Religious Iconoclasm

When I visited the Orange County Museum of Art (OCMA), I was mesmerized by the beautiful sculptures, paintings, and many other works of art. This museum introduces many different exhibitions at different times and dates. The exhibition that I chose to visit is called the “Sandow Birk: American Qur’an”. The reason why I was very interested in this type of exhibition was because it displayed Middle Eastern artwork. Another reason was because I am Middle Eastern and that I can relate to it. Although I was so focused on this exhibition only, I did not realize the other works of art. However, as I walked deeper into the museum, another exhibition caught my attention. That exhibition is called the “Olga Lah: Amass and Swell”. If anyone decides to visit the Orange County Museum of Art (OCMA), I would recommend to look online about any appealing exhibitions that are being displayed as well as calling their office to plan a visit. Furthermore, in my opinion, there were some types of art that I did not fully analyze because they were not relatively fascinating as the rest. Moreover, the artworks that I examined displayed unique qualities and their messages were demonstrated in a significant, yet informative way.

Every religion has its own approach to art and architecture. An assessment between different traditions can offer an illuminating insight into the varying religious outlooks and theologies. Architecture, as well as art, is influenced by a number of forces in society, in the environment, in the psychology of the people who produce it, and in different institutions. It is an expression of inner feelings and beliefs and so naturally is influenced by religion in many societies. Religious architecture is created to experience the sacred, to provide a place into which spiritual energies flow and reflect a sense of the divine. Some

In ancient times there was always a main focus or theme to art that was created. Majority of the time this focus was on religion. Religion has inspired many artists to create great paintings, sculpture, and architecture. In this paper, I will focus mainly on religious architecture, beginning with Greece, reflecting on Rome, traveling to Tunisia, and ending in India. Though the structures being covered are different in religion and time period, they all have one thing in common, they are spaces that create a spiritual experience for an individual.

To ensure the safety of your own personal health and the health of your family, it is best to eat a low fat, highly nutritious diet. It is best to do all of your grocery shopping around the outside of the grocery store. The processed and preserved foods being dumped into society, disease, and life-threatening illness became commonplace. Everyone seems to know a person who has lost their life or a loved one to the epidemic caused by poor diet in American culture. There have been movements such as vegetarians and vegans as well as gluten free efforts for people to work on improving themselves from the inside out. However, some of the zealots of any cause can give the actual ideology a bad name. It is important to take care of yourself and your

The museum presents its exhibits in a dark, gloomy atmosphere to show how (according to them) a world ruled by non-believers looks like. As the authors take the reader on a tour through the museum in their book, they pose critical questions that reveal the museum’s exhibits as non-objective. In doing so, the mechanisms and superficial solutions of the museum are exposed. The Wonders of Creation room features videos from animals that should prove that an intelligent designer is behind them: A bird is equipped with wings because its design should enable it to fly. Its beauty and complexity, according to the exhibit, reveals the creator behind it. Here, the authors stop and ponder several questions, e.g.: If the bird and its wings stand for beauty, and the whole creation is based on it – what about ugliness? Does ugliness result from sin (and what is considered to be ugly)? The flaws in the museum’s line of argumentation (omission of information, subjective presentation of topics and exhibits) become entirely

Chris Carron is the director of collections at the museum. Carron said the goal of the exhibit was to help children understand their own religion and their friend’s religion. Children after seeing the exhibit will better understand why other people dress certain ways or celebrate different holidays. The Museum wants “to talk about religion without telling people what they should believe of even that they should believe,”

The Zealots were known for their passionate commitment to Jewish religious and political freedom: the Zealots formed a party dedicated to evicting the Romans from Palestine (Harris, 2014). The Zealots did not constitute an identifiable political party until after the revolt against Roman began in 66 CE; the Zealots’ blind nationalism launched the Palestinian Jews on a suicidal course (Harris, 2014). This catastrophe and the later bar Kochba rebellion of 132-135 CE discredited both the Zealot party and its apocalyptic hope of divine intervention in achieving national liberation (Harris, 2014). Thanks to the Zealot features, both armed rebellion and end of the world predictions were henceforth repudiated by mainstream Judaism (Harris, 2014).

I think that it is not rational to be a religious exclusivist. In the contemporary world, religions are diversified, and we have numerous religions with each one insisting on being the right and true religion. Although for instance, in some places like Islamic dominated regions there are still other religions who have different opinions on the manner they worship. People adopt any religion through coincidence. Additionally, beliefs rely on one’s faith and one must not disapprove other people’s beliefs founded on their faith. Believing that your faith is the true one while other adherent’s faith is wrong like what religious exclusivists do is wrong because it is a religious and cultural intolerance and arrogance. On that note, all religious

“I’d rather you shoot at tin cans in the backyard, but I know you’ll go after birds. Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit ‘em, but remember it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird”(90). Atticus Finch, a guide mentor of the novel, explains this to his children after they are gifted with air rifles for Christmas. Notably, the title of this American classic, To Kill A Mockingbird, by Harper Lee, is taken from a seemingly insignificant excerpt. However, if read carefully, the reader begins to understand that this is just one other example out of a plethora of symbolism. Set in a Depression-era Southern town, Lee features various themes, though the novel focuses on various forms of prejudice. It brings forth the idea that prejudice, in

An object placed on display behind a glass case inside a museum would hold a vastly different meaning if it were for sale by a street vendor, such as the individuals who set up their tables only a few feet away from the Met. Brent Plate in Religion, Art, and Visual Culture argues that “objects obtain different meanings in different locations and historical settings.” The different meanings that objects are able to obtain is attributed to the relationships that are established between the object itself and the environment that it is located in. These relationships often involve the kind of audience that a museum attracts, where the work is exhibited, and how the exhibit is laid out. Museums subsequently have the ability

In Liberal Civic Education and Religious Fundamentalisms, Macedo presents the controversies between liberal civic education and religious diversity. As seen in the Mozert v Hawkins case, the school (representing Hawkins) implemented a reading program that require students from Christian families to read text that went against their religious views (471). Mozert argued that family should allow their children to opt out of the reading program to prevent exposures that undermines their religion. Although it can be argued similar to the Amish cases that opting out should be a viable option, Macedo’s argument that implementation of the reading program is valid because exposure allows for the developing tolerance toward diversity. The controversial

Sarah Benson explains this concept when she claims that, “The scientific age is an age where we come to know the world as a picture,” and that this poses a threat to understanding other cultures because, “[This age is] an age that equates looking with knowing.” Falling into this habit of likening looking with knowing causes viewers to inadequately understand what makes historical monuments important, such as the Pyramid of Kukulcan. This creates a false interpretation of the value of worldly monuments, which is harmful to the process of understanding other cultures. In addition to a false interpretation, we lose the authentic details that make another culture so unique. Through this lack of detail, artists appropriate other cultures by numbing down the details of monuments, which are so intricately interwoven into other culture’s identities. This process of translation leads to orientalism—viewing ideals from the eastern cultures through the eyes of westernized norms. In this sense, the western-world loses empathy towards foreign cultures because they are only exposed to their own previously created stereotypes that are continuously translated through various art

The whole essay argues that visual culture isn’t something that the Church should be afraid of, but rather embrace. It allows believers to dive deeper into the Word and experience faith in a different, more visual way than before.

When reading both of these articles the one that really stood out to me in terms of interest was the article Women & Islam: The rise and rise of convert. This article really stood out to me because of the staggering statistics about how many of the converts was women. During the last decade 100,000 Britons have converted to Islam from their previous religion and seventy percent of the converts were women (Peppiatt 1). This statistic is up from the previous decade which only 60,000 Britons had converted (Peppiatt 1). It is so curious to why there is such an increase in the number of converts into the religion of Islam and why so many of them are women. In the article it

Trace the origin of the law of blasphemy and explain the relevance or otherwise of this law