DEFINITIONS
Ariel Hessayon, “What is Millenarianism?”, CenSAMM/Queen's University Belfast symposium, The Gender of Apocalypse (published 10 Feb. 2016)
Ariel Hessayon on “What is Prophesy and Prophet?”, CenSAMM/Queen's University Belfast symposium, The Gender of Apocalypse (published 10 Feb. 2016)
VIOLENCE
Stuart Wright (read by Eileen Barker), “Factors to Consider in the Trajectory of Violence in Millenarian Movements”, CenSAMM conference on Violence and Millenarian Movements (published 27 April 2017)
Susan Palmer, “Millennial Children & Potential for Violence in Contemporary New Religious Movements”, CenSAMM conference on Violence and Millenarian Movements (published 8 May 2017)
GENDER
Sarah Jane Harvey & Suzanne Newcombe, “Apocalyptic religions and gender - how far can we generalize?”, CenSAMM/Queen's University Belfast symposium, The Gender of Apocalypse (published 9 Feb. 2016)
“This presentation will consider what generalizations could be made from the 198 groups with millennial beliefs – how many do have female leaders? How many have a focus on gender dynamics as a feature of their teachings? Are millennial movements any more prone to violence than other groups? We will make some guesses as to the answers to these questions on the basis of the Inform database and give an overview of some case studies of female-led millenarian new religious.”
Timothy Jenkins, “The prophetic condition and questions of gender”, CenSAMM/Queen's University Belfast symposium, The Gender of Apocalypse (published 9 Feb. 2016)
“I offer a distinction between prophecy and prediction as an aid to thinking about apocalyptic movements, drawing on an analysis of Festinger’s When Prophecy Fails (1956) (see Jenkins 2013). In this analysis, gender distinctions play a significant role, notably in the leadership of the group by a series of women spirit mediums, and in the male-led negotiations of the group’s relations to a wider public through the press. The social scientific description of the group drew on the latter because it matched some of its own presuppositions, leading to the misrecognition of features of the female-led group. In a brief concluding discussion, I ask whether it is possible, following this line of argument, to offer a better description of comparable apocalyptic groups, and whether gender is a key to such a description or simply an indicator.”
Tristan Sturm, “The 'Nature' of the Prophet Woman”, CenSAMM/Queen's University Belfast symposium, The Gender of Apocalypse (published 9 Feb. 2016)
“Women since Descartes have been equated with nature: the irrational, the nurturer, the aggressor, the body. Well before Descartes, however, women have served as mystics, oracles, prophets of the future that are in no way endemic to Christianity. I propose that the predominance of women as soothsayers has a much longer history that is related to seeing them as an irrational and embodied part of nature. They are positioned between the world of a pure god and humans therefore better channelling the mystical forces of god(s).”
ANGELS, HEAVEN AND HELL
“Angels”, In Our Time (BBC Radio 4, 24 March 2005)
“Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the heavenly host of Angels. George Bernard Shaw made the observation that "in heaven an angel is nobody in particular", but there is nothing commonplace about this description of angels from the Bible's book of Ezekiel: "They had the likeness of a man. And every one had four faces, and every one had four wings. And their feet were straight feet; and the sole of their feet was like the sole of a calf's foot: and they sparkled like the colour of burnished brass...As for the likeness of their faces, they four had the face of a man, and the face of a lion, on the right side: and they four had the face of an ox on the left side; they four also had the face of an eagle." With angels like that, it is easy to see why they have caused so much controversy over the centuries. What part have angels played in western religion? How did they get their halos and their wings? And what are they really: Gods or men?”
Available here
“Hell”, In Our Time (BBC Radio 4, 21 December 2006)
“Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss hell and its representation in literature and the visual arts, through the ages from Ancient Egypt to modern Christianity. Why do certain religions have a Satan figure and others don’t? And why did hell shift from the underworld to here on earth in 20th Century representations? A fiery vault beneath the earth or as Sartre put it, other people - it seems our ideas of hell are inevitably shaped by religious and cultural forces. For Homer and Virgil, it’s a place you can visit and return from, often a wiser person for it. With Christianity it’s a one-way journey and a just punishment for a sinful, unrepentant life. Writers and painters like Dante and Hieronymus Bosch gave free rein to their imaginations, depicting a complex hierarchical world filled with the writhing bodies of tormented sinners. In the 20th century hell can be found on earth in portrayals of war and the Holocaust but also in the mind, particularly in the works of TS Eliot and Primo Levi. So, what is the purpose of hell and why is it found mainly in religions concerned with salvation? Why has hell proved so inspirational for artists through the ages, perhaps more so than heaven? And why do some ideas of hell require a Satan figure while others don't?”
Available here
Heaven and Hell at the BBC in partnership with the Open University (and featuring Ariel Hessayon):
“A visual journey through hell: What might hell look or sound like? Here's a journey through some interpretations” (7 Dec. 2018)
“A visual journey through heaven: What might heaven look or sound like? Here's a journey through some interpretations” (7 Dec. 2018)
