The Sacrifice of Domestication: Theorizing Religion

Author(s): Jeremy Biles / Language(s): English Publication Year: 0

This comparative study will thus serve the scholarly purposes of articulating a multifaceted critique of Smith’s work while offering a corrective to his theory of religion through a turn to Bataille. More broadly, it commends further attention to Bataille by students of religion, for the field of religious studies stands to be invigorated by Bataille’s provocative, deliriously lucid writings. Following the example of Bataille, I will formulate grounds for resisting the rationalist mode in religious studies as exemplified by Smith, inquiring into the possibilities presented by shifting the register of religious studies from Smith’s privileged ratio-scientific concepts - for example, objectivity, distance, reason, conservation, accumulation, knowledge, and futurity - to those that Bataille puts forward in his theory religion: excess, experience, eroticism, expenditure, destruction, violence, and the present moment. I will argue that the (usually implicit) values connected with these respective approaches must be discerned and considered in thinking about how to theorize religion. There is, I believe, much to commend thinking more frequently and intensely in a Bataillean experimental register.

Religie și modernitate: reconfigurări ale morfologiei religioase în societatea pluralistă și seculară

Author(s): Ioan Dura / Language(s): Romanian Publication Year: 0

The substance of the secularization theory, as formulated by most sociologists in the 1960s and 1970s, presupposed that modernity would implicitly lead to the decline of religion in society, ultimately to its elimination. Secularization, as a separation of the sacred-profane spheres, was the direct result of modernization. Today's reality contradicts this religious skepticism.

„O teorie a dreptății“ și reconectarea filosofiei politice românești la sursele contemporane ale modernității

Author(s): Laurenţiu Gheorghe / Language(s): Romanian Publication Year: 0

After 1990, the Romanian political philosophy freed from the compulsory official Marxist dogma had to choose between a range of inadequate options from the viewpoint of current reality: reconnecting with the interwar tradition but in a different historical context; replaying the cold war ideological clash this time from the anti-Marxist perspective, that seemed redundant given the political and economic failure of Marxism or embracing the western post modern discourse, that didn’t reflect in any way the current Romanian political and social realities. Faced with these alternatives it was necessary to regain a philosophical experience of the transition from modernity to post-modernity that will enable the adequate approach to the realities of the transition from communism to post-modern capitalism. Given this context, from a certain philosophical perspective, the study of Rawls from A theory of Justice to Political Liberalism provided a unique opportunity to escape tradition without canceling it, to overcome the socialist-capitalist dichotomy and to connect to contemporary philosophical debates without losing the local perspective.

Raporturile dintre populaţia autohtonă a Basarabiei şi minorităţile confesionale în prima jumătate a secolului al XIX‑lea

Author(s): Ion Gumenâi / Language(s): Romanian Publication Year: 0

Anexarea Basarabiei şi încadrarea acesteia Imperiului Rus a dus, pe lângă alte schimbări, şi la o modificare a structurii confesionale a acestui teritoriu. Ne referim la faptul că în această regiune, datorită politicii de colonizare şi altor factori, au apărut, pe de o parte, o serie de curente religioase necunoscute până în acel moment în ţinutul dintre Prut şi Nistru, iar, pe de altă parte, la creşterea artificială numerică a altor curente religioase convenabile Curţii Imperiale de la Sankt‑Petersburg.

Война 1941‑1945 гг. Против христианских святынь южной бессарабии: К вопросу об ущербе и авторстве

Author(s): Micola Ivanovici Mihăiluţă / Language(s): Romanian Publication Year: 0

Articolul face referire la distrugerile suferite de biserici şi alte clădiri cu caracter religios din zona Bugeacului în anii celui de‑al Doilea Război Mondial. Ţinta studiului este stabilirea celor responsabili pentru distrugerile provocate pe durata conflictelor din regiune.

EDUCAȚIE, NAȚIUNE ȘI CREZ RELIGIOS LA SIMION MEHEDINȚI

Author(s): Alin Albu / Language(s): Romanian Publication Year: 0

Simion Mehedinți was a pioneer of Romanian science and culture in the first half of the twentieth century – when he militated for national renewal through education and culture in a Christian spirit; he was also a reformer of the Romanian educational system, but also a genuine Christian educator. As a researcher, he highlighted the educational value of science, professing himself a science out of conviction. His pedagogical conception contains two special nuances – the Christian one and its application to one’s own ethnic space – and he introduces the concept the school of work, as area and instrument of modeling the student’s character. In his ethnographic approaches we discover the recovering and pedagogical function of history and in the analysis of Romanian Christianity those valences which can be considered modern and democratic today.

Activitatea social-umanitară a societăților de binefacere în vreme de război

Author(s): Ema Bogdan / Language(s): Romanian Publication Year: 0

Metropolitan Pimen Georgescu shepherded at a time when the Romanian Orthodox Church and our country have crossed a tense period through the prism of the First World War. During the Wars, the Church accompanied the military troops on the battlefield. In monasteries have been established orphanages, hospitals and charity societies that provided both, spiritual and material aid. Romanian priests contributed to the creation of the Romanian National State offering hope to the soldiers to obtain the Glory of our country.

Култът към Св. Иван Рилски в търновската агиография

Author(s): Venelin Grudkov / Language(s): English,Bulgarian Publication Year: 0

The research focuses on the main texts of the Old Bulgarian hagiographical cycle about Saint John of Rila. Text analysis of the post-biographical parts leads to the conclusion that the relics of the Rila saint extremely actualize their impact in historical periods that are dramatic for the ethnic destiny.

Средновековният текст – проблем на нашето време

Author(s): Kiril Kabakchiev / Language(s): Bulgarian,German,Old Bulgarian Publication Year: 0

Сбирката от старопечатни книги на манастира „Света троица“ в Ново село, град Априлци

Author(s): Maria Polimirova / Language(s): English,Bulgarian Publication Year: 0

This article presents an unknown until now old printed books collection of the “Holy Trinity Monastery” in Novo Selo, Apriltsi. It contains 18 printed books, most of them are Russian liturgical books, the earliest of which are the Gospel and the Apostle, published in the Kievo-Pechorian Lavra in 1752. Rare editions of engravings are presented and is given the content of the contributions, which gives information about the books themselves, about their owners and about the history of “The Holy Trinity Monastery” in Novo Selo. Particular attention is paid to an unknown note from the famous Bulgarian Revival writer Stoyan Kovanlushki.

Към въпроса за словното богатство в произведенията на Патриарх Евтимий

Author(s): Tatyana Ilieva / Language(s): English,Bulgarian,Old Bulgarian Publication Year: 0

The article summarises the author’s work on the excerpt of Letter N from the Glossary of Patriarch Euthymius. It presents a preliminary observation of part of the vocabulary in the writings of this 14th-century Bulgarian man of letters. The statistical structure of the Glossary is presented in summary – the letter N and the dissemination of the words beginning with N on the micro- and macro-level both in the works by this author and in the Medieval literature with a view to following the continuity of the language and influence of the Cyrillo-Methodian tradition on the writers associated with the Literary School of Tarnovo. A general characteristic of the Glossary is made in relation to the grammatical and semantic category of the constituent lexemes in comparison with the word-forming tendencies in the Old Bulgarian as well as with regard to the origin and functional delimitation of words. Special attention is paid to the vocabulary which has not been lexicographically described so far, as well as to the lexis which is considered diagnostic when ascribing this precise author to a particular literary tradition.

За лексиката с чужд произход в оригиналното творчество на Патриарх Евтимий

Author(s): Mariyana Tsibranska-Kostova / Language(s): English,Bulgarian,Old Bulgarian Publication Year: 0

The study is an essay to draw a classification of the lexemes with foreign origin, mostly Greek and Latin, according to the 13th original works of Patriarch Eythymius. Those lexical strata englobe multifunctional and nonhomogeneous unities, dispersed in different textual contexts. They are just a nuance, not the base of the vocabulary, but perform important historical, cognitive, and stylistic functions, rising the prestige of the lexical richness, and crediting it with international dimensions in basic conceptual spheres of Christianity.

Причастията в дионисиевия превод на словата против аномеите от св. Йоан Златоуст

Author(s): Kamen Dimitrov / Language(s): English,Bulgarian,Old Bulgarian Publication Year: 0

The survey hereby focuses on the peculiarities of the participles in a hitherto linguistically unexplored text, namely the Middle Bulgarian translation of Contra Anomoeos („On the Incomprehensible Nature of God“) by John Chrysostom. It consists of six sermons, comprising the first part of the book Margarit (Pearl), a crucial component of the Slavic handwritten tradition. The study of the Slavonic translation of Margarit is very important for outlining the translation practice of the scholars of the literary circle around Theodosius of Tarnovo. The survey is based on the earliest Bulgarian transcript – manuscript F.I.197, kept in The National Library of Russia, Saint Petersburg – written in the middle of the fourteenth century. The manuscript is considered to have been composed during the lifetime of his translator – the scholar Dionisiy Divniy. The article highlights a high degree of similarity between the linguistic devices used by Dionisiy Divniy and by the other representatives of the Turnovo Literary School from the fourteenth century.

Костен архиерейски жезъл от затворения комплекс при Църква № 3 на Трапезица

Author(s): Mirko Robov / Language(s): English,Bulgarian Publication Year: 0

The prelatic sceptre is a symbol of strength and spiritual power. It imposes the obligation and responsibility to care for the integrity and preservation of the spiritual flock. The sceptre provides the bishop the power to judge and make decisions. The find from Trapezitsa is discovered in the big duplex building, in the civil complex near church № 3, in the Southeastern sector of the stronghold. The find has a biconical shape, with an almost flat upper surface. It’s quite possible that the workmanship is linked to a metropolitan studio. The entire surface features a “bird eye” ornament, applied circumferentially and also radially. Eight relief sheets are placed on the side surface. They are crafted in tall relief. From below the item ends with a bush for the attachment of the wooden stick. It remains an open question as to what kind of a representative of the metropolitan aristocracy was the complex in question meant for – a high-ranking layman or a clerical individual? The bone end of the prelatic sceptre is an important find, which links the new-found civil complex of Trapezitsa with a high-ranking representative of the metropolitan ecclesiastical hierarchy.

Граматикът и неговият статус: монах, църковник или светско лице

Author(s): Bistra Nikolova / Language(s): English,Bulgarian Publication Year: 0

The subject of this article is the social status of 22 grammarians known from the medieval Bulgarian sources. The period on which names “grammarians” are found in the Bulgarian Middle Ages is of Xth to beginning of XVth century. One of the goals is to point out what is the status of the “grammarian” in Medieval Bulgaria – is it a service, an alias, a title or an epithet. The places which are connected to these people have been researched. The work of grammarians is mainly connected with copying theological books or with translations from Greek to Old Bulgarian. The Old Bulgarian grammarians are mostly secular persons who work for churches or monasteries. Their work is custom-made or in some cases the work for a fee. The alias “grammarian” in medieval Bulgaria has no official character, it is not a title with designated service. In indicates to certain professional skill, level of education and deserved status higher than the one that an ordinary medieval scribe has.

Женското монашество на Балканите от ХІV до края на ХVІІI век

Author(s): Atanaska Stamboliyska / Language(s): English,Bulgarian Publication Year: 0

For the existence of women monasteries we lack sources, unlike men monasteries, for which we have plenty of written, archaeological and hagiographical data. Relying mainly on the written sources – building and gravestone inscriptions, bead-rolls and marginal notes – I will try to examine the existence of female monasticism in the territory of the Balkan Peninsula from the period of Christianization till the end of the 18th c. (using the above-mentioned sources). Despite some separate mentions of nuns, it could be traced back through the sources that the development of female monasticism in the Balkans was not interrupted from the period before the Ottoman conquest till the end of the 18th c.

Концептът „воля“ в оригиналните произведения на патриарх Евтимий

Author(s): Vanya Micheva / Language(s): English,Bulgarian,Old Bulgarian Publication Year: 0

The semantic realizations of the concept of will in the history of Bulgarian literary language are examined in this paper. The linguistic facts of Old Bulgarian manuscripts, original works of Patriarch Euthimius, New Bulgarian damascenes and modern language are used. The system of phrases and sentences with “will” and its distribution in different contexts are analyzed in a relation with cultural situation in the ХIV c., Christian ideas and strategy of the author.

Ктиторският портрет на митрополит Игнатий и Христовата генеалогия в катедралната църква на Търново „Св. Първоапостоли Петър и Павел“

Author(s): Zarko Zhdrakov,Plamen Orfeev / Language(s): English,Bulgarian,Old Slavonic Publication Year: 0

A photograph and a color copy of the fresco, made before the earthquake in 1913 have survived as evidence of the ktitor’s portrait. The ktitor is young and has a black beard, he is clad in a splendid bishop’s vestment with Latin crosses and a black monastic koukoulion. In the image, dedicated to the apostles of the Church of Rome Peter and Paul, he is positioned next to the Virgin Mary with Child on throne, above the western entrance of the church, where there had never been other ktitor’s portrait and inscription and, in fact, that gives grounds for the monumental composition to be dated in the same way as the main painting at the time of bishop Ignatius in 1442. The ktitor is depicted to give the model of the church with both of his hands to the apostles of the Church of Rome St. Peter, who presents him before Christ and his Mother, symbolizing the Church. He seems to be smaller than the other figures and his eyes are looking upwards to the Prince of the Apostles Peter – a vision of the Roman claim for supremacy. The ktitor’s model of the church reflects the state of the building with the external gal¬lery before painting the calendar in the sixteenth century, when the big arch-like barred windows were bricked in connection with the painting of the calendar. Most likely, that earlier reconstruction was done in the mid-fifteenth century, when the town of Turnovo was undertaking major buildings – e.g. the bridge and the mosque of Feruz Bey (1435). To identify the Turnovo metropolitan Ignatius, it is the style of the ktitor’s composition that also helps and the accompanying inscription with palaeographic characteristics that are specific for the signatures of the painter Nikolas (e.g. the anagram from 1442). It is known that Ignatius and the Ecumenical Patriarch Joseph II came from the Bulgarian tsarist family and had been in one and the same kellion of the Mount Athos monastery Alipu. That explains the exceptional presence of St. Athanasius of Mount Athos in the altar near the patron of metropolitan St. Ignatius the God-bearer in the diaconicon where the order of dressing was taking place. The Tree of Jesse is contaminated with the Genealogy of Christ and covers the whole space of the church. It unifies the conceptual program by spreading its branches around the Virgin Mary with Child in the apse, the arcade of the triumphant Heavenly Church with the parents of the Mother of God, the martyr priests and warriors, and the scenes from the life of Christ. A painting by Boris Denev painted before the earthquake in 1913 shows the lying Jesse at the southern pillar of the narthex where the stem of the genealogy tree is sprouting out. The vision is related to the genealogy in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, and also in the Hermeneia of Dionysius of Fourna. The Genealogy of Matthew according to his father’s royal line starting from Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is associated with the one of Luke, according to his maternal line from the ancestors of the |Virgin Mary, Adam, Eve, and Abel, who never occupied the throne of the Jews and in this connection there is the unique branch with the righteous women. The origin of the two genealogies was on the western wall of the narthex facing Jesse. The direction of the visual narrative from left to right is indicated by the image of the semi full-face of Tara, the father of Patriarch Abraham, depicted on the western end of the southern wall of the narthex. The genealogy of Luke on the western wall of the narthex over the entrance had been developing north-wise in the narthex and the naos. The images of their descendants are partially preserved on the northern wall of the narthex (Noah with the Ark and his sons Sim and Japheth) and the naos (Nahor, the father of Tara). The genealogy after Mat¬thew on the western wall of the narthex, south of the entrance, spread over the apse with a unique branch, dedicated to the twelve sons of Patriarch Jacob. Further on, there are the sons of Judah, the Patriarch Kings Zar on the northern pillar in the narthex, and Phares on the southern wall of the narthex next to Tara, where it continues eastward reaching Jesse. From there on, the genealogy is continuing on the northern pillar with Patriarch Ravoam and then in the central arch next to Christ. The Tree of Jesse includes also images from the Hermeneia – e.g. the righteous women, the prophet Nathan, and King Joshua in the southern arch between the narthex and the naos, Patriarch Melchizedek at the northern pillar of the narthex and the pointed by him righteous men named Tobit and Tobias with scrolls unfolded in the northern arch between the narthex and the naos. The connection between the Old Testament and the New Testament is achieved along the west-east axis, from the narthex through the naos to the altar. Depicted in the apse is a branch with the Covenant of Patriarch Jacob as a symbol of the Old Testament unity and prefiguration of the Virgin Mary with Child – cf. the ewer with heavenly manna of Levi and Christ in the hands of Judas. Depicted in the central arch between the narthex and the naos is an allegory of the New Testament unity – the Council of Jerusalem, presented by God’s brethren Jacob and Judas, and the leaders of the apostles Peter and Paul, based of the Seven Ecumenical Synods in the narthex. The tree of Jesse is an element of imperial propaganda, as it is an evidence of the power being taken over from father to son. Most kings have their hands covered for the Holy Communion, but some point to the visual text – e.g. king Zar, the first-born son of Judas, points with his right hand the younger brother Perez from whom originates the family line of Jesse, and his great-grandson, King Aminadav, points with his left hand to his son Nahshon who is called upon to lead Judah’s family line before Moses during the escape of the Jews from Sinai. In the central arch, King Jotham points out to his father Uzziah, who during his life, made him a co-ruler, whereas the kings Sadok and his son Ahim, as well as their descendant St. Joseph, point to the Child dressed in golden vestments as in a dream of the prophet Jesse.

Зографи от Бока-Которска школа и техните икони (XVIII – XIX век)

Author(s): Plamen Sabev / Language(s): English,Bulgarian Publication Year: 0

In the second half of the 17th century a Boka-Kotorska icon painting school was formed. Despite its popularity, extensive research and publications have been made on representative personalities. In the museum of the medieval town of Dubrovnik today there are 35 icons belonging to the Boka-Kotor School. The amount of works attributed to the artistic range of the school is not exhausted. In the first decades of the eighteenth century icons appeared in the most elite and high-paying commercial territories, churches and monasteries, which are post-Byzantine. Even in stylistic terms, as I have already said, they have nothing to do with the old masterpieces of the Dubrovnik masters. The first distinctive feature is that the models and models of iconography that will be used in the work of this school are of post-Byzantine origin. For example, the composition “Deisis”, which is strongly represented in the work of some generations of masters, is indicative. Of course, Western prototypes, decorative elements characteristic of Baroque painting, are coming into the art of later periods. The Tryavna iconographic school, despite its individual characteristics, also follows the traces of naivetry and the shaping of shapes. Undoubtedly, there are long distances, distant centres developing independently of each other. But, on the other hand, the boundaries of art come closer, even cross, especially when it comes to religious-popular ideas and the progression of visual rhythm and reflection of creative consciousness. The present study is devoted to these issues and a comparative analysis of various inscriptions and stylistic features.

Наблюдения върху езика на литургийното тълкувание в MSS РГАДА 88 И БОГИШИЧ 52. Морфология на имената

Author(s): Tatyana Ilieva / Language(s): Bulgarian,Old Slavonic,Old Bulgarian Publication Year: 0

The object of study in this article are the morphological peculiarities of the nominal system in the hitherto unattributed liturgical commentary of MSS RGADA 88 and Bogishich 52. On the basis of a thorough linguistic analysis linguistic data are gathered about the age in which the work appeared and the literary school to which its author belonged. This investigation shows that as regards its morphological characteristics, the commentary has the characteristic features of Southern Slavonic literature, which conform to the linguistic norms probably already established on Mt. Athos in the first decades of the 14th century and adopted by the Tarnovo men of letters as well, norms underlying the Resava orthography in Serbia later. Judging by the linguistic data examined, the commentary could have been written in the Western Bulgarian or the Eastern Serbian lands by an author who had a command of Old Bulgarian and observed its morphological and syntactic norms by using synthetic nominal forms at the time when the new analytical system had already established itself in the vernacular.