Throughout most of Western European history, Jews have been a
numerically tiny or entirely absent minority, but across that
history Europeans have nonetheless worried a great deal about
Judaism. Why should that be so? This short but powerfully argued
book suggests that Christian anxieties about their own transcendent
ideals made Judaism an important tool for Christianity, as an
apocalyptic religion - characterized by prizing soul over flesh,
the spiritual over the literal, the heavenly over the physical
world - came to terms with the inescapable importance of body,
language, and material things in this world. Nirenberg shows how
turning the Jew into a personification of worldly over spiritual
concerns, surface over inner meaning allowed cultures inclined
toward transcendence to understand even their most materialistic
practices as spiritual. Focusing on art, poetry, and politics -
three activities especially condemned as worldly in early Christian
culture - he reveals how, over the past two thousand years, these
activities nevertheless expanded the potential for their own
existence within Christian culture because they were used to
represent Judaism. Nirenberg draws on an astonishingly diverse
collection of poets, painters, preachers, philosophers, and
politicians to reconstruct the roles played by representations of
Jewish "enemies" in the creation of Western art, culture, and
politics, from the ancient world to the present day. This erudite
and tightly argued survey of the ways in which Christian cultures
have created themselves by thinking about Judaism will appeal to
the broadest range of scholars of religion, art, literature,
political theory, media theory, and the history of Western
civilization more generally.
General
Is the information for this product incomplete, wrong or inappropriate?
Let us know about it.
Does this product have an incorrect or missing image?
Send us a new image.
Is this product missing categories?
Add more categories.
Review This Product
No reviews yet - be the first to create one!
Welcome to Loot.co.za!
Sign in / Register |Wishlists & Gift Vouchers |Help | Advanced search
