Antiquitopia

For those who missed it, Hendrickson Publishers has released a facsimile edition of Codex Sinaiticus.  Being to scale, it is of course huge, as is the price. Check it out here for you or your library--it can be yours for only $799.

I just saw that there is a new version of Attar's Conference of the Birds!  I am excited to check it out, since I teach the Conference of the Birds in my Exploring Mysticism course. Check it out here .

It is always nice when multiple classes start overlapping.  My Religions of the World and my Sexuality and Christianity classes hit upon martyrdom and monasticism at the same time, although we spent much more time on these topics in my Sexuality and Christianity class. I had a student in one class make a suggestion through a momentary flash of inspiration that the monks--at least many of the earliest eremetical hagiographies--acted much like a shaman.  I would like to sit, think, and see if we can develop this idea a bit and see where it leads us. Firstly, while Shamanism proper belongs only to Siberia and the northern Caucuses, it is a phenomenon that shows some interesting cross-cultural comparisons with other phenomena of holy men and women, medicine men and women, etc., so long as historical context is properly taken into account. Some of the qualities often associated with these figures are: 1.  Death imagery is prevalent--the shaman is surrounded by...

My latest painting, finished just two nights ago.

Christianity has now been with us for two millennia; it clearly has staying power--although as Philip Jenkins book on "The Lost History of Christianity" in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia reminds, religions can die.  But a question I would like to raise is what difference did it make?  This is not a theological question, nor a soteriological one.  It is a historical and social one.  The difference here is not so much concerned with how people have conceived of God or salvation, but how these conceptions have affected daily life and the rhythms of ancient society.  Did conversion to Christianity affect these things?  Did it affect how a villager or urbanite went about their day, how they engaged with the sacred, or even their religious practices (new or just old rites redirected to new deities)? This of course is a big question, bigger than perhaps most of us could capably answer in all its facets, and it is likely impossible to answer in all it...