Transcendence And Sensoriness

In Transcendence and Sensoriness, scholars of theology, philosophy, art, music, and architecture, discuss questions of transcendence, the human senses, and the arts through case studies considered in a broad theological framework of religious aesthetics of the arts.

Paradoxes have become characteristic of the world we live in - poverty and privilege, empire and oppression, migration and enclaveseeking, war and peace, justice and injustice, reconciliation and revenge. During the 2016 Societas Homiletica annual conference held in South Africa, these paradoxes served as a rediscovery of the calling of preachers to deliver the promise that lies within life's contradictions. A divine promise brought forth by the grace of God and the gospel of Christ - embodied in and through us by the Spirit of Christ. This promise may take many forms and calls for discernment and often interrupts the status quos in surprising, shocking ways. It is a promise that interrupts, in order to comfort.

Imagination allows individuals and groups to think beyond the here-and-now, to envisage alternatives, to create parallel worlds, and to mentally travel through time. Imagination is both extremely personal (for example, people imagine unique futures for themselves) and deeply social, as our imagination is fed with media and other shared representations. As a result, imagination occupies a central position within the life of mind and society. Expanding the boundaries of disciplinary approaches, the Handbook of Imagination and Culture expertly illustrates this core role of imagination in the development of children, adolescents, adults, and older persons today. Bringing together leading scholars in sociocultural psychology and neighboring disciplines from around the world, this edited volume guides readers towards a much deeper understanding of the conditions of imagining, its resources, its constraints, and the consequences it has on different groups of people in different domains of society. Summarily, this Handbook places imagination at the center, and offers readers new ways to examine old questions regarding the possibility of change, development, and innovation in modern society.

The Oxford Handbook of Divine Revelation offers a systemic approach to the notion of revelation in its various theoretical contexts. It provides in-depth coverage of the theoretical and historical fields in which the notion of revelation is discussed. It does not reflect the views of a certain school; under the horizon of contemporary discussions it offers the broadest understanding of the notion. Its main parts include biblical, theological, philosophical, historical, comparative, and scientific-cultural approaches. The contributors discuss the most important contemporary questions in theology, philosophy, and science. The Handbook offers a unique overview of the key problems of revelation, an overview missing from scholarly literature. Featuring contributions from leading scholars, the collection opens up further possibilities of scholarly work and spiritual vistas concerning the notion and the fact of divine revelation.

Through cross-disciplinary explorations of and engagements with nature as a forming part of architecture, this volume sheds light on the concepts of both nature and architecture. Nature is examined in a raw intermediary state, where it is noticeable as nature, despite, but at the same time through, man’s effort at creating form. This is done by approaching nature from the perspective of architecture, understood, not only as concrete buildings, but as a fundamental human way both of being in, and relating to, the world. Man finds and forms places where life may take place. Consequently, architecture may be understood as ranging from the simple mark on the ground and primitive enclosure, to the contemporary megalopolis. Nature inheres in many aesthetic forms of expression. In architecture, however, nature emerges with a particular power and clarity, which makes architecture a raw kind of art. Even though other forms of art, as well as aesthetic phenomena outside the arts, are addressed, the analogy to architecture will be evident and important. Thus, by using the concept of ’raw’ as a focal point, this book provides new approaches to architecture in a broad sense, as well as other aesthetic and artistic practices, and will be of interest to readers from different fields of the arts and humanities, spanning from philosophy and theology to history of art, architecture and music.

Music is played and heard in time, yet it is also embodied in space by musical scores. The observation of a musical score turns time into space and allows musicians to embrace the flow of time in a single glance. This experience constitutes a symbol for the Eternal Present, the simultaneous knowledge of all time outside time. This book analyzes the implications of this view through a variety of interdisciplinary perspectives, linking theology, philosophy, literature, and music. It also studies how this theme has been foreshadowed in the writings of Dante and J. R. R. Tolkien, demonstrating the connections between their masterpieces and the aesthetics of their times. The result is a fascinating itinerary through the history of culture, thought, and music, but also a deeply theological and spiritual experience.

Icons of Space: Advances in Hierotopy brings together important scholars of Byzantine religion, art, and architecture, to honour the work of renowned art historian Alexei Lidov. As well as his numerous publications, Lidov is well known for developing the concept of hierotopy, an innovative approach for studying the creation of sacred spaces. Hierotopy and the related concepts of ‘spatial icons’ and ‘image-paradigms’ emphasize fundamental questions about icons, including what defines them as structures, spaces, and experiences. Chapters in this volume engage with the overarching theme of icons of space by employing, contrasting, and complementing methods of hierotopy with more traditional approaches such as iconography. Examinations of icons have traditionally been positioned within strictly historical, theological, socio-economic, political, and art history domains, but this volume poses epistemological questions about the creation of sacred spaces that are instead inclusive of multi-layered iconic ideas and the lived experiences of the creators and beholders of such spaces. This book contributes to image theory and theories of architecture and sacred space. Simultaneously, it moves beyond colonial studies that predominantly focus on questions of religion and politics as expressions of privileged knowledge and power. This book will appeal to scholars and students of Byzantine history, as well as those interested in hierotopy and art history.

The presence of gold, silver, and other metals is a hallmark of decorated manuscripts, the very characteristic that makes them “illuminated.” Medieval artists often used metal pigment and leaf to depict metal objects both real and imagined, such as chalices, crosses, tableware, and even idols; the luminosity of these representations contrasted pointedly with the surrounding paints, enriching the page and dazzling the viewer. To elucidate this key artistic tradition, this volume represents the first in-depth scholarly assessment of the depiction of precious-metal objects in manuscripts and the media used to conjure them. From Paris to the Abbasid caliphate, and from Ethiopia to Bruges, the case studies gathered here forge novel approaches to the materiality and pictoriality of illumination. In exploring the semiotic, material, iconographic, and technical dimensions of these manuscripts, the authors reveal the canny ways in which painters generated metallic presence on the page. Illuminating Metalwork is a landmark contribution to the study of the medieval book and its visual and embodied reception, and is poised to be a staple of research in art history and manuscript studies, accessible to undergraduates and specialists alike.