Stephen D. Moore - Böcker

The impact of Gilles Deleuze on critical thought in the opening decades of the twenty-first century rivals that of Jacques Derrida or Michel Foucault on critical thought in the closing decades of the twentieth. The "Deleuze and..." industry is in overdrive in the humanities, the social sciences, and beyond, busily connecting Deleuzian philosophy to everything from literature to architecture, metaphysics to mathematics, ethics to physics, sexuality to technology, and ecology to theology. What of Deleuze and the Bible? What does the Bible become when it is plugged into the Deleuzian corpus? An immense affective assemblage, among other things. And what does biblical criticism become in the process? A practice of close reading that is other than interpretation and renounces the concept of representation. Not just for those already familiar with the work of Deleuze, the book begins with an extended introduction to Deleuzian thought. It then proceeds to unexegetical explorations of five successive themes: Text (how to make yourself a Bible without Organs, and why); Body (why there are no bodies in the Bible, and how to read them anyway); Sex (a thousand tiny sexes, a trillion tiny Jesuses); Race (Jesus and the white faciality machine); and Politics (democracy, despots, pandemics, ancient prophets). Cumulatively, these explorations limn the fluid contours of a Bible after Deleuze.

What does Jesus say and do within the narrative worlds of the New Testament gospels that, through the ages, enabled innumerable gory horrors and immense systemic violences to be perpetrated with his presumed permission? That is the question driving this book. Its compound title, Jesusviolence, simultaneously denotes: first, the violences inflicted on the gospel Jesuses in their narrative worlds; second, the violences enacted by the gospel Jesuses in their narrative worlds; and third, certain of the violences enacted in Jesus's name in our histories and worlds. The book's investigation of Jesusviolence extends over a spectrum ranging from the spectacularly visible--most notably, the ultraviolent spectacle that was Roman crucifixion--to the systemically invisible, which is to say structural, sanctioned, or sanctified violence, encapsulated in such gospel sayings as "The poor you always have with you" and "Are you [humans] not of more value than [nonhuman animals]?" Entangled with class- and species-related stratgems of systemic violence in and after the gospels are sex/gender-related stratagems, and race/ethnicity-related stratagems, the latter epitomized by the whitening of the gospel Jesus(es). A religio-cultural by-product of European colonialism, this white Jesus still towers over much of the globe. The book also conducts an iconoclastic interrogation of representation, the foundational concept for all previous scholarship on biblical violence, arguing that it is a distantiating concept inadequate for engaging with the visceral nature and immediacy of violence. Inspired by affect theory, non-representational theory, and other related currents of thought, this book is more interested in what gospel texts do than what they mean--not least when what they do, or cause to be done, is violent.

"What is the lesson of that other, newly sprung tree (the cross) in whose bark Mark has carved his Gospel (for this is a book that bleeds)? Is it that Jesus's body, grafted onto the cross, became one with it, and thus became tree, branch, book, and leaf, inscribed with letters of blood, can now at last be read, no longer an indecipherable code but an open codex? And that in its (now) re(a)d(able) ink, lately invisible, the message that was scratched into the fig tree is transcribed: outside the gates, but only just, the summer Son is shining in full strength?"--Stephen D. MooreIn this book Stephen D. Moore offers a dazzling new reading of the Gospels of Mark and Luke, applying the poststructuralist techniques of Derrida, Lacan, and Foucault to illuminate these texts in a way that no one has done before. Written with wit and a sensitivity to words--and wordplay--that is reminiscent of Moore's fellow countryman James Joyce, the book is also deeply learned, impressive in its detailed knowledge of previous scholarship as well as in the challenges it presents to that scholarship.Moore argues that whereas the language of the Gospels is concrete, pictorial, and often startling, the language of modern gospel scholarship tends to be propositional and abstract. Calling himself a New Test-what-is-meant scholar, he approaches the Gospels of Mark and Luke as though they were pictograms or dreamwork to decipher and interpret, writing a response that is no less visceral and immediate than the biblical texts themselves.

Postcolonial studies have recently made significant inroads into biblical studies, giving rise to numerous conference papers, articles, essays and books. "Postcolonial Biblical Criticism" is the most in-depth and multifaceted introduction to this emerging field to date. It probes postcolonial biblical criticism from a number of different but interrelated angles in order to bring it into as sharp a focus as possible, so that its promise - and potential pitfalls - can be better appreciated. This volume carefully positions postcolonial biblical criticism in relation to other important political and theoretical currents in contemporary biblical studies: feminism; racial/ethnic studies; poststructuralism; and Marxism. Alternating between hermeneutical and exegetical reflection, the essays cumulatively isolate and evaluate the definitive features of postcolonial biblical criticism. Such a mapping of postcolonial biblical criticism as a whole has never before been undertaken in such explicit and detailed terms. The contributors include Roland Boer, Laura E. Donaldson, David Jobling, Tat-siong Benny Liew, Stephen D. Moore and Fernando F. Segovia.

Postcolonial studies has recently made significant inroads into biblical studies, giving rise to numerous conference papers, articles, essays and books. 'Postcolonial Biblical Criticism' is the most in-depth and multifaceted introduction to this emerging field to date. It probes postcolonial biblical criticism from a number of different but interrelated angles in order to bring it into as sharp a focus as possible, so that its promise - and potential pitfalls - can be better appreciated. This volume carefully positions postcolonial biblical criticism in relation to other important political and theoretical currents in contemporary biblical studies: feminism; racial/ethnic studies; poststructuralism; and Marxism. Alternating between hermeneutical and exegetical reflection, the essays cumulatively isolate and evaluate the definitive features of postcolonial biblical criticism. Such a mapping of postcolonial biblical criticism as a whole has never before been undertaken in such explicit and detailed terms. The contributors include Roland Boer, Laura E. Donaldson, David Jobling, Tat-siong Benny Liew, Stephen D. Moore and Fernando F. Segovia.

This study guide explores the origins and reception history of the Book of Revelation and its continuing fascination for readers from both religious and secular backgrounds. Stephen D. Moore examines the transcultural impact Revelation has had, both within and beyond Christianity, not only on imaginings of when and how the world will end, but also on imaginings of the risen Jesus, heaven and hell, Satan, the Antichrist, and even Mary the mother of Jesus.Moore traces Revelation’s remarkable reception through the ages, with special emphasis on its twentieth and twenty-first century appropriations, before resituating the book in its original context of production: Who wrote it, where, when, why, and modelled on what? The study guide culminates with a miniature commentary on the entire text of Revelation, weaving together liberationist, postcolonial, feminist, womanist, queer, and ecological approaches to the book in order to discern what it might mean for contemporary readers and communities concerned with issues of social justice.

God's Beauty Parlor opens the Bible to the contested body of critical commentary on sex and sexuality known as queer theory and to masculinity studies. Through a series of dazzling rereadings staged not only in God's beauty parlor, but also in God's boudoir, locker room, and war room, the author pursues the themes of homoeroticism, masculinity, beauty, and violence through such texts as the Song of Songs, the Gospels, the Letter to the Romans, and the Book of Revelation.He ponders such matters as the curious place of the Song of Songs in the history of sexuality, or how an apparent paean to male-female love became a pretext for literary cross-dressing for legions of male Jewish and Christian commentators; Jesus' face and physique in relation to ideologies of beauty, ranging from the patristic era, when the "earthly" Jesus was regularly represented as ugly, to the contemporary global culture industry, with its trademark equation of looks with worth; the gendered and sexual substratum of Paul's doctrine of salvation embedded in his most influential epistle—not least his gendering of righteousness as masculine and sin as feminine; and the intimate imbrication of masculinity and mass death in Revelation, a book about war making men making war-making men . . . some of whom also happen to be gods. God's Beauty Parlor is an exhilarating attempt to bring some of the most significant currents in contemporary gender studies to bear on a text that, even in the post-Christian West, remains the ultimate cultural icon, cipher, and shibboleth.

God's Beauty Parlor opens the Bible to the contested body of critical commentary on sex and sexuality known as queer theory and to masculinity studies. Through a series of dazzling rereadings staged not only in God's beauty parlor, but also in God's boudoir, locker room, and war room, the author pursues the themes of homoeroticism, masculinity, beauty, and violence through such texts as the Song of Songs, the Gospels, the Letter to the Romans, and the Book of Revelation.He ponders such matters as the curious place of the Song of Songs in the history of sexuality, or how an apparent paean to male-female love became a pretext for literary cross-dressing for legions of male Jewish and Christian commentators; Jesus' face and physique in relation to ideologies of beauty, ranging from the patristic era, when the "earthly" Jesus was regularly represented as ugly, to the contemporary global culture industry, with its trademark equation of looks with worth; the gendered and sexual substratum of Paul's doctrine of salvation embedded in his most influential epistle—not least his gendering of righteousness as masculine and sin as feminine; and the intimate imbrication of masculinity and mass death in Revelation, a book about war making men making war-making men . . . some of whom also happen to be gods. God's Beauty Parlor is an exhilarating attempt to bring some of the most significant currents in contemporary gender studies to bear on a text that, even in the post-Christian West, remains the ultimate cultural icon, cipher, and shibboleth.

Postcolonial theology has recently emerged as a site of intense intellectual and political energy and has taken its place in the interdisciplinary field of postcolonial studies. This volume is animated by the conviction that postcolonial theology is now ready for a second, deeper phase of engagement with postcolonial theory, one that moves beyond the general to the specific. No critic has been more emblematic of the challenging and contested field of postcolonial theory than Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak. In this volume, the product of a theological colloquium in which Spivak herself participated, theologians and biblical scholars engage with her thought in order to catalyze a diverse range of original theological and exegetical projects. The volume opens with a "topography" of postcolonial theology and also includes other valuable introductory essays. At the center of the collection are transcriptions of two extended public dialogues with Spivak on theology and religion in general. A further dozen essays appropriate Spivak's work for theological and ethical reflection. The volume is also significant for the larger field of postcolonial studies in that it is the first to focus centrally on Spivak's immensely suggestive and vital concept of "planetarity."

Postcolonial theology has recently emerged as a site of intense intellectual and political energy and has taken its place in the interdisciplinary field of postcolonial studies. This volume is animated by the conviction that postcolonial theology is now ready for a second, deeper phase of engagement with postcolonial theory, one that moves beyond the general to the specific. No critic has been more emblematic of the challenging and contested field of postcolonial theory than Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak. In this volume, the product of a theological colloquium in which Spivak herself participated, theologians and biblical scholars engage with her thought in order to catalyze a diverse range of original theological and exegetical projects. The volume opens with a "topography" of postcolonial theology and also includes other valuable introductory essays. At the center of the collection are transcriptions of two extended public dialogues with Spivak on theology and religion in general. A further dozen essays appropriate Spivak's work for theological and ethical reflection. The volume is also significant for the larger field of postcolonial studies in that it is the first to focus centrally on Spivak's immensely suggestive and vital concept of "planetarity."

A turn to the animal is underway in the humanities, most obviously in such fields as philosophy, literary studies, cultural studies, and religious studies. One important catalyst for this development has been the remarkable body of animal theory issuing from such thinkers as Jacques Derrida and Donna Haraway. What might the resulting interdisciplinary field, commonly termed animality studies, mean for theology, biblical studies, and other cognate disciplines? Is it possible to move from animal theory to creaturely theology?This volume is the first full-length attempt to grapple centrally with these questions. It attempts to triangulate philosophical and theoretical reflections on animality and humanity with theological reflections on divinity. If the animal–human distinction is being rethought and retheorized as never before, then the animal–human–divine distinctions need to be rethought, retheorized, and retheologized along with it. This is the task that the multidisciplinary team of theologians, biblical scholars, philosophers, and historians assembled in this volume collectively undertakes. They do so frequently with recourse to Derrida's animal philosophy and also with recourse to an eclectic range of other relevant thinkers, such as Haraway, Giorgio Agamben, Emmanuel Levinas, Gloria Anzaldua, Helene Cixous, A. N. Whitehead, and Lynn White Jr.The result is a volume that will be essential reading for religious studies audiences interested in ecological issues, animality studies, and posthumanism, as well as for animality studies audiences interested in how constructions of the divine have informed constructions of the nonhuman animal through history.

A turn to the animal is underway in the humanities, most obviously in such fields as philosophy, literary studies, cultural studies, and religious studies. One important catalyst for this development has been the remarkable body of animal theory issuing from such thinkers as Jacques Derrida and Donna Haraway. What might the resulting interdisciplinary field, commonly termed animality studies, mean for theology, biblical studies, and other cognate disciplines? Is it possible to move from animal theory to creaturely theology?This volume is the first full-length attempt to grapple centrally with these questions. It attempts to triangulate philosophical and theoretical reflections on animality and humanity with theological reflections on divinity. If the animal–human distinction is being rethought and retheorized as never before, then the animal–human–divine distinctions need to be rethought, retheorized, and retheologized along with it. This is the task that the multidisciplinary team of theologians, biblical scholars, philosophers, and historians assembled in this volume collectively undertakes. They do so frequently with recourse to Derrida's animal philosophy and also with recourse to an eclectic range of other relevant thinkers, such as Haraway, Giorgio Agamben, Emmanuel Levinas, Gloria Anzaldua, Helene Cixous, A. N. Whitehead, and Lynn White Jr.The result is a volume that will be essential reading for religious studies audiences interested in ecological issues, animality studies, and posthumanism, as well as for animality studies audiences interested in how constructions of the divine have informed constructions of the nonhuman animal through history.

Sexual Disorientations brings some of the most recent and significant works of queer theory into conversation with the overlapping fields of biblical, theological and religious studies to explore the deep theological resonances of questions about the social and cultural construction of time, memory, and futurity. Apocalyptic, eschatological and apophatic languages, frameworks, and orientations pervade both queer theorizing and theologizing about time, affect, history and desire. The volume fosters a more explicit engagement between theories of queer temporality and affectivity and religious texts and discourses.

Religion, Emotion, Sensation asks what affect theory has to say about God or gods, religion or religions, scriptures, theologies, and liturgies. Contributors explore the crossings and crisscrossings between affect theory and theology and the study of religion more broadly, as well as the political and social import of such work.Bringing together affect theorists, theologians, biblical scholars, and scholars of religion, this volume enacts creative transdisciplinary interventions in the study of affect and religion through exploring such topics as biblical literature, Christology, animism, Rastafarianism, the women's Mosque Movement, the unending Korean War, the Sewol ferry disaster, trans and gender queer identities, YA fiction, queer historiography, the prison industrial complex, debt and neoliberalism, and death and poetry.Contributors: Mathew Arthur, Amy Hollywood, Wonhee Anne Joh, Dong Sung Kim, A. Paige Rawson, Erin Runions, Donovan O. Schaefer, Gregory J. Seigworth, Max Thornton, Alexis G. Waller

Religion, Emotion, Sensation asks what affect theory has to say about God or gods, religion or religions, scriptures, theologies, and liturgies. Contributors explore the crossings and crisscrossings between affect theory and theology and the study of religion more broadly, as well as the political and social import of such work.Bringing together affect theorists, theologians, biblical scholars, and scholars of religion, this volume enacts creative transdisciplinary interventions in the study of affect and religion through exploring such topics as biblical literature, Christology, animism, Rastafarianism, the women's Mosque Movement, the unending Korean War, the Sewol ferry disaster, trans and gender queer identities, YA fiction, queer historiography, the prison industrial complex, debt and neoliberalism, and death and poetry.Contributors: Mathew Arthur, Amy Hollywood, Wonhee Anne Joh, Dong Sung Kim, A. Paige Rawson, Erin Runions, Donovan O. Schaefer, Gregory J. Seigworth, Max Thornton, Alexis G. Waller

For this volume, sequel to The Bible in Three Dimensions, the seven full-time members of the research and teaching faculty in Biblical Studies at Sheffield-Loveday Alexander, David Clines, Meg Davies, Philip Davies, Cheryl Exum, Barry Matlock and Stephen Moore-set themselves a common task: to reflect on what they hope or imagine, as century gives way to century, will be the key areas of research in biblical studies, and to paint themselves, however modestly, into the picture. The volume contains, as well as those seven principal essays, a 75-page 'intellectual biography' of the Department and a revealing sketch of the 'material conditions' of its research and teaching, together with a list of its graduates and the titles of their theses.