The Matter of the Gods

The Matter of the Gods PDF Author: Clifford Ando
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520933656
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 267

Get Book

Book Description
What did the Romans know about their gods? Why did they perform the rituals of their religion, and what motivated them to change those rituals? To these questions Clifford Ando proposes simple answers: In contrast to ancient Christians, who had faith, Romans had knowledge, and their knowledge was empirical in orientation. In other words, the Romans acquired knowledge of the gods through observation of the world, and their rituals were maintained or modified in light of what they learned. After a preface and opening chapters that lay out this argument about knowledge and place it in context, The Matter of the Gods pursues a variety of themes essential to the study of religion in history.

The Matter of the Gods

The Matter of the Gods PDF Author: Clifford Ando
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520933656
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 267

Get Book

Book Description
What did the Romans know about their gods? Why did they perform the rituals of their religion, and what motivated them to change those rituals? To these questions Clifford Ando proposes simple answers: In contrast to ancient Christians, who had faith, Romans had knowledge, and their knowledge was empirical in orientation. In other words, the Romans acquired knowledge of the gods through observation of the world, and their rituals were maintained or modified in light of what they learned. After a preface and opening chapters that lay out this argument about knowledge and place it in context, The Matter of the Gods pursues a variety of themes essential to the study of religion in history.

The Matter of the Gods

The Matter of the Gods PDF Author: Clifford Ando
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520259866
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 266

Get Book

Book Description
What did the Romans know about their gods? Why did they perform the rituals of their religion, & what motivated them to change those rituals? Clifford Ando explores the answers to these questions, pursuing a variety of themes essential to the study of religion in history.

The Matter of the Gods

The Matter of the Gods PDF Author: Clifford Ando
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 9780520250833
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 282

Get Book

Book Description
What did the Romans know about their gods? Why did they perform the rituals of their religion, & what motivated them to change those rituals? Clifford Ando explores the answers to these questions, pursuing a variety of themes essential to the study of religion in history.

Summer for the Gods

Summer for the Gods PDF Author: Edward J Larson
Publisher: Basic Books
ISBN: 1541646029
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 352

Get Book

Book Description
The Pulitzer Prize-winning history of the Scopes Trial and the battle over evolution and creation in America's schools In the summer of 1925, the sleepy hamlet of Dayton, Tennessee, became the setting for one of the twentieth century's most contentious courtroom dramas, pitting William Jennings Bryan and the anti-Darwinists against a teacher named John Scopes, represented by Clarence Darrow and the ACLU, in a famous debate over science, religion, and their place in public education. That trial marked the start of a battle that continues to this day-in cities and states throughout the country. Edward Larson's classic Summer for the Gods -- winner of the Pulitzer Prize in History -- is the single most authoritative account of this pivotal event. An afterword assesses the state of the battle between creationism and evolution, and points the way to how it might potentially be resolved.

Cicero on the Philosophy of Religion

Cicero on the Philosophy of Religion PDF Author: J. P. F. Wynne
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1107070481
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 321

Get Book

Book Description
Do the gods love you? Cicero gives deep and surprising answers in two philosophical dialogues on traditional Roman religion.

The Case for God

The Case for God PDF Author: Karen Armstrong
Publisher: Knopf Canada
ISBN: 0307372952
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 432

Get Book

Book Description
From the bestselling author of A History of God and The Great Transformation comes a balanced, nuanced understanding of the role religion plays in human life and the trajectory of faith in modern times. Why has God become incredible? Why is it that atheists and theists alike now think and speak about God in a way that veers so profoundly from the thinking of our ancestors? Moving from the Paleolithic Age to the present, Karen Armstrong details the lengths to which humankind has gone to experience a sacred reality that it called God, Brahman, Nirvana, Allah, or Dao. She examines the diminished impulse toward religion in our own time when a significant number of people either want nothing to do with God or question the efficacy of faith. With her trademark depth of knowledge and profound insight, Armstrong elucidates how the changing world has necessarily altered the importance of religion at both societal and individual levels. And she makes a powerful, convincing argument for structuring a faith that speaks to the needs of our dangerously polarized age.

Big Gods

Big Gods PDF Author: Ara Norenzayan
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691169748
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 264

Get Book

Book Description
Examines how the belief in gods has lead to cooperation and sometimes conflict between groups. The author also looks at how some cooperative societies have developed without belief in gods.

The Final Book: Gods

The Final Book: Gods PDF Author: SW Hammond
Publisher: Surf Star Media
ISBN: 0996285466
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 238

Get Book

Book Description
Multi-cultural, multi-historical, and spanning man's faith across time, The Final Book is a controversial and blasphemous last chapter of humanity. In the beginning there was love. The Goddess of Life in an elated romance with a beloved mortal. Her sister killed him. Their combined actions ripping a hole in destiny and plaguing mankind with an age of unprecedented corruption, vicious holy wars, and religious absolution. Though long forgotten by the mortals they serve, Zeus and his Pantheon continue to foster and protect mankind which is tearing itself apart—but even God isn't infallible. After failed diplomacy, the King of the Gods is left with no choice but to take the persona of a modern man—the famed genetic scientist Dr. Hork. In an effort to preserve the future by reshaping the past, Dr. Hork uses Project Genesis—the transfer of consciousness—to send subjects back in time. However, not without devastating failures. Subjects of the experiment wreak havoc upon humanity until a familiar character is reborn to correct the course. Reincarnated and ready to fulfill his true destiny, Joshua Bach is the catalyst the Gods have been waiting for—and Dr. Hork’s final beacon of salvation. Ferociously idealistic, the free-spirited young man struggles to come-of-age in a time and society ruled by money and corruption. Under the wing of the Gods, Josh rediscovers his purpose, along with a love that can only be considered timeless. Set in three periods—modern day, the 1960s, and ancient Mesopotamia—this epic blends human history, ruthless mythology, science fiction, and the supernatural to tell a love story of the future.

The Gods, the State, and the Individual

The Gods, the State, and the Individual PDF Author: John Scheid
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
ISBN: 0812247663
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 200

Get Book

Book Description
Roman religion has long presented a number of challenges to historians approaching the subject from a perspective framed by the three Abrahamic religions. The Romans had no sacred text that espoused its creed or offered a portrait of its foundational myth. They described relations with the divine using technical terms widely employed to describe relations with other humans. Indeed, there was not even a word in classical Latin that corresponds to the English word religion. In The Gods, the State, and the Individual, John Scheid confronts these and other challenges directly. If Roman religious practice has long been dismissed as a cynical or naïve system of borrowed structures unmarked by any true piety, Scheid contends that this is the result of a misplaced expectation that the basis of religion lies in an individual's personal and revelatory relationship with his or her god. He argues that when viewed in the light of secular history as opposed to Christian theology, Roman religion emerges as a legitimate phenomenon in which rituals, both public and private, enforced a sense of communal, civic, and state identity. Since the 1970s, Scheid has been one of the most influential figures reshaping scholarly understanding of ancient Roman religion. The Gods, the State, and the Individual presents a translation of Scheid's work that chronicles the development of his field-changing scholarship.

For the Love of the Gods

For the Love of the Gods PDF Author: Brandy Williams
Publisher: Llewellyn Worldwide
ISBN: 073874977X
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 291

Get Book

Book Description
Follow the Footsteps of History and Discover the Path to the Gods For the Love of the Gods tells the epic story of theurgy, from its roots in ancient Egypt to its modern day practice. The lives and passions of the early Pagan philosophers come alive in these pages, immersing you in the bustling cities and diverse cultures that spawned theurgy as we know it today. Theurgy is best understood when it is deeply experienced. The stories presented here re-create the experience of these ancient practices and show how they were passed down through generations of teachers and students of differing ethnicities, genders, and ages. It's commonly believed that ancient Pagan theurgy traditions were erased from the earth and replaced by monotheistic religions—but this is a myth. The way to the gods was never lost. For the Love of the Gods shares step-by-step instructions for theurgic rituals, so that you can create relationships with the gods and love them as the ancients did. Discover how to offer devotionals, create living statues, invoke into yourself and others, and achieve personal communion so that you, too, may dwell in the happy presence of the divine.