Celibacy in the Ancient World (Paperback)
$66.46 - Save $21.56 24% off - RRP $88.02 Free delivery worldwide (to United States and
all these other countries) Usually dispatched within 48 hours | |Short Description for Celibacy in the Ancient World Celibacy is a commitment to remain unmarried and to renounce sexual relations, for a limited period or for a lifetime. Such a commitment places an individual outside human society in its usual form, and thus questions arise: What significance does such an individual, and such a choice, have for the human family and community as a whole? Is celibacy possible? These questions guide Dale Launderville
Full description- Publisher: Michael Glazier Inc
- Published: 12 October 2010
- Format: Paperback 576 pages
- See: Full bibliographic data
- Categories: Ancient History: To C 500 CE | Religion: General | Roman Catholicism, Roman Catholic Church | Biblical Studies & Exegesis | Christian Life & Practice
- ISBN 13: 9780814656976 ISBN 10: 0814656978
- Sales rank: 865,324
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Full description for Celibacy in the Ancient World
Celibacy is a commitment to remain unmarried and to renounce sexual relations, for a limited period or for a lifetime. Such a commitment places an individual outside human society in its usual form, and thus questions arise: What significance does such an individual, and such a choice, have for the human family and community as a whole? Is celibacy possible? Is there a socially constructive role for celibacy?These questions guide Dale Launderville, OSB, in his study of celibacy in the ancient cultures of Israel, Mesopotamia, and Greece prior to Hellenism and the rise of Christianity. Launderville focuses especially on literary witnesses, because those enduring texts have helped to shape modern attitudes and can aid us in understanding the factors that may call forth the practice of celibacy in our own time. Readers will discover how celibacy fits within a context of relationships, and what kinds of relationships thus support a healthy and varied society, one aware of and oriented to its cosmic destiny."This wide-ranging book situates virginity, chastity, and celibacy within the larger social structure of the patriarchal household in Mesopotamia, Israel, and Greece. Drawing out the understandings of human sexuality in these three pre-Hellenistic cultures, this probing study examines sexual `outliers,' such as the celibate prophet, Jeremiah. In this study, celibacy emerges as an effort to separate from customary social-sexual relations with a human partner in order to connect with the divine in a manner that would transcend death; it is, in other words, `a proleptic death and a quest for transcendence.' The result is an understanding---and a concrete rationale for---the symbolic value of celibacy in the modern world: `For one committed to a celibate life such sexual discipline is a fundamental means of shaping the ascetic body into a symbol of enduring life in the cosmic community.' The result of this challenging book is a rethinking of sexual `outliers,' based on a learned examination of the very societies of antiquity that influenced Christian traditions of celibacy."
