A cultural history of how Christianity was born from its martyrs. Though it promises eternal life, Christianity was forged in death. Christianity is built upon the legacies of the apostles and martyrs who chose to die rather than renounce the name of their lord. In this innovative cultural history, Kyle Smith shows how a devotion to death has shaped Christianity for two thousand years. For centuries, Christians have cared for their saints, curating their deaths as examples of holiness. Martyrs' stories, lurid legends of torture, have been told and retold, translated and rewritten. Martyrs' bones are alive in the world, relics pulsing with wonder. Martyrs' shrines are still visited by pilgrims, many in search of a miracle. Martyrs have even shaped the Christian conception of time, with each day of the year celebrating the death of a saint. From Roman antiquity to the present, by way of medieval England and the Protestant Reformation, Cult of the Dead tells the fascinating story of how the world's most widespread religion is steeped in the memory of its martyrs.

Many men aim high; Tom Farrell dares to be average. While his friends accumulate wedding rings, mortgages, and even, alarmingly, babies, Tom still lives alone in his rented apartment with nothing but condiments and alcohol in his refrigerator. He spends Saturday mornings watching cartoons and eating Cocoa Puffs out of an Empire Strikes Back bowl, and devotes the rest of the weekend to his other favorite hobbies: sports and girls. His credo, to think and act like a thirteen-year-old boy at all times, has worked well enough to land him a decent job writing headlines for the New York Tabloid. But neither his personal life nor his professional life has any forward momentum; he's occupied the same cubicle since the first George Bush was president and is currently "between girlfriends." At thirty-two, it starts to occur to him: There's a fine line between picky and loser. Enter a sly, beautiful coworker named Julia. After a few torrid dates, Tom is hooked. "She's like cleaning behind my refrigerator. A once-in-a-lifetime thing." But the closer he gets to Julia, the more elusive she becomes. Frustrated, Tom seeks the dubious advice of his buddy Shooter, a shallow sexual gladiator, and wonders why he keeps getting into arguments with Bran, his smart, sarcastic "default date." But then tragedy strikes, and everyone's attitudes toward life and love change -- and even Tom begins to see himself in a new light. By turns riotous and tenderhearted, Kyle Smith's Love Monkey is the most candid and excruciatingly funny exploration of the male mind and libido since High Fidelity.

It is widely believed that the Emperor Constantine's conversion to Christianity politicized religious allegiances, dividing the Christian Roman Empire from the Zoroastrian Sasanian Empire and leading to the persecution of Christians in Persia. This account, however, is based on Greek ecclesiastical histories and Syriac martyrdom narratives that date to centuries after the fact. In this groundbreaking study, Kyle Smith analyzes diverse Greek, Latin, and Syriac sources to show that there was not a single history of fourth-century Mesopotamia. By examining the conflicting hagiographical and historical evidence, Constantine and the Captive Christians of Persia presents an evocative and evolving portrait of the first Christian emperor, uncovering how Syriac Christians manipulated the image of their western Christian counterparts to fashion their own political and religious identities during this century of radical change.

Desiring to lead an ascetic life during the 5th century, Paul abandons his bishopric in Italy and travels to Edessa. John realizes that Paul is a wonderworker, and so begs to accompany him on his travels. The two leave Edessa to visit the monks on Sinai, but instead of reaching their destination they are abducted and taken to Yemen by tree-worshipping Arabs. After a battle with a tree-god, they succeed in converting the Arabs to Christianity. During the journey home, they encounter a wandering band of monks among whom is a woman disguised as a man.

It is widely believed that the Emperor Constantine's conversion to Christianity politicized religious allegiances, dividing the Christian Roman Empire from the Zoroastrian Sasanian Empire and leading to the persecution of Christians in Persia. This account, however, is based on Greek ecclesiastical histories and Syriac martyrdom narratives that date to centuries after the fact. In this groundbreaking study, Kyle Smith analyzes diverse Greek, Latin, and Syriac sources to show that there was not a single history of fourth-century Mesopotamia. By examining the conflicting hagiographical and historical evidence, Constantine and the Captive Christians of Persia presents an evocative and evolving portrait of the first Christian emperor, uncovering how Syriac Christians manipulated the image of their western Christian counterparts to fashion their own political and religious identities during this century of radical change.

Learn the A to Z of building excellent Splunk applications with the latest techniques using this comprehensive guide About This Book * This is the most up-to-date book on Splunk 6.3 for developers * Get ahead of being just a Splunk user and start creating custom Splunk applications as per your needs * Your one-stop-solution to Splunk application development Who This Book Is For This book is for those who have some familiarity with Splunk and now want to learn how to develop an efficient Splunk application. Previous experience with Splunk, writing searches, and designing basic dashboards is expected. What You Will Learn * Implement a Modular Input and a custom D3 data visualization * Create a directory structure and set view permissions * Create a search view and a dashboard view using advanced XML modules * Enhance your application using eventtypes, tags, and macros * Package a Splunk application using best practices * Publish a Splunk application to the Splunk community In Detail Splunk provides a platform that allows you to search data stored on a machine, analyze it, and visualize the analyzed data to make informed decisions. The adoption of Splunk in enterprises is huge, and it has a wide range of customers right from Adobe to Dominos. Using the Splunk platform as a user is one thing, but customizing this platform and creating applications specific to your needs takes more than basic knowledge of the platform. This book will dive into developing Splunk applications that cater to your needs of making sense of data and will let you visualize this data with the help of stunning dashboards. This book includes everything on developing a full-fledged Splunk application right from designing to implementing to publishing. We will design the fundamentals to build a Splunk application and then move on to creating one. During the course of the book, we will cover application data, objects, permissions, and more. After this, we will show you how to enhance the application, including branding, workflows, and enriched data. Views, dashboards, and web frameworks are also covered. This book will showcase everything new in the latest version of Splunk including the latest data models, alert actions, XML forms, various dashboard enhancements, and visualization options (with D3). Finally, we take a look at the latest Splunk cloud applications, advanced integrations, and development as per the latest release. Style and approach This book is an easy-to-follow guide with lots of tips and tricks to help you master all the concepts necessary to develop and deploy your Splunk applications.

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While evangelical Christians seem to agree that God guides his people, they are far from reaching a consensus on precisely how God guides. This book helpfully identifies and evaluates three evangelical positions on the subject of guidance and defends what is here called the modified wisdom view. In contrast to both the blueprint and wisdom views, which maintain, respectively, that God always and never gives special, personalized messages of guidance, the modified wisdom view argues that special guidance is possible, but not promised, for Christians today. Instead, God intends for Christians to make decisions normatively by studying and wisely applying Scripture. Smith argues that a theology of guidance that takes into account doctrines such as divine providence and the sufficiency of Scripture will produce some much-needed clarity on the subject. Interacting with contemporary authors as well as the Reformers, Smith concludes with practical application and three challenges for evangelicals. A helpful work for scholars and pastors alike, this book promises to advance the conversation regarding divine guidance.

The History of Mar Behnam and Sarah tells the story of two siblings who convert to Christianity under the tutelage of Mar Mattai, a monastic leader and wonderworker from the Roman Empire. In this volume, Jeanne-Nicole Mellon Saint-Laurent and Kyle Smith provide the first critical edition and English translation of this fascinating martyrdom narrative.

The Martyrdom, and the later History, of Simeon bar Sabba'e narrate the death of the bishop of Seleucia-Ctesiphon who was killed around the year 340 C.E. at the beginning of King Shapur II's "Great Persecution" of Christians in Sasanian Persia.