Philosophy, Hellenicity, Law: Porphyry on Origen, Again

2012 ◽  
Vol 132 ◽  
pp. 55-69 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aaron P. Johnson

AbstractPorphyry's criticism of Origen (in c.Christ. fr. 39 Harnack) is usually interpreted as expressive of the ‘double apostasy’ accusation: Christians had not only abandoned their pagan religious traditions (‘Hellenism’) but also their new religious host, Judaism, whose texts they misappropriated for themselves. Reading key elements of the fragment within Porphyry's broader philosophical thought prompts suspicion of this cultural interpretation of the fragment, and instead points to a serious Platonic reaction to Christianity.

Author(s):  
Anna Maria Piskorska

This article undertakes the issue of defining film phenomena which put forward questions of a primary religious nature (about the meaning of life, source of evil, life after death, the existence of Absolute, etc.) in a way that is independent from major religious traditions. The author posits that describing this phenomenon in the case of European film culture is done best by employing the philosophical thought of postsecularism. Utilizing Mieke Bal’s method of cultural analysis, the author takes as an example the term “sacrifice” to point to the existence of different models by which religious topics are undertaken by the cinema. This leads to a preliminary typology of the phenomenon which differentiates between ‘apologetic’ and ‘critical’ films and, furthermore, between films that refer to particular religious traditions and those expressing a postsecular perspective.


2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Dr. Muhammad Mushtaq ◽  
Muhammad Riaz Mahmood

The problématique of governing diversity has attracted a great deal of scholarly attention but literature has largely overlooked the challenges appertaining to growing religious diversity in many places. The contemporary power sharing models and multicultural policies which are of a secular nature fall short of the expectations to foster peaceful coexistence in multi-religious societies. The primary concern of this paper is to manifest how religion can help us to lessen faith based violence. It is argued that religious traditions may offer valuable insights to design more inclusive governance. In this backdrop, the current paper evaluates the Islamic values of religious accommodation to gauge how helpful they are for designing inclusive policies in religiously diverse societies. The analysis illustrates that Islamic doctrine contemplates the politics of accommodation and forbearance. The pluralistic approach of Islam offered religious autonomy to non-Muslims in the state of Madinah. The ‘millet system’ established by the Ottoman Empire is widely admired for granting non-territorial autonomy in the matters related to religion, culture, and personal laws to non-Muslims. This display of an Islamic pluralistic approach at different junctures of Muslim history attests the capacity of the Islamic values of accommodation to nurture peaceful coexistence in modern societies. However, it requires a more unbiased and rigorous analysis to convince the global audience in this regard.


2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 212-232
Author(s):  
Sam Abede Pareno ◽  
M Rif’an Arif

ABSTRACT Religious traditions in Indonesia are known to be very moderate and tolerant abroad is a reflection of the character of a great noble nation. Between religion, tradition and culture are able to perform compounds so as to create a genuine religious harmony. Because of this reality Indonesia is regarded as the largest Muslim majority country in the world that almost without conflict, in the midst of reality Muslim countries in the Middle East that impressed the dispute into the daily menu. However, the reality of Indonesia as a moderate nation is injured by the act of a group that is fond of terrorism and radicalism by riding Islamic religious teachings. Thus, this reversed religion is assumed as a source of cruelty.   It is through that phenomenon researcher, feel the need to examine the strategy of disseminating moderate Islam by Nahdlatul Ulama. The selection of this Islamic organization according to the authors due to its success in moderating Islam in Indonesia. In this study, the study using a qualitative approach or method as well as adopting the theory of Van Dijk discourse analysis as a scalpel to peel the discourse of moderate Islam published by PWNU East Java through the website. As for this research, the findings are important, among others are: 1) moderate Islamic discourse campaigned by Nahdlatul Ulama East Java is categorized into three segments, namely social, religious and nationality. 2) the text structure that builds moderate Islamic discourse NU East Java in Van Dijk perspective constructed in three domains, namely text, social cognition and social context. 3) the principles of Public Relationship implemented by NU through cyber (online media), among others; News publications and expert opinions, production of image and video-based information, and updating official NU information to the public about their attitudes and views on the phenomena that occur by promoting the values of Islamic moderatism. Key Word : Islamic Moderatism, Nahdlatul Ulama, Cyber Public Relationship


2017 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 498-517
Author(s):  
Yuk Hui ◽  
Louis Morelle

This article aims to clarify the question of speed and intensity in the thoughts of Simondon and Deleuze, in order to shed light on the recent debates regarding accelerationism and its politics. Instead of starting with speed, we propose to look into the notion of intensity and how it serves as a new ontological ground in Simondon's and Deleuze's philosophy and politics. Simondon mobilises the concept of intensity to criticise hylomorphism and substantialism; Deleuze, taking up Simondon's conceptual framework, repurposes it for his ontology of difference, elevating intensity to the rank of generic concept of being, thus bypassing notions of negativity and individuals as base, in favour of the productive and universal character of difference. In Deleuze, the correlation between intensity and speed is fraught with ambiguities, with each term threatening to subsume the other; this rampant tension becomes explicitly antagonistic when taken up by the diverse strands of contemporary accelerationism, resulting in two extreme cases in the posthuman discourse: either a pure becoming, achieved through destruction, or through abstraction that does away with intensity altogether; or an intensity without movement or speed, that remains a pure jouissance. Both cases appear to stumble over the problem of individuation, if not disindividuation. Hence, we wish to raise the following question: in what way can one think of an accelerationist politics with intensity, or an intensive politics without the fetishisation of speed? We consider this question central to the interrogation of the limits of acceleration and posthuman discourse, thus requiring a new philosophical thought on intensity and speed.


Derrida Today ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 215-237
Author(s):  
Michael Barnes Norton

This paper examines Derrida's treatment of the quasi-transcendental structure of hospitality, particularly as it pertains to religious traditions, conceptions of human rights, and modern secularism. It begins by looking to the account Derrida presents in ‘Hostipitality’, focusing especially on his treatment of the work of Louis Massignon. It then proceeds to an exploration of Kant's concept of cosmopolitanism and some of its contemporary descendants before returning to Derrida's treatment of hospitality by way of his critique of this Kantian heritage. The paper argues both that religious traditions exhibit (though, perhaps, often not explicitly) the kind of structures of openness to difference to which Derrida's notion of hospitality refers, and that modern Western conceptions of secularism too easily preclude understanding and fostering those aspects of religious traditions which can contribute to more peaceful coexistence in pluralistic environments.


2011 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 86-108 ◽  
Author(s):  
Isra Yazicioglu

Miracle stories in sacred texts have been a source of both fascination and heated debate across religious traditions. Qur'anic miracle stories are especially interesting because they are part of a discourse that also de-emphasises the miraculous. By looking at how three scholars have engaged with Qur'anic miracle stories, I here investigate how these narratives have been interpreted in diverse and fruitful ways. The first part of the article analyses how two medieval scholars, al-Ghazālī (d. 505/1111) and Ibn Rushd (d. 595/1198), engaged with the implications of miracle stories. Taking his cue from miracle stories, al-Ghazālī offered a sophisticated critique of natural determinism and suggested that the natural order should be perceived as a constantly renewed divine gift. In contrast, Ibn Rushd dismissed al-Ghazālī’s critique as sophistry and maintained that accepting the possibility that the natural order might be suspended was an affront to human knowledge and science. In the second part, I turn to Bediuzzaman Said Nursi (1870–1960), whose interpretation offers a crystallisation of al-Ghazālī’s insights as well as, surprisingly, an indirect confirmation of Ibn Rushd's concerns about human knowledge and science. Nursi redefines the miraculous in light of miracle stories, and interprets them as reminders of ‘everyday miracles’ and as encouragements to improve science and technology in God's name.


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