• Cite/Export
  Cite/Export

  Copy a citation

  APA (6th ed.)

  

  Chicago (Author-Date, 15th ed.)

  

  Harvard (18th ed.)

  

  MLA (7th ed.)

  

  Turabian (6th ed.)

  

  Export a citation

  Export to RefWorks   Export to EndNote / Reference Manager   Export to EasyBib
  Export to EndNote / Reference Manager(non-Latin)   Cancel

  Note: Citations are based on reference standards. However, formatting rules can vary widely between applications and fields of interest or study. The specific requirements or preferences of your reviewing publisher, classroom teacher, institution or organization should be applied.
• Print
• E-mail
  E-mail

  All fields are required.

  The E-mail Address(es) field is required. Please enter recipient e-mail address(es).

  The E-mail Address(es) you entered is(are) not in a valid format. Please re-enter recipient e-mail address(es).

  You may send this item to up to five recipients.

  Enter recipient e-mail address(es): Separate up to five addresses with commas (,)

  The name field is required. Please enter your name.

  Enter your name: The subject field is required. Please enter the subject. Subject:

  The E-mail message field is required. Please enter the message.

  E-mail Message: I thought you might be interested in this item at http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/978273105 Title: Battling the gods : atheism in the ancient world Author: Tim Whitmarsh Publisher: New York, NY : Alfred A. Knopf, 2015. ISBN/ISSN: 9780307958334 0307958337 9780571279326 0571279325 OCLC:978273105

  
  

  Please verify that you are not a robot.

  Cancel
• Share
• Permalink
  Permalink

  Copy this URL to link to this page:

• Write a review
• Rate this item:
• • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5

Battling the gods : atheism in the ancient world

Author:	Tim Whitmarsh
Publisher:	New York, NY : Alfred A. Knopf, 2015.
Edition/Format:	eBook : Document : EnglishView all editions and formats
Summary:	"How new is atheism? Although adherents and opponents alike today present it as an invention of the European Enlightenment, when the forces of science and secularism broadly challenged those of faith, disbelief in the gods, in fact, originated in a far more remote past. In Battling the Gods, Tim Whitmarsh journeys into the ancient Mediterranean, a world almost unimaginably different from our own, to recover the stories and voices of those who first refused the divinities. Homer's epic poems of human striving, journeying, and passion were ancient Greece's only "sacred texts," but no ancient Greek thought twice about questioning or mocking his stories of the gods. Priests were functionaries rather than sources of moral or cosmological wisdom. The absence of centralized religious authority made for an extraordinary variety of perspectives on sacred matters, from the devotional to the atheos, or "godless." Whitmarsh explores this kaleidoscopic range of ideas about the gods, focusing on the colorful individuals who challenged their existence. Among these were some of the greatest ancient poets and philosophers and writers, as well as the less well known: Diagoras of Melos, perhaps the first self-professed atheist; Democritus, the first materialist; Socrates, executed for rejecting the gods of the Athenian state; Epicurus and his followers, who thought gods could not intervene in human affairs; the brilliantly mischievous satirist Lucian of Samosata. Before the revolutions of late antiquity, which saw the scriptural religions of Christianity and Islam enforced by imperial might, there were few constraints on belief. Everything changed, however, in the millennium between the appearance of the Homeric poems and Christianity's establishment as Rome's state religion in the fourth century AD. As successive Greco-Roman empires grew in size and complexity, and power was increasingly concentrated in central capitals, states sought to impose collective religious adherence, first to cults devoted to individual rulers, and ultimately to monotheism. In this new world, there was no room for outright disbelief: the label "atheist" was used now to demonize anyone who merely disagreed with the orthodoxy--and so it would remain for centuries"--Publisher's description  Read more...
Rating:	(not yet rated) 0 with reviews - Be the first.
Subjects	Atheism -- Greece -- History. Greece -- Religion. Christianity and atheism. View all subjects
More like this	Similar Items