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After Lives
A Guide to Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory
John Casey
480 pages
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10 black and white halftone illustrations
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233x154mm
978-0-19-509295-0
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Hardback
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07 January 2010
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- A fascinating exploration of ideas of life after death, ranging from ancient times to the present, and from religion and philosophy to literature and science
- One of the most comprehensive scholarly works available today on a great variety of approaches to heaven and hell
- A refreshingly insightful critical analysis on topics usually treated with dry objectivity
One of the most profound, deeply affecting questions we face as human beings is the matter of our mortality—and its connection to immorality. Ancient animist ghost cultures, Egyptian mummification, late Jewish hopes of resurrection, Christian eternal salvation, Muslim belief in hell and paradise all spring from a remarkably consistent impulse to tether a triumph over death to our conduct in life.
In After Lives, British scholar John Casey provides a rich historical and philosophical exploration of the world beyond, from the ancient Egyptians to St. Thomas Aquinas, from Martin Luther to modern Mormons. In a lively,
wide-ranging discussion, he examines such topics as predestination, purgatory, Spiritualism, the Rapture, Armageddon and current Muslim apocalyptics, as well as the impact of such influences as the New Testament, St. Augustine, Dante, and the Second Vatican Council. Ideas of heaven and hell, Casey argues, illuminate how we understand the ultimate nature of sin, justice, punishment, and our moral sense itself. The concepts of eternal bliss and eternal punishment express—and test—our ideas of good and evil. For example, the ancient Egyptians saw the afterlife as flowing from ma'at, a sense of being in harmony with life, a concept that includes truth, order, justice, and the fundamental law of the universe. "It is an optimistic view of life," he writes. "It is an ethic that connects wisdom
with moral goodness." Perhaps just as revealing, Casey finds, are modern secular interpretations of heaven and hell, as he probes the place of goodness, virtue, and happiness in the age of psychology and scientific investigation.
With elegant writing, a magisterial grasp of a vast literary and religious history, and moments of humor and irony, After Lives sheds new light on the question of life, death, and morality in human culture.Readership: Students and scholars of comparative religion, especially the afterlife
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John Casey, Fellow and Tutor, Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge
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"Students of the religious drama will find interesting background material for the Harrowing of Hell and Doomsday pageants, and useful speculation regarding medieval attitudes to the afterlife, in John Caseys entertaining whistle-stop tour of conceptions of post-mortem punishment and reward in cultures from ancient Egypt to the present." - Greg Walker, Years Work in English Studies "Casey is a well-read and sure-footed guide, with a keen analytic mind and a neat turn of phrase...I look forward to rereading much of this at leisure." - Philip Johnstone, Journal of Semitic Studies "wide ranging and thought-provoking...One of the most striking features of the book is its willingness to grasp what is
morally or spiritually positive in each of a wide range of conflicting positions." - Noel Malcolm, The Tablet "Casey is an acute historian." - James Wood, The London Review of Books
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PART 1
Prologue
1: AFTER LIVES
2: EGYPT
3: MESOPOTAMIA AND ISRAEL
4: GREECE AND ROME
5: THE CHRISTIAN BEGINNINGS
6: DANTE: INFERNO
7: PREDESTINATION: AUGUSTINE TO CALVIN AND BEYOND
8: THE DECLINE OF HELL
Part II
9
HEAVEN
10: HEAVEN: EGYPT, MESOPOTAMIA, ISRAEL
11: BODIES FLESHLY AND SPIRITUAL
12: DANTE: PARADISO
13: CELESTIAL PLEASURES: RENAISSANCE AND
REFORMATION HEAVENS
14: HEAVENLY SPECULATIONS
15: HEAVEN SEEN AND HEARD: SWEDENBORG
16: WITH EASY INTERCOURSE PASS TO AND FRO
17: SCORING IN HEAVEN
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The specification in this catalogue, including without limitation price, format, extent, number of illustrations, and month of publication, was as accurate as possible at the time the catalogue was compiled. Occasionally, due to the nature of some contractual restrictions, we are unable to ship a specific product to a particular territory. Jacket images are provisional and liable to change before publication.
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