Mirrors of the Divine: Late Ancient Christianity and the Vision of God by Emily R. Cain
English | February 13th, 2023 | ISBN: 0197663370 | 224 pages | True EPUB | 1.01 MB
Mirrors of the Divine brings into focus how four influential authors of the late ancient world–Tertullian of Carthage, Clement of Alexandria, Gregory of Nyssa, and Augustine of Hippo–employ language of vision and of mirrors in their discursive struggles to construct Christian agency, identity, and epistemology. Early Christian authors described the vision of God through the Pauline verse 1 Corinthians 13:12: "For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face." Yet each author interpreted this verse differently, based on a diverse set of assumptions about how they understood seeing and mirrors to function: does vision occur by something leaving or entering the eye? Is one impacted by seeing or by being seen? Do mirrors offer trustworthy knowledge?