by Bruce Chilton ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 19, 2008
It seems that Chilton forces more blame on the Abraham story than it can reasonably bear, but his careful look at the...
Sweeping overview of monotheistic violence and sacrifice, tied to one of the most studied and academically tortured portions of the Bible.
The verses in Genesis depicting Abraham’s near-sacrifice of his son Isaac contain the seeds of cyclical and ceremonial violence that has plagued Judaism, Christianity and Islam to this day, suggests Chilton (Religion/Bard Coll.). While the subtitle suggests that child sacrifice is his focus, religious violence is in fact much more broadly defined here. Acknowledging that child sacrifice was nothing new in Abraham’s time, the author then discusses early Jewish views on the practice, especially emphasizing the importance of martyrdom to the Jewish community during its years of revolt against Hellenistic and Roman rule. Chilton goes on to consider martyrdom in the Christian context, explaining the parallel made by early Christians between the self-sacrifice of the willing Isaac and the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. He explains the Qur’anic version of this story and its impact upon Islam, especially in the context of religious violence during the Crusades. The confrontation of all three monotheistic religions from the Crusades onward most clearly exhibits the violent inheritance of the Abrahamic peoples. Chilton discusses instances of child sacrifice and the death of children through religious violence, but just as Isaac’s age is uncertain in the biblical account, this exploration of religious sacrifice also spans childhood and adulthood. In his final analysis, the author calls on the faithful to “come down from Mt. Moriah” and have faith that “Abraham’s curse,” or the need for sacrifice in human blood, is not inevitable.
It seems that Chilton forces more blame on the Abraham story than it can reasonably bear, but his careful look at the contemporary problem of religious violence merits attention.Pub Date: Feb. 19, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-385-52027-0
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2007
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by Albert Camus ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 26, 1955
This a book of earlier, philosophical essays concerned with the essential "absurdity" of life and the concept that- to overcome the strong tendency to suicide in every thoughtful man-one must accept life on its own terms with its values of revolt, liberty and passion. A dreary thesis- derived from and distorting the beliefs of the founders of existentialism, Jaspers, Heldegger and Kierkegaard, etc., the point of view seems peculiarly outmoded. It is based on the experience of war and the resistance, liberally laced with Andre Gide's excessive intellectualism. The younger existentialists such as Sartre and Camus, with their gift for the terse novel or intense drama, seem to have omitted from their philosophy all the deep religiosity which permeates the work of the great existentialist thinkers. This contributes to a basic lack of vitality in themselves, in these essays, and ten years after the war Camus seems unaware that the life force has healed old wounds... Largely for avant garde aesthetes and his special coterie.
Pub Date: Sept. 26, 1955
ISBN: 0679733736
Page Count: 228
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 19, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1955
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by Stephen Batchelor ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 18, 2020
A very welcome instance of philosophy that can help readers live a good life.
A teacher and scholar of Buddhism offers a formally varied account of the available rewards of solitude.
“As Mother Ayahuasca takes me in her arms, I realize that last night I vomited up my attachment to Buddhism. In passing out, I died. In coming to, I was, so to speak, reborn. I no longer have to fight these battles, I repeat to myself. I am no longer a combatant in the dharma wars. It feels as if the course of my life has shifted onto another vector, like a train shunted off its familiar track onto a new trajectory.” Readers of Batchelor’s previous books (Secular Buddhism: Imagining the Dharma in an Uncertain World, 2017, etc.) will recognize in this passage the culmination of his decadeslong shift away from the religious commitments of Buddhism toward an ecumenical and homegrown philosophy of life. Writing in a variety of modes—memoir, history, collage, essay, biography, and meditation instruction—the author doesn’t argue for his approach to solitude as much as offer it for contemplation. Essentially, Batchelor implies that if you read what Buddha said here and what Montaigne said there, and if you consider something the author has noticed, and if you reflect on your own experience, you have the possibility to improve the quality of your life. For introspective readers, it’s easy to hear in this approach a direct response to Pascal’s claim that “all of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone.” Batchelor wants to relieve us of this inability by offering his example of how to do just that. “Solitude is an art. Mental training is needed to refine and stabilize it,” he writes. “When you practice solitude, you dedicate yourself to the care of the soul.” Whatever a soul is, the author goes a long way toward soothing it.
A very welcome instance of philosophy that can help readers live a good life.Pub Date: Feb. 18, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-300-25093-0
Page Count: 200
Publisher: Yale Univ.
Review Posted Online: Nov. 24, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
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