The discipline of embodied cognitive science and associated concept of intercorporeality provide the theoretical framework of our analysis of Proverbs 31:10–31. This essay fleshes out the underlying cognitive and meaning-making processes and entailments inherent in the valiant woman’s use of her hands and body as depicted in the poem. The val…[Read more]

When Jesus humbly washes his disciples’ feet (John 13), he engages his friends up close using the sense of touch. This article explores how his touch conveys a quality of love that no other physical sense can capture. Sensory Anthropology reveals how touch is often overlooked and undervalued but is quite potent. We confronted these dynamics most r…[Read more]

The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs contain nuanced discussions of the nature of sin, which is invariably associated with both demonic forces and the human body. The senses are portrayed as human spirits. These senses, when used inappropriately, can allow the spirits of deceit to overcome a person and lead them to sin. Seeing, tasting and…[Read more]

This working paper presents in full translation four texts of the Uzbek early 20th-century jadid reformist Abdurrauf Fitrat. Identifying educational reform as the main key to progress, he advocated for the emancipation and nationalisation of the Chaghatay/Uzbek language as a tool to educate the masses rather than to serve the interests of a…[Read more]

This essay explores the meaning of the word glōssa, the tongue, in Acts. The focus of my study will be Acts 2:1-13, the Pentecost narrative, where the reader first interacts with tongues of fire and with the experience of glossolalia, speaking in tongues. I read this passage exegetically (but playfully) while I consider the meaning and usage of…[Read more]

The Mandaean proselyte Meryay, best known from her representations in the Canonical Prayerbook, the Great Treasure (Genzā Rabbā), and the Book of John (Drāši d-Yaḥyā), serves as an illuminating example of the sort of figure who partially and ambiguously bridges the interests and concerns of differently constituted religious communities, allowi…[Read more]

The fourth volume of the DH Benelux Journal. This volume includes seven full-length, peer-reviewed articles that are based on accepted contributions to the 2021 virtual DH Benelux conference. Contents: 1. Editors’ Preface (Wout Dillen, Margherita Fantoli, Marijn Koolen, Marieke van Erp); 2. Introduction: The Humanities in a Digital World (Lorella…[Read more]

The performing Arts encompass a wide range of disciplines which are invariably synonymous with creativity, thus, creativity is the hallmark of performance. For the sake of clarity, Performing Arts comprise Theatre Arts, Music, Dance and Choreography and the electronic media of Radio, Television and film commonly referred
to as the audio-visual…[Read more]

This 23-minute presentation at the University of Hyogo in Kobe goes more deeply into the biography of Steve McCarty than appears in his long chapter in the new book A Passion for Japan: A Collection of Personal Narratives. Formative influences discussed include Hermann Hesse’s Siddhartha, Tibetan yoga, and Zen. Places include Boston, the Taos P…[Read more]

New Aesthetics in African Drama and Theatre … is a unique work. It is a valedictory gift to a man who has paid his academic dues, and also a justification of these dues that he has paid. The contributions in the book come from both seasoned eggheads and academic neophytes. The book interrogates the oeuvre of Sam Ukala’s works. it also updates…[Read more]

Scientific diagrams could and did appear in unexpected places. This essay discusses such an example: the diagrams that the thirteenth- to fourteenth-century scholar George-Gregory Chioniades added to a manuscript of John of Damascus’s Fountain of Knowledge as part of his commentary on the text. I argue that the diagrams were a very important, if…[Read more]

This excel file contains structured and formalized data about all surviving and identified early medieval Western manuscripts containing the text of the Etymologiae of Isidore of Seville, fully or partially. It records information about the place of origin, provenance, preservation, the date of origin, material properties, script, content, the…[Read more]

This excel file contains the raw data behind the digital scholarly edition of the glosses to the first book of the Etymologiae of Isidore of Seville published at: https://db.innovatingknowledge.nl/edition

This article reassesses the metaphors found in Isa 49.26a and 63.6 in their historical and socio-religious context of alcohol production. Using interdisciplinary approaches from archaeology and anthropology, traditional interpretations that have emphasised a context of alcohol consumption and drunkenness, rather than wine production, are…[Read more]

This essay examines the Book of Revelation in dialogue with the films of Christopher Nolan, with particular attention to the use of nonlinear narrative. The approach taken to Nolan’s work is that of auteur theory, a pattern theory which traces the distinctive technical and artistic voice of the director across a wide range of films (e.g. M…[Read more]

This article concentrates on the affective impacts of the relationship between the bodies of the father and his daughter in Sirach. It relies on gender studies as well as affect theory to explore how intensities pass from body to body in the biblical text, and also to the bodies of those who read it. The father’s body is marked by gynophobic a…[Read more]