A01=Carol Delaney
Abrahamic religions
Aggression
Animal sacrifice
Anthropologist
Author_Carol Delaney
Bethuel
Category=JHM
Category=QRJ
Category=QRM
Category=QRP
Category=QRVC
Child abuse
Child sacrifice
Child support
Christ
Christian
Christian theology
Christianity
Christianity and Judaism
Church Fathers
Circumcision
Conflation
Crucifixion of Jesus
David Koresh
Deity
District attorney
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eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
eq_society-politics
Exegesis
Gender role
God
God the Father
Greek mythology
Harvard Divinity School
Hebrew Bible
Hermeneutics
Human sacrifice
I Wish (manhwa)
Incest
Infanticide
Islam
Israelites
Jephthah
Jews
Judaism
Jury
Kinship
Masculinity
Midrash
Milcah
Monotheism
Moses and Monotheism
Mother
Muslim
Narrative
New Testament
Obedience (human behavior)
Oedipus complex
Old Testament
On Religion
Origin myth
Painting
Patriarchy
Psychoanalysis
Quran
Religion
Religious text
Rite
Sacrifice
Sacrifice of Isaac (Caravaggio)
Sigmund Freud
Spirituality
Suggestion
Tertullian
Theology
Totem and Taboo
Western culture
Yahweh
Product details
- ISBN 9780691070506
- Weight: 482g
- Dimensions: 152 x 235mm
- Publication Date: 01 Oct 2000
- Publisher: Princeton University Press
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Paperback
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Abraham on Trial questions the foundations of faith that have made a virtue out of the willingness to sacrifice a child. Through his desire to obey God at all costs, even if it meant sacrificing his son, Abraham became the definitive model of faith for the major world religions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. In this bold look at the legacy of this biblical and qur'anic story, Carol Delaney explores how the sacrifice rather than the protection of children became the focus of faith, to the point where the abuse and betrayal of children has today become widespread and sometimes institutionalized. Her strikingly original analysis also offers a new perspective on what unites and divides the peoples of the sibling religions derived from Abraham and, implicitly, a way to overcome the increasing violence among them. Delaney critically examines evidence from Jewish, Christian, and Muslim interpretations, from archaeology and Freudian theory, as well as a recent trial in which a father sacrificed his child in obedience to God's voice, and shows how the meaning of Abraham's story is bound up with a specific notion of fatherhood.
The preeminence of the father (which is part of the meaning of the name Abraham) comes from the still operative theory of procreation in which men transmit life by means of their "seed," an image that encapsulates the generative, creative power that symbolically allies men with God. The communities of faith argue interminably about who is the true seed of Abraham, who can claim the patrimony, but until now, no one has asked what is this seed. Kinship and origin myths, the cultural construction of fatherhood and motherhood, suspicions of actual child sacrifices in ancient times, and a revisiting of Freud's Oedipus complex all contribute to Delaney's remarkably rich discussion. She shows how the story of Abraham legitimates a hierarchical structure of authority, a specific form of family, definitions of gender, and the value of obedience that have become the bedrock of society. The question she leaves us with is whether we should perpetuate this story and the lessons it teaches.
Carol Delaney is Associate Professor in Cultural and Social Anthropology at Stanford University. She has a Master's degree in Theological Studies from Harvard Divinity School and a Doctorate in Cultural Anthropology from the University of Chicago. Her other works include The Seed and the Soil: Gender and Cosmology in Turkish Village Society.
