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Mirrors of the Divine examines four early Christian authors--Tertullian of Carthage, Clement of Alexandria, Gregory of Nyssa, and Augustine of Hippo--and analyzes their writings on vision and knowledge of God to show how they envisioned one's relationship to the world and how they imagined the unknown. Emily R. Cain explores how contradictory theories of sight shaped their cosmologies, theologies, subjectivities, genders, and discursive worlds, and shows that early Christian arguments about the phenomenon of visual perception are deeply intertwined with broader debates about identity, agency, and epistemology.
List of contents
- Preface and Acknowledgements
- INTRODUCTION
- CHAPTER 1: "Now We See": Scientific and Scriptural Sight
- CHAPTER 2: Tertullian of Carthage: A Visual Hierarchy of Beards and Veils
- CHAPTER 3: Clement of Alexandria: Seeing God Through a Cataract Darkly
- CHAPTER 4: "Through a Mirror": (Im)Moral, Magical, and Metaphorical Mirrors
- CHAPTER 5: Gregory of Nyssa: Perpetual Perception
- CHAPTER 6: Augustine of Hippo: The Paradox of Perception
- CHAPTER 7: "In an Enigma": Reflections on Reflection
- CONCLUSION
About the author
Emily R. Cain received her Ph.D. in History of Christianity in 2016 from Fordham University, where she specialized in Christianity in Late Antiquity. She is currently an Assistant Professor of History of Christianities at Loyola University Chicago.
Summary
Mirrors of the Divine brings into focus how four influential authors of the late ancient world--Tertullian of Carthage, Clement of Alexandria, Gregory of Nyssa, and Augustine of Hippo--employ language of vision and of mirrors in their discursive struggles to construct Christian agency, identity, and epistemology. Early Christian authors described the vision of God through the Pauline verse 1 Corinthians 13:12: "For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face." Yet each author interpreted this verse differently, based on a diverse set of assumptions about how they understood seeing and mirrors to function: does vision occur by something leaving or entering the eye? Is one impacted by seeing or by being seen? Do mirrors offer trustworthy knowledge?
Spanning the second through fourth centuries CE in both Eastern and Western Christianity, Mirrors of the Divine analyzes these four authors' theological writings on vision and knowledge of God to explore how contradictory theories of sight shaped their cosmologies, theologies, subjectivities, genders, and discursive worlds. As Emily R. Cain demonstrates, how the authors portray eyes reveals how they envisioned one's relationship to the world, while how they portray mirrors reveals how they imagined the unknown. Both have dramatic impacts on how one interprets what it means to see God through a mirror dimly. She shows that arguments about the phenomenon of visual perception are deeply intertwined with broader debates about identity, agency, and epistemology, and uncovers some of the most self-conscious ways that late ancient Christians thought of themselves, their worlds, and their God.
Additional text
Cain situates Mirrors of the Divine as an excellent starting point for scholars of each of these authors, regions, eras and themes.
