Desire in René Girard and Jesus

Desire in René Girard and Jesus PDF Author: William L. Newell
Publisher: Lexington Books
ISBN: 0739171100
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 243

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Book Description
William L. Newell presents a comprehensive analysis of René Girard’s work on the origins of culture and the depths of human desire. Girard makes no claim toward a theory of religion, but he lays the groundwork for a postmodern theory of it. Girard’s desire concerns fallen humanity, those insanely imitating what they lacked, and his use of the Bible brings back into play the idea of the holy in secular academia. Newell challenges Girard’s interpretation of Jesus’s Passion as non-sacrificial and he offers a close reading of Girard’s works on mimetic desire, scape-goating, and sacrifice, and Newell creates breakthrough theology on Jesus in the Excursus. Girard makes no claim to having a theory of religion, but he lays the groundwork for a postmodern theory of it, and in this book, Newell seeks to begin a theory of “the end of the sacred” and what will be in its place: the holy.

Desire in René Girard and Jesus

Desire in René Girard and Jesus PDF Author: William L. Newell
Publisher: Lexington Books
ISBN: 0739171100
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 243

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Book Description
William L. Newell presents a comprehensive analysis of René Girard’s work on the origins of culture and the depths of human desire. Girard makes no claim toward a theory of religion, but he lays the groundwork for a postmodern theory of it. Girard’s desire concerns fallen humanity, those insanely imitating what they lacked, and his use of the Bible brings back into play the idea of the holy in secular academia. Newell challenges Girard’s interpretation of Jesus’s Passion as non-sacrificial and he offers a close reading of Girard’s works on mimetic desire, scape-goating, and sacrifice, and Newell creates breakthrough theology on Jesus in the Excursus. Girard makes no claim to having a theory of religion, but he lays the groundwork for a postmodern theory of it, and in this book, Newell seeks to begin a theory of “the end of the sacred” and what will be in its place: the holy.

Desire in René Girard and Jesus

Desire in René Girard and Jesus PDF Author: William Lloyd Newell
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780739171097
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Desire in René Girard and Jesus presents a comprehensive analysis of René Girard's work on the origins of culture and the depths of human desire. Girard's hypothesis of mimesis discloses the lack of originality in human desire even as it offers a scientific method for handling religion after two centuries of its absence in the social science

I See Satan Fall Like Lightning

I See Satan Fall Like Lightning PDF Author: RenŽ Girard
Publisher: Orbis Books
ISBN: 160833158X
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 225

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Book Description
Rene Girard holds up the gospels as mirrors that reveal our broken humanity, and shows that they also reflect a new reality that can make us whole. Like Simone Weil, Girard looks at the Bible as a map of human behavior, and sees Jesus Christ as the turning point leading to new life. The title echoes Jesus' words: "I saw Satan falling like lightning from heaven". Girard persuades us that even as our world grows increasingly violent the power of the Christ-event is so great that the evils of scapegoating and sacrifice are being defeated even now. A new community, God's nonviolent kingdom, is being realized -- even now.

René Girard and Secular Modernity

René Girard and Secular Modernity PDF Author: Scott Cowdell
Publisher: University of Notre Dame Pess
ISBN: 0268076979
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 323

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Book Description
In René Girard and Secular Modernity: Christ, Culture, and Crisis, Scott Cowdell provides the first systematic interpretation of René Girard’s controversial approach to secular modernity. Cowdell identifies the scope, development, and implications of Girard’s thought, the centrality of Christ in Girard's thinking, and, in particular, Girard's distinctive take on the uniqueness and finality of Christ in terms of his impact on Western culture. In Girard’s singular vision, according to Cowdell, secular modernity has emerged thanks to the Bible’s exposure of the cathartic violence that is at the root of religious prohibitions, myths, and rituals. In the literature, the psychology, and most recently the military history of modernity, Girard discerns a consistent slide into an apocalypse that challenges modern ideas of romanticism, individualism, and progressivism. In the first three chapters, Cowdell examines the three elements of Girard’s basic intellectual vision (mimesis, sacrifice, biblical hermeneutics) and brings this vision to a constructive interpretation of “secularization” and “modernity,” as these terms are understood in the broadest sense today. Chapter 4 focuses on modern institutions, chiefly the nation state and the market, that function to restrain the outbreak of violence. And finally, Cowdell discusses the apocalyptic dimension of Girard's theory in relation to modern warfare and terrorism. Here, Cowdell engages with the most recent writings of Girard (particularly his Battling to the End) and applies them to further conversations in cultural theology, political science, and philosophy. Cowdell takes up and extends Girard’s own warning concerning an alternative to a future apocalypse: “What sort of conversion must humans undergo, before it is too late?”

René Girard, Unlikely Apologist

René Girard, Unlikely Apologist PDF Author: Grant Kaplan
Publisher: University of Notre Dame Pess
ISBN: 0268100888
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 222

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Book Description
Since the late 1970s, theologians have been attempting to integrate mimetic theory into different fields of theology, yet a distrust of mimetic theory persists in some theological camps. In René Girard, Unlikely Apologist: Mimetic Theory and Fundamental Theology, Grant Kaplan brings mimetic theory into conversation with theology both to elucidate the relevance of mimetic theory for the discipline of fundamental theology and to understand the work of René Girard within a theological framework. Rather than focus on Christology or atonement theory as the locus of interaction between Girard and theology, Kaplan centers his discussion on the apologetic quality of mimetic theory and the impact of mimetic theory on fundamental theology, the subdiscipline that grew to replace apologetics. His book explores the relation between Girard and fundamental theology in several keys. In one, it understands mimetic theory as a heuristic device that allows theological narratives and positions to become more intelligible and, by so doing, makes theology more persuasive. In another key, Kaplan shows how mimetic theory, when placed in dialogue with particular theologians, can advance theological discussion in areas where mimetic theory has seldom been invoked. On this level the book performs a dialogue with theology that both revisits earlier theological efforts and also demonstrates how mimetic theory brings valuable dimensions to questions of fundamental theology.

René Girard's Mimetic Theory

René Girard's Mimetic Theory PDF Author: Wolfgang Palaver
Publisher: MSU Press
ISBN: 1609173651
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 576

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Book Description
A systematic introduction into the mimetic theory of the French-American literary theorist and philosophical anthropologist René Girard, this essential text explains its three main pillars (mimetic desire, the scapegoat mechanism, and the Biblical “difference”) with the help of examples from literature and philosophy. This book also offers an overview of René Girard’s life and work, showing how much mimetic theory results from existential and spiritual insights into one’s own mimetic entanglements. Furthermore it examines the broader implications of Girard’s theories, from the mimetic aspect of sovereignty and wars to the relationship between the scapegoat mechanism and the question of capital punishment. Mimetic theory is placed within the context of current cultural and political debates like the relationship between religion and modernity, terrorism, the death penalty, and gender issues. Drawing textual examples from European literature (Cervantes, Shakespeare, Goethe, Kleist, Stendhal, Storm, Flaubert, Dostoevsky, Proust) and philosophy (Plato, Camus, Sartre, Lévi-Strauss, Derrida, Vattimo), Palaver uses mimetic theory to explore the themes they present. A highly accessible book, this text is complemented by bibliographical references to Girard’s widespread work and secondary literature on mimetic theory and its applications, comprising a valuable bibliographical archive that provides the reader with an overview of the development and discussion of mimetic theory until the present day.

Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World

Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World PDF Author: René Girard
Publisher: A&C Black
ISBN: 0826468535
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 480

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Book Description
Presenting an original global theory of culture, Girard explores the social function of violence and the mechanism of the social scapegoat. His vision is a challenge to conventional views of literature, anthropology, religion and psychoanalysis. Rene Gerard is the Andrew B. Hammond Professor Emeritus of French Language, Literature and Civilization at Stanford University, USA.

Battling to the End

Battling to the End PDF Author: René Girard
Publisher: MSU Press
ISBN: 1609171330
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 328

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Book Description
In Battling to the End René Girard engages Carl von Clausewitz (1780–1831), the Prussian military theoretician who wrote On War. Clausewitz, who has been critiqued by military strategists, political scientists, and philosophers, famously postulated that "War is the continuation of politics by other means." He also seemed to believe that governments could constrain war. Clausewitz, a firsthand witness to the Napoleonic Wars, understood the nature of modern warfare. Far from controlling violence, politics follows in war's wake: the means of war have become its ends. René Girard shows us a Clausewitz who is a fascinated witness of history's acceleration. Haunted by the French-German conflict, Clausewitz clarifies more than anyone else the development that would ravage Europe. Battling to the End pushes aside the taboo that prevents us from seeing that the apocalypse has begun. Human violence is escaping our control; today it threatens the entire planet.

The Nonviolent Atonement, Second Edition

The Nonviolent Atonement, Second Edition PDF Author: J. Denny Weaver
Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing
ISBN: 0802864376
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 363

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Book Description
A provocative study that cuts to the very heart of Christian thought, The Nonviolent Atonement challenges the traditional, Anselmian understanding of atonement along with the assumption that heavenly justice depends on Christ s passive, innocent submission to violent death at the hands of a cruel God. Instead J. Denny Weaver offers a thoroughly nonviolent paradigm for understanding atonement, grounded in the New Testament and sensitive to the concerns of pacifist, black, feminist, and womanist theology. While many scholars have engaged the subject of violence in atonement theology, Weaver s Nonviolent Atonement is the only book that offers a radically new theory rather than simply refurbishing existing theories. Key features of this revised and updated second edition include new material on Paul and Anselm, expanded discussion on the development of violence in theology, interaction with recent scholarship on atonement, and response to criticisms of Weaver s original work. Praise for the first edition: The best current single volume on reconstructing the theology of atonement. S. Mark Heim in Anglican Theological Review Weaver provides an important contribution to atonement theories by seriously inserting the contemporary concerns of pacifist, feminist, womanist, and black theologians into the centuries-old christological conversation. . . . A provocative but faithful proposal benefiting any student of christology. Religious Studies Review A noteworthy contribution to the literature on the atonement. Weaver provides a useful critique of the history of atonement motifs; he does a fine job of placing Anselm s theology in its historical context; he creatively fuses a singular biblical vision from the earthly narrative of the Gospels and the cosmic perspective of the Apocalypse; and he attempts to relate discussions of the atonement to Christian social ethics. Trinity Journal This is a superb succinct survey and analysis of classical and contemporary theories of the atonement, ideal for students and general readers. . . . A clearly written, passionately expressed introduction to current debates on the atonement. . . . Excellent resource. Reviews in Religion and Theology

On Sacrifice

On Sacrifice PDF Author: Moshe Halbertal
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 1400842352
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 147

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Book Description
The idea and practice of sacrifice play a profound role in religion, ethics, and politics. In this brief book, philosopher Moshe Halbertal explores the meaning and implications of sacrifice, developing a theory of sacrifice as an offering and examining the relationship between sacrifice, ritual, violence, and love. On Sacrifice also looks at the place of self-sacrifice within ethical life and at the complex role of sacrifice as both a noble and destructive political ideal. In the religious domain, Halbertal argues, sacrifice is an offering, a gift given in the context of a hierarchical relationship. As such it is vulnerable to rejection, a trauma at the root of both ritual and violence. An offering is also an ambiguous gesture torn between a genuine expression of gratitude and love and an instrument of exchange, a tension that haunts the practice of sacrifice. In the moral and political domains, sacrifice is tied to the idea of self-transcendence, in which an individual sacrifices his or her self-interest for the sake of higher values and commitments. While self-sacrifice has great potential moral value, it can also be used to justify the most brutal acts. Halbertal attempts to unravel the relationship between self-sacrifice and violence, arguing that misguided self-sacrifice is far more problematic than exaggerated self-love. In his exploration of the positive and negative dimensions of self-sacrifice, Halbertal also addresses the role of past sacrifice in obligating future generations and in creating a bond for political associations, and considers the function of the modern state as a sacrificial community.