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This volume in honour of Prof. Dr. Johannes van Oort offers a rich variety of in-depth studies on Augustine, Manichaeism, and other Gnostic currents, thus reflecting the rich variety of the honorand’s research interests.
There are many excellent books dealing with Old Turkic, Preclassical and Classical Mongolian and Literary Manchu individually, but none providing in a single volume a comprehensive survey of all the three major Altaic languages. The present volume attempts to fill this gap; at the same time it reviews also the much debated Altaic Hypothesis. The book is intended for use by students at university level as well as by general readers with a basic knowledge of linguistics. The 39 language texts analysed in the volume are discussed within their historical and cultural context, thus vastly enlarging the scope of the purely linguistic investigation.
A corrective to the contemporary idea that Buddhism has always been an environmentally friendly religion In the current popular imagination, Buddhism is often understood to be a religion intrinsically concerned with the environment. The Dharma, the name given to Buddhist teachings by Buddhists, states that all things are interconnected. Therefore, Buddhists are perceived as extending compassion beyond people and animals to include plants and the earth itself out of a concern for the total living environment. In The Buddha's Footprint, Johan Elverskog contends that only by jettisoning this contemporary image of Buddhism as a purely ascetic and apolitical tradition of contemplation can we see the true nature of the Dharma. According to Elverskog, Buddhism is, in fact, an expansive religious and political system premised on generating wealth through the exploitation of natural resources. Elverskog surveys the expansion of Buddhism across Asia in the period between 500 BCE and 1500 CE, when Buddhist institutions were built from Iran and Azerbaijan in the west, to Kazakhstan and Siberia in the north, Japan in the east, and Sri Lanka and Indonesia in the south. He examines the prosperity theology at the heart of the Dharma that declared riches to be a sign of good karma and the means by which spritiual status could be elevated through donations bequeathed to Buddhist institutions. He demonstrates how this scriptural tradition propelled Buddhists to seek wealth and power across Asia and to exploit both the people and the environment. Elverskog shows the ways in which Buddhist expansion not only entailed the displacement of local gods and myths with those of the Dharma—as was the case with Christianity and Islam—but also involved fundamentally transforming earlier social and political structures and networks of economic exchange. The Buddha's Footprint argues that the institutionalization of the Dharma was intimately connected to agricultural expansion, resource extraction, deforestation, urbanization, and the monumentalization of Buddhism itself.
Is the Nag Hammadi Apocalypse of Paul a Valentinian text? Many would say no, few would say yes. The Valentinian Temple brings together all the available evidence to produce a systematic argument in favour of the Apocalypse of Paul’s Valentinian origins. From Valentinus himself to the Gospel of Truth and the Gospel of Philip, this book traces one of the most neglected trajectories in Valentinian Christianity, namely the pursuit of mystical experiences oriented around a heavenly temple. Starting with the divine Name in the fragments of Valentinus, the development of a high-priestly Christology is uncovered across a range of primary sources, culminating in the Gospel of Philip’s temple-based rituals of initiation. The Valentinian Temple argues that it is against this intellectual background that the Apocalypse of Paul ought to be understood. This book will be of interest to experts and students in Gnosticism, Valentinianism, early Christianity, Coptic and biblical literature, and Pauline studies.
In this third volume covering the flourishing period from the third to the eighth century A.D., scholars describe the powerful role played by the Sasanian state in Iran, the Gupta empire in India and the T'ang dynasty in China. Waves of nomadic migrations and the formation of steppe empires left their mark on political and social life. This multiethnic society had its roots in the great religious traditions of Buddhism, Zoroastrianism, Manichaeism, Christianity and Shamanism. The Islamization of a great part of the region brought fundamental changes to all aspects of life. Intensive trade along the Silk Route encouraged cultural and scientific exchanges, making this period one of impressive artistic and intellectual creativity.
Pachomius, who died in 346, has long been regarded as the "founder of monasticism." Available again, Philip Rousseau's careful reading of the available texts reveals that Pachomius's pioneering enterprise has been consistently misread in light of later monastic practices. Rousseau not only provides a fuller and more accurate portrait of this great teacher and spiritual director but also gives a new perspective on the development of monasticism. In a new preface Rousseau reviews the scholarly developments that have modified his views and emphases since the book was published. The result is to make Pachomius an even less assured pioneer, a man likely to have been more involved in the village and urban society of his time than previously thought.
Dans sa deuxieme epitre aux Corinthiens, l'apotre Paul mentionne qu'autrefois il a ete ravi aux cieux, sans donner de details. Cette breve allusion a une ascension celeste a suscite la curiosite de generations de lecteurs, et quelques-uns d'entre eux, voulant combler les lacunes du texte paulien, ont invente leurs propres recits de ce qui s'est passe pendant ce voyage celeste. Un de ces recits, la Visio sancti Pauli, a connu une grande fortune dans l'antiquite tardive et au Moyen-age, et a exerce une influence considerable sur la creation de la Divine comedie de Dante. Il existe d'autres recits analogues, parmi lesquels se trouve l'Apocalypse de Paul conservee dans une version copte, et d'origine gnostique, recit beaucoup plus obscur que la Visio, mais tout aussi fascinant. Son auteur utilise de facon pleinement consciente, la tradition judeo-chretienne des apocalypses d'ascension, une tradition constituee de textes qui racontent l'ascension aux cieux d'un visionnaire. L'Apocalypse de Paul se sert des motifs de cette tradition pour construire son propre recit. La seule copie de cette Apocalypse de Paul qui nous soit parvenue se trouve dans le cinquieme codex de la bibliotheque de Nag Hammadi. D'une importance considerable pour quiconque s'interesse aux ecrits pauliniens ou apocalyptiques, ce texte possede en lui-meme un charme certain. Le present volume contient une nouvelle edition du texte copte, accompagnee d'une traduction francaise, d'une ample introduction, d'un commentaire exhaustif, redige en anglais, et d'index copte et greco-copte; il offre l'analyse la plus complete a ce jour de cet ecrit. L'auteur de commentaire propose de voir dans l'Apocalypse de Paul un ouvrage de propagande valentinien, redige pour convaincre ses lecteurs de la domination du dieu createur, alors que l'auteur de l'introduction adopte un point de vue different.