“Then He Stabbed Me with a Spear”: Aggressive Sacred Images and Interreligious Polemics
This paper studies Coptic communal identity in early Islamic Egypt by analyzing two hagiographical narratives from the Christian Copto-Arabic text The History of the Patriarchs of Alexandria. The narratives relate incidents of sacred images that become ‘aggressive’ when they retaliate against insult...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
2022
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| In: |
Method & theory in the study of religion
Year: 2022, Volume: 34, Issue: 1/2, Pages: 86-104 |
| Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains: | B
Taʾrīḫ baṭārikat al-Kanīsa al-Miṣrīya
/ Egypt
/ Copts
/ Islam
/ Interfaith dialogue
/ Christian art
/ Polemics
/ Social identity
/ History 704-767
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| IxTheo Classification: | AD Sociology of religion; religious policy BJ Islam CC Christianity and Non-Christian religion; Inter-religious relations CE Christian art KAD Church history 500-900; early Middle Ages KBL Near East and North Africa KCD Hagiography; saints |
| Further subjects: | B
interreligious polemic
B Islamic Egypt B Sacred images B History of the patriarchs B Christian-Muslim engagement |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Summary: | This paper studies Coptic communal identity in early Islamic Egypt by analyzing two hagiographical narratives from the Christian Copto-Arabic text The History of the Patriarchs of Alexandria. The narratives relate incidents of sacred images that become ‘aggressive’ when they retaliate against insults. Although the relation between religious violence and sacred art has merited much scholarly attention, the focus is usually on humans as the aggressors and sacred art as the victim. The reverse is scarcer, and its rarity means we miss an opportunity to rethink such narratives as communicative modes of rhetoric to be contextually interpreted. Here I argue that these aggressive sacred images were tools of power within a polemic religious discourse aimed at proclaiming divine truth, undergirding it with supernatural power, and ultimately shaping Coptic communal identity around this discourse. |
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| ISSN: | 1570-0682 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Method & theory in the study of religion
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1163/15700682-12341532 |