Overview

In Western religious traditions, God is conventionally conceived as a humanlike creator, lawgiver, and king, a being both accessible and actively present in history. Yet there is a concurrent and strong tradition of a God who actively hides. The two traditions have led to a tension between a God who is simultaneously accessible to humanity and yet inaccessible, a God who is both immanent and transcendent, present and absent. Western Gnostic, esoteric, and mystical thinking capitalizes on the hidden and hiding God. He becomes the hallmark of the mystics, Gnostics, sages, and artists who attempt to make accessible to humans the God who is secreted away. 'Histories of the Hidden God' explores this tradition from antiquity to today. The essays focus on three essential themes: the concealment of the hidden God; the human quest for the hidden God, and revelations of the hidden God.

Full Product Details

Author:   April D DeConick ,  Grant Adamson
Publisher:   Taylor & Francis Ltd
Imprint:   Routledge
Weight:   0.620kg
ISBN:  

9781138664302

ISBN 10:   1138664308
Pages:   368
Publication Date:   21 January 2016
Audience:   College/higher education ,  General/trade ,  Tertiary & Higher Education ,  General
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   In Print  
This item will be ordered in for you from one of our suppliers. Upon receipt, we will promptly dispatch it out to you. For in store availability, please contact us.

Table of Contents

Introduction: In search of the hidden God: By April D. DeConick Part I - Concealment of the Hidden God 1 - Who is hiding in the Gospel of John? Reconceptualizing Johannine theology and the roots of Gnosticism 2 - Adoil outside the cosmos: God before and after Creation in the Enochic tradition 3 - The old gods of Egypt in lost Hermetica and early Sethianism 4 - Hidden God and hidden self: The emergence of apophatic anthropology in Christian mysticism 5 - God's occulted body: On the hiddenness of Christ in Alan of Lille's Anticlaudianus Part II - The Human Quest for the Hidden God 6 - Obscured by the scriptures, revealed by the prophets: God in the Pseudo-Clementine Homilies 7 - How hidden was God? Revelation and pedagogy in ancient and medieval Hermetic writings 8 - From hidden to revealed in Sethian revelation, ritual, and protology 9 - Shamanism and the hidden history of modern Kabbalah 10 - Dreaming of paradise: Seeing the hidden God in Islam Part III - Revelations of the Hidden God 11 - Revealing and concealing God in ancient synagogue art 12 - The invisible Christian God in Christian art 13 - On the Mothman, God, and other monsters: The demonology of John A. Keel 14 - Hidden away: Esotericism and Gnosticism in Elijah Muhammad's Nation of Islam 15 - Conscious concealment: The repression and expression of African American Spiritualists 16 - Occulture in the academy? The case of Joseph P. Farrell Afterword: Mysticism, Gnosticism, and esotericism as entangled discourses Bibliography Index

Reviews

All of these chapters are learned and provocative, and many will surely become standard citations-and flash-points of debate-in their respective fields... Histories of the Hidden God will prove worthwhile and thought-provoking reading to scholars of religion who are interested in ''Gnosticism, esotericism, and mysticism'' and wish to hone their knowledge of their own sub-fields while learning about material with which they may be less familiar. - Nova Religio

"""All of these chapters are learned and provocative, and many will surely become standard citations—and flash-points of debate—in their respective fields... Histories of the Hidden God will prove worthwhile and thought-provoking reading to scholars of religion who are interested in ‘‘Gnosticism, esotericism, and mysticism’’ and wish to hone their knowledge of their own sub-fields while learning about material with which they may be less familiar."" - Nova Religio"

Author Information

April D. DeConick is Isla Carroll and Percy E. Turner Professor of Biblical Studies, Rice University, Houston, Texas. Grant Adamson is Ph.D. candidate, Rice University.

Tab Content 6

Author Website:  

Customer Reviews

Recent Reviews

No review item found!

Add your own review!

Countries Available

All regions