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[German Version] I. Old Testament The motif of the tree of life (םייִּחַהַ ץעֵ/ ʿeṣ haḥayyîm), a variation of the id…

[German Version] I. Ancient to Pre-Roman Times – II. From Roman Times I. Ancient to Pre-Roman Times From its earliest beginnings, ancient art reflected the central role of the hand in sign language. Hands were raised in prayer, incantation, greeting, blessing, and in delivering a blow. Hands were raised in entreaty and in mourning, or were thrown in the air in triumph. Hostility was averted with an extended hand and fingers or the fist. Parties to a contract shook the right hand as a sign of binding commitment…

[German Version] I. Ancient Near East and Ancient Art – II. Christian Art I…

[German Version] I. Ancient Near Eastern Art – II. Greco-Roman Art – III. Christian Art I. Ancient Near Eastern Art The earliest datable representations of animals in ancient Near Eastern art stem from the Mesolithic Period, and the oldest representations of the human form from the Neolithic Period (reworked male skulls or imitations of the same, cf. Kenyon; stylized or three-dimensional figurines of sitting, corpulent women). Anthropomorphic ¶ (Anthropomorphism) deities are usually distinguished from humans through attributes (for the exception of the “naked goddess” cf. Uehlinger, art. “Nackte Göttin”). Frontality in the representation (Hathor, Bes, naked goddess) is an indication of divinity (devotional images, icons). Humans are not depicted frontally in relief art; in three-dimensional art, frontality (e.g. in the representation of a ruler) is meant to elicit veneration or at least submissiveness. The depictions of the human form in the art of the ancient Near East are less realistic and descr…

[German Version] I. Religious Studies The sun is omnipresent; in the phenomenal world, it marks and accentuates the course of our chronological and spatial lifeworld. The range of associated structures, interpretations, and ambivalences (light and dark, life-giving and life-consuming) makes it only natural that the sun should acquire religious symbolisms and orientations in many ways and in many areas: (1) orientation in time (annual calendrical cycle, identification of sacral seasons and hours of th…

[English Version] I. Religionswissenschaftlich …