The Pathos Of The Cross

This volume traces how theologies and the arts of the Baroque period stressed the "pathos" of Christ's death on the cross as the means of salvation, and invited believers to an emotional response that binds them to Christ's saving act.

The Baroque period was in some senses the beginning of modern Western scientific and intellectual culture-the early budding of the Enlightenment. In the light of a new scientific and historical consciousness, it saw the rise of deism and the critique of traditional forms of Christianity. Secular values and institutions were openly or surreptitiously replacing the structures of traditional Christian society. At the same time, there was also a trend of religious renewal and the reaffirmation of tradition. In Roman Catholicism, the Patristic, medieval, and Tridentine paradigms were subsumed into a powerful Counter-Reformation spirituality, propagated not only in books, treatises, and sermons, but also in music and in the works of what was arguably the last period of great sacred art. It inspired masters like Bernini, Reni, Rubens, Velázquez, Zurbarán, and Van Dyck. In the Protestant traditions, the Reformation movement found affective expression in new forms of music produced by Monteverdi, Scarlatti, Handel, Telemann, and Bach. The title, The Pathos of the Cross, points to a major aspect of the spirituality of this period: a dramatic portrayal of the events of Christ's passion meant to provoke an emotional response from the viewer and listener. Many works of the period retain their emotional pull centuries later, even though the theology they represent has been challenged and frequently rejected. This volume traces the ways in which Roman Catholic and Protestant theologies of the period proclaimed the centrality of the cross of Christ to human salvation. In a parallel movement, it illustrates how musical and artistic works of the period were both inspired and informed by these theologies, and how they moved beyond them in an aesthetic mediation of faith.

What does a Christian life lived "by the Spirit" look like? For many Christians throughout history, fulfilling Paul's command in Galatians 5:25 included a form of contemplation and prayer that leads to spiritual formation. But in large part, contemporary Christians—perhaps especially evangelicals—seem to have lost or forgotten about this treasure from their own tradition. Bringing together scholars and practitioners of spiritual formation from across the Protestant spectrum, this volume offers a distinctly evangelical consideration of the benefits of contemplation. The contributors draw on historical examples from the church—including John Calvin, Richard Baxter, Jonathan Edwards, and John Wesley—to consider how contemplative prayer can shape Christian living today. The result is a robust guide to embracing contemplation that will help Christians as they seek to keep in step with the Spirit.

This book explores the life and spirituality of John Cennick (1718–1755) and argues for a new appreciation of the contradictions and complexities in early evangelicalism. It explores Cennick’s evangelistic work in Ireland, his relationship with Count Zinzendorf and the creative tension between the Moravian and Methodist elements of his participation in the eighteenth-century revivals. The chapters draw on extensive unpublished correspondence between Cennick and Zinzendorf, as well as Cennick’s unique diary of his first stay in the continental Moravian centres of Marienborn, Herrnhaag and Lindheim. A maverick personality, John Cennick is seen at the centre of some of the principal controversies of the time. The trajectory of his emergence as a prominent figure in the revivals is remarkable in its intensity and hybridity and brings into focus a number of themes in the landscape of early evangelicalism: the eclectic nature of its inspirations, the religious enthusiasm nurtured in Anglican societies, the expansion of the pool of preaching talent, the social tensions unleashed by religious innovations, and the particular nature of the Moravian contribution during the 1740s and 1750s. Offering a major re-evaluation of Cennick’s spirituality, the book will be of interest to scholars of evangelical and church history.

Scholarship often presumes that texts written about the Shoah, either by those directly involved in it or those writing its history, must always bear witness to the affective aftermath of the event, the lingering emotional effects of suffering. Drawing on the History of Emotions and on trauma theory, this monograph offers a critical study of the ambivalent attributions and expressions of emotion and “emotionlessness” in the literature and historiography of the Shoah. It addresses three phenomena: the metaphorical discourses by which emotionality and the purported lack thereof are attributed to victims and to perpetrators; the rhetoric of affective self-control and of affective distancing in fiction, testimony and historiography; and the poetics of empathy and the status of emotionality in discourses on the Shoah. Through a close analysis of a broad corpus centred around the work of W. G. Sebald, Dieter Schlesak, Ruth Klüger and Raul Hilberg, the book critically contextualises emotionality and its attributions in the post-war era, when a scepticism of pathos coincided with demands for factual rigidity. Ultimately, it invites the reader to reflect on their own affective stances towards history and its commemoration in the twenty-first century.

A THEOLOGY OF LIBERATION FOR NORTH AMERICANS Much has been written about issues of oppression and liberation for Latin Americans, but little about the same struggles for middle-class North Americans who feel powerlessÐthose, for example, experiencing problems with employment, money, marriage, and alcohol dependency. Through a close reading of the Book of Revelation, with illustrations from his pastoral experience, Ewing offers readers a Christian view of power.

This volume offers 37 original essays from leading scholars on the crucial topics, issues, methods, and resources for studying and teaching religion and the arts.