Sacred Song from the Byzantine Pulpit

Sacred Song from the Byzantine Pulpit
Author: Romanus (Melodes.)
Publisher:
Total Pages: 230
Release: 1995
Genre: Literary Collections
ISBN: 9780813013633

Romanos the Melodist, a sixth-century deacon in Constantinople, is regarded as the premier poet of the Greek-speaking Christian church. His kontakia are elaborate, dramatic hymns designed to be sung before a congregation on major feast days. Their brilliant rhetoric and imagery are the avenue for deft commentary on scriptural texts and moral instructions. This book is an introduction to, and selected translations of, seventeen sung sermons of Romanos. While R. J. Schork reviews Romanos's life and times, his emphasis is on the hymns themselves as inspired and inspirational pieces of religious poetry. In addition, Schork focuses special attention on the poet's pervasive and sensitive treatment of various women, including Eve, the Virgin Mary, Potiphar's Wife, and the Sinful Woman who anointed Christ's feet. The translations and commentary make these contemporary recreations accessible to general audience interested in literature, the history of the Christian church, ingenious interpretation of scripture, and, especially, Romano's unique poetic form.

Liturgical Subjects

Liturgical Subjects
Author: Derek Krueger
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
Total Pages: 324
Release: 2014-09-05
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0812290151

Liturgical Subjects examines the history of the self in the Byzantine Empire, challenging narratives of Christian subjectivity that focus only on classical antiquity and the Western Middle Ages. As Derek Krueger demonstrates, Orthodox Christian interior life was profoundly shaped by patterns of worship introduced and disseminated by Byzantine clergy. Hymns, prayers, and sermons transmitted complex emotional responses to biblical stories, particularly during Lent. Religious services and religious art taught congregants who they were in relation to God and each other. Focusing on Christian practice in Constantinople from the sixth to eleventh centuries, Krueger charts the impact of the liturgical calendar, the eucharistic rite, hymns for vigils and festivals, and scenes from the life of Christ on the making of Christian selves. Exploring the verse of great Byzantine liturgical poets, including Romanos the Melodist, Andrew of Crete, Theodore the Stoudite, and Symeon the New Theologian, he demonstrates how their compositions offered templates for Christian self-regard and self-criticism, defining the Christian "I." Cantors, choirs, and congregations sang in the first person singular expressing guilt and repentence, while prayers and sermons defined the collective identity of the Christian community as sinners in need of salvation. By examining the way models of selfhood were formed, performed, and transmitted in the Byzantine Empire, Liturgical Subjects adds a vital dimension to the history of the self in Western culture.

Encyclopedia of Early Christianity

Encyclopedia of Early Christianity
Author: Everett Ferguson
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 1270
Release: 2013-10-08
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1136611576

First published in 1997. What's new in the Second Edition: Some 250 new entries, twenty-five percent more than in the first edition, plus twenty-five new expert contributors. Bibliographies are greatly expanded and updated throughout; More focus on biblical books and philosophical schools, their influence on early Christianity and their use by patristic writers; More information about the Jewish and pagan environment of early Christianity; Greatly enlarged coverage of the eastern expansion of the faith throughout Asia, including persons and literature; More extensive treatment of saints, monasticism, worship practices, and modern scholars; Greater emphasis on social history and more theme articles; More illustrations, maps, and plans; Additional articles on geographical regions; Expanded chronological table; Also includes maps.

New Perspectives on the Qur'an

New Perspectives on the Qur'an
Author: Gabriel Said Reynolds
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 561
Release: 2012-03-29
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1136700781

This book continues the work of The Qur’ān in its Historical Context, in which an international group of scholars address an expanded range of topics on the Qur’ān and its origins, looking beyond medieval Islamic traditions to present the Qur’ān’s own conversation with the religions and literatures of its day. Particular attention is paid to recent debates and controversies in the field, and to uncovering the Qur’ān’s relationship with Judaism and Christianity. After a foreword by Abdolkarim Soroush, chapters by renowned experts cover: method in Qur'ānic Studies analysis of material evidence, including inscriptions and ancient manuscripts, for what they show of the Qur'ān’s origins the language of the Qur'ān and proposed ways to emend our reading of the Qur'ān how our knowledge of the religious groups at the time of the Qur'ān’s emergence might contribute to a better understanding of the text the Qur'ān’s conversation with Biblical literature and traditions that challenge the standard understanding of the holy book. This debate of recent controversial proposals for new interpretations of the Qur'ān will shed new light on the Qur’anic passages that have been shrouded in mystery and debate. As such, it will be a valuable reference for scholars of Islam, the Qur’an, Christian-Muslim relations and the Middle East.

Celebration of Living Theology

Celebration of Living Theology
Author: Justin Mihoc
Publisher: A&C Black
Total Pages: 273
Release: 2014-04-24
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0567145603

Peeler recognizes the inherent connection between the paternal identity of God, the filial identity of the Son, and the filial identity of the audience.

Tasting Heaven on Earth

Tasting Heaven on Earth
Author: Walter D. Ray
Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing
Total Pages: 171
Release: 2012-09-20
Genre: History
ISBN: 0802866638

The Church at Worship is a new series of documentary case studies of specific worshiping communities from around the world and throughout Christian history. In this second volume, Tasting Heaven on Earth, Walter Ray provides vivid descriptions of Constantinople, its history, its people, and its worship practices, which set the stage for a rich selection of primary documents that present readers with a vibrant snapshot of Byzantine Christianity in the sixth century. Some of the primary materials included here: Photos of mosaics, liturgical vessels, icons, and manuscripts Drawings, diagrams, descriptions, and photographs of Hagia Sophia Firsthand accounts of worship by Maximus the Confessor, Eutychius, and Procopius Liturgical prayers and a reconstruction of the Divine Liturgy of St. Basil

Religious Stories in Transformation: Conflict, Revision and Reception

Religious Stories in Transformation: Conflict, Revision and Reception
Author: Alberdina Houtman
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 498
Release: 2016-10-18
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9004334815

In Religious Stories in Transformation: Conflict, Revision and Reception, the editors present a collection of essays that reveal both the many similarities and the poignant differences between ancient myths in Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and modern secular culture and how these stories were incorporated and adapted over time. This rich multidisciplinary research demonstrates not only how stories in different religions and cultures are interesting in their own right, but also that the process of transformation in particular deserves scholarly interest. It is through the changes in the stories that the particular identity of each religion comes to the fore most strikingly.

Greek Laughter and Tears

Greek Laughter and Tears
Author: Margaret Alexiou
Publisher: Edinburgh University Press
Total Pages: 504
Release: 2017-06-05
Genre: History
ISBN: 1474403816

Explores the range and complexity of human emotions and their transmission across cultural traditionsWhat makes us laugh and cry, sometimes at the same time? How do these two primal, seemingly discrete and non-verbal modes of expression intersect in everyday life and ritual, and what range of emotions do they evoke? How may they be voiced, shaped and coloured in literature and liturgy, art and music?Bringing together scholars from diverse periods and disciplines of Hellenic and Byzantine studies, this volume explores the shifting shapes and functions of laughter and tears. With a focus on the tragic, the comic and the tragicomic dimensions of laughter and tears in art, literature and performance, as well as on their emotional, socio-cultural and religious significance, it breaks new ground in the study of ancient and Byzantine affectivity.Key featuresIncludes an international cast of 25 distinguished contributors Prominence is given to performative arts and to interactions with other cultures Transitions from Late Antiquity to Byzantium, and from Byzantium to the Renaissance, form focal points from which contributors look backwards, forwards and sidewaysHighlights the variety, audacity and quality of the finest Byzantine works and the extent to which they anticipated the renaissance

Mother of God

Mother of God
Author: Miri Rubin
Publisher: Penguin UK
Total Pages: 775
Release: 2009-02-26
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0141912642

Mary, the mother of Jesus, is one of the most powerful, influential and complex of all religious figures. The focus for women, the inspiration of faith, the subject of innumerable paintings, sculptures, pieces of music and churches, Mary is so entangled in our world that it is impossible to conceive of the history of Western culture and religion without her. Miri Rubin's Mother of God is a major work of cultural imagination. Mary's role in the Gospels is a relatively minor one, and yet in the centuries during which Christianity established itself she emerged as a powerful, strange and ungovernable force, endlessly remade and reimagined by wave after wave of devotees, ultimately becoming 'a sort of God', in ways that have always made some Christians uneasy. Whether talking about the vast public festivals celebrating Mary that sweep up entire communities or the intense private agony of individual devotion, Rubin's book is a triumph of sympathy and intelligence. Throughout Christianity's journey from mysterious origins to global religion, the Mother of God has been a profound presence in countless lives - Mother of God is the story of that presence and a book that raises profound questions about the human experience.

Liturgy and the Emotions in Byzantium

Liturgy and the Emotions in Byzantium
Author: Andrew Mellas
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 219
Release: 2020-07-09
Genre: History
ISBN: 1108487599

Emotions in Byzantium came to life through hymnody, which invited the faithful to step into a liturgical world of compunction.