Of all the spoils that come from success in war, perhaps the least appreciated is the ability to write the history. To the victor goes the narrative. When the narrative is not straightforward history but is bound to politico-religious ideology and integral to nation building, the stakes are even higher. I was reminded of this [...]
Tags:Assyrians·Israelites·Jersualem·Jewish history·Judaism·Moses·Mount Gerizim·Samaria·Samaritans·Solomon's Temple·Stefan Schorch·Torah·Tribes of Israel·Yitzhak Magen
The aptly named Christian Smith, professor of sociology at Notre Dame, has posted an article in First Things claiming that “man” (sorry women) is a religious animal. With a gender correction, the question he poses is: “Are human beings naturally religious?” Setting aside for a moment that the Christian professor at Notre Dame probably has [...]
Tags:Christian Smith·essentializing·human nature·human universals·Man the Religious Animal·Neolithicization·Nietzsche·Notre Dame·Plato·secularization
This provocative Spiegel interview with Czech moral economist Tomas Sedlacek nicely dovetails with the conversation surrounding David Graeber’s work on debt. The issues are framed as religious allegory:
SPIEGEL: Has the crisis in financial capitalism reduced greed to what it was once before, one of the seven deadly sins?
Sedláček: Mankind’s oldest stories tell us [...]
Tags:Adam and Eve·David Graeber·Edenic myth·greed·Marshall Sahlins·Tomas Sedlacek
In this interview with German writer Martin Walser, we witness someone struggling with faith, existence, meaning, and history:
Once you have awakened to the question of faith, you cannot simply return to your everyday agenda like a committed atheist could. You cannot retreat to the comforts of atheism. Behind us are two thousand [...]
CultureLab has posted an interview with sociologist William Sims Bainbridge, who in the past has done a great deal of work on religions in general and “cults” in particular. He now focuses on virtual realities and gaming. To research his most recent book, he spent 2300 hours playing World of Warcraft (WoW).
When asked about the [...]
Tags:animism·genealogy of faith·Nurit Bird-David·relational epistemology·William Sims Bainbridge·World of Warcraft
At the start of my anthropology of religion course, I ask students to “explain” religion: Why do you think it exists? What do you think it does? The majority will usually give answers along existential lines: “Religion provides purpose and consolation. It gives meaning to life and relieves fear of death.”
These answers aren’t surprising given [...]
Tags:afterlife·Ernest Becker·existential angst·fear of death·immortality·Irvin Yalom·Ivan Ilyich·Leo Tolstoy·meaning of life·mortality·nihilism·purpose of life·Stephen Cave
Over at the New Yorker, Adam Gopnik has weighed in with his review of Elaine Pagels’ newest book, Revelations: Visions, Prophecy, and Politics in the Book of Revelations. In a previous post, I excerpted a lecture in which Pagels discusses the book and its themes. Gopnik’s review is a nice companion.
In keeping with a persistent [...]
Tags:Adam Gopnik·Christian mysticism·early Christianity·Elaine Pagels·Gnostic·Nicene·Revelations
As a native Nebraskan, I was a bit surprised to see this headline in the Lincoln newspaper: “Minister’s Lecture to Examine How Ignorance of Scripture Hurts America.” I’m naturally interested in any story which connects ignorance with pain. I soon discovered the minister wasn’t talking about the ignorance of not knowing at all (which is [...]
Tags:bible·biblical studies·discourse·hermeneutics·interpretation·interpretive strategy·Reverend Jim Keck·rhetorical slippage·what the bible really says
At the conclusion of Elaine Pagels’ lecture on the Book of Revelation, the first question someone asked her was why does religion persist? Pagels answered: “I think because this is about emotion. This isn’t conceptual. People who talk about it as if it matters whether you believe in God or not, have got [...]
Tags:attachment·Elaine Pagels·emotions·fear·Future of An Illusion·Revelation·Robert Fuller·separation anxiety·Sigmund Freud·Spirituality in the Flesh
Elaine Pagels is an unlikely celebrity. It is not often that professors of religion write books which so thoroughly and successfully straddle the professional/popular divide. Pagels has written many such books:
The Gnostic Gospels
Adam, Eve, and the Serpent: Sex and Politics in Early Christianity
The Origin of Satan: How Christians Demonized Jews, Pagans, and [...]
Tags:apocalypse·bible·Book of Revelation·canonization·Catholic Church·Christian history·Constantine·Elaine Pagels·exegesis·Gnostic Gospels·John of Patmos·Left Behind·prophecy·rapture·Revelation·Satan·the Beast
