The law of God : exploring God and civilization /
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In today's society, a positive relation between 'God' and 'civilization' is by no means self-evident. Religious believers who want to live their lives in accordance with 'the law of God' are often considered a threat to civilization. To many, monotheistic religion is inherently repressive and violent. The central aim of this volume is to think of both God and civilization in a more open, space-giving way. God is seen as the One who prevents man from making an absolute claim for a relative reality, including one's religion and culture. The multifaceted relations between God and civilization are explored from systematic-theological, missiological, philosophical and ethical perspectives.
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Includes index. :
1 online resource (vi, 330 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004281844 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Religions of modernity : relocating the sacred to the self and the digital /
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Religions of Modernity' challenges the social-scientific orthodoxy that, once unleashed, the modern forces of individualism, science and technology inevitably erode the sacred and evoke the profane. The book's chapters, some by established scholars, others by junior researchers, document instead in rich empirical detail how modernity relocates the sacred to the deeper layers of the self and the domain of digital technology. Rather than destroying the sacred tout court, then, the cultural logic of modernization spawns its own religious meanings, unacknowledged spiritualities and magical enchantments. The classical theoretical accounts of modernity by Max Weber, Emile Durkheim and others, it is argued in the introductory chapter, already hinted that there's a future for such religions of modernity.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references and indexes. :
9789004193697 :
1573-4293 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Civic ideology, organization, and law in the Rule scrolls : a comparative study of the Covenanters' sect and contemporary voluntary associations in political context /
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Over the past sixty years, several studies have demonstrated that the Dead Sea Scrolls sect was one of numerous voluntary associations that flourished in the Hellenistic-Roman age. Yet the origins of organizational and regulatory patterns that the sect shared with other associations have not been adequately explained. Drawing upon sociological studies of modern associations, this book argues that most ancient groups appropriated patterns from the state. Comparison of the Rule Scrolls with Greco-Roman constitutional literature, as well as philosophical, rabbinic, and early Christian texts, shows that the sect's appropriation helped articulate an \'alternative civic ideology\' by which members identified themselves as subjects of a commonwealth alternative and superior to that of the status quo. Like other associations with alternative civic ideology, the Covenanters studied constitution and law with the intention of reform, anticipating governance of restored Israel at the End of Days.
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Revised version of author's thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Chicago, 2007. :
1 online resource (xxv, 586 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. [525]-552) and indexes. :
9789004212183 :
0169-9962 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.