The Down Payment of Righteousness

2021 ◽  
pp. 93-110
Author(s):  
Jennifer A. Quigley

This chapter studies a letter or set of letters written some fifty to seventy-five years after Paul, partially preserved in Greek, Latin, and Syriac: Polycarp's Letter to the Philippians (Pol. Phil.). The letter's seemingly disjointed themes — from its emphasis on the Philippian community as recipients of Pauline correspondence to its focus on quoting the Pastoral Epistles in condemning philarguria (love of money) to its intense interest in right belief and practice to its stark imagery of divine judgment — make sense when taken in a broader theo-economic context. The chapter focuses especially on Pol. Phil. 8.1–2, in which Polycarp introduces the idea that Christ is the “down payment for our righteousness.” Polycarp understands both the use of money and following proper teaching within a juridical theo-economic context in which Christ has spent blood in suffering as a down payment for humanity's future judgment and that both right belief and right action are required in order to avoid being held liable for that down payment. This text expands the economy of suffering that one finds in Paul's letter, where Christ and suffering are commodified.

2017 ◽  
Vol 48 (1) ◽  
pp. 40-46 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jolanda Jetten ◽  
Rachel Ryan ◽  
Frank Mols

Abstract. What narrative is deemed most compelling to justify anti-immigrant sentiments when a country’s economy is not a cause for concern? We predicted that flourishing economies constrain the viability of realistic threat arguments. We found support for this prediction in an experiment in which participants were asked to take on the role of speechwriter for a leader with an anti-immigrant message (N = 75). As predicted, a greater percentage of realistic threat arguments and fewer symbolic threat arguments were generated in a condition in which the economy was expected to decline than when it was expected to grow or a baseline condition. Perhaps more interesting, in the economic growth condition, the percentage realistic entitlements and symbolic threat arguments generated were higher than when the economy was declining. We conclude that threat narratives to provide a legitimizing discourse for anti-immigrant sentiments are tailored to the economic context.


2014 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
pp. 40-41
Author(s):  
James LoRusso

This piece argues that new technologies generally, and social media in particular, are too often accepted uncritically and incorporated hastily into course designs for the humanities. The author encourages teachers to ask two basic questions when considering social media in the classroom: 1. Does social media actually improve the learning process? And 2. How are these technologies embedded in the larger socio-economic context?


2017 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 157-169
Author(s):  
Serawit Debele

Based on the author’s experience in conducting fieldwork on religion in Ethiopia, in this article she analyses the complexities of being an insider in a certain socio-political and economic context. Instead of ascribing an essence to insider-ness as a straightforward and definite category, it is argued that insider-ness is a product of dynamic and complex intersubjective interactions and processes. It is an ambiguous position marked by a continuous shift resulting from the researcher’s navigations between multiple identities at different times and environments in relation to research participants. As pointed out by Bourke (2014), the perpetual flux of one’s identity as an insider or an outsider stems from the researcher’s position: gender, class, ethnic background and religious as well as political persuasion. Furthermore, in as much as one enjoys the associated benefits thereof, the insider is faced with myriad challenges due to her or his variegated identities that in turn inform interlocutors’ perceptions, expectations and responses.


2008 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 100-126
Author(s):  
Peter Maddock

The theological and sociological implications associated with the existence (or non-existence) of ancient Great Goddess religions have been hotly debated for more than half a century, even prior the rise of recognizable feminist approaches to Archaeology and Religious Studies. This rare, if not unique, ethnographic account of such a theology as practised today is therefore a significant intervention, hopefully putting some clothes on otherwise naked speculation. The Sorathiya Rabari pastoralists of Saurastra, western India, hold Mammai Mataji as their Godhead. Mammai Dharma (religion) provides their path to salvation and a guide to right action in the world. It is a vital ingredient of Sorathiya Rabari identity and offers a structure for intra-caste political organization. Like most other Hindus, Rabari social values are unambiguously patriarchal, so how this coexists with belief in an omnipotent feminine Divine is explored throughout the article.


Author(s):  
Stefan Winter

This chapter follows the rise to power of the Shamsins, the Bayt al-Shillif, and associated ʻAlawi families as Ottoman tax concessionaries. It shows that their position of local autonomy, rather than having evolved out of some domestic or “tribal” leadership structure, resulted from a paradigm shift in Ottoman provincial administration as well as from a very favorable economic context, in particular the development of commercial tobacco farming in the northern highlands around Latakia. If the eighteenth century witnessed the emergence of a veritable Ottoman–ʻAlawi landed gentry, it also saw increasing social disparities lead to large-scale emigration away from the highlands toward the coastal and inland plains as well as toward the Hatay district of what is today southern Turkey.


2013 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 3255-3260
Author(s):  
Stelian Stancu ◽  
Alexandra Maria Constantin

Instilment, on a European level, of a state incompatible with the state of stability on a macroeconomic level and in the financial-banking system lead to continuous growth of vulnerability of European economies, situated at the verge of an outburst of sovereign debt crises. In this context, the current papers main objective is to produce a study regarding the vulnerability of European economies faced with potential outburst of sovereign debt crisis, which implies quantitative analysis of the impact of sovereign debt on the sensitivity of the European Unions economies. The paper also entails the following specific objectives: completing an introduction in the current European economic context, conceptualization of the notion of “sovereign debt crisis, presenting the methodology and obtained empirical results, as well as exposition of the conclusions.


Author(s):  
Brendan Luyt

This paper argues that the rise of the JIF is a result of the perceived value of quantification measures in modern society and the restructuring of capitalism. Two key implications of this acceptance are explored: an increase in global academic dependency and a lessening of autonomy in the scientific field.Cet article défend la thèse que la montée du FIRS est le résultat de la valeur perçue des mesures de quantification de la société moderne et de la restructuration du capitalisme. Seront explorées deux conséquences importantes de cette acceptation : une augmentation de la dépendance globale du milieu universitaire et une perte d'autonomie du milieu de la science. 


2020 ◽  

This book explores some of the risks associated with sustainable peace in Colombia. The book intentionally steers away from the emphasis on the drug trade as the main resource fueling Colombian conflicts and violence, a topic that has dominated scholarly attention. Instead, it focuses on the links that have been configured over decades of armed conflict between legal resources (such as bananas, coffee, coal, flowers, gold, ferronickel, emeralds, and oil), conflict dynamics, and crime in several regions of Colombia. The book thus contributes to a growing trend in the academic literature focusing on the subnational level of armed conflict behavior. It also illustrates how the social and economic context of these resources can operate as deterrents or as drivers of violence. The book thus provides important lessons for policymakers and scholars alike: Just as resources have been linked to outbreaks and transformations of violence, peacebuilding too needs to take into account their impacts, legacies, and potential


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