The Law of God: The Philosophical History of an Idea

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University of Chicago Press, 15 mai 2007 - 365 pages
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The law of God: these words conjure an image of Moses breaking the tablets at Mount Sinai, but the history of the alliance between law and divinity is so much longer, and its scope so much broader, than a single Judeo-Christian scene can possibly suggest. In his stunningly ambitious new history, Rémi Brague goes back three thousand years to trace this idea of divine law in the West from prehistoric religions to modern times—giving new depth to today’s discussions about the role of God in worldly affairs.
Brague masterfully describes the differing conceptions of divine law in Judaic, Islamic, and Christian traditions and illuminates these ideas with a wide range of philosophical, political, and religious sources. In conclusion, he addresses the recent break in the alliance between law and divinity—when modern societies, far from connecting the two, started to think of law simply as the rule human community gives itself. Exploring what this disconnection means for the contemporary world, Brague—powerfully expanding on the project he began with The Wisdom of the World—re-engages readers in a millennia-long intellectual tradition, ultimately arriving at a better comprehension of our own modernity.
“Brague’s sense of intellectual adventure is what makes his work genuinely exciting to read. The Law of God offers a challenge that anyone concerned with today’s religious struggles ought to take up.”—Adam Kirsch, New York Sun “Scholars and students of contemporary world events, to the extent that these may be viewed as a clash of rival fundamentalisms, will have much to gain from Brague’s study. Ideally, in that case, the book seems to be both an obvious primer and launching pad for further scholarship.”—Times Higher Education Supplement
 

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The law of God: the philosophical history of an idea

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What makes a law "divine"? What characteristics does that divinity confer on the law? How can we describe societies in which human behavior is regulated by laws characterized as divine? Why has ... Consulter l'avis complet

Table des matières

LAW AND CITIES IN THE MIDDLE AGES
121
DIVINE LAW IN MEDIEVAL THOUGHT
157
NEITHER FAITH NOR LAW?
229
Conclusion
256
Notes
265
Selected Bibliography
321
Index
355
Droits d'auteur

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Expressions et termes fréquents

Fréquemment cités

Page 69 - This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends.
Page 56 - You have been told, O man, what is good, and what the LORD requires of you: Only to do the right and to love goodness, and to walk humbly with your God.
Page 80 - The punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His Messenger, and strive with might and main for mischief through the land is: execution, or crucifixion, or the cutting off of hands and feet from opposite sides, or exile from the land: that is their disgrace in this world, and a heavy punishment is theirs in the Hereafter; 34.
Page 78 - Alms are for the poor and the needy, and those employed to administer the (funds); for those whose hearts have been (recently) reconciled (to Truth); for those in bondage and in debt; in the cause of Allah; and for the wayfarer: (thus is it) ordained by Allah, and Allah is full of knowledge and wisdom.
Page 235 - That which doth assign unto each thing the kind, that which doth moderate the force and power, that which doth appoint the form and measure, of working, the same we term a Law.
Page 239 - God is related to the universe, as Creator and Preserver; the laws by which he created all things are those by which he preserves them. He acts according to these rules, because he knows them; he knows them, because he made them; and he made them, because they are relative to his wisdom and power.
Page 109 - The philosophy that answers to this description was handed down to us by the Greeks from Plato and Aristotle only. Both have given us an account of philosophy, but not without giving us also an account of the ways to it and of the ways to re-establish it when it becomes confused or extinct.
Page 51 - Are you not like the Ethiopians to me, O people of Israel? says the LORD. Did I not bring up Israel from the land of Egypt, And the Philistines from Caphtor and the Arameans from Kir?
Page 110 - His corporeality and many other metaphysical subjects as we shall make clear. All this is due to people being habituated to, and brought up on, texts that it is an established usage to think highly of and to regard as true and whose external meaning is indicative of the corporeality of God and of other imaginings with no truth in them, for these have been set forth as parables and riddles.

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À propos de l'auteur (2007)

Rémi Brague is professor of philosophy at the Université de Paris I–Sorbonne and at the University of Munich. He is the author of five previous books, including The Wisdom of the World, also published by the University of Chicago Press, and Eccentric Culture.

Informations bibliographiques