1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910463029303321

Autore

Dupuy Jean Pierre <1941->

Titolo

The mark of the sacred / / Jean-Pierre Dupuy ; translated by M.B. DeBevoise

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Stanford, California : , : Stanford University Press, , [2013]

©2013

ISBN

0-8047-8845-6

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (239 pages) : illustrations

Collana

Cultural Memory in the Present

Cultural memory in the present

Altri autori (Persone)

DeBevoiseM. B

Disciplina

201/.7

Soggetti

Religion and sociology

Catastrophical, The

Faith and reason

Holy, The

Electronic books.

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

"Originally published in French under the title La marque du sacré."

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references.

Nota di contenuto

Prologue : the form of the sacred -- Imagining the end : a personal journey -- Science : a theology in spite of itself -- Religion : natural vs. supernatural -- Rationality and ritual : the Babylon lottery -- Justice and resentment : corruption of the best -- The nuclear menace : a new sacrament for humanity -- Epilogue : variations on vertigo.

Sommario/riassunto

Jean-Pierre Dupuy, prophet of what he calls "enlightened doomsaying," has long warned that modern society is on a path to self-destruction. In this book, he pleads for a subversion of this crisis from within, arguing that it is our lopsided view of religion and reason that has set us on this course. In denial of our sacred origins and hubristically convinced of the powers of human reason, we cease to know our own limits: our disenchanted world leaves us defenseless against a headlong rush into the abyss of global warming, nuclear holocaust, and the other catastrophes that loom on our horizon. Reviving the religious anthropology of Max Weber, Emile Durkheim, and Marcel Mauss and in dialogue with the work of René Girard, Dupuy shows that we must remember the world's sacredness in order to keep human violence in



check. A metaphysical and theological detective, he tracks the sacred in the very fields where human reason considers itself most free from everything it judges irrational: science, technology, economics, political and strategic thought. In making such claims, The Mark of the Sacred takes on religion bashers, secularists, and fundamentalists at once. Written by one of the deepest and most versatile thinkers of our time, it militates for a world where reason is no longer an enemy of faith.