Critical Theory and Early Christianity
edited by Matthew G. Whitlock
Paperback (Published)
(October 2022)
ISBN: 9781781794135
6.14 x 9.21 inches
Price: $39.95
In stock
Hardback (Published)
(October 2022)
ISBN: 9781781794128
6.14 x 9.21 inches
Price: $100.00
In stock
This volume aims to create–in Walter Benjamin’s terms–dialectical images from early Christian texts and the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. It blasts the past and the present into one another, creating new constellations of thought, ones connected with tensions and mediated by theory (mediation being what Theodor Adorno adds to Benjamin’s concept of the dialectical image). Our ancient images derive from the Gospels, the Apostle Paul, Revelation, Irenaeus, Origen, and Augustine. Our modern images and theories derive from Walter Benjamin, Gilles Deleuze, Alain Badiou, and Judith Butler. Together these images and theories challenge the way we think about gentrification, progress, early Christianity, revolutionary movements, history, the body of Christ, canonicity, language, gender, and bodies, both human and non-human.
This volume aims to create–in Walter Benjamin’s terms–dialectical images from early Christian texts and the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. It blasts the past and the present into one another, creating new constellations of thought, ones connected with tensions and mediated by theory (mediation being what Theodor Adorno adds to Benjamin’s concept of the dialectical image). Our ancient images derive from the Gospels, the Apostle Paul, Revelation, Irenaeus, Origen, and Augustine. Our modern images and theories derive from Walter Benjamin, Gilles Deleuze, Alain Badiou, and Judith Butler. Together these images and theories challenge the way we think about gentrification, progress, early Christianity, revolutionary movements, history, the body of Christ, canonicity, language, gender, and bodies, both human and non-human. Eleven international scholars contribute to this volume. These scholars are experts in the fields of Biblical Studies, Early Christian Studies, Philosophy, and Critical Theory.
Contents Preface: Dialectical Images and Critical Theory vii 1. Introduction: Making Early Christian Texts Strange (Again) 1 Matthew G. Whitlock PART I: WALTER BENJAMIN 2. Walter Benjamin and Early Christian Texts 35
Matthew G. Whitlock 3. Reading, Libraries, and Urban Change in the Shadow of Capitalism and Apocalypse: Reading Walter Benjamin and John of Patmos 50 Robert Paul Seesengood 4. “On the Concept of History”: St. Augustine and Walter Benjamin 66 Carl A. Levenson PART II: GILLES DELEUZE 5. Gilles Deleuze and Early Christian Texts 99 Matthew G. Whitlock 6. The Deleuzioguattarian Body of Christ without Organs 127
Bradley H. McLean 7. The Many Acts of the Apostles: Simulacra and Simulation 147 Matthew G. Whitlock and Philip L. Tite 8. Face-ing the Nations: Becoming a Majority Empire of God Reterritorialization, Language, and Imperial Racism in Revelation 7.9-17 184 Sharon Jacob PART III: ALAIN BADIOU 9. Alain Badiou and Early Christian Texts 213 Matthew G. Whitlock 10. Christianity Appears First, as Itself 236 Bruce Worthington 11. Towards a Vulgar Marxist Reading of Christian Origins Today 252 James Crossley 12. Recapitulating the Event: Reading Irenaeus with Badiou 268 Hollis Phelps PART IV: JUDITH BUTLER 13. Judith Butler and Early Christian Texts 295 Matthew G. Whitlock 14. Paul Exposed: Reading Galatians with Judith Butler 314 Valérie Nicolet
15. Mattering Bodies: Animacy and Justice in Origen’s On First Principles 350 Peter Anthony Mena Index of Biblical References 367 Index of Classical References and Authors 371 Index of Early Christian Writings 372
Index of Jewish Writings 374 Index of Modern Authors 375 Index of Subjects 380
- Edited by Matthew G. Whitlock
Other Titles in this Series
The Complexity of Conversion
Intersectional Perspectives on Religious Change in Antiquity and Beyond
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