Blasphemy in the Christian World

Download or read book Blasphemy in the Christian World written by David Nash and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2010-09-16 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Tracing the subject from the Middle Ages to the present, David Nash outlines the history of blasphemy as a concept - from a species of heresy to modern understandings of it as a crime against the sacred and individual religious identity. Investigating its appearance in speech, literature, popular publishing and the cinema, he disinters the likely motives and agendas of blasphemers themselves, as well as offering a glimpse of blasphemy's victims. In particular, he seeks to understand why this seemingly medieval offence has reappeared to become a distinctly modern presence in the West.