The Puppet and the Dwarf: The Perverse Core of Christianity (Short Circuits)
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- Synopsis
- One of our most daring intellectuals offers a Lacanian interpretation of religion, finding that early Christianity was the first revolutionary collective. Slavoj Žižek has been called "an academic rock star" and "the wild man of theory"; his writing mixes astonishing erudition and references to pop culture in order to dissect current intellectual pieties. In The Puppet and the Dwarf he offers a close reading of today's religious constellation from the viewpoint of Lacanian psychoanalysis. He critically confronts both predominant versions of today's spirituality—New Age gnosticism and deconstructionist-Levinasian Judaism—and then tries to redeem the "materialist" kernel of Christianity. His reading of Christianity is explicitly political, discerning in the Pauline community of believers the first version of a revolutionary collective. Since today even advocates of Enlightenment like Jurgen Habermas acknowledge that a religious vision is needed to ground our ethical and political stance in a "postsecular" age, this book—with a stance that is clearly materialist and at the same time indebted to the core of the Christian legacy—is certain to stir controversy.
- Copyright:
- 2003
Book Details
- Book Quality:
- Publisher Quality
- Book Size:
- 196 Pages
- ISBN-13:
- 9780262261302
- Related ISBNs:
- 9780262740258
- Publisher:
- MIT Press
- Date of Addition:
- 08/14/20
- Copyrighted By:
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology
- Adult content:
- No
- Language:
- English
- Has Image Descriptions:
- No
- Categories:
- Nonfiction, Religion and Spirituality, Psychology
- Reading Age:
- 18 and up
- Submitted By:
- Bookshare Staff
- Usage Restrictions:
- This is a copyrighted book.