The Symbolism Of The Christian Temple

That sacred art scarcely exists today is all too clear. We can perhaps speak of a "religious," but certainly not a sacred art. True sacred art is not sentimental or psychological, but ontological and cosmological in nature. Sacred art cannot be the result of the feelings, fantasies, or even "thought" of the artist-as with most modern art-but rather the translation of a reality largely surpassing the limits of human individuality. Sacred art is precisely a supra-human art. The temple of former times was an "instrument" of recollection, joy, sacrifice, and exaltation. First through the harmonious combination of a thousand crafted symbols, then by offering itself as a receptacle to the symbols of the liturgy. For the temple and the liturgy together constitute a prodigious formula capable of preparing man to become aware of the descent of Grace, of the epiphany of the Spirit in corporeity. It is a matter of urgency, then, to recall what is true in sacred art, especially since in the cultural wasteland of our age signs of resistance to its anarchy and subversion manifest themselves, and a pressing call is felt to recover the traditional conceptions that must form the basis and condition of any restoration.

This colorful book looks both beyond the church building and deep within it to find symbols relevant to Judeo-Christianity.

A comprehensive treatment of the early Christian approaches to the Temple and its role in shaping Jewish and Christian identity The first scholarly work to trace the Temple throughout the entire New Testament, this study examines Jewish and Christian attitudes toward the Temple in the first century and provides both Jews and Christians with a better understanding of their respective faiths and how they grow out of this ancient institution. The centrality of the Temple in New Testament writing reveals the authors’ negotiations with the institutional and symbolic center of Judaism as they worked to form their own religion.

A study of how the commandments relating to the ancient Temple still impact upon the life of the modern Jew.

As more and more is being discovered about the beginnings of Christianity, a whole new understanding of the context of Christian origins is emerging. Any serious student now needs a knowledge of the traditions of the temple. This book, a supplement to Margaret Barker's The Gate of Heaven: The History and Symbolism of the Temple in Jerusalem, breaks further new ground, showing how the symbols and rituals of the temple shaped the lives of the early Christians, and illustrates the striking relevance of temple theology to the New Testament. The influence of the temple cult has to be reconstructed by drawing on the increasing number of non-biblical texts now available. These include those written in the early churches; fragments from among the Dead Sea Scrolls; and Jewish texts written in the early Christian period. Piece by piece the world of the temple is emerging from this material. Through this close study of the Pseudepigrapha and other non-canonical writings, Margaret Barker examines four symbols of temple theology: Light, Life, Blood, and the Robes of Glory. She shows how details missing from the Old Testament descriptions can be recovered from other ancient texts to throw new light upon many significant passages of the Bible. This is a reprint of the volume published by T. & T. Clark in 1995.

Reproduction of the original: The Symbolism of Churches and Church Ornaments by William Durandus

Symbols of the Christian Faith is an illustrated guide to the major visual symbols used by the Christian church throughout history. These stylized illustrations, designed by artist Alva William Steffler, are intended to provide usable, up-to-date resources for contemporary church worship and Christian education. Throughout church history symbols have been used to aid worship and to communicate difficult spiritual ideas. Steffler here collects these symbols, from early Christian catacomb art to the present, offering fresh graphic interpretations of old visual forms. The accompanying text notes the biblical sources for the various symbols and traces their use in church tradition and their links to Greco-Roman culture. Extensive glossaries and indexes round out the book. Broadly inclusive and sensitive to the perspectives of every church tradition, this volume will be an invaluable resource for churches using Christian art as well as for general readers curious about the meaning of common Christian symbols.