IMC 2007: Sessions
Session 1529: Heaven and Hell: Jerusalem and Babylon
Thursday 12 July 2007, 09.00-10.30
Moderator/Chair: | Donna Altimari-Adler, Loyola University Chicago |
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Paper 1529-b | From Babylon to the Civitas diaboli paradigm (Language: English) Index terms: Anthropology, Biblical Studies, Mentalities |
Paper 1529-c | Babylon: The Apocalyptic Enemy in the Carolingian Imagination (Language: English) Index terms: Biblical Studies, Historiography - Medieval, Language and Literature - Latin, Political Thought |
Abstract | Paper a: In the Book of Revelation 21:2 the Paradise is represented as the Holy City of Jerusalem which comes down from heaven from God. In the like manner, Hell was also imagined as city, or rather a mighty unassailable fortress, totally godless, which usually bore the name of Babylon. These ideas were crystallised and further developed in De civitate Dei by the great thinker and theologian of the Western Church, St Augustine of Hippo (350-430). Apart from theology and art his ideas have largely influenced political thought, in Middle Ages as well as in the Renaissance. In the East, the ideas of the two cities were also present and expressed in art, theological and apocryphal writings, and in political thinking. This paper strives to give an overview of the development of the idea of the two symbolic cities both in theology and art, Western, as well as Eastern. |