Erasmus' Biblical Humanism

1970 ◽  
Vol 17 ◽  
pp. 119-152 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. A. L. Jarrott

Behind the humanists’ battle cry ‘ad fontes’ lies a long and laborious endeavor to get at the original meaning of the ancient texts with all the admittedly limited philological tools at their disposal. In his work on the Bible Erasmus was spurred to this effort by a religious zeal which is too seldom associated with the author of the Praise of Folly. Yet one of his most important contributions to the history of thought was his use of a humanistic method for the interpretation of scripture.

Author(s):  
Jan Loop

This chapter discusses the discovery of Arabic poetry in Western Europe in the context of Protestant Arabic studies of the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. The piece centres on the work of the Dutch Orientalist Albert Schultens (1686–1750). His interest in Arabic poetry was driven by the idea that it preserves some of the characteristics of the primeval language and that it can help us understand the original meaning of the Hebrew texts of the Bible. The essay argues that in spite of its shortcomings, Schultens’ work is a significant moment in the history of oriental studies. It stimulated an entire generation of young scholars in Protestant Northern Europe; and his comparative study of Semitic languages, his concepts of the primeval language and its transmission as well as his great interest in the poetry of the East still resonate in early Romantic approaches to oriental poetry.


2021 ◽  
Vol 2020 (15 n.s.) ◽  
pp. 109-123
Author(s):  
Giancarlo Schirru

The article deals with the Armenian substantive hnjan, which in the modern language denotes the ‘wine-press’ or a ‘rural hut located on the fields’. An exam of its use in the texts of classical age where it is attested (the translation of the Bible and the History of Armenians of Agathangelos) allows to recognize an original meaning of ‘hole dug for the squeezing and the fermentation of the grapes’. The etymology proposed connects the word with Sanskrit paṅka- ‘mud, mire, dirt, clay; ointment; moral impurity’, and a German cognate represented by Old High German fūhti, fūht, Anglo-Saxon fūht ‘damp, moist’, the German source of the Romance loanwords Italian, fango, French fange, Catalan fanc ‘mud, mire’.


Author(s):  
Colby Dickinson

In his somewhat controversial book Remnants of Auschwitz, Agamben makes brief reference to Theodor Adorno’s apparently contradictory remarks on perceptions of death post-Auschwitz, positions that Adorno had taken concerning Nazi genocidal actions that had seemed also to reflect something horribly errant in the history of thought itself. There was within such murderous acts, he had claimed, a particular degradation of death itself, a perpetration of our humanity bound in some way to affect our perception of reason itself. The contradictions regarding Auschwitz that Agamben senses to be latent within Adorno’s remarks involve the intuition ‘on the one hand, of having realized the unconditional triumph of death against life; on the other, of having degraded and debased death. Neither of these charges – perhaps like every charge, which is always a genuinely legal gesture – succeed in exhausting Auschwitz’s offense, in defining its case in point’ (RA 81). And this is the stance that Agamben wishes to hammer home quite emphatically vis-à-vis Adorno’s limitations, ones that, I would only add, seem to linger within Agamben’s own formulations in ways that he has still not come to reckon with entirely: ‘This oscillation’, he affirms, ‘betrays reason’s incapacity to identify the specific crime of Auschwitz with certainty’ (RA 81).


2005 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 73-86 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Wetherell

Every discipline which deals with the land question in Canaan-Palestine-Israel is afflicted by the problem of specialisation. The political scientist and historian usually discuss the issue of land in Israel purely in terms of interethnic and international relations, biblical scholars concentrate on the historical and archaeological question with virtually no reference to ethics, and scholars of human rights usually evade the question of God. What follows is an attempt, through theology and political history, to understand the history of the Israel-Palestine land question in a way which respects the complexity of the question. From a scrutiny of the language used in the Bible to the development of political Zionism from the late 19th century it is possible to see the way in which a secular movement mobilised the figurative language of religion into a literal ‘title deed’ to the land of Palestine signed by God.


2017 ◽  
Vol 8 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 27-37 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dorina Miller Parmenter

Despite Christian leaders’ insistence that what is important about the Bible are the messages of the text, throughout Christian history the Bible as a material object, engaged by the senses, frequently has been perceived to be an effective object able to protect its users from bodily harm. This paper explores several examples where Christians view their Bibles as protective shields, and will situate those interpretations within the history of the material uses of the Bible. It will also explore how recent studies in affect theory might add to the understanding of what is communicated through sensory engagement with the Bible.


2020 ◽  
Vol 63 (10) ◽  
pp. 7-24
Author(s):  
Anatoly A. Lazarevich

The article considers the formation and development of philosophy in Belarus in the context of historical conditions and modern opportunities. Discussing the national context of the philosophical process, the author reveals the four aspects of the phenomenon of “national philosophy.” Firstly, there are national institutional and disciplinary structures, which are responsible for an organized scientific, methodological, research and educational activity, which at the level of the nation-state is formalized by certain institutions, system of professional education, norms of professional ethos, standards of behavior within the community and in the wider social environment. Secondly, in the light of philosophical culture, national philosophy is interpreted as a set of value and cognitive orientations passed down from generation to generation. Thirdly, national philosophy can be viewed in the aspect of the tradition of studying the philosophical thought of the nation in the context of its historical development. Fourthly, national philosophy appears in the aspect of the philosophical foundations of the national idea and national-cultural identity. The author examines the main stages of the development of the Belarusian philosophical culture, it is shown that the features of this culture were formed under the condition of a complex combination of the worldview and values of Latin civilization, Christianity, modern European science, rationalism of social projects of the Enlightenment, ideological and worldview attitudes of Western Russian culture, formalized Soviet philosophical disciplines. The article reviews the circle of theoretical, ideological, and practical problems that the modern philosophical process in Belarus faces, the author emphasizes the unfading value of philosophical knowledge as a source of heuristic means for finding effective local answers to global problems of cultural and civilizational development. The author argues that there are two conditions that make national philosophy possible: this is, first of all, a connection with the history of thought in the area of national genesis and also the expression of thought in a national language.


GEOgraphia ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 20 (42) ◽  
pp. 38
Author(s):  
Lucas Labigalini Fuini

Resumo: O objetivo deste artigo é reconhecer, através de uma seleção de autores e obras, as características principais da abordagem territorial na Geografia brasileira desenvolvida desde fins dos anos 1970, quando se reconhece um verdadeiro interesse na sistematização e no conhecimento teórico sobre o conceito em nossa ciência. No perpassar por autores, objetiva-se identificar a crescente multidimensionalidade e transescalaridade que o conceito adquire nos seus conteúdos e aplicações e a mudança de sentido explicativo que assume no avançar dos anos 2000.Palavras-chave: Território. Territorialidade. História do pensamento. Político. Geografia brasileira. THE APPROACH TO THE TERRITORY IN AUTHORS OF THE BRAZILIAN GEOGRAPHY: MUTATIONS OF A CONCEPTAbstract: The purpose of this article is to recognize, through a selection of authors and works, the main features of the territorial approach in the Brazilian Geography developed since the late 1970s, when it recognizes a real interest in the systematization and theoretical knowledge about the concept in our science. In pervade by authors, aims to identify the increasing multidimensionality and transescalarity that the concept gets in their content and applications and the change in explanatory sense that assumes in advance the years 2000.Keywords: Territory. Territoriality. History of thought. Political. Brazilian geography. EL ENFOQUE SOBRE EL TERRITORIO EN AUTORES DE GEOGRAFÍA BRASILEÑA: MUTACIONES DE UN CONCEPTOResumen: El objetivo de este artículo es reconocer, a través de una selección de autores y obras, las características principales del abordaje territorial en la Geografía brasileña desarrollada desde fines de los años 1970, cuando se reconoce un verdadero interés en la sistematización y en el conocimiento teórico sobre el concepto en nuestra ciencia . En el traspaso por autores, se objetiva identificar la creciente multidimensionalidad y transescalaridad que el concepto adquiere en sus contenidos y aplicaciones y el cambio de sentido explicativo que asume a lo largo de los años 2000.Palabras-clave: Territorio. Territorialidad. Historia del pensamiento. Político. Geografía brasileña.


Author(s):  
Madipoane Masenya (Ngwan’A Mphahlele)

The history of the Christian Bible’s reception in South Africa was part of a package that included among others, the importation of European patriarchy, land grabbing and its impoverishment of Africans and challenged masculinities of African men. The preceding factors, together with the history of the marginalization of African women in bible and theology, and how the Bible was and continues to be used in our HIV and AIDS contexts, have only made the proverbial limping animal to climb a mountain. Wa re o e bona a e hlotša, wa e nametša thaba (while limping, you still let it climb a mountain) simply means that a certain situation is being aggravated (by an external factor). In this chapter the preceding Northern Sotho proverb is used as a hermeneutical lens to present an HIV and AIDS gender sensitive re-reading of the Vashti character in the Hebrew Bible within the South African context.


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