Eric Nelson

The Greek Tradition in Republican Thought (Ideas in Context)

The founding fathers were rebels against the British Parliament, Eric Nelson argues, not the Crown. As a result of their labors, the 1787 Constitution assigned its new president far more power than any British monarch had wielded for 100 years. On one side of the Atlantic were kings without monarchy; on the other, monarchy without kings.

Monarchy and the American Founding

The Royalist Revolution

This volume in the Clarendon Edition of the Works of Thomas Hobbes contains his translations of Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, edited by Eric Nelson. Hobbes translated the Homeric poems into English verse during the course of the 1670s, when he was already well into his eighties. These texts constitute his most extensive single undertaking, as well as his last major work. Yet, despite the explosion of interest in Hobbes over the last fifty years, this is the first modern critical edition of the Homer translations. Nelson provides extensive annotation detailing Hobbes's interactions with the Greek text of the epics and with other early-modern editions and commentaries, as well a substantial scholarly introduction placing Hobbes's enterprise in the wider context of Restoration politics and poetics. Nelson also offers a detailed analysis of the translations themselves, identifying the numerous instances in which Hobbes rewrites the poems in order to bring them into alignment with his views on politics, rhetoric, aesthetics, and theology. Hobbes's Iliads and Odysses of Homer, Nelson suggests, should be regarded as a continuation of Leviathan by other means. This edition will be fascinating reading for anyone interested in early-modern political philosophy, literature, and classical studies.

The Iliad and the Odyssey

Thomas Hobbes: Translations of Homer

Modern liberal political philosophy is closely associated with post-1945 secularism. But Eric Nelson contends that the liberal tradition founded by John Rawls is an unwitting outgrowth of ancient theological debates about justice and evil. When we understand this, we can better untangle the knotted strands of liberal political thought.

Political Philosophy and the Justice of God

The Theology of Liberalism

You're no idiot, of course. The battle scenes in Gladiator had you on the edge of your seat and wondering where you could find more information on the rise and fall of ancient Rome. But, so far, your search has left you feeling like a blundering barbarian. Pick yourself up off the Colisseum floor! Consult 'The Complete Idiot's Guide to the Roman Empire', a fun-to-read introduction to the fascinating history, people, and culture of Ancient Rome. In this Complete Idiot's Guide, you get: -The history of the Roman Empire's rise and fall. -An idiot-proof introduction to the great epic literature of the Roman Republic. -A survey of the Romans in arts and popular culture. -Fascinating details of some of history's most nefarious emperors, including Nero, Caligula, and Commodus.

Engrossing Stories of Roman Conquest, Palace Intrigue, and the Politics of Empire

The Complete Idiot's Guide to the Roman Empire

Jonathan Wright

This volume explores the conceptualization and construction of sacred space in a wide variety of faith traditions: Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, and the religions of Japan. It deploys the notion of "layered landscapes" in order to trace the accretions of praxis and belief, the tensions between old and new devotional patterns, and the imposition of new religious ideas and behaviors on pre-existing religious landscapes in a series of carefully chosen locales: Cuzco, Edo, Geneva, Granada, Herat, Istanbul, Jerusalem, Kanchipuram, Paris, Philadelphia, Prague, and Rome. Some chapters hone in on the process of imposing novel religious beliefs, while others focus on how vestiges of displaced faiths endured. The intersection of sacred landscapes with political power, the world of ritual, and the expression of broader cultural and social identity are also examined. Crucially, the volume reveals that the creation of sacred space frequently involved more than religious buildings and was a work of historical imagination and textual expression. While a book of contrasts as much as comparisons, the volume demonstrates that vital questions about the location of the sacred and its reification in the landscape were posed by religious believers across the early-modern world.

Eric Nelson

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