In the religious systems of ancient Mesopotamia, Egypt, and the
Mediterranean, gods and demigods were neither abstract nor distant,
but communicated with mankind through signs and active
intervention. Men and women were thus eager to interpret, appeal
to, and even control the gods and their agents. In Prayer, Magic,
and the Stars in the Ancient and Late Antique World, a
distinguished array of scholars explores the many ways in which
people in the ancient world sought to gain access to--or, in some
cases, to bind or escape from--the divine powers of heaven and
earth.
Grounded in a variety of disciplines, including Assyriology,
Classics, and early Islamic history, the fifteen essays in this
volume cover a broad geographic area: Greece, Egypt,
Syria-Palestine, Mesopotamia, and Persia. Topics include celestial
divination in early Mesopotamia, the civic festivals of classical
Athens, and Christian magical papyri from Coptic Egypt. Moving
forward to Late Antiquity, we see how Judaism, Christianity, and
Islam each incorporated many aspects of ancient Near Eastern and
Graeco-Roman religion into their own prayers, rituals, and
conceptions. Even if they no longer conceived of the sun, moon, and
the stars as eternal or divine, Christians, Jews, and Muslims often
continued to study the movements of the heavens as a map on which
divine power could be read.
The reader already familiar with studies of ancient religion
will find in Prayer, Magic, and the Stars both old friends and new
faces. Contributors include Gideon Bohak, Nicola Denzey, Jacco
Dieleman, Radcliffe Edmonds, Marvin Meyer, Michael G. Morony, Ian
Moyer, Francesca Rochberg, Jonathan Z. Smith, Mark S. Smith, Peter
Struck, Michael Swartz, and Kasia Szpakowska.
Published as part of Penn State's Magic in History series,
Prayer, Magic, and the Stars appears at a time of renewed interest
in divination and occult practices in the ancient world. It will
interest a wide audience in the field of comparative religion as
well as students of the ancient world and late antiquity.
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!