Religion, Empire and Torture: The Case of Achaemenian Persia (Hardback)
$34.04 - Free delivery worldwide (to United States and
all these other countries) Usually dispatched within 48 hours | |Short Description for Religion, Empire and Torture How does religion stimulate and feed imperial ambitions and violence? This title identifies three core components of an imperial theology that have transhistorical and contemporary relevance: dualistic ethics, a theory of divine election, and a sense of salvific mission. It shows how the religious ideas shaped Achaemenian practice.
Full description- Publisher: University of Chicago Press
- Published: 10 July 2007
- Format: Hardback 192 pages
- See: Full bibliographic data
- Categories: Political Oppression & Persecution | European History | Middle Eastern History | Ancient History: To C 500 CE | Classical History / Classical Civilisation | Religion & Politics | Ancient Religions & Mythologies
- ISBN 13: 9780226481968 ISBN 10: 0226481964
- Sales rank: 752,593
Other books
Full description for Religion, Empire and Torture
How does religion stimulate and feed imperial ambitions and violence? Recently, this question has acquired new urgency, and in Religion, Empire, and Torture, Bruce Lincoln approaches the problem via a classic but little-studied case: Achaemenian Persia. Lincoln identifies three core components of an imperial theology that have transhistorical and contemporary relevance: dualistic ethics, a theory of divine election, and a sense of salvific mission. Beyond this, he asks, how did the Achaemenians understand their place in the cosmos and their moral status in relation to others? Why did they feel called to intervene in the struggle between good and evil? What was their sense of historic purpose, especially their desire to restore paradise lost? And how did this lead them to deal with enemies and critics as imperial power ran its course? Lincoln shows how these religious ideas shaped Achaemenian practice and brought the Persians unprecedented wealth, power, and territory, but also produced unmanageable contradictions, as in a gruesome case of torture discussed in the book's final chapter. Close study of that episode leads Lincoln back to the present with a postscript that provides a searing and utterly novel perspective on the photographs from Abu Ghraib.
