Research Catalog

The Axial Age and its consequences / edited by Robert N. Bellah and Hans Joas.

Title: The Axial Age and its consequences / edited by Robert N. Bellah and Hans Joas.
Publication: Cambridge, Mass. : Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2012.

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Status	Format	Access	Call Number	Item Location
Request for On-site Use Request Scan How do I pick up this item and when will it be ready?	Text	Request in advance	CB311 .A885 2012	Off-site

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Description

548 pages; 25 cm

Summary

"The first classics in human history-the early works of literature, philosophy, and theology to which we have returned throughout the ages-appeared in the middle centuries of the first millennium BCE. The canonical texts of the Hebrew scriptures, the philosophical writings of Plato and Aristotle, the Analects of Confucius and the Daodejing, the Bhagavad Gita and the teachings of the Buddha-all of these works came down to us from the compressed period of history that Karl Jaspers memorably named the Axial Age. In The Axial Age and Its Consequences, Robert Bellah and Hans Joas make the bold claim that intellectual sophistication itself was born worldwide during this critical time. Across Eurasia, a new self-reflective attitude toward human existence emerged, and with it an awakening to the concept of transcendence. From Axial Age thinkers we inherited a sense of the world as a place not just to experience but to investigate, envision, and alter through human thought and action. Bellah and Joas have assembled diverse scholars to guide us through this astonishing efflorescence of religious and philosophical creativity. As they explore the varieties of theorizing that arose during the period, they consider how these in turn led to utopian visions that brought with them the possibility of both societal reform and repression. The roots of our continuing discourse on religion, secularization, inequality, education, and the environment all lie in Axial Age developments. Understanding this transitional era, the authors contend, is not just an academic project but a humanistic endeavor."--Jacket.

Subject

Genre/Form

Conference papers and proceedings
Congressen (vorm)
Actes de congrès.

Note

Revisions of papers delivered at a conference held July 3-5, 2008 at the University of Erfurt.

Bibliography (note)

Includes bibliographical references (pages 469-537) and index.

Processing Action (note)

committed to retain

Contents

Fundamental questions: The Axial Age debate as religious discourse / Hans Joas ; What was the Axial revolution? / Charles Taylor ; An evolutionary approach to culture : implications for the study of the Axial Age / Merlin Donald ; Embodiment, transcendence, and contingency : anthropological features of the Axial Age / Matthias Jung ; The Axial Age in global history : cultural crystallizations and societal transformations / Björn Wittrock ; The Buddha's meditative trance : visionary knowledge, aphoristic thinking, and Axial Age rationality in early Buddhism / Gananath Obeyesekere ; The idea of transcendence / Ingolf U. Dalferth -- A comparative perspective: Religion, the Axial Age, and secular modernity in Bellah's theory of religious evolution / José Casanova ; Where do Axial commitments reside? : problems in thinking about the African case / Ann Swidler ; The Axial Age theory : a challenge to historism or an explanatory device of civilization analysis? : with a look at the normative discourse in Axial Age China / Heiner Roetz -- Destructive possibilities?: The Axial conundrum between transcendental visions and vicissitudes of their institutionalizations : constructive and destructive possibilities / Shmuel N. Eisenstadt ; Axial religions and the problem of violence / David Martin ; Righteous rebels : when, where, and why? / W.G. Runciman -- Reevaluations: Rehistoricizing the Axial Age / Johann P. Arnason ; Cultural memory and the myth of the Axial Age / Jan Assmann -- Perspectives on the future: The Axial invention of education and today's global knowledge culture / William M. Sullivan -- The future of transcendence : a sociological agenda / Richard Madsen -- The heritage of the Axial Age : resource or burden? / Robert N. Bellah.

ISBN

9780674066496
0674066499
9780674067400 (canceled/invalid)
0674067401 (canceled/invalid)

LCCN

2012008329
40021530613

OCLC

784708285
SCSB-11361760

Owning Institutions

Harvard Library