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Conceptions Of The Afterlife In Early Civilizations
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Book Synopsis Conceptions of the Afterlife in Early Civilizations by : Gregory Shushan
Download or read book Conceptions of the Afterlife in Early Civilizations written by Gregory Shushan and published by Continuum. This book was released on 2011-12-22 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Gregory Shushan challenges post-modern scholarly attitudes concerning cross-cultural comparisons in the study of religions. In an original and innovative piece of comparative research, he analyses afterlife conceptions in five ancient civilisations (Old and Middle Kingdom Egypt, Sumerian and Old Babylonian Mesopotamia, Vedic India, pre-Buddhist China, and pre-Columbian Mesoamerica). These are considered in light of historical and contemporary reports of near-death experiences, and shamanic afterlife 'journeys'. Conceptions of the Afterlife in Early Civilizations is a significant study, for it presents a comprehensive new comparative framework for the cross-cultural study of myth and religion, while at the same time providing a fascinating exploration of the interface between belief and experience.
Download or read book Life After Death written by Alan Segal and published by Image. This book was released on 2010-06-23 with total page 882 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A magisterial work of social history, Life After Death illuminates the many different ways ancient civilizations grappled with the question of what exactly happens to us after we die. In a masterful exploration of how Western civilizations have defined the afterlife, Alan F. Segal weaves together biblical and literary scholarship, sociology, history, and philosophy. A renowned scholar, Segal examines the maps of the afterlife found in Western religious texts and reveals not only what various cultures believed but how their notions reflected their societies’ realities and ideals, and why those beliefs changed over time. He maintains that the afterlife is the mirror in which a society arranges its concept of the self. The composition process for Judaism, Christianity, and Islam begins in grief and ends in the victory of the self over death. Arguing that in every religious tradition the afterlife represents the ultimate reward for the good, Segal combines historical and anthropological data with insights gleaned from religious and philosophical writings to explain the following mysteries: why the Egyptians insisted on an afterlife in heaven, while the body was embalmed in a tomb on earth; why the Babylonians viewed the dead as living in underground prisons; why the Hebrews remained silent about life after death during the period of the First Temple, yet embraced it in the Second Temple period (534 B.C.E. –70 C.E.); and why Christianity placed the afterlife in the center of its belief system. He discusses the inner dialogues and arguments within Judaism and Christianity, showing the underlying dynamic behind them, as well as the ideas that mark the differences between the two religions. In a thoughtful examination of the influence of biblical views of heaven and martyrdom on Islamic beliefs, he offers a fascinating perspective on the current troubling rise of Islamic fundamentalism. In tracing the organic, historical relationships between sacred texts and communities of belief and comparing the visions of life after death that have emerged throughout history, Segal sheds a bright, revealing light on the intimate connections between notions of the afterlife, the societies that produced them, and the individual’s search for the ultimate meaning of life on earth.
Book Synopsis Death and Immortality in Ancient Philosophy by : Alex Long
Download or read book Death and Immortality in Ancient Philosophy written by Alex Long and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2019-06-13 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Provides an accessible account of the variety and subtlety of Greek and Roman philosophy of death, from Homer to Marcus Aurelius.
Book Synopsis The Palgrave Handbook of the Afterlife by : Yujin Nagasawa
Download or read book The Palgrave Handbook of the Afterlife written by Yujin Nagasawa and published by Springer. This book was released on 2017-10-12 with total page 451 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This unique Handbook provides a sophisticated, scholarly overview of the most advanced thought regarding the idea of life after death. Its comprehensive coverage encompasses historical, religious, philosophical and scientific thinking. Starting with an overview of ancient thought on the topic, The Palgrave Handbook of the Afterlife examines in detail the philosophical coherence of the main traditional notions of the nature of the afterlife including heaven, hell, purgatory and rebirth. In addition (and breaking with traditional conceptions) it also explores the most recent exciting advance – digital models. Later sections include analysis of various possible metaphysical accounts that might make sense of the afterlife (including substance dualism, emergent dualism and materialism) and the science of near death experiences as well as the links between human psychology and our attitude to the afterlife. Key features: • Grounded in the most advanced philosophical, theological and scientific thinking • Contributions by eminent scholars from the world’s top universities • Balanced treatment of fundamental issues that are relevant to everyone • Diverse approaches ranging from the religious to the scientific, from the optimistic to the pessimistic • A major section on the meaning of the afterlife which includes chapters on fear, purpose, evil, and issues regarding identity The Palgrave Handbook of the Afterlife is essential reading for scholars, researchers and advanced students researching attitudes to and effects of beliefs about death and life after death from philosophical, historical, religious, psychological and scientific perspectives.
Book Synopsis Excavating the Afterlife by : Guolong Lai
Download or read book Excavating the Afterlife written by Guolong Lai and published by University of Washington Press. This book was released on 2015 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This pioneering study examines art objects and texts excavated from tombs in what was once the state of Chu, in south China, dating from the Warring States period (ca. 480-221 BCE) to the beginning of the imperial era (3rd century BCE to 1st century CE) to explore critical changes in religious beliefs and practices concerning the dead and the afterlife."
Book Synopsis Battling the Gods by : Tim Whitmarsh
Download or read book Battling the Gods written by Tim Whitmarsh and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2015-11-10 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How new is atheism? Although adherents and opponents alike today present it as an invention of the European Enlightenment, when the forces of science and secularism broadly challenged those of faith, disbelief in the gods, in fact, originated in a far more remote past. In Battling the Gods, Tim Whitmarsh journeys into the ancient Mediterranean, a world almost unimaginably different from our own, to recover the stories and voices of those who first refused the divinities. Homer’s epic poems of human striving, journeying, and passion were ancient Greece’s only “sacred texts,” but no ancient Greek thought twice about questioning or mocking his stories of the gods. Priests were functionaries rather than sources of moral or cosmological wisdom. The absence of centralized religious authority made for an extraordinary variety of perspectives on sacred matters, from the devotional to the atheos, or “godless.” Whitmarsh explores this kaleidoscopic range of ideas about the gods, focusing on the colorful individuals who challenged their existence. Among these were some of the greatest ancient poets and philosophers and writers, as well as the less well known: Diagoras of Melos, perhaps the first self-professed atheist; Democritus, the first materialist; Socrates, executed for rejecting the gods of the Athenian state; Epicurus and his followers, who thought gods could not intervene in human affairs; the brilliantly mischievous satirist Lucian of Samosata. Before the revolutions of late antiquity, which saw the scriptural religions of Christianity and Islam enforced by imperial might, there were few constraints on belief. Everything changed, however, in the millennium between the appearance of the Homeric poems and Christianity’s establishment as Rome’s state religion in the fourth century AD. As successive Greco-Roman empires grew in size and complexity, and power was increasingly concentrated in central capitals, states sought to impose collective religious adherence, first to cults devoted to individual rulers, and ultimately to monotheism. In this new world, there was no room for outright disbelief: the label “atheist” was used now to demonize anyone who merely disagreed with the orthodoxy—and so it would remain for centuries. As the twenty-first century shapes up into a time of mass information, but also, paradoxically, of collective amnesia concerning the tangled histories of religions, Whitmarsh provides a bracing antidote to our assumptions about the roots of freethinking. By shining a light on atheism’s first thousand years, Battling the Gods offers a timely reminder that nonbelief has a wealth of tradition of its own, and, indeed, its own heroes.
Book Synopsis Religions of the Ancient World by : Sarah Iles Johnston
Download or read book Religions of the Ancient World written by Sarah Iles Johnston and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2004-11-30 with total page 750 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This groundbreaking, first basic reference work on ancient religious beliefs collects and organizes available information on ten ancient cultures and traditions, including Greece, Rome, and Mesopotamia, and offers an expansive, comparative perspective on each one.
Book Synopsis Advancement in Ancient Civilizations by : Harald Haarmann
Download or read book Advancement in Ancient Civilizations written by Harald Haarmann and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2020-09-21 with total page 245 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Traditional scholarship on how ancient civilizations emerged is outmoded and new insights call for revision. According to the well-established paradigm, Mesopotamia is considered the cradle of civilization. Following the cliche of ex oriente lux ("light from the East") all major achievements of humankind spread from the Middle East. Modern archaeology, cultural science and historical linguistics indicate civilizations did not originate from a single prototype. Several models produced divergent patterns of advanced culture, developing both hierarchical and egalitarian societies. This study outlines a panorama of ancient civilizations, including the still little-known Danube civilization, now identified as the oldest advanced culture in Europe. In a comparative view, a new paradigm of research and a new cultural chronology of civilizations in the Old and New Worlds emerges, with climate change shown to be a continual influence on human lifeways.
Book Synopsis Ancient Egypt and Early China by : Anthony J Barbieri-Low
Download or read book Ancient Egypt and Early China written by Anthony J Barbieri-Low and published by . This book was released on 2021-06-17 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Although they existed more than a millennium apart, the great civilizations of New Kingdom Egypt (ca. 1548-1086 BCE) and Han dynasty China (206 BCE-220 CE) shared intriguing similarities. Both were centered around major, flood-prone rivers--the Nile and the Yellow River--and established complex hydraulic systems to manage their power. Both spread their territories across vast empires that were controlled through warfare and diplomacy and underwent periods of radical reform led by charismatic rulers--the "heretic king" Akhenaten and the vilified reformer Wang Mang. Universal justice was dispensed through courts, and each empire was administered by bureaucracies staffed by highly trained scribes who held special status. Egypt and China each developed elaborate conceptions of an afterlife world and created games of fate that facilitated access to these realms. This groundbreaking volume offers an innovative comparison of these two civilizations. Through a combination of textual, art historical, and archaeological analyses, Ancient Egypt and Early China reveals shared structural traits of each civilization as well as distinctive features.
Book Synopsis The Legacy of Ancient Civilizations: Insights into Early Societies by : Rowena Malpas
Download or read book The Legacy of Ancient Civilizations: Insights into Early Societies written by Rowena Malpas and published by Richards Education. This book was released on with total page 135 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Journey through time with 'The Legacy of Ancient Civilizations: Insights into Early Societies,' a comprehensive exploration of the world's most influential early cultures. This book delves into the intricacies of ancient societies from Mesopotamia, Egypt, and the Indus Valley to Greece, Rome, China, the Americas, and Africa. Each chapter provides detailed accounts of the rise, achievements, and legacies of these civilizations, highlighting their contributions to modern science, art, governance, and cultural practices. Ideal for history enthusiasts, students, and scholars, this book offers a thorough understanding of how ancient civilizations have shaped our present and continue to influence our future. Discover the enduring legacy of humanity’s earliest societies and their profound impact on the world today.
Book Synopsis Madness Cracked by : Michael J. Power
Download or read book Madness Cracked written by Michael J. Power and published by . This book was released on 2015 with total page 243 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'The recent publication of a new edition of the American Diagnostic and Statistical manual (DSM-5) highlighted the two contrary viewpoints that exist within the field of mental health. There are those who value such classification systems, seeing each revision of the DSM as a fine-tuning exercise, and there are those who are strongly opposed, seeing such exercises as fundamentally flawed. 'Madness Cracked' provides a fascinating introduction to the history of psychiatry and clinical psychology, looking at how these areas have attempted to classify the various problems and disorders that their practitioners have faced in everyday use. Within the book, Power argues that - like in other areas of science - progress can only be made if the classification systems that are used have a sound theoretical basis. In addition, he outlines a model derived from work on cognition and emotion showing how, with appropriate modifications, it could provide a theoretical basis for classification and diagnosis. Using extraordinary examples from the history of psychiatry and clinical psychology, along with fascinating case material, he shows how our current knowledge in psychology can be developed to provide the theoretical basis that the field needs. For anyone in the field of mental health, Madness Cracked is a thought-provoking and controversial new book.'
Book Synopsis Making Sense of Death and Immortality by : Paul Badham
Download or read book Making Sense of Death and Immortality written by Paul Badham and published by SPCK. This book was released on 2013-06-20 with total page 100 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Many think that belief in life after death flies in the face of what science has discovered. Paul Badham explores the grounds on which the hope of immortality, central for Christian doctrine, can be revitalized today. He suggests that the possibility of a relationship between God and human beings is confirmed by our religious experience, and that resurrection and immortality need each other. Includes chapters on the evidential value of near-death experiences, concepts of heaven, and arguments against belief in hell.
Download or read book Before Religion written by Brent Nongbri and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2013-01-22 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Examining a wide array of ancient writings, Brent Nongbri dispels the commonly held idea that there is such a thing as ancient religion. Nongbri shows how misleading it is to speak as though religion was a concept native to pre-modern cultures.
Book Synopsis Going the Extra Mile by : Gunda, Masiiwa R.
Download or read book Going the Extra Mile written by Gunda, Masiiwa R. and published by University of Bamberg Press. This book was released on 2024-07-22 with total page 450 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Book Synopsis The Story of the First Civilizations from Mesopotamia to the Aztecs by : Subhadra Sen Gupta
Download or read book The Story of the First Civilizations from Mesopotamia to the Aztecs written by Subhadra Sen Gupta and published by Talking Cub. This book was released on 2021-10-20 with total page 264 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Description Did you know... The Chinese were the first civilization to introduce the concept of exams? The Indus Valley Civilization was perhaps the cleanest and most organized of all civilizations? There used to be an Inca king who would dust himself with gold? Dive into these and many more nuggets of information about the world's earliest civilizations. Here you will read about the Egyptian rulers who built lavish tombs for their afterlife; about Greece, the first European civilization that gave us philosophers and mathematicians as well as the cherished concept of democracy; the builders and architects and the gladiators and warring emperors of Rome; and about Africa, the continent where gold and libraries abounded. In her unique and engaging style, Subhadra Sen Gupta takes us on a journey around the world, and tells the known and little-known stories about our origins. Well-researched and filled with captivating illustrations, The Story of the First Civilizations will delight and educate readers everywhere.
Book Synopsis Signals in the Noise: Encountering the Limits of Materialist Science - An Exploration of Consciousness and Reality by : Robert DeFilippis
Download or read book Signals in the Noise: Encountering the Limits of Materialist Science - An Exploration of Consciousness and Reality written by Robert DeFilippis and published by BookLocker.com, Inc.. This book was released on 2023-10-15 with total page 517 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Signals in the Noise: An Exploration of Consciousness and Reality. How Current Research is Challenging Materialist Science "The Signals in the Noise," groundbreaking theories about consciousness are meticulously explored, presenting an avant-garde perspective that stands to challenge our traditional, materialist viewpoints. The author leads us on an intellectual journey, questioning established materialist scientific norms and bringing forward evidence that defies materialist theories of consciousness. The book emphasizes that consciousness persists and can even be enhanced when brain activity decreases, supported by numerous research studies involving psychedelics, near-death experiences, and other instances when brain functions are diminished. This new understanding suggests that consciousness transcends the physical confines of our biological makeup, challenging conventional notions about its origin and nature. Furthermore, the book introduces a transformative perspective on the universe, proposing that what we perceive as material is merely a function of our sensory systems. Based on the author's review of current theories of the composition of the cosmos, we now know everything that exists is composed of energy, with physicality representing deeper qualities that lie out of our reach. Drawing on proven quantum physics, the author presents the theory that the universe's interconnectedness is a product of coherent quantum fields from which everything emerges and takes on the character of separateness and materiality in the 4D or manifest level we experience. In a radical departure from mainstream materialist thought, "The Signals in the Noise" argues that consciousness is a universal phenomenon occurring in varying degrees of complexity across all organisms. The author posits that while the presence of proto-consciousness is universal, the consciousness we experience emerges in the fourth-dimensional or manifest level, an idea that, if widely accepted, can redefine our understanding of life and existence. Finally, the author criticizes the materialist worldview, stating that this ingrained belief system creates many societal, political, religious, and environmental problems. He argues that our obstinate adherence to materialist orthodoxy drives our trajectory toward planetary destruction. Catalyzed by our capitalist system of consumption, this materialist belief system hinders our ability to recognize and correct the adverse effects of our actions. "The Signals in the Noise" is a compelling critique of the materialist worldview, challenging our understanding of consciousness, existence, and our place in the universe. It underscores the urgency to redefine our perspectives to avert the catastrophic trajectory that our current beliefs are driving us toward. This book is a radical and thought-provoking read for anyone interested in consciousness, quantum physics, and the future of our planet.
Book Synopsis Free Zone Scientology by : Aled Thomas
Download or read book Free Zone Scientology written by Aled Thomas and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2021-04-08 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this novel academic study, Aled Thomas analyses modern issues surrounding boundaries and fluidity in contemporary Scientology. By using the Scientologist practice of 'auditing' as a case study, this book explores the ways in which new types of 'Scientologies' can emerge. The notion of Free Zone Scientology is characterised by its horizontal structure, in contrast to the vertical-hierarchy of the institutional Church of Scientology. With this in mind, Thomas explores the Free Zone as an example of a developing and fluid religion, directly addressing questions concerning authority, leadership and material objects. This book, by maintaining a double-focus on the top-down hierarchy of the Church of Scientology and the horizontal-fluid nature of the Free Zone, breaks away from previous research on new religions, with have tended to focus either on new religions as indices of broad social processes, such as secularization or globalization, or as exemplars of exotic processes, such as charismatic authority and brainwashing. Instead, Thomas adopts auditing as a method of providing an in-depth case study of a new religion in transition and transformation in the 21st century. This opens the study of contemporary and new religions to a series of new questions around hybrid religions (sacred and secular), and acts as a framework for the study of similar movements formed in recent decades.
