Books about Ascetics from Amazon.com

Originally published under the title Asceticism and Eroticism in the Mythology of Siva, this book traces the development of an Indian approach to an enduring human dilemma: the conflict between spiritual aspirations and human desires. The work examines hundreds of related myths and a wide range of Indian texts--Vedic, Puranic, classical, modern, and tribal--centering on the stories of the great ascetic, Siva, and his erotic alter ego, Kama..
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"No other author has delved so deeply into the life and work of this complex, influential, and tragic figure of the fourth century and produced such a far-ranging but precise, solidly researched, and eminently readable account . . . Chrysostom emerges as a sympathetic and tragic figure of great integrity, whose human failings contributed and perhaps led to his downfall. . . . Kelly has used a careful analysis of many of John's writings and sermons to present new insights and to confirm details of Chrysostom's life previously considered doubtful; his comments and summaries stimulate one to turn to the originals. Those who are interested in Chrysostom or in this historical period must read this book."--Catholic Historical Review

"A rewarding . . . read as well as a rich mine of historical information. . . . [The book] is peppered with new, revisionist insights about . . . Chrysostom's life."--Bryn Mawr Classical Review

"A monumental achievement, which examines with fairness and thoroughness both the primary sources and continuing scholarship on John and his often-stormy episcopacy in Constantinople."--Christian Century.
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This is the first complete English translation of Evagrius' Greek ascetic writings, based on modern critical editions, and collations of the principal manuscripts. Two appendices provide variant readings for the Greek texts and the complete text of the long recension of Eulogios. The translations are accompanied by a commentary to guide the reader through the intricacies of Evagrian thought by offering explanatory comments and references to other Evagrian texts and relevant scholarly literature..
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Written for lay persons living in the world, this is an excellent resource for daily meditation, spiritual guidance and a revitalized religious life. Succinct yet profound extracts from the Fathers, with commentary..
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This book provides an original and rewarding context for understanding the prolific fourth-century Christian theologian John Chrysostom and the religious and social world in which he lived. Blake Leyerle analyzes two highly rhetorical treatises by this early church father attacking the phenomenon of "spiritual marriage." Spiritual marriage was an ascetic practice with a long history in which a man and a woman lived together in an intimate relationship without sex. What begins as an analysis of Chrysostom's attack on spiritual marriage becomes a broad investigation into Chrysostom's life and work, the practice of spiritual marriage itself, the role of the theater in late antique city life, and the early history of Christianity. Though thoroughly grounded in the texts themselves and in the cultural history of late antiquity, this study breaks new ground with its focus on issues of rhetoric, sexuality, and power.

Leyerle argues that Chrysostom used images and tropes drawn from the theater to persuade religious men and women that spiritual marriage was wrong. In addition to her analysis of the significance of the rhetorical strategies used by Chrysostom, Leyerle gives a thorough discussion of the role of the theater in late antiquity, particularly in Antioch, one of the gems among late antique cities. She also discusses gender in the context of late antique religion, shedding new light on early Christian attitudes toward sexuality. Throughout Leyerle weaves an ongoing conversation with contemporary theory in film and gender studies that gives her study an important analytic dimension..
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Focusing on Christianity, Buddhism and Hinduism, this book argues that asceticism must be understood within the boundaries of tradition It exemplifies a completely new paradigm for comparative religion which seeks to avoid a problematic universalism on the one hand and an area-specific relativism on the other. The volume's original contribution to methodology will be influential in the future development of comparative religious studies..
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Why do we read? Based on a series of lectures delivered at the Historical Society of Israel in 2005, Brian Stock presents a model for relating ascetic and aesthetic principles in Western reading practices. He begins by establishing the primacy of the ethical objective in the ascetic approach to literature in Western classical thought from Plato to Augustine. This is understood in contrast to the aesthetic appreciation of literature that finds pleasure in the reading of the text in and of itself. Examples of this long-standing tension as displayed in a literary topos, first outlined in these lectures, which describes "scenes of reading," are found in the works of Peter Abelard, Dante, and Virginia Woolf, among others. But, as this original and often surprising work shows, the distinction between the ascetic and aesthetic impulse in reading, while necessary, is often misleading. As he writes, "All Western reading, it would appear, has an ethical component, and the value placed on this component does not change much over time." Tracing the ascetic component of reading from Late Antiquity through the Renaissance and beyond, to Coleridge and Schopenhauer, Stock reveals the ascetic or ethical as a constant with the aesthetic serving as opposition, parallel force, and handmaiden, underscoring the historical consistency of the reading experience through the ages and across various media..
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The debut novel about the roots of desire and the enigmatic author of the Kama Sutra that is also an international sensation, with rights sold in six countries

The Kama Sutra is the most widely read treatise on sex ever written, while the man who chronicled all there was to experience between men and women remains a mystery. In The Ascetic of Desire, Sudhir Kakar tells the story of its author, Vatsayana, and his times--the fourth century A.D., considered the golden age of Indian history--in a way that promises to make this debut novel a major literary event.

In Kakar's masterful account, we see Vatsayana through the eyes of his pupil, the son of a Brahmin scholar who is embarking on his first exploration of the sensual life. Vatsayana recounts his own life to the young man, including a childhood spent largely in the brothel where his favorite aunt worked. There Vatsayana gained his first, indelible impressions of sexual artifice and the arousal of desire. Side by side with the unfolding of Vatsayana's life is the story of a young man's coming of age. And at the point where their stories intersect, the unexpected happens.

Like Arthur Golden's Memoirs of a Geisha, Sudhir Kakar's novel is a startling combination of psychological insight and historical background. With rights already sold in six countries, The Ascetic of Desire is the novel people will be talking about this spring..
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Shaping the Future maps out the ascetic practices of a Neitzschean way of life. Hutter argues that Nietzsche's doctrines are attempts and temptations that aim to provoke his free-spirited readers into changing themselves by putting philosophy into practice in their lives..
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