The use of persuasion by Reformation-Era Christians and their Spiritual Successors

Public displays of images used in conjunction with lines of symbolic rhetoric are powerful tools of propaganda.[1] As moving as printed propaganda can be, they are unintelligible and therefore without power unless the viewer has access to the proper context. Propaganda seeks to encapsulate and communicate a group’s worldview in a compact space. Necessarily, the propaganda pieces boil down the presenting group’s worldview to the components that are most important to those seeking to foster change. Two such instances of religious propaganda are a 2007 Baptist parade float and a 16^th century Lutheran woodcut entitled The Contents of Two Sermons. This paper will seek to explore each of these images and to structurally compare the two. Structures work to create effective propaganda through spatial and relational juxtapositions; these structures are reliant on their situation within larger, over-arching structures for meaning, and serve to expand or restrict the presenting groups’ social borders.

On Relations: A Guide to Structuralism

Structuralism is an approach to the study of phenomena that places the emphasis on the relation between objects as its primary source of analysis. Jensen, in his chapter entitled “Structure” in The Guide to the Study of Religion, describes structure as “…a set or network of relations which gives a phenomenon an identity as a closed system or interdependent parts.”[2] Structures are rule-laden; internal rules govern how elements within the structure behave and are defined against one another. (more…)

An Interpretation of RigVeda Hymn 7:103

One of the more fascinating Vedic hymns is the The Frogs.[1] It is interesting because of the multitude of complex issues that the hymn touches upon. Essentially, the hymn compares the chanting of frogs with the chanting of Vedic Brahmin priests. Is this a positive comparison? For a modern American reader, the meaning is not clear. At first light, one can easily imagine this hymn being composed by either a rival group of priests or disgruntled laypeople. If so, it seems as though the composer, if he was a non-Sanskrit speaker, could have been lampooning rival Vedic priests and comparing their nonsensical chanting, i.e. in Sanskrit, with those of frogs. Perhaps stanza five speaks to the perception among the composing community that Brahmin priests and all Vedic followers are mindlessly repeating what has gone on before them without truly understanding it.

Is this really the case? The transmission and content of the hymn question this surface analysis. In the poems, the Brahmin priests and the frogs were responsible for the upkeep of the world. They are both inspired by Parjanya, the god of the rainstorm.[2] Through the chanting of the frogs and the Brahmins the people receive real-time benefits.[3] Therefore, the hymn is can be seen as one of reverence, comparing the sacred and sustaining sounds of Sanskrit with the sacred and sustaining sounds of the frogs; each is drawing off of the power of the divine sound. In addition, stanza six emphasizes the frogs’ particular variety and essential unity, hardly a tactic of the lampooner. All content aside, the transmission of the text must be considered.[4] No matter the identity of the composer, the hymn was definitely transmitted through successive generations solely by Brahmin priests orally. Because the hymns were in the sole possession of the people potentially being critiqued, it is unlikely that the Brahmin priests would include a hymn that was overtly antagonistic towards them. It is even possible that the use of frogs is a rhetorical device designed to hook the listener with humor and hammer them with truth. So perhaps it is the case that the hymn was a positive one. The gulf of time, culture, and worldview is too great to bridge with the tools that accompany a surface reading of the text.

In order to unravel the meaning and function of the hymn, several things must be accomplished. First, the authorship of the hymn needs to be addressed. For instance, did the author speak Sanskrit? Was he from a rival group of indigenous priests? Understanding the author is crucial to understanding how he intended to affect his listeners. Next the perception of frogs in Vedic culture needs to be identified, in order to open a window as to how the listener would have understood the hymn. Once these preliminary questions are answered, the hymn can be analyzed in light of its context. (more…)

Introduction

The purpose of this research paper is to analyze and compare the use of miracle stories in the Canonical and Gnostic gospels. The Canonical gospels will be used to represent what became the orthodox Christian community in West Asia and the Mediterranean. The Gospels of the Nag Hammadi library will be representative of the Gnostic sects with the similar understanding that Gnosticism was not a monolithic tradition, but had many forms. Karen King, in What is Gnosticism?, dismantles the assumption that there was a monolithic entity called Gnosticism. The origins of the assumption date back to the early church fathers who created the dichotomy between orthodoxy and heresy, a dichotomy that still exists in religion and scholarship to this day (King 216). As I have defined it, these groups stretch from the communities that formed the Canonical and Gnostic gospels on to those that ended up employing them. The focus on this paper is not on the communities themselves, but on the writers of the gospels and how they employed miracle stories in their works and how they intended to affect their implied readers. The purpose of this is to obtain a better grasp of how each group viewed reality and employed rhetoric for the purposes of advancing their worldviews.

First, the metaphysical basis of varying approaches to miracle stories will be examined with an emphasis on Hume and Lewis’ positions. Luke will be used as representative of the Canonical gospel tradition. Each Gnostic gospel will be examined individually with the goal of surveying how each author used miracles. Finally, the results of the Canonical and Gnostic gospels’ attitudes towards miracles will be compared and contrasted.

I will argue that the Canonical and Gnostic gospels employed miracle stories with opposite effects. In the Canonical gospels, the primary set of miracle stories served a marketing function, drawing in the first and second century readers to the Canonical gospels. The immediacy of miracle stories to the gospel message formed what Hume would later term a “constant conjunction.” This constant conjunction served to link in the readers mind the practicality of the effects of the miracles and the way of life demanded by Jesus’ teachings as recorded in the gospels. The same power that manifested itself in the miracles was behind the teaching. Once this link of earthly benefits to earthly teaching had been established, a second set of miracle stories were employed to draw the reader to other-worldly benefits and to the corresponding set of other-worldly teachings. This is the opposite effect that the gospels of the Nag Hammadi Library intend to have on their readers. I will argue that the Nag Hammadi gospels, used miracles for a different function; the texts only employed miracles sparsely, using them to emphasize the divine spark in everyone and the priority of spirit over matter. (more…)

Was Augustine’s transition from a libertarian to a determinist?

Abstract:

This post is taken from a paper submitted for my class on the life and works of Augustine. It posits a forum where three people are invited to give their interpretations of Augustine’s works. The papers are then followed up by a discussion on how or if Augustine’s thought developed throught his life.

Henry:

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This paper is an evaluation and critique Edward Said’s work, Orientalism[1] and will answer its principal concern of how Western Scholars should approach other cultures. Orientalism was first used to denote a section of scholarship that dealt with the examination of the geographic regions including the Middle East and India. Since its inception it was refined to the Middle East, or Arab studies, as more and more subfields were developed and broke off of from the field, dividing what was called the Orient[2] into smaller and smaller geo-cultural regions of study[3]. In 1973, the twenty-ninth International Congress of Orientalists decided to drop the name altogether[4]. Edward Said used the term to describe a relationship between the scholarship of the Orientalists and the colonial domination by the imperial powers. Said also rejects the validity of the terms Orient and Occident, but employs them because this is how the argument has been framed by the Orientalists[5].

I will examine the following claims of Orientalism. First, while Orientalism presents itself as an objective field of study, the knowledge it generated was used to justify the power behind the political domination of the East by the West[6]. Secondly, the Orientalists employed a essentialist way of viewing the Near East, this essentialist thinking was a false way of viewing people groups and their culture. Lastly, since the Orientalist scholars were the product of the system they came from they could not cannot help but to misrepresent the “Other.” Therefore, what was needed was for the subaltern to speak for itself. I will argue that while a significant portion of this theory is valuable and an useful way of viewing part of the Imperialist/Orientalist framework, it too was essentialist in nature and was more indicative of the nature of the Imperialists than the nature of the Orientalist scholars.

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This paper will seek to plot out the relationship between the will, the salvific process and predestination in Augustine’s letter to Simplician, “De Diversis Quaestionibus Ad Simplicianum :”(I am using the translation by John H. S. Burleigh, Regius that was published in Augustine: Earlier Writings, Volume VI of the Library of Christian Classics, Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1953. I have taken this translation from “Aggiornamento” on 10/5/2006. From here on out in the paper I will refer to this document as “Letter to Simplician.” )”: . ” The letter was a response to Simplician’s questions on the content of Romans 9.10-29. In Augustine’s exegesis, he wrestled with the question of why Esau was rejected and Jacob was accepted by God. There was a sense that Augustine is troubled by his conclusions; this was evident by his careful back and forth of objections and explanations. While a bit troublesome, it did lead to his final formulation of several important doctrines, or at least laid their foundations. His conclusion changed the way he and as a corollary, the Catholic Church and many of the Reformers, viewed salvation and free will. While his conclusions may have seemed in contrast to some of his earlier works:”(Augustine’s earlier work, On the Free Choice of the Will, suggests a libertarian view of free will that says that in order for there to be true love of God, there must be a choice to love or reject God. When this precept is taken to its conclusion, it excludes a pre-determining of human salvation.)”: , Augustine was committed to discovering the truth, even if it means admitting he was wrong:”(This is evidenced by the very existence of his work, Reconsiderations, where he goes through all of his previous works and makes corrections.)”:. This paper will show how Augustine came to modify his stance on libertarian free will and come to the conclusion that there was a consequence to Adam’s sin, namely that the will was unable to choose God. God selected some to have their wills amended so that they are free to choose him or not; of those enabled few, God had the foreknowledge of who will choose Him and who will not.
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This post is an attempt to flesh out Edward Said’s postcolonial theory of Orientalism:”(When set off in italics, the term “Orientalism” will refer to the book by Said, when merely capitalized; it will refer to Said’s theory.)”:. It has drawn from Said’s best-known work, Orientalism and incorporated several articles written in response to or are reviews of the work. These articles included “Orientalism Reconsidered” by Edward Said, and “Review of Books: Orientalism” by C. Earnest Dawn. These articles were utilized to help add clarity to a complex theory.

The four central claims of Orientalism are as follows. First, while Orientalism presents itself as an objective field of study, it was used to justify the political domination of the East by the West. Secondly, Orientalism was actually more about defining itself through the mirror of the East than it was about objectively studying it :”(The very terms “East” and “West” are rejected by Said as valid descriptions; however, they will be used as terms of convenience for the purposes of this paper.)”:. Third, points one and two are produced and reinforced by viewing the Orient as a homogenous group. This essentialist thinking was a false way of viewing people groups and their culture. Said also rejects the validity of the terms Orient and Occident, but employs them because this is how the argument has been framed by the Orientalists:”(Edward Said, “Orientalism Reconsidered,” Cultural Critique, No. 1, 1985, p. 90. )”:. Lastly, the Orientalist scholars are the product of the system they come from. Due to this, they cannot help but to misrepresent the “Other.” Therefore, what is needed is for the subaltern to speak for itself. (more…)

This short paper will seek to examine and refute Augustine’s view of Original Sin and the ability of the will to choose to turn towards God. It was Augustine view, and the view of the reformers after him, that if one denies these tenants, then one is forced to adopt the views of Pelagius, namely that Jesus was just an enlightened man. I will employ three arguments to discount Augustine’s above claims. The first one involves a logical extension of the personhood of Jesus. The second argument demonstrates the need for a total free will as a prerequisite for sin. The third argument gives an alternate understanding of how God can cause faith and at the same time, faith can be freely chosen. Finally, an alternate view of soteriology will be given. |inline

This paper will seek to explore the relationship between those in power that abuse it, otherwise known as the oppressors, and those that were the recipients of that abuse of power, affectionately known as the oppressed. More specifically, this paper will look first at a particular case of this relationship, the case of the bombing of Hiroshima by the American military with an atomic bomb. Then it will look at a wide-scale nuclear war in general. Three main sources were used in this limited inquiry; John Hersey’s Hiroshima, Jonathan Schell’s The Fate of the Earth, and lastly the academic paper Moral Disengagement in the Perpetration of Inhumanities by Albert Bandura. The grid of oppression will be looked at as it applies to the case, incorporating elements from Hiroshima and The Fate of the Earth. The grid of oppression is a collection of five ways that oppression can work according to Marion Young in Justice and the Politics of Difference. They include exploitation, marginalization, powerlessness, cultural imperialism, violence, and environmental injustice. Finally, the cases will be examined in light of the social cognitive theory put forth by Bandura. While the bombing and aftermath of Hiroshima was not a clear-cut example of postcolonial strife, there are elements that pervade the reading. The Fate of the Earth details the consequences would be if the powers left over from the postcolonial world ever took the step and started a nuclear holocaust. |inline