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This paper intends to make an important contribution to the studies of religious utopianism by considering religions as comprehensive utopian systems which have an ontological and a social utopian mode. It argues that the ontological mode/utopia is related to human finality and that its fantastical content, abstractness and ontological Othering undermine the transformative powers of left religious social utopianism, while it encourages pernicious social Othering in religious fundamentalism. The article has four sections. In Section 1, it clarifies the definition of utopia on which the paper relies and the reasons for this particular choice. Section 2 discusses the religious ontological utopia and religions as utopian systems and utopian programs. Section 3 utilises E. Bloch's considerations about concrete and abstract utopias to explain the reasons for the incapacity of politically left orientated religious utopianism to function as a revolutionary force. Finally, the Section 4 discusses the way religious fundamentalism employs social Othering as a way of defending the universality of its ontological vision against competing religious and pseudo-religious universals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Deuteronomy 23:3, says: "No ... Moabite may enter the assembly of the Lord". This verse is motivated by a discriminatory tendency embedded in the ontology of the Deuteronomist. Interestingly, Deuteronomy 23:3 was used by Ezra-Nehemiah to discriminate against the "Moabites" during the Second Temple. Such ontology is countered by the author of Ruth in the narrative of Ruth during the Second Temple. This demonstrates an ontological "war" within the Bible itself. The primary contestation lies in whether God is exclusive or inclusive. This development necessitates a hermeneutics of suspicion. In the course of history, the "theology" of Deuteronomy has been used to grossly violate the human dignity of many God-fearing African people and many other people of the South for colonial purposes. To exacerbate the situation, there were persistent attempts from some quarters to universalise such a discriminatory biblical perspective. This would feed into the centre–periphery arrangement, with the centre feeding the periphery with such hermeneutics. For this reason, African scholars are implored to be very vigilant against ardent pressures put on the biblical texts by ontological, epistemological, and contextual biases of interpretations. Accordingly, Andrew Mbuvi identifies African Biblical Hermeneutics perfectly when he says it seeks to undo "the very construct of the 'centre-periphery' binary by allowing the possibility of multiple centres"). Kenneth Ngwa, thus, rightly asserts that African Biblical Hermeneutics considers African epistemologies and conditions "to be invaluable and legitimate contexts and resources in biblical interpretation"), drinking from our own wells). In consequence, this paper intends to set a dialogue between Deuteronomy 23:3 and Ruth 4:18–22. This paper aims to examine the understanding of God behind these verses. This paper will then compare the two theologies with the African philosophical concept of God. Harnessing the African concept of Ubuntu, this paper will de-ideologise the two texts and thus will provide a recommendation concerning the two texts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines Richard Jefferies' contribution to the study of nature mysticism. I argue that the study of nature mysticism can be utilized as a valuable source of insight to cultivate a more ecocentric response to the ecological crisis. Historically, the study of mysticism in the West has been shaped by a monotheistic bias that tends to marginalize the teachings of nature mystics. I seek to redress this lacuna in the field by calling attention to the understudied teachings of the English mystic and author, Richard Jefferies. I claim that Jefferies' spiritual autobiography, The Story of My Heart ([1883] 2014) presents a compelling vision of nature mysticism that challenges the reader to reflect critically on conventional understandings of God, body, and time/being. Most significantly, I argue that Jefferies' concept of "soul-life" can be interpreted as an ontological category characterized by an intellectual and moral sensitivity towards the wonders of nature. Jefferies believed that the cultivation of soul-life is transformative and key to unlocking the full potential of our relationship to the earth and each other. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to examine and illustrate how the animistic ontology present in neopaganism allows embodied and sensuous interactions with virtual worlds. By considering animism as a strategy with which to rethink human cohabitation with the techno-digital otherness, I will show how neopagans who use computer technology for spiritual purposes experience the online context as an environment where lived religious practices can occur. To do so, I will particularly focus on religious practices taking place in digital games and 3D social virtual platforms due to their ability to induce immersive and interactive experiences. Because neopaganism recognizes the material living world as a central aspect of spiritual experiences, I will explore the ways that the spatial and material dimensions are articulated in neopagan's online performances, the actions they make possible, and how they enable a more intimate relationship with virtual platforms. I will accompany the theoretical reflection with case studies and interviews with technopagan practitioners experiencing their religion with and within computer technology. This paper also aims to show how this new conception of animism connects to what Mikhail Bakhtin calls "dialogism", a condition that recognizes the multiplicity of perspectives and voices and denies the possibility of not getting involved with the otherness. For such reasons, approaching the digital through an animistic ontology can help us acknowledge the convergence of humans with the techno-digital otherness and explore, on deeper levels, sensuous and embodied experiences taking place in the religious context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In his works on ecological philosophy, Bruno Latour develops an interesting perspective on religion and pluralism. He proposes a new worldview, in which religion is reinterpreted in view of a Gaian philosophy. He extends 'pluralism' beyond the anthropocentrism that dominates modern humanism. In his book Facing Gaia Latour includes nonhuman beings in a larger community and works towards a larger concept of eco-humanism. In this paper, I try to reconstruct his position by showing that the philosophical foundation for his interpretation of religion could be called 'terrarism' and is to be classified as a form of new materialism. This new interpretation of materialism has postmodernist origins (inspired by Gilles Deleuze), but it is not identical to it, because Latour distances himself from 'postmodernism'. He wants to positively contribute to a new ontology. My point is that Latour's 'terrarist' grounding of religious pluralism obstructs any foundation of transcendence and, finally, congests a really pluralistic ecumene because he still adheres to the postmodernist idea that we should renounce to a unitary principle of being. His ideas on eco-humanism and pluralistic ecumene could gain momentum if we opened ourselves to a more holistic and spiritual way of thinking, retaking Lovelock's conception of Gaia. However, Latour's new-materialistic interpretation of 'animism' can be seen as a positive contribution to a new perspective of the world that definitively sets 'materialism' aside. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper intends to make an important contribution to the studies of religious utopianism by considering religions as comprehensive utopian systems which have an ontological and a social utopian mode. It argues that the ontological mode/utopia is related to human finality and that its fantastical content, abstractness and ontological Othering undermine the transformative powers of left religious social utopianism, while it encourages pernicious social Othering in religious fundamentalism. The article has four sections. In Section 1, it clarifies the definition of utopia on which the paper relies and the reasons for this particular choice. Section 2 discusses the religious ontological utopia and religions as utopian systems and utopian programs. Section 3 utilises E. Bloch’s considerations about concrete and abstract utopias to explain the reasons for the incapacity of politically left orientated religious utopianism to function as a revolutionary force. Finally, the Section 4 discusses the way religious fundamentalism employs social Othering as a way of defending the universality of its ontological vision against competing religious and pseudo-religious universals.

Deuteronomy 23:3, says: “No … Moabite may enter the assembly of the Lord”. This verse is motivated by a discriminatory tendency embedded in the ontology of the Deuteronomist. Interestingly, Deuteronomy 23:3 was used by Ezra-Nehemiah to discriminate against the “Moabites” during the Second Temple. Such ontology is countered by the author of Ruth in the narrative of Ruth during the Second Temple. This demonstrates an ontological “war” within the Bible itself. The primary contestation lies in whether God is exclusive or inclusive. This development necessitates a hermeneutics of suspicion. In the course of history, the “theology” of Deuteronomy has been used to grossly violate the human dignity of many God-fearing African people and many other people of the South for colonial purposes. To exacerbate the situation, there were persistent attempts from some quarters to universalise such a discriminatory biblical perspective. This would feed into the centre–periphery arrangement, with the centre feeding the periphery with such hermeneutics. For this reason, African scholars are implored to be very vigilant against ardent pressures put on the biblical texts by ontological, epistemological, and contextual biases of interpretations. Accordingly, Andrew Mbuvi identifies African Biblical Hermeneutics perfectly when he says it seeks to undo “the very construct of the ‘centre-periphery’ binary by allowing the possibility of multiple centres”). Kenneth Ngwa, thus, rightly asserts that African Biblical Hermeneutics considers African epistemologies and conditions “to be invaluable and legitimate contexts and resources in biblical interpretation”), drinking from our own wells). In consequence, this paper intends to set a dialogue between Deuteronomy 23:3 and Ruth 4:18–22. This paper aims to examine the understanding of God behind these verses. This paper will then compare the two theologies with the African philosophical concept of God. Harnessing the African concept of Ubuntu, this paper will de-ideologise the two texts and thus will provide a recommendation concerning the two texts.

The occurrence of the term σχήμα in Phil 2:7d is analyzed in comparison with two other crucial Pauline occurrences: 1 Cor 7:31 and Phil 3:21 (here as a semanteme included in the verb μετασχηματίσει). This comparative study aims to provide a revision of the current interpretation of the word as designating the outward, sensory, accidental appearance in which Christ's human nature was manifested to those who dealt with him. This traditional reconstruction is unsatisfactory in two respects: (1) it is tributary to a substantialist ontology that identifies corporeality as a mere spatial extension, unrelated to historicity and (2) it is fraught with highly problematic theological, potentially docetic, implications. As an alternative, the term σχήμα is here interpreted within the framework of the great Pauline theology of history: as a temporal–eschatological marker designating the peculiar temporal state of transience and suffering corruptibility inherent in physicality and corporeal life. This change also clarifies the conceptual articulation of σχήμα with the parallel expression μορφὴν δούλου. According to this interpretation, contrary to the prevailing view, the locution "slave form" does not designate 'the' or 'one' 'human form' but the 'creature form', as cosmic submission to temporal finitude. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Literature, this paper argues, is a privileged language that can give form to those specters of existence that resist the traditional ontological boundaries of being and non-being, alive and dead. This I describe as the "hauntology" of literature. Literature, unlike our everyday, referential language, is not obliged to refer to a determinable reality, or to sustain meaning. It can therefore be viewed as a negation of the world of things and sensible phenomena. Yet it gives us access to vivid and sensory rich worlds. The status of this literary world, then, is strangely in-between; its ontology is not present and fixed, but rather quivering or ghostlike. The "I" that speaks in a literary text never coincides with the "I" of the writing subject, rather they haunt each other. This theoretical understanding is based on texts by Jacques Derrida and Maurice Blanchot. The paper also draws an analogy between this spectral dynamic of literature and an understanding of religious faith or belief. Belief relates to that which cannot be ontologically fixed or verified, be it God, angels, or spirits. Literature, because it releases and sustains this ontological quivering, can transmit the ineffable, the repressed and transcendent. With this starting point, I turn to Toni Morrison's book Beloved (1987) and to Beloved's strange, spectral monologue. By giving literary voice to the dead, Morrison releases literature's hauntology to express the horror that history books cannot convey, and that our memory struggles to contain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article addresses a critical problem in the history of South Asian philosophy, namely the nature of the 'knowledge of knowledge' (svasaṃvedana). In particular, it investigates how the Śaiva tantric school of the Pratyabhijñā (10th-11th c. CE) used the notion as an argument against the Buddhists' ideas on the nature of the self. The paper then considers the possibility that the source of the Śaivas' discussion was the work of the philosopher/grammarian Bhartṛhari (5th c. CE). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper engages with predominantly Eastern Orthodox thinkers in reassessing the conditions under which sacred art may be possible today. The sacred has both ontological and cultural aspects. An artwork is sacred, firstly, by virtue of partaking of transcendent realities; and secondly, by being embedded in a worldview which allows the work to be made and received as sacred. Drawing on the thought of Philip Sherrard, the paper suggests that current conditions are characterised by cultural forgetting and the loss of such a metaphysical worldview. This paper proposes that the possibilities of sacred art must be rediscovered from within the practices of particular arts; and that this goes hand in hand with the rediscovery of a sacred ontology and of a Christian understanding of freedom. The paper will follow David Bentley Hart in affirming a theological understanding of freedom—as the orientation towards, and the attainment of communion with, ontological goods—against the prevalent postmodern and ultimately nihilistic notion of freedom as spontaneous volition. It is crucial, therefore, to also identify those transcendent goods towards which art may fruitfully be directed. In this light, the paper proposes the need to revise our concepts of matter, form, and, above all, beauty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A Sepik myth tells of a time in which women were in charge of powerful spirits before jealous men reversed the gender roles by force. Today, the men of Timbunmeli (Nyaura, West Iatmul) have lost control over spirits who have started to act through female bodies. Christian charismatic rituals hint at mythical times, and remind villagers that women are the original custodians of spirits now understood as being spirits of God. While previously, male bodies represented spirits in shamanic rituals and through male ritual regalia, now women are the predominant recipients of God's gifts. This paper analyzes the current religious practices as onto-praxis in relation to the local concept of personhood and the relational ontology informing the Nyaura's lifeworld. Building on Strathern, Bird-David, and Gell's theories about the personhood of humans and things from an anthropology of ontology perspective and adding a gender perspective to the discussion, this paper argues that dividuality put into practice has not only informed the way the Nyaura have made charismatic Christianity their own, but is also central for understanding current events impacting gender relations in which material objects representing spirits play a crucial role. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the Eucharist is attested four times (Matthew 26:26–29; Mark 14:22–25; Luke 22:15–20; 1 Corinthians 11:23–26) in the New Testament, only two (Luke and 1 Corinthians) out of the four instances bespeak of commemorating this event ("Do this in remembrance of me"). Limiting the discussion to Mark's iteration of this event, Mark's version does not command to remember; rather he focuses on the ontological ("This is my body/blood"). This paper follows Stephen D. Moore's vegetal reading of the Johannine Jesus (Gospel Jesuses and Other Nonhumans) that invites and acknowledges the animacy of the vegetal in affectively re-engaging the identity of the messiah. That is, (processed) plants/food are not there just to be symbolically equated with the body and blood of the messiah. They re-animate and re-define the nature of messiahship. This paper utilizes Jane Bennett's vital materialism, Bruno Latour's actants, and Michael Marder's vegetality in arguing that Mark vegetally reconfigures the ontology of the messiah in the Eucharist/Last Supper scene (14:22–25). Deleuze and Guattari's concept of assemblage will assist in elaborating how the vegetal could dismantle anthropocentric understanding of ontology. By doing so, this paper opens up the possibility to reimagine a messiah who finds his identity with the vegetal or those that are considered dispensable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many readers of the Dao De Jing have identified an ontology associated with the text. In such ontological readings, the term dao 道 is taken to refer to some type of monolithic, eternal, abstract fundamental reality. They generally point to certain chapters of the text as supporting this interpretation. The implication seems virtually theological, at least in the impersonal "Advaitic Brahman" sense. However, if we carefully examine the passages to which such proponents refer as evidence of this position, it becomes clear that these chapters are metaphorical rather than metaphysical. I propose to examine several of these chapters to clarify the tentative and rhetorical nature of their expression. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses Zhuangzi's metaphysical theory from the standpoint of a form of structural ontology that was developed by neurophilosopher Northoff and which differs from typical studies of Zhuangzi's metaphysics. According to Nossoff's world–brain relationship, a structural positivism based on relationships, the body is nested in the world and the brain is nested in the body. Northoff contends that elements of Eastern philosophy support this viewpoint. I have examined three aspects of Zhuangzi's philosophy by interpreting his texts: the existence of a world independent from the subject and mind, the subject and mind dependent on the world, and the coexistence of differentiation and inclusiveness between the world and the subject. The problem this article attempts to address is how Zhuangzi achieved a Copernican revolution within the framework of non-reductive neurophilosophy, bringing about a shift away from non-anthropocentrism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

After his conversion in 1263, and following a vision on Mount Randa in 1273, Ramon Llull adopted a trinitarian view of the world. At the same time, he found his purpose in missionary activity, seeking to convert Christians, Muslims, and Jews to the Catholic faith. He also wanted to serve this purpose through his books. The trinitarian ontology that these books presuppose can be seen in his understanding of relations. Llull's trinitarianism begins with the Augustinian tradition's trinitarian understanding of the world. The basis of his trinitarian ontology lies in his understanding of correlatives, one of his most original contributions to the thought. Together with relative principles and the doctrine of God's Dignities as absolute principles, these form the basis of his doctrine of Art, the art of combining elements. Trinitarian ontology also appears in his analysis of human's relationship with God, in his dynamic definition of human being, and in the structure of the composition of human being. This article will show that trinitarian ontology is a presupposition of Ramon Llull's vision of the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article compares the relational anthropologies of Martin Luther and Martin Buber and suggests that both thinkers presuppose a notion of creative dialogue. This notion captures the understanding in the Hebrew Bible of the world as created and sustained through God's utterance and, thus, of reality as spoken and human existence as reliant upon dialogue with God. It argues that this common grounding led Luther and Buber to suggest anthropologies that focus on relation rather than substance, on the role of language, and on creative dialogue as the kernel of sound interpersonal relationships, which articulate the human relationship with God. The perception of reality as constituted through dialogical relationships made them both question the prevailing philosophical ontology of their time: in Luther's case, Aristotelean substance ontology, and in Buber's case, Kantian subject–object dualism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Charles Babbage's Analytical Engine can be recollected as a fossilized image of the first digital computer. It is essentially distinguished from all prior and analog computers by the transcription of the 'mechanical notation', the separation of the mnemonic 'store' from the cybernetic 'mill', and the infinite miniaturization of its component parts. This substitution of finite space for an accelerating singularity of time creates the essential rupture of the digital, in which a singular calculation of mechanical force stands opposed to the universal totality of space. Babbage's criticism of Christian doctrine to preserve the mathematical consistency of mechanics and computing would result in the collapse of the Christian Trinity into a digital theology. This Arian subordinate difference of the Son to the Father would then be infinitely transcribed in a technical contradiction that would threaten to annul the metaphysical ground of any machine. Against digital and postdigital theologies alike, this rupture can only be repaired by a dialectical analysis of the digital into a hyperdigital grammar, which is created by Christ the Logos in a trinitarian ontology of computers. Digital computers can thus be vindicated from theological suspicion as incarnationally accelerated calculators of the sacraments, or 'sacramental engines' of the digital age. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Through a case study of pastoralists in the Limi valley of north-western Nepal, this article revisits the notion of domestication with regards to Limey pastoral practice. Taken in its etymological sense, of "making part of one's home" (domus), domestication could be seen to draw a line between the inside and the outside. Yet, in Limi, these lines are blurred and shifting in nature: those that are a part of the home are not defined ontologically but relationally. Beyond strictly human–animal relations, domestication is here extended to involve politics and moralities of human differences such as gender and age, politics of relations to spiritual entities, and politics of nature. In Limi, pastoral practice inserts humans in a constellation of relations of co-domestication governed by religious precepts and gender norms, conceived as foundational to multispecies coinhabitation. Domestication is not a solely anthropogenic process but a composition of multiple—including nonhuman—agencies. And yet, pastoralism, as it is practiced today, also contributes to creating a space of hybridity and fluidity of social and ontological boundaries—between women and men, humans and livestock, domestic and wild animals, land and spiritual entities. This article, through a case study of Limey pastoralists' gendered relation with herds and an animated landscape, adds to the understanding of domestication as not merely the domination of the human over the non-human but as an art of multispecies coinhabitation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article addresses a critical problem in the history of South Asian philosophy, namely the nature of the ‘knowledge of knowledge’ (svasaṃvedana). In particular, it investigates how the Śaiva tantric school of the Pratyabhijñā (10th–11th c. CE) used the notion as an argument against the Buddhists’ ideas on the nature of the self. The paper then considers the possibility that the source of the Śaivas’ discussion was the work of the philosopher/grammarian Bhartṛhari (5th c. CE).

After groundbreaking work by multiple archaeologists in the latter half of the 20th century, caves in the Maya world are currently acknowledged as fundamentally ritual rather than domestic spaces. However, a more nuanced read of the anthropological literature and conversations with Indigenous collaborators in the past and present pushes us to move still farther and see caves not as passive contexts to contain ceremonies directed elsewhere but animate beings with unique identities and personalities in their own right. This article combines archaeological, ethnohistoric, and ethnographic documentation of Maya cave use in central Guatemala to build a foundation for examining caves as living beings, with particular attention played to the role they play as active agents in local politics and quotidian life. Through ritual offerings, neighboring residents and travelers maintain tight reciprocal relationships with specific caves and other geographic idiosyncrasies dotting the landscape to ensure the success of multiple important activities and the continued well-being of families and communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Van Gordon et al. outline the classification of their Ontological Addiction Theory (OAT), including its aetiology and treatment. In this review article I will from an appreciative perspective question some of its fundamental assumptions by presenting an alternative view on the ontology of 'the person', as distinct from its presently assumed conventional conflation with a contracted separate egoic self. I will propose this view as structurally and ethically significant for the 'embodied' experience of a reconstructed "dynamic and non-dual self", as cultivated in their treatment. Rather than this reconstructed self simply being socially desirable for functional purposes, I will underscore the meaning-generative case for ontological status, in the absence of which, a pervasive 'sense of lack' is evident, with all attendant individual, psychological, social, ecological and ethical implications. This article brings a developmental psychology perspective to bear in appreciating 'personhood' as an emergent, progressively realised and is thus similarly aligned with the intent of OAT in overcoming egoic addictive suffering. This mapping of the territory however populates a blind spot in OAT's diagnosis by affirming unique personhood, a quality of 'integrative presence', meaningfully understood as a psycho-spiritual ontological reality. It offers, as with OAT's stated intent, the merit of avoiding attendant mental health and developmental pitfalls, which can beset what we may discern as an implicit transcendental reductionist assumption operative in OAT, where 'the many' are reduced to 'the One' and there are, it is assumed, no real many. This framing is resonant with the lived experience of healthy 'individuation', a process distinct from the problematic phenomenon of 'individualism', evidenced by the empirical data on post-conventional human development, which potentially provides diagnostic markers for any optimal treatment discernment. It is also attuned to what many recognise as a contemporary Fourth Turning in Buddhism, in its conscious evolutionary recognition of the emergence in non-dual states of a 'unique personal perspective', and/or a relative individuation within the whole. This differentiation has formerly been interpreted through an 'impersonal' lens as an egoic holdover, and potentially inhibits ethical action in the world, as distinct from the ethical import and potential fruits stemming from the ontological affirmation of the person. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Both Buber and Heidegger develop a notion of responsivity—in terms of dialogue regarding the former, and correspondence in the case of the latter—not merely as different types of discourse, but as transcendental structures in a relational or fundamental ontology. However, the responsive register is also transmitted on a different frequency; one that begins from elsewhere, not in a transcendental a priori, but in a transcendent address. Through a focused reading of Buber and Heidegger, I argue that responsivity not only takes place across the transcendental–transcendent divide, but shapes the ontological makeup of such a divide. In short, the ontological conditions of dialogue are negotiated, in turn, through dialogue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most Native American groups believed in a form of animism in which spirit essence(s) infused forces of nature (e.g., the wind and thunder), many living plants and creatures, and many inanimate objects. This animism created other-than-human persons in which spirits were fused with matter that allowed them to interact with and even influence humans. Art in Western culture tends to denote "imagination", and many scholars studying Native American art bring a similar perspective to their analyses. However, many Native Americans do not equate art with imagination in the same way, but instead use art to realistically portray these other-than-human persons, even when they are not typically visible in the natural world (e.g., the Southwestern horned-plumed serpent). Here, we apply a cognitive framework to evaluate the interplay of spirits at various levels that were created as Casas Grandes artisans used art as a means of depicting the inherent structure of the Casas Grandes spirit world. In doing so, they created links between ceremonially important objects such as pots and spirits that transformed these objects into newly created animated beings. The art thus simultaneously reflected the structure of the unseen world while also helping to determine the characteristics of these newly created other-than-human persons. One technique commonly used was to decorate objects with literal depictions of spirit beings (e.g., horned-plumed serpents) that would produce a natural affinity among the ceremonial objects and the spirit creatures. This affinity in turn allowed the animated ceremonial objects to mediate the interaction between humans and spirits. This approach transcends a view in which Casas Grandes art is considered symbolically significant and instead emphasizes the art as a component that literally helped create other-than-human collaborators that aided Casas Grandes people as they navigate ontologically significant relationships. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The following article is an exploration of supernal dreaming, a type of dream that engages the dreamer as a profound, participatory, and often revelatory event. Dream types are not well developed in dream research; this article contributes to the development of a more typological approach to dream analysis. Four dream types are presented and contextualized with reference to their metaphysical and ontological significance. The types discussed are normative-rational dreams, mythic-imaginal dreams, psychic-intuitive dreams, and supernal-transpersonal dreams. The various types are illustrated with examples from the author's extensive dream journal in order to highlight the subtle distinctions between the dream types, and how they might intersect or overlap. The dream morphology is placed within a larger context of metatheory based on the ontological significance of agency and its relationship, through dreaming, to a sentient cosmology. This cosmology is based on a creative, process-based metaphysics, in which dreams function to sustain and promote human development. Dreaming is presented as a visionary capacity leading to new enactive and embodied ways of life. The article shows how dreams can act as a stimulus for ontological insights and become a basis for paranormal perceptions and an inspirational approach to dream actualization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The cultural and spiritual repository of religion is an indispensable resource for shaping public and cultural life in a post-secular era. Although the floods of culturally intrigued 'pilgrims' and spiritually 'captivated' tourists have marked religious sites on nationwide cultural maps, religious sites have yet to achieve a holistic interpretative experience which will reveal the deeper meanings of ecclesiastical art. The absence of 'holistic interpretations' from European Christian churches, addressing the tangible and intangible (faith) aspect of Christian tradition, run the risk of undermining both the cognitive and emotive aspects of visitors. Following a thematic analysis on interpretations found at Orthodox, Catholic and Protestant churches in Europe, this article investigates how religious sites adapt different interpretational strategies to communicate their stories. The findings are discussed with reference to heritage practices found at religious sites expressed through two coexisting cultural ideologies: the prominent postmodern cultural paradigm, expressed through New Museology, and the religious cultural paradigm, expressing religious tradition and vision. The research concludes that the more content a denomination appears to be over the postmodern cultural paradigm of New Museology, the more likely it is to experiment with postmodern interpretative strategies. In this context, the article raises the question of whether museum theory is applicable to religious settings. The bottom line is that stakeholders' ontological presuppositions are the catalyst of how religious history, tradition, and faith, are negotiated and presented in religious settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article is born out of a deep concern for our current ecological crisis and serves as a beginning foundational work for how the Christian tradition can address global climate change. Our current way of being gives precedence to the autonomous individual, whose freedom is characterized by disregard for other creatures. John Zizioulas' communal ontology demonstrates that as the world was created out of God's loving will, it is comprised of relationship. Living into individuation and division is a refusal of this communion with other creatures and God, but the Eucharist serves as the ritual that brings Christians into communion through the remembrance of Christ. Ian McFarland's work on the theology of creation provides the helpful nuance that creaturely movement in communion must include the full diversity of creatures. I then turn to Bruce Morrill's work to demonstrate that the Eucharistic practice must have bearing beyond the walls of the church. It leads practitioners to live into eschatological hope and kenotic service to the world. John Seligman's ritual theory demonstrates that ritual practice can accomplish these goals because it creates a subjunctive 'as-if' world in the face of the world that is perceived as chaotic. Through the continuous practice of the ritual, participants are then formed to live into this subjunctive 'as-if' world without ritual precedence. In this way, the Eucharistic practice can prepare practitioners to live into the kenotic service to a world broken by individuation that has led to global climate change and creaturely destruction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay addresses the topic of place, more specifically it raises the question how and why place is essential for defining the strangeness of the other person. In Levinas' philosophy the Other as stranger is the one whom I welcome to my home and country, i.e., to my place. This essay takes up three interrelated topics: (1) the general notion of place; (2) the ethical notion of place in Levinas' philosophy, contrasted with an ontological notion of place. The deepest significance and virtue of place appears not in my dwelling or my compatibility with being but at the site from which the I is able to welcome the Other. Furthermore, the "ownness" of my place is always contested by the stranger as I have no necessity, no ultimate right to be; (3) the strangeness of the Other in Levinas' philosophy defined not by topology but by vulnerability. To welcome the stranger and give up my place comes from my infinite responsibility for the Other. On the ethical level, the vulnerable face of the Other cannot be objectified and classified. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What might a sense of decolonisation (not)/be? Or, what comes after the logic of the coloniser? This question is at the centre of many debates in South Africa and extends to all countries worldwide who are faced with the challenge of self-determination by rethinking the world we live in after the domination of the world by the so-called “all enclosing Western world-view” incarnated in various oppressive political, economic, social and intellectual practices. The challenge of rethinking the world following the demotion of the West from its centre, as will be argued, is not only for those who are particularly living in a previously colonised world, but also for those who were/ still are in the position of dominance, which is a universal task. It is at this point where the various philosophical traditions meet, more precisely that of continental philosophy of religion and African philosophy. Accordingly, this article seeks to explore the question in two parts by way of an inter-cultural approach. Part one retraces the critique of (a certain) Western metaphysics in terms of its onto-theological constitution. Subsequently, this onto-theological constitution is discussed in relation to the notions of identity and political to outline what a sense of decolonisation might not be, that is a re-enforcement of the logic of the coloniser, which denies the full existence of an-other. In part two, four suggestions are made on what a sense of decolonisation might be in dialogue with Jean-Luc Nancy and Achille Mbembe. The suggestions include a two-sided attitude of reticence/dissidence against falling back into the problematic logic. A move to consider decolonisation as the dis-enclosure of the world, which in turn, opens up a space for an alternative ontology that acknowledges our existence as always being-in-the-word with others. The fourth suggestion concerns the implications of this alternative ontology regarding a non-substantialist notion of identity as mêlée, which is the action of constant struggle within the re-opened space for what it means to live in the world. Finally, it is concluded that the alternative ontology of decolonisation as dis-enclosure implies a universal task of taking responsibility for the reparation of the dignity of the whole of humanity within our shared world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]