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The burden of the flesh : fasting and sexuality in early Christianity
- Author
- Shaw, Teresa M., 1958-
- Title
- The burden of the flesh : fasting and sexuality in early Christianity / Teresa M. Shaw.
- Format
- Book
- Published
- Minneapolis : Fortress Press, ©1998.
- Description
- xi, 298 pages ; 23 cm
- Notes
- Includes bibliographical references (pages 255-284) and index.
- Contents
-
- Ch. 1. Introduction. What Is Asceticism? Fasting in Sources on Early Desert Monasticism. Bodily Practice and Ascetic Theory
- Ch. 2. Philosophy of the Body and Medicine of the Soul: Ethics, Diet, and Sexuality in Late Antiquity. The Moralist Tradition. Diet and the Physiology of Sexual Desire. Ancient Medical Representations of the Female Body
- Ch. 3. The Physiology of Ascetic Fasting. Basil of Ancyra. Gregory of Nyssa. Jerome. John Cassian. Food Deprivation and Sexual Function
- Ch. 4. The Mother of All Vice: Gluttony and the Health of Body and Soul. Gluttony in John Chrysostom's Homilies. Gluttony and the Passions of the Soul in Evagrius of Pontus. Abstinence and the Control of Passion
- Ch. 5. Fasting and the Return to Paradise. Humanity in the "Golden Age" Christian Asceticism and the Return to Paradise. The Body of Paradise
- Ch. 6. Fasting and the Female Body. Ascetic Women and Fasting in Early Christian Sources. Female Flesh and Future Body.
- Review
- "Shaw's rich and fascinating work provides a startling look at early Christian notions of the body - diet, sexuality, the passions, and especially the ideal of virginity - and sheds important light on the growth of Christian ideals that remain powerful cultural forces even today."--Jacket.
- Subject headings
- Fasting--Religious aspects--Christianity--History of doctrines--Early church, ca. 30-600. Chastity--History of doctrines--Early church, ca. 30-600. Women--Religious aspects--Christianity--History of doctrines--Early church, ca. 30-600.
- Kinsey subjects
- Christianity history. Catholic sex ethics. Catholic sex attitudes.
- ISBN
- 0800627652 (pbk. ; alk. paper) 9780800627652 (pbk. ; alk. paper)