces of religious dissent. Adopting a comparative, transatlantic approach, the book situates the rhetoric of enthusiastic rapture in the context of the major institutional transformations of early modernity—transformation that now drive our contemporary world order: the dispossession and plunder of the globe, the rise of finance, legal reform, and the administration of racialized labor. By approaching the history of capitalism through religious debates, the book discloses legacies of aesthetic form and of global flows of capital that have been hitherto inaccessible to our study of the period. Chapters bring together the moral philosophy of the Third Earl of Shaftesbury, French Camisard religious prophesy, early modern statute law, Swift’s poetry, and the political theory of Hobbes, Hume, and Locke. Less

Discourse on Civility and Barbarity

Timothy Fitzgerald

This book analyzes the development of different meanings of the term “religion” in different contexts and in relation to other categories with shifting and unstable nuances such as the ... More

This book analyzes the development of different meanings of the term “religion” in different contexts and in relation to other categories with shifting and unstable nuances such as the state, politics, economics, and the secular. It traces a major transformation of the category as a function of Euro‐American colonialism and capitalism from its traditional meaning of Christian Truth to the modern generic and pluralized category of religions and world religions. For centuries the English word Religion meant Christian Truth, and it stood in opposition to superstition, paganism, and falsehood. As such Religion encompassed not only individual salvation but also, and of equal importance, what we today refer to as the secular, the state, politics, economics, law, and science. Until the second half of the seventeenth century there was no powerful discourse on the nonreligious. Indeed, terms such as politics and economics were newly coined in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and the term secular had a profoundly different nuance, for example, referring to the priesthood. Furthermore, the discourse on Religion as Christian Truth in contrast to superstition and paganism overlapped significantly with discourses on “our” civility, as opposed to “their” barbarity, and thus functioned as an expression of the superiority of the Christian male elite. Current uncritical practices of historians, political scientists, anthropologists, and religionists in their projection of modern Anglophone categories such as “religion,” “politics,” and “economics” as though they are eternal features of all human experience and social organisation indirectly and usually unconsciously serve the interests of the modern state under the guise of secular objectivity. Less