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An introduction is presented in which the author explores the articles in the issue on topics including celebration of Irish writing, Christianity in Irish literature and engagement of Irish authors with Catholicism.

Sadie Jones's The Snakes (2019) examines the overlap between secular capitalism and religious thought. Jones contemplates how Christianity and capitalism have shaped the moral economy, blending wealth and virtue to create a modern system of values. The essay first examines the responses of Jones's characters to this system: the protagonist, Bea, renounces her family's fortune to live the life of a saint, whereas her brother Alex sees himself as a sinner, attracted to the annihilation of self in Keats, Rumi, and Weil. The essay's second half focuses on how Jones disrupts this economy by strategically incorporating elements from ancient Greek culture. The Greek gods reject the transactional logic that underpins capitalism, so that not even Bea's virtue can prevent her brutal murder. No amount of credit, moral or financial, can move the amoral sovereignty of the world, as implacable as the rocks and trees Bea contemplates in her final moments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Analyzing the content of the parable of the Grand Inquisitor from Fyodor M. Dostoevsky's novel The Brothers Karamazov allows us to identify the root ideas and consequences of a program for reorganizing society aimed solely at transforming the external material environment. Historical experience has confirmed Dostoevsky's warning that implementing this kind of program requires permanent violence against nature, society, and man. The temptation of the powerful by their own power can be countered by a program for forming social harmony. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A literary criticism of the book "Gulliver's Travels," by Jonathan Swift is presented. Topics discussed include the Christian theme in the book, the loss of faith in the book, the apostasy of Gulliver in the Fourth Voyage, the distinction between Dutch Calvinism and Gulliver's presumptive Anglicanism, and Swift's emphasis on the importance of Gulliver's conversion from Christianity to atheism.

For John Webster, faithful reading of Holy Scripture occurs in the wake of the mortifying and vivifying grace of the triune God. This baptismal movement from death to life is doubly characterized: it refers to, first, the missions of the Word and Spirit to slay and make alive, and, second, the mortifying and vivifying readerly activity of human creatures. As the extension of baptism into the Christian life, the ecclesial task of reading Scripture is a moral‐spiritual undertaking, forming an integral part of the covenantal fellowship between God and creatures. The burden of Webster's teaching, however, calls the significance of Scripture's contingent origins into question; that is, the intrusive, initiatory character of divine grace risks undermining the historicality of Holy Scripture and so the faculty of historical‐critical methods. This article first outlines Webster's theology of scriptural interpretation. Next, it responds to the recent criticism that Webster fails to integrate sufficiently Scripture's theological function as an instrument of divine speech with its contingent, historical character. I show that, far from suspending hermeneutical activity, the baptismal shape of exegesis underwrites a ministerial use of historical and literary tools. Furthermore, the ascetic character of scriptural reading thwarts phenomenalism and naturalism, which, on Webster's view, are forms of idolatry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A story which dramatizes the distinction between the historical reality of Jesus and the 'Christ of faith' has given new life to a once powerful critique of Christian doctrine. Pullman's alternative version of the gospel story can be countered by historical scholarship which shares his non-supernaturalist assumptions, but a theological response which communicates the Christian message of the gospels is also needed. The allegorical interpretation that Pullman's fable invites allows a reading that is compatible with a rational form of traditional Christianity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses Chinua Acebe's 1951 story "In a Village Church." It asserts that the story is an exploration of an on-going process of transforming Christianity into a crucial part of the social and cultural fabric of contemporary African societies across the continent during the mid-twentieth century. Also discussed is the story's depiction of the traditional Igbo culture through the setting, the characters, and the seating arrangement in the church.

This essay argues that a postsecular moment requires our return to George Eliot to consider anew the relations between religion and secularity. Looking at her early works, in particular "Janet's Repentance" (1857) and The Mill on the Floss (1860), I suggest that Eliot offers us a counterintuitive narrative in which her heroines' ethical transformation coincides with a conversion to Christianity rather than a move away from it. Rather than imagining a thoroughly Christian England revitalized by its turn to humanist religion, Eliot depicts a nominally Christian England, attached to hollow forms and mere custom, in need of conversion to an ardent faith. In these novels, evangelicalism, for all its flaws, functions as the vessel for such conversion when human beings' own agency fails. I suggest here that what we have construed as sympathy over recent decades of critical reading may be more intelligible if we read it as grace, thus leaving us to reassess the extent to which major mid-Victorian intellectuals sought to conceive a post-Christian ethics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Focuses on the theme of the silent rhetorician Christian soul in the poem 'Confession Amantis,' by John Gower. Allegory of love; Tales on vice and virtue; Rejection of secular love in favor of Christian love.

ABSTRACT Drawing on Renaissance romances from Ludovico Ariosto's Orlando Furioso to Spenser's Faerie Qveene, the major characters of Samuel Richardson's Clarissa use allegory to frame their lives according to spiritual and metaphysical narratives. While Lovelace recycles Renaissance rape narratives to justify his abuse of Clarissa, Clarissa herself alludes to the Bible and The Faerie Qveene to move from the errors of temporal life to the spiritual wholeness of eternity. Clarissa subsumes Lovelace into her allegory of Christian repentance. She weaves into her epistolary narrative the "pilgrim allegory" of the English Puritans, which shows how error can be used to sanctify the Christian's soul. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The narrative in BT Kiddushin 81b about R. Hiyya bar Ashi tells of a sage who waged a battle with his Urge after he refrained from engaging in sexual relations with his wife. He, however, did not reveal to her the battle being waged within him, but rather pretended to be an 'angel'. When his wife incidentally found it, she disguised herself as a harlot and set out to seduce him. After they had engaged in sexual relations, the rabbi wanted to commit suicide. The traditional readings view R. Hiyya as the hero of the tale. This article claims that the aim of the narrative is to present the rabbi as being carried away by dualistic-Christian conceptions. The article further argues that the topic of the narrative is not sexual relations, but dialogue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A short response to ‘One Christ—Many Witnesses: Vision of Mission and Unity, Edinburgh and Beyond’ by Dana Robert. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article talks about the concept of money in the book "The Female American; or, The Adventures of Unca Eliza Winkfield". Topics discussed include the protagonist converting the natives to Christianity, critics accusing the book of coding imperial plunder and cultural desecration in the name of missionary benevolence, and the author's view that the protagonist reorganized the conditions of her island society so that the fetishizing of gold could be made impossible.

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses various reports within the issue on topics including emotional attachment in relationship with neighbors, considering neighbors as guiding metaphor for creation of literary work and literary work containg Christian approaches.

Offers a stronger argument for Georg Buchmann's contention that the term `Milke' in Lady Macbeth's description of her husband's nature in the drama `Macbeth,' carries Christian resonances. Scriptural passage pointed to by Buchmann; Dispute over the exact implication of `take my Milke for Gall.'

The article focuses on the liturgy for Holy Communion in the book "An Apology Against a Pamphlet Call'ed A Modest Confutation of the Animadversions upon the Remonstrant Against Smectymnuus," by John Milton. Prescription of the liturgy by the established church; Arguments on the expedience of set formes; Common directory of public prayer.

The article provides a different reading of Phillis Wheatley's most often anthologized poem, 'On being brought from AFRICA to AMERICA.' The author uses rhetorics, semiotics, and grammar as reading strategies to reveal Wheatley's rejection of Christianity, her acknowledgement of life before slavery, and her efforts to align her own body with those of other enslaved Africans. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reads Matthew Arnold’s poem “Stanzas from the Grande Chartreuse” in the context of his conflicted attitudes toward Christianity, which are illustrated by an examination of his contradictory view of the Oxford Movement and of the nineteenth-century Roman Catholic revival, in both of which John Henry Newman played a major role. Arnold’s ambivalence can be traced back to the very different influences of his father and his mother, and it reflects a strong emotional, cultural, and even spiritual attachment to Christianity at the same time that he regards existing forms of Christianity as rendered impossible by the critique of the Enlightenment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines the relevance of the conversion of Shylock from Judaism to Christianity and the Easter vigil in William Shakespeare's play "The Merchant of Venice." It argues that Shylock's conversion articulates an unambiguously supersessionist vision of the relations between Jews and Christians. The Easter vigil mediates between Jew, Christian, Protestant and Catholic and suggests both a desire to look past at denominational divide in Pre-Reformist times and the difficulty of doing so.

A literary criticism is presented that examines the depictions of male pacifists in books written by female British authors on the topic of World War I. Topics discussed include the depictions of some of these pacifists as homosexuals, the Christian aspects of pacifism as depicted in the novels, and books including "The Weapon Unsheathed: A Spiritual Adventure" by Theodora Wilson Wilson, "Despised and Rejected" by Rose Allatini, and "Non-Combatants and Others" by Rose Macaulay.

A literary criticism of the novel "Remembering" by Wendell Berry is presented. It outlines the characters and explores the symbolic significance of these characters. The themes of the novel are analyzed which include nightmares, dependence on Christianity, and pagan mythology. An overview of the novel is also given.

William Whiston's translation of The Genuine Works of Flavius Josephus (1737) became the most popular edition of Josephus's works in the English-speaking world--remaining so for well over two hundred and fifty years, with more than three hundred editions printed. Despite its importance, however, Whiston's biographers accorded scant attention to i t-- perhaps because research into the early modern reception of Josephus had scarcely begun. My article seeks to assess the protracted and eccentric manner by which Whiston became Josephus's champion, and how his idiosyncratic reading of the Jewish historian served Whiston's mission to restore "primitive Christianity" to its former glory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

E. Talbot Donaldson's emendation of CT, III 117 to "And of so parfit wis a wrighte ywroughte," not adopted in the recent Variorum volume, rests on insufficiently established evidence. I demonstrate that Donaldson himself retracts crucial aspects of his argument; that Middle English usage shows both ambiguity and significant overlap between the word wight and divine beings (especially the second person of the Trinity); that Chaucer, who adheres to Donaldson's categorical distinction in Troilus, abandons it in the Canterbury Tales; and that various writers in the Christian tradition designate as the Creator (the point at issue in this line) Jesus the Christ: the second person of the Trinity whom it is unambiguously possible to call a wight. Donaldson's emendation remains possible, but the case for making it is much weaker than we have long supposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In an often quoted but imperfectly understood passage in John Milton's Paradise Regain'd, Satan professes to doubt whether the kingdom portended for Christ is 'Real or Allegoric'. This article takes this passage, the only instance of the term allegory in the w hole of Milton's poetry, as a starting point for a reconsideration of Milton's attitude towards the complex and controversial theological, political, and aesthetic issues raised by this term in early modern Protestant culture. Specifically, the article examines the usage of the term in Milton's early prose writings and its abandonment from 1645 onwards; Milton's familiarity with the disputes surrounding Galatians 4:24, a biblical verse of central importance in early modern treatments of the subject; and an overlooked tradition in Protestant commentary according to which allegorical reading was introduced into Christianity by Satan, in order to obscure the true meaning of scripture. Having firmly aligned Milton with the anti-allegorical tendency in Protestant thought, the discussion returns to Paradise Regain'd to demonstrate how this anti-allegorism informs a number of key passages in the poem, and briefly discusses its broader implications for the ongoing debates about the representational mode of Milton's biblical epics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An essay is presented about the depiction of life and death in the Harry Potter book series. It discusses the limited immortality of the character Voldemort as well as his use of Horcruxes to sustain his existence, the escape of the character Harry Potter from death in the presence of a symbol of Christianity and Christ and the paradox of lifedeath as depicted in the meeting of Harry Potter and the dead Professor Albus Dumbledore.

Cormac McCarthy's The Road takes place not before or during but after the end. The novel follows a man and his son as they seek to survive in what remains of the world after some unspecified cataclysmic event. There is almost nothing left: no society, no food, no animals, no hope. Many readers will feel that the question the novel poses is why anyone would wish to continue living under such circumstances. But although that question might be more urgent post-apocalypse, it is in fact one that can always be asked: what, if anything, makes human life valuable and worthwhile? The novel provides answers to these questions, but these answers are contradictory. The reader is left with a choice between powerful arguments for both faith and despair. In The Road, hope is associated with Christianity and hopelessness with an atheistic understanding of the world. Nonetheless, the novel makes it clear that faith is no easy option. This article will begin by discussing the importance of Christian imagery in the novel, focusing on the key symbolic dimensions of fire and darkness, before going on to show how both Christian and atheistic readings are not only made possible, but actively put forward by the text. It will be argued that the novel presents a powerful challenge to both Christian and atheistic views of the world, without ever actually rejecting either. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay examines how the postsecular turn might encourage a reappraisal of the changes in literary form that transpired during the Victorian period. Specifically, I revisit Alton Locke (1850), Charles Kingsley's fictional autobiography of the eponymous "tailor and poet,'' who moves from working class obscurity, to literary notoriety, to political failure and eventual conversion to Christianity. Though often treated as an artistic failure, Alton's abrupt conversion can be read as an effort, on Kingsley's part, to re-present a phenomenon that Victorian studies has only recently brought to light: the spate of famous mid-Victorian radicals who reconverted to Christianity. I argue that the political implications of reconversion during this period, combined with the secularizing pressures of Victorian autobiography account for the novel s messy transformation from a religiously inflected bildungsroman to politically conscious spiritual autobiography. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Friendship in Flannery O’Connor’s world is scarce. Enmity prevails. Yet, in Wise Blood, O’Connor’s adversaries heal each other, as a self-mortifying blasphemer and covetous pagan woman forge a tie that opens a way to God. Drawing on monastic theology, this article traces their relationship from attraction, through intention, to a fruition that participates in divine life. The zeal of their bond further answers the often-heard charges that Wise Blood depicts a fraudulent Christianity that ignores the gospel call to ethical responsibility. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A literary criticism is presented of the early 17th century American book "Thomas Shepard’s Confessions," by Thomas Shepard. Particular focus is given to the Puritan conversion narratives depicted within the book, including in regard to the relationship between the book's portrayal of spiritual hypocrisy and the history of what is referred to as hypocritical rhetoric within Christianity.

A literary criticism is presented on the "Millennium Trilogy," composed of the books "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo," "The Girl Who Played With Fire" and "The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest," by Stieg Larsson. Particular focus is given to the trilogy's themes of the Norse god Thor, Christianity and justice, including in regard to the morality of fictitious character Lisbeth Salander.

The article discusses evangelical tract tales and the relationship between 19th century U.S. fiction and Christian didacticism. Emphasis is given to the narrative, dialogue, and aesthetics of books such as "Robert Dawson; or, The Brave Spirit" by Helen Cross Knight and "Rest for the Weary; or, the Story of Hannah Lee" by Sarah Maria Fry. Other topics include the book "Uncle Tom's Cabin" by Harriet Beecher Stowe and biblical lessons in literature.

In the largely autobiographical text Time Flies, Christina Rossetti constructs a Christian identity for herself based on the integration of mind, body, and environment. By practicing strategies of processing the world derived from the Tractarian movement of 19th-century England, Rossetti gains knowledge of God based on her embodied perspective in relation to the natural environment. This leads her to an ethical view of nature in which she constantly finds evidence of God’s love. Rossetti continually applies this understanding of love as a core belief in order to make meaning of her life. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz uses the tradition of typological interpretation of the Bible, which dates back to St. Paul and St. Augustine, to interpret the ancient pagan authors and the Aztecs cults like obscure or enigmatic allegories of the Christianity. This appropriation of pre-Cristian texts and mythology is not linked to the alleged liberal pluralism of the Creoles, as Octavio Paz raised, nor a supposed cultural mix, as Gruzinski arise. Far from an openness to cultural otherness, his gesture is rather an absorption in the Christian sameness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A review of the article "Shaw's Subversion of Biblical Language" by Gustavo A. Rodriguez Martin, from the book "Godly Heretics: Essays on Alternative Christianity in Literature and Popular Culture," is presented.

Clerical satires with anxious depictions of religious devotion poured forth from British presses in the eighteenth century, a period of conversation about whether secularism and toleration could be seen as the hallmarks of a modern culture. The images in this essay represent this abundant clerical satire; they are drawn from the Lewis Walpole Library holdings at Yale University and were the basis of a gallery show, Sacred Satire, which I co-curated with Cynthia Roman in 2011. Through these images, I illustrate the tension between an understanding of religion as part of a traditional past and of religion as a collection of new evangelical Christian movements and practices including 'human' hymns, evangelical preaching, religious life beyond the parish, 'heart religion' or 'primitive Christianity,' and working-class enthusiasm. Clerical figures such as George Whitefield and John Wesley loom large in the visual satires of modern religion and the implicit questions it raised about the relationship of belief to modernity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An essay on Christian belief in contemporary literature is presented. The author responds to critiques of his essay "Has Fiction Lost Its Faith?" published in the December 23, 2012 issue of "The New York Times Book Review." It critiques literary criticisms of novels including "Someone," by Alice McDermott, "The Road," by Cormac McCarthy and "A Mercy," by Toni Morrison on the relevance of Christian belief and fiction.

An essay on faith and literature is presented. It makes reference to the essay "Has Fiction Lost Its Faith?," by Paul Elie published in "The New York Times Book Review" on December 23, 2012. It analyzes the novel "Someone," by Alice McDermott which found the novel meeting Elie's criteria of the integration of Catholic/Christian faith in fiction.

A relationship between Achilles Tatius and Christianity has been imagined from at least as early as the tenth century when the Suda claimed that he had converted to Christianity and been ordained as a bishop. Modern scholarship has found this highly improbable; nevertheless, attempts to explore connections between his late second-century c.e. novel, Leucippe and Clitophon, and early Christianity continue. In recent decades, within a context of renewed interest in the ancient novel, scholars of early Christianity have found a wealth of material in the novels to illuminate the generic development and meaning of Christian narratives in the New Testament and beyond. Less attention, however, has been given to the ways in which the novels respond to and incorporate themes from Christianity. Achilles Tatius's etiological myth of wine and its associated harvest festival in Leuc. Clit. 2.2 represent a particularly striking point of contact between Christianity and the Greek novel. In the first section below, I systematically review the narrative and ritual parallels between Leuc. Clit. 2.2 and the Christian Eucharist and conclude that they are too striking to be accidental or to have gone unnoticed by an ancient reader with knowledge of Christianity. Although these similarities have been pointed out, their meaning and consequences have received comparatively little attention from scholars either of the novel or of early Christianity. Thus, in the subsequent sections of this study I contextualize these parallels within second-century Christian and non-Christian literary and religious culture. My contention is that an exploration of the relationship between Leuc. Clit. 2.2 and the Christian Eucharist will provide valuable insight both into the larger project of Achilles Tatius and into the relationship between early Christianity and its contemporary context, particularly the Second Sophistic. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Gender bending has been a staple of the medium of shōjo manga, Japanese girls’ comics, as best exemplified by cross-dressing “girl knight” characters and “Boys Love” stories, whose plots focus on romance between effeminate beautiful young men. The imaginary space created through the representation of these figures shares many traits in common with another typical feature of shōjo comics, namely their exoticisation of Europe. Both have been used as simultaneously escapist and subversive strategies, as a refuge from contemporary social norms and a platform for critical reflection. In this article, I aim to problematise our understanding of the connection between gender bending and exoticism in shōjo manga through an analysis of the representation of one specific aspect of European culture – namely, the Christian religion – in the genre of Boys Love manga. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The framework and the characters of Lucian's descriptions of the afterlife, focusing in particular on the decisions of Rhadamanthys as a judge of human beings, show a kind of morality which can be analyzed both from the perspective of traditional Graeco-Roman standards and from that of the new religious contexts of the Roman Empire. Christian apologists, on the other hand, like Tatian in Oratio ad Graecos, insist on distinguishing clearly between the judgment of Rhadamanthys and that of God himself. Both views of the afterlife are influenced by Greek myth and by Plato's manipulation of it. The loss of the ancient function of myth among the pagans and the real presence of Christian issues regarding the afterlife may have caused a writer like Lucian to reflect on the real sense of the afterlife [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Henry Hallywell was a minor Cambridge Platonist who was educated at Christ's College, Cambridge, while Ralph Cudworth was master, and Henry More was a fellow. Hallywell's tutor was George Rust, and he was responsible for preserving and publishing several of Rust's discourses. Hallywell was later associated with Benjamin Whichcote's centre of liberal preaching at St Lawrence Jewry in the City of London. All of Hallywell's writings show the influence of these Cambridge Platonist authors. He accepted Cambridge Platonist ideas on the immortality of the soul, the deiform life, enthusiasm and atheism, the paranormal, millenarianism and the public and private usefulness of rational religion. His special contribution to Cambridge Platonism was his simplified presentation of the circle's main theological themes in his pastoral role as a parish priest. This introduction to Hallywell's published and manuscript writings complements the author's account of his career as a Sussex clergyman, which is published elsewhere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]