Utilising Giorgio Agamben’s concepts of homo sacer and drawing from political theory, philosophy, and psychoanalysis, this book creates a theoretical framework from which to analyse interpretations of Genesis 4:1-16 and to propose an alternative reading of the Biblical text that incorporates other texts inside and outside the Biblical canon.
Do you know a Cain at work? The back-stabbing liar who steals credit for your ideas... The a**-kissing co-worker who worries about "face time" while you stay late working hard... The gossipy colleague who spreads rumors just to create drama in the office. If any of these people sound familiar, watch out: a Cain is lurking, ready to sabotage your job, your promotion, and even your reputation at work. Written by two veteran media and political strategists, Cain and Abel at Work will help you survive the ultimate political arena—the office—and prepare you for the real-world interpersonal dynamics they don't teach you in business school. In the Old Testament story that serves as the beginning metaphor for this book, backstabbing Cain kills the honorable Abel out of jealousy, and despite being punished with banishment, he goes on to marry, have a son, and build a city around him. All of a sudden, Cain gets to be a father, real estate developer, and probably the first politician of his day, while Abel's life is over in a flash. Authors Gerry Lange and Todd Domke have discovered that this type of injustice is still alive and well in the modern competitive workplace. Together, they have decades of personal experience and first-hand encounters with scheming, calculating Cains, and now they're giving readers an invaluable guide for coping with and combating Cain at work. Using real-life case studies to illustrate how Cains operate, Cain and Abel at Work will teach you how to: Identify the Cains before they make you their victim Recognize the tactics Cains use to gain status and power Win out over Cains without stooping to their level With compelling new insight into human behavior and competition developed from the authors' experience in the political, media, and business arenas, Cain and Abel at Work explains what motivates both Cains and Abels at work. Not only does this book explore and deplore the behavior of Cains, it also explains how the simple naïveté of Abels allows Cains to get away with their shenanigans. If anyone has ever stolen an idea from you or grabbed credit for your work, if they've taken advantage of or walked all over you, you need this book. Cain and Abel at Work is an office survival guide no well-intentioned Abel should be without.
Enter the packed courtroom and take your seat as a juror on the Cain v. Abel trial. Soon, the prosecution and defense attorneys (angels from Jewish legend) will call Cain, Abel, Sin, Adam, Eve, and God to the witness stand to present their perspectives on the world's first murder. Great Jewish commentators throughout the ages will also offer contradictory testimony on Cain's emotional, societal, and spiritual influences. As jurors, when we mete out Cain's punishment, must we factor in his family history, psychological makeup, and the human impulse to sin? In this highly eclectic and gripping compilation of insights by Jewish commentators on the Cain and Abel story, courtroom scenes are juxtaposed with the author's commentary, advancing novel insights and introspection. As each of us grapples with Cain's actions, we confront our own darkest traits. If Cain is a symbol for all humanity, what can we do to avoid becoming like him? Furthering this conversation, Rabbi Dan Ornstein includes a discussion and activity guide to promote open dialogue about human brokenness and healing, personal impulses, and societal responsibility.
The NIV is the world's best-selling modern translation, with over 150 million copies in print since its first full publication in 1978. This highly accurate and smooth-reading version of the Bible in modern English has the largest library of printed and electronic support material of any modern translation.
The real Jesus is deeply challenging, something which cannot be said for the stain-glass window figure of Christian imagery. "The Lost Message of Jesus" is written to stir thoughtful debate, to pose fresh questions, perhaps even to shed a little new light and help create a deeper understanding of Jesus and his message.
The idea and practice of sacrifice play a profound role in religion, ethics, and politics. In this brief book, philosopher Moshe Halbertal explores the meaning and implications of sacrifice, developing a theory of sacrifice as an offering and examining the relationship between sacrifice, ritual, violence, and love. On Sacrifice also looks at the place of self-sacrifice within ethical life and at the complex role of sacrifice as both a noble and destructive political ideal. In the religious domain, Halbertal argues, sacrifice is an offering, a gift given in the context of a hierarchical relationship. As such it is vulnerable to rejection, a trauma at the root of both ritual and violence. An offering is also an ambiguous gesture torn between a genuine expression of gratitude and love and an instrument of exchange, a tension that haunts the practice of sacrifice. In the moral and political domains, sacrifice is tied to the idea of self-transcendence, in which an individual sacrifices his or her self-interest for the sake of higher values and commitments. While self-sacrifice has great potential moral value, it can also be used to justify the most brutal acts. Halbertal attempts to unravel the relationship between self-sacrifice and violence, arguing that misguided self-sacrifice is far more problematic than exaggerated self-love. In his exploration of the positive and negative dimensions of self-sacrifice, Halbertal also addresses the role of past sacrifice in obligating future generations and in creating a bond for political associations, and considers the function of the modern state as a sacrificial community.
The story of Cain and Abel narrates the primeval events associated with the beginnings of the world and humanity. But the presence of linguistic and grammatical ambiguities coupled with narrative gaps provided translators and interpreters with a number of points of departure for expanding the story. The result is a number of well established and interpretive traditions shared between Jewish and Christian literature. This book focuses on how the interpretive traditions derived from Genesis 4 exerted significant influence on Jewish and Christian authors who knew rewritten versions of the story. The goal is to help readers appreciate these traditions within the broader interpretive context rather than within the narrow confines of the canon.
For Regina Schwartz, we ignore the dark side of the Bible to our peril. The perplexing story of Cain and Abel is emblematic of the tenacious influence of the Bible on secular notions of identity - notions that are all too often violently exclusionary, negatively defining "us" against "them" in ethnic, religious, racial, gender, and nationalistic terms. In this compelling work of cultural and biblical criticism, Schwartz contends that it is the very concept of monotheism and its jealous demand for exclusive allegiance - to one God, one Land, one Nation or one People - that informs the model of collective identity forged in violence, against the other.
