Material Spirit


Book Description

The essays in this collection examine philosophical, religious, and literary or artistic texts using methodologies and insights that have grown out of reflection on literature and art. In them, them phrase “material spirit” becomes a point of departure for considering the continuing spectral effects of religious texts and concerns in ways that do not simply call for, or assume, new orrenewed forms of religiosity. The writers in this collection seek to examine religion beyond traditional notions of transcendence: Their topics range from early Christian religious practices to global climate change. Some of the essays explore religious themes or tones in literary texts, for example, works by Wordsworth, Hopkins, Proust, Woolf, and Teresa of Avila. Others approach—in a literarycritical mood—philosophical or para-philosophical writers such as Bataille, Husserl, Derrida, and Benjamin. Still others treat writers of a more explicitly religious orientation, such as Augustine, Rosenzweig, or Bernard of Clairvaux.




Cosmology and Self in the Apostle Paul


Book Description

This text presents an innovative challenge to the traditional reading of Paul. Troels Engberg-Pedersen argues that the usual mainly cognitive and metaphorical ways of understanding central Pauline concepts must be supplemented by a literal understanding that directly reflects Paul's materialist cosmology.




Burning Money


Book Description

For a thousand years across the length and breadth of China and beyond, people have burned paper replicas of valuable things—most often money—for the spirits of deceased family members, ancestors, and myriads of demons and divinities. Although frequently denigrated as wasteful and vulgar and at times prohibited by governing elites, today this venerable custom is as popular as ever. Burning Money explores the cultural logic of this common practice while addressing larger anthropological questions concerning the nature of value. The heart of the work integrates Chinese and Western thought and analytics to develop a theoretical framework that the author calls a “materialist aesthetics.” This includes consideration of how the burning of paper money meshes with other customs in China and around the world. The work examines the custom in contemporary everyday life, its origins in folklore and history, as well as its role in common rituals, in the social formations of dynastic and modern times, and as a “sacrifice” in the act of consecrating the paper money before burning it. Here the author suggests a great divide between the modern means of cultural reproduction through ideology and reification, with its emphasis on nature and realism, and previous pre-capitalist means through ritual and mystification, with its emphasis on authenticity. The final chapters consider how the burning money custom has survived its encounter with the modern global system and internet technology. Innovative and original in its interpretation of a common ritual in Chinese popular religion, Burning Money will be welcomed by scholars and students of Chinese religion as well as comparative religion specialists and anthropologists interested in contemporary social theory.




Spirit, Soul, and Body


Book Description

Have you ever asked yourself what changed when you were "born again?" You look in the mirror and see the same reflection - your body hasn't changed. You find yourself acting the same and yielding to those same old temptations - that didn't seem to change either. So you wonder, Has anything really changed? The correct...




Matters of Spirit


Book Description

Hundreds of buildings, thousands of people, countless stories&—there&’s always more to learn about Penn State, no matter how much time you&’ve spent there. This Is Penn State: An Insider&’s Guide to the University Park Campus will enlighten anyone with an interest in the University, from visiting parents to lifelong State College residents. This Is Penn State documents the rich history beneath the surface of the Penn State experience, offering facts and figures, essays and anecdotes, obscure trivia, notable quotations, and a wealth of other information about Penn State&’s past, present, and future. Forty of the University&’s most prominent buildings and areas are highlighted, accompanied by more than 120 illustrations, ranging from historical photographs to architectural sketches of buildings not yet completed. Essays by veteran Penn Staters Leon Stout, Craig Zabel, and Gabriel Welsch cover Penn State&’s history, architecture, and changing physical landscape. And when you want to get outside and see the campus firsthand, This Is Penn State is your guidebook to University Park. The four detailed maps take you on a west-to-east walking tour of Penn State&’s buildings, allowing you to understand the development of each area of campus. Over the last 150 years, Penn State has been devoted to scholarship, research, and community service. In honor of the University&’s sesquicentennial and in celebration of the Press&’s fiftieth anniversary, the Penn State Press is proud to offer This Is Penn State as its gift to everyone who feels a connection with &“dear old State.&”




The Laws of the Spirit World


Book Description

WITH A BRAND NEW LOOK! ON FEBRUARY 22, 1980, KHORSHED AND RUMI BHAVNAGRI’S WORLD WAS SHATTERED. ONE MONTH LATER, A NEW ONE OPENED. Khorshed and Rumi Bhavnagri lost their sons, Vispi and Ratoo, in a tragic car crash. With both their sons gone, the couple felt they would not survive for long. They had lost all faith in God until a miraculous message from the Spirit World gave them hope and sent them on an incredible journey.




Spirited Things


Book Description

The word “possession” is anything but transparent, especially as it developed in the context of the African Americas. There it referred variously to spirits, material goods, and people. It served as a watershed term marking both transactions in which people were made into things—via slavery—and ritual events by which the thingification of people was revised. In Spirited Things, Paul Christopher Johnson gathers together essays by leading anthropologists in the Americas that reopen the concept of possession on these two fronts in order to examine the relationship between African religions in the Atlantic and the economies that have historically shaped—and continue to shape—the cultures that practice them. Exploring the way spirit possessions were framed both by material things—including plantations, the Catholic church, the sea, and the phonograph—as well as by the legacy of slavery, they offer a powerful new way of understanding the Atlantic world.




Spirit Matters


Book Description

Orthodox Christianity, scientific materialism, and alternative religions -- The evolution of occult spirituality in Victorian England and the representative case of Edward Bulwer-Lytton -- Anthony Trollope's religion : the orthodox/heterodox boundary -- The influences of Buddhism and comparative religion on Matthew Arnold's theology -- Interpenetration of religion and national politics in Great Britain and Sri Lanka : William Knighton's Forest life in Ceylon -- Identity, genre, and religion in Anna Leonowens' The English governess at the Siamese court -- Ancient Egyptian religion in late-Victorian England -- The economics of immortality : the demi-immortal Oriental, Enlightenment vitalism, and political economy in Bram Stoker's Dracula -- Conclusion : from Victorian occultism to new age spiritualities




The Science of Spirit


Book Description

Throughout the 20th century and into the new millennium, humanity has made enormous advancements in science and technology. Spiritual enlightenment, however, has gone relatively neglected, as fascination with material progress tends to keep us focused on the physical world, giving less importance to universal values, to being, to spiritual life. Parapsychological research has produced significant findings over the last few decades, and science has the obligation to continue exploring this area, seeking to contribute to the spiritual enlightenment of humanity. This book examines evidence of traditional psychic phenomena, promoting a more comprehensive understanding of them, and offering new perspective to see ourselves as particles of "universal energy," interconnected with all others.




The Spirit Level


Book Description

It is common knowledge that, in rich societies, the poor have worse health and suffer more from almost every social problem. This book explains why inequality is the most serious problem societies face today.