You Shall Have No Other Gods Before Me: Covenant in Faith and History

In this paper I have attempted to explore "covenant" in faith and history, as it extends throughout the entire framework of the Bible and the entire history of the people who produced it. With such a monstrous topic, a comprehensive analysis of the material could take a lifetime to do it justice. Therefore, I have taken a very specific approach to the material in order to investigate the evolution of covenant from the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) to the Christian Scriptures (New Testament). I have made every effort to approach this thesis as a text-based, non-doctrinal discussion. However, having my own religious convictions, it has, at times, been difficult to recognize and escape my biases. Nevertheless, I am confident that this final product is, for the most part, objective and free from dogmatism. Of course, I have brought my own perspective and understanding to the material, which may be different from the reader's, so there may be matters of interpretation on which we differ, but c 'est fa vie in the world of religious dialogue. The structure of this paper is symmetrical: Part I examines the traditions of the Torah and the Prophets; Part II, the Gospels and Paul's letters. I have balanced the Old Testament against the New Testament (the Torah against the Gospels; the Prophets against Paul) in order to give approximately equal weight to the two traditions, and establish a sense of parallelism in the structure of my overall work. A word should also be said about three matters of style. First, instead of the customary Christian designation of time as B.C. or A.D., I have opted to use the more modem B.C.E. (Before the Common Era) and C.E. (Common Era) notations. This more recent system is less traditional; however, more acceptable in academic and, certainly, more appropriate for a non-doctrinal discussion. Second, in the body of this paper I have chosen to highlight several texts using a variety of colors. This highlighting serves (1) to call the reader's attention to specific passages, and (2) to compare the language and imagery of similar texts. All highlighting has been added to the texts at my own discretion. Finally, the divine name, traditionally vocalized as "Yahweh," is a verbal form of the Hebrew "to be," and means, approximately, "I am who I am." This name was considered too holy to pronounce by the ancient Israelites, and, the word adonai ("My LORD") was used in its stead. In respect of this tradition, I have left the divine name in its original Hebrew form. Accordingly, should be read as "the LORD" throughout this paper. All Hebrew and Greek translations, where they occur, are my own. The Greek translations are based on the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) of the Bible.

Scriptural Archeology: Excavating the Presence of Women in the Torah

Women's roles in religious history have been traditionally described in terms of their relation and value to men. The normative religious texts provide an androcentric perspective on the gender relationships within the early community, the growth of Judaism in "Jacob's House" and the monotheistic worship of God. Yet these literary representations omit an entire half of the experience of the Jewish community: the perspective and participation of women. As Judith Plaskow argues extensively in Standing Again at Sinai, women are defined not in her own terms or in her own voice, but by her relationship and value to men through the androcentric vocabulary of the Torah. This statement is textually illustrated by the authorial and editorial presentation of women and their place in ancient Israelite society in the Torah. As Judaism grew increasingly androcentric in its leadership, women were increasingly reduced to marginal figures in the community by authorial and editorial revisions. Yet the participation of women of ancient Israel is not lost. Instead, the presence of women is buried beneath the androcentric presentation of the early Judaic community, waiting to be excavated by historical and scriptural examination. The retelling of the past is influenced by the present; memory is not static but takes on different shapes depending on the focus of concentration. However, tradition greatly influences the interpretation of religious history as well. In the book of Genesis, the literature emphasizes the divine appointment of male figures such as Abraham the father of the covenant and Jacob who is renamed and claimed by God as "Israel," placing them at the center of Jewish history. As a result, the other figures in these biblical narratives are described in relation to the patriarchs, those male bearers of the covenant, by their service or their value to him. Women are at the bottom of this hierarchy. Although female figures of exceptional quality are noted in later chronicles, such as Ruth, Deborah and Miriam, it is the very nature of their exception that highlights the androcentric editorial focus of the Torah. I agree with Peggy Day, whose own scriptural examination in Gender and Difference in Ancient Israel, makes the important distinction between the literary representation and the reality of ancient Israelite culture: they are not coextensive nor equivalent. Although the text represents the culture of ancient Israel as male dominated from the time of Abraham, this presentation omits the perspective of half of the population-the women. By beginning at the point of realization that women did exist and were active in their culture, and placing aside the androcentric perspective of the text and its editors, the reality of women's place in ancient Israel may be determined. Through this new perspective, the women of the Torah will emerge as the archetypes of strength, leadership and spiritual insight to provide Jewish women of the present with female, ancestral role models and a foundation for their gender's heritage, a more complete understanding of the partial record of Jewish history recorded in the Torah. Those stories that appear as the exception of women's presence will unveil an exceptional presence. As Tamar Frankiel eloquently states in The Voice of Sarah, "the women we call our 'Mothers'-Sarah, Rivkah (Rebekah), Rachel, and Leah-are not merely mothers, any more than the 'Fathers'-Abraham, Isaac and Jacob-are merely fathers "(Frankiel 5).

Intent and Method: A Study of Female Characters in Aeschylean and Euripidean Drama

Aeschylus and Euripides used tragic female characters to help fulfill the purpose of religious celebration and to achieve the motivation of public reaction. The playwrights, revising myths about tragic woman and redefining the Greek definition of appropriate femininity, supported or questioned the very customs which they changed. Originally composed as part of a religious festival for Dionysus, the god of wine, revelry and fertility, the tragedies of Aeschylus and Euripides were evaluated by Aristotle. He favored Aeschylus over Euripides, but it appears as if his stipulations for tragic characterization do not apply to Aeschylean and Euripidean women. Modem critics question both Aristotle's analysis in the Poetics as well as the tragedies which he evaluated. As part of the assessment of Aeschylus, the character of the Persian Queen, Atossa, appears as a conradiction the images that Greeks maintain of non-Greeks. The Persians is discussed in relation to modem criticisms and as on its function as a warning against radical changes in Athenian domestic life. The Oresteia, a trilogy, also charts the importance of an atypical woman in Aeschylean tragedy, and how this role, Clytaemnestra, represents an extreme example of the natural and necessary evolution of families, households and kingdoms. In contrast to Aeschylus' plea to retain nomoi (traditional custom and law), EUripides' tragedy, the Medea, demonstrates the importance of a family and a country to provide security, especially for women. Medea's abandonment by Jason and subsequent desperation drives her to commit murder in the hope of revenge. Ultimately, Euripides advocates changes in social convention away from the alienation of non-Greek, non-citizens, and females. Euripides is, unfortunately, tagged a misogynist by some in this tragedy and another example-the Hippolytus. Euripides' Phaedra becomes entangled in a scheme of divine vengeance and ultimately commits suicide in an attempt to avoid societal shame. Far from treatises of hate, Euripidean women take advantage of the little power they possess within a constrictive social system. While both Aeschylus and Euripides revise customary images and expectations of women in the context of religiously-motivated drama, one playwright intends to maintain civic order and the other intends to challenge the secular norm.

Is neoliberalism a Liberalism, or a strange kind of bird? On Hayek and our discontents

This paper examines the theoretical ideas of Friedrich von Hayek, arguably the key progenitor of the global economic orthodoxy of the past two decades. It assesses Hayek's thought as he presents it: namely as a form of liberalism. Section I argues that Hayek's thought, if liberal, is hostile to participatory democracy. Section II then argues the more radical thesis that neoliberalism is also in truth an illiberal doctrine. Founded not in any social contract doctrine, but a form of constructivism, neoliberal thought at its base accepts the paradoxical need to "discipline subjects for freedom", however this might contravene peoples' natural, social inclinations. The argument is framed by reference to Aristophanes' great comedy, The Birds, whose off shore borderless empire ironically prefigures the dream of neoliberal social engineers, and their corporate supporters.

What was the iconoclast controversy about?

Byzantine society of the eighth and ninth centuries experienced a vigorous and often violent dispute over the status of holy icons. 'Iconoclasts' were deeply suspicious of any pictorial representations of Christ, the Mother of God, and the saints, and they therefore unleashed a wave of persecution against the use of religious images, while 'iconophiles' fiercely defended the veneration of icons as an integral element of the life of the church. The extent and magnitude of this controversy indicates that it was more than a mere dispute over competing conceptions of religious art. A number of deeper issues and concerns were at play, and in this paper I seek to uncover some of these underlying concerns and hidden agendas. In particular, I argue that the opposing factions in the iconoclast crisis were, at bottom, concerned with issues relating to salvation, power, idolatry, tradition, and access to the divine.

Does hard determinism render the problem of evil even harder?

Hard determinism, in theological dress, holds that there is no human free will since God is the sufficient active cause of everything that happens in creation. It is surprising that, in the ever-growing literature on the problem of evil, very little attention has been paid to theodicies that adopt a hard determinist outlook. It is commonly assumed that without free will the theodical project is a non-starter. I challenge this long-held assumption by, firstly, developing a cumulative-style theodicy from within a hard determinist framework, and secondly, comparing the merits of such a theodicy with two libertarian rivals, specifically, Molinism and open theism. The hard determinist model of divine providence is, I argue, in no worse shape than the principal models developed by libertarians.

Beyond Abrahamism : a fresh reading of the Tanakh traditions respecting Lot, Moab and Ammon

At the heart of this study is my interest in the way in which a religious community establishes its sense of identity and its boundaries in relation to other groups. I explore the case of Israel's attitude towards her eastern neighbours, the Moabites and Ammonites, as portrayed in Tanakh, the Hebrew Bible. Most commentary from the last one hundred years privileges one particular view of Moab and Ammon as traditional enemies of Israel. I aim to show the validity of readings of the biblical accounts that reveal a more complex relationship between Israel and her neighbours. Tanakh exhibits a dialectic between eirenic and hostile viewpoints. The stories of Abraham and Lot, who are presented as ancestors of Israel and of Moab and Ammon, to some degree represent Israel’s understanding of her neighbours. Conventional commentaries take for granted the accepted orthodoxy of Judaism, Christianity and Islam concerning Abraham and his significance in terms of faith and righteousness and blessing and covenant. As none of these notions is specifically linked to Lot at any point, he is treated as a pathetic figure and remains secondary in conventional commentary. Many commentaries denigrate the character of Lot, often in direct comparisons with Abraham. My reading of the texts of Genesis attempts to free the story of Lot from the constraints imposed by the way the story of Abraham functions. A careful reading of the Genesis account shows that Lot and Abraham exhibit similar elements of moral ambiguity, and Genesis contains no statement that condemns Lot on moral or religious grounds. Genesis 19, the single narrative in which Lot appears independently of Abraham, participates in the dialectic elsewhere in Tanakh. On the basis of a consistent pattern of action and speech throughout the first portion of Genesis 19, I advance my own original conception of the eirenic viewpoint of the narrator concerning Lot and his relationship to the divine. I attempt to demonstrate ways in which the story of Lot critiques or deconstructs the dominant ideology centred upon Abraham. My conception of the particular interests of the compiler of Genesis 19 is supported by several intertextual studies. These include the traditions of Sodom and of Zoar, the story of hospitality in Judges 19, the story of the deluge (Genesis 6-9) and stories of women who, like Lot’s daughters, act to continue the family line. In a treatment of the history of Lot traditions, I find evidence to separate the story of Lot from the work of the Yahwist. I consider whether the stories of Lot have a derivation east of the Jordan and whether the stories were of particular interest to the Deuteronomists. In the final chapter of this study, I focus on the main themes of the narratives concerning Lot and Abraham, and Moab and Ammon and Israel. The question of social boundaries arises in regard to many of these themes, such as the interaction of female and male, the role of wealth, the relation of city and country, kinship, and rights to land settlement. In this way, the treatment of Lot and Abraham in Tanakh and in subsequent traditions offers a perspective upon the formation of identity in the contemporary world of religious plurality.

Hagia Sofia (532–537AD) : a study of centrality, interiority and transcendence in architecture

The study by Robin Evans of the centralised churches of the Renaissance explores the idea of centrality, and argues that architecture does not simply invest in one geometric centre. Evans’s analysis makes detours into the histories of theology, geometry and mathematics attempting to find how architecture participates with these fields. In a footnote, he suggests that architecture in its singular artistic physicality ‘suspends our disbelief in the ideal’, offering a world that does not reflect culture, in all its fullness, but rather supplements culture’s incompleteness. This idea reiterates psychoanalytic theories of Freud and Kristeva that qualify the notion of transcendence with the psychoanalytic concept of transference. Architecture, like art, is able to resolve that which in society and in other fields remains a contradiction, giving a picture (albeit fictional) of a harmonious and unified order and wholeness. In this essay, I turn to Hagia Sofia (532–537AD) in present-day Istanbul, a church that marks the beginning of a Christian empire relocated to Constantinople, East of Rome, and built one thousand years before the Renaissance churches discussed by Evans. Hagia Sofia is a building that symbolises the shift towards a domed centralised form, away from a basilica form, and a building that develops an innovative interior. Hagia Sofia is usually observed and described in a devotional manner, as though addressing the architecture of the church is equivalent to a pious person addressing the church itself, and more significantly, addressing the Divine figure of God, through the architecture of the church. Its influence on Islamic mosque design has been noted. What rôle does Hagia Sofia play in the kind of artistic mastery that Evans is proposing, and what other dimensions of centrality and transcendence in architecture are offered by a study of Hagia Sofia?

Mirjana Lozanovska. Deakin University

Creativity can be related to the human capacity to make, but with more emphasis on the process of making and the way the thing made reveals this. Creativity can also be related to production or objects that involve beauty, innovation, pleasure and ideas beyond the functional, rational and economic. Creativity can thus be associated with the human subject and/ or the object produced. The subject and object of creativity are sometimes entwined, and often represented as symbiotic in relation to artists and artistic production. In the seminal text Keywords, Raymond Williams (1976: 76) explains the historical associations between the words 'create' and 'creation' and the 'divine'; and later associations with the poet's and the artist's productions, leading eventually to the 'creative arts: However, the subject and object of creativity are not the same, as illustrated in the study of archaeological artefacts, where often the human subject (maker) is unknown. It is important they are not merged, and in this text I will try to respond to each part.

Water in the Indic Traditions

The essay critically discusses the predominant role played by water in the lives of people from Vedic times to the present day, in the Hindu world. A number of ceremonies both happy or auspicious-making and secular have been associated with water. Several hymns of the Vedas, Brāhmanas, Mahābhārata, Āgamic and Purānic texts are drawn upon to bring out the legends and myths, and genuine beliefs, connected with water that underscore the sacred and profane, purificatory, healing and resuscitating dimensions of water. The essay treats readers to many ancient motifs concerning the pervasive value and utility of water. These comprise, variously, sacrifice, fertility rites, water-medium birth, divine metamorphosis, self-conceiving cosmic birth, totemism life-cycle rites, sanctifications, consecration and installation of icons and edifices, food rituals, monsoon rites, to pacifications, possession and exorcism, death, after-life and rebirth rituals. Reference is also made to the ecology of water resources, the economy of water scarcity, ‘war-wars’ or water imperialism, and water justice in the socio-political arenas of post independent India, in a rapidly liberalising and globalising world. In that regard practical applications of the knowledge-base are explored through the work of NGOs and Water Swamis in the subcontinent.

A mystery to the medical world : Florence Nightingale, Rosendo Salvado and the risk of civilisation

In 1860 Florence Nightingale conducted a study on the mortality rates of indigenous children attending native colonial schools across the British Empire. Her study was driven by the question: ‘Can we civilise the natives without killing them?’ One colonial school that participated in the survey was New Norcia Benedictine mission in Western Australia. When Rosendo Salvado, the mission’s superintendent, responded, he drew on his daily encounters with the Yuat people, his statistics on the mission residents and his Benedictine philosophy of civilisation and conversion of colonised peoples. The correspondence between Salvado and Nightingale took place in the climate of intense debates about Aboriginal health, colonisation and extinction in Britain and the colonies. While many settlers and colonial observers understood Aboriginal depopulation to be the result of either the vices and diseases of unprincipled Europeans or an unstoppable destiny, whether Divine Providence or natural selection, Nightingale and Salvado shared a belief in practical solutions to what they understood to be a practical problem. Their collaboration is an example of the humanitarian opposition to the racial pessimism of Social Darwinism. They both sought to use the recently influential intellectual discipline of social statistics to support their conviction that Aborigines, if patiently and carefully handled, would survive the admittedly risky process of civilisation.

Health-related religious rituals of the Greek Orthodox Church : their uptake and meanings

Aim
To examine the uptake of religious rituals of the Greek Orthodox Church by relatives of patients in critical condition in Greece and to explore their symbolic representations and spiritual meanings.
Background
Patients and their relatives want to be treated with respect and be supported for their beliefs, practices, customs and rituals. However nurses may not be ready to meet the spiritual needs of relatives of patients, while the health-related religious beliefs, practices and rituals of the Greek Orthodox Christian denomination have not been explored.
Method
This study was part of a large study encompassing 19 interviews with 25 informants, relatives of patients in intensive care units of three large hospitals in Athens, Greece, between 2000 and 2005. In this paper data were derived from personal accounts of religious rituals given by six participants.
Results
Relatives used a series of religious rituals, namely blessed oil and holy water, use of relics of saints, holy icons, offering names for pleas and pilgrimage.
Conclusion
Through the rituals, relatives experience a sense of connectedness with the divine and use the sacred powers to promote healing of their patients.
Implications for nursing management
Nurse managers should recognize, respect and facilitate the expression of spirituality through the practice of religious rituals by patients and their relatives.