David Nash's new study focuses on the development of blasphemy in the Christian world. Tracing the subject from the Middle Ages to the present, he 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.
- ISBN10 661116412X
- ISBN13 9786611164126
- Publish Date 12 July 2007 (first published 1 January 2007)
- Publish Status Active
- Out of Print 17 July 2012
- Publish Country US
- Imprint Oxford University Press
- Format eBook
- Pages 286
- Language English