[Themaintainers] theologies of maintenance

[Camille E. Acey]

Yes, interested. Will save the date for the May 1st talk!
Camille

On March 18, 2019 2:34:24 AM EDT, David Zvi Kalman <depst at sas.upenn.edu> wrote:
>Thanks, everyone for your comments. I sent my email just before getting
>on
>a 15 hour flight and I was so glad to open my inbox and hear that the
>topic
>is of interest to others! Needless to say, I will follow up on your
>leads.
>
>I'll share a little more of some of the directions that I'm thinking
>about:
>
>- In Jewish and Islamic theology (I work in both), there are notions of
>God's role as constant maintainer of the universe. I think it may
>actually
>be stronger in Islam, because Islamic theology takes more seriously the
>idea that humans lack free will, that everything—including the movement
>of
>the celestial spheres—is directly coordinated by God.
>- There's certainly a feminist theology angle here—maintenance work is
>often associated with women, often undervalued, etc. I think this is a
>very
>important angle.
>- For Judaism, I suspect there's a link to the Sabbath, i.e. a day of
>non-creation, as the pinnacle of the week. Theologians like Abraham
>Joshua
>Heschel have already attempted to turn this into a kind of bucking of
>American notions of progress, but I don't think the notion of
>"maintenance"
>shows up as much.
>- I wonder—both for Judaism and Christianity—perhaps not Islam, in
>which
>Gabriel plays a more critical role?—if maintenance is associated with
>the
>notion of angels, i.e. divine beings who do lesser work or more
>"invisible"
>work.
>- Of course, many religions place a special emphasis on reflecting on
>goodness in the present moment. In Judaism, the blessing said after
>relieving oneself has a line, "If one [orifice] is opened, or one is
>closed
>[when it shouldn't be], it would be impossible to exist and stand
>before
>You, even for a single moment." Food blessings—basically anything that
>involves thanksgiving—reflect on the path by which the food has come to
>the
>table.
>
>For those interested, I'll be giving a talk at the Shalom Hartman
>Institute
>in Manhattan on May 1 that will cover some of these issues—I don't have
>the
>details yet, but I'm happy to share them when I do.
>
>
>
>On Sun, 17 Mar 2019 at 17:44, Bastien <bzg at bzg.fr> wrote:
>
>> Hi David,
>>
>> David Zvi Kalman <depst at sas.upenn.edu> writes:
>>
>> > I'm a PhD student working at the intersection of Jewish history and
>> > the history of technology. I'm currently doing research on
>> > "theologies of maintenance" — that is, understandings of God as a
>> > being without whom the universe would cease to exist/fall
>apart/etc.
>>
>> Not directly related to your inquiry, but I've always wondered if
>> the thought experiment of the "ship of theseus" (which dates back to
>> Heraclitus) was born out of everyday concerns, or if it was somehow
>> related to biblical or mythical narratives.
>>
>> > Does anyone know if this frame has been associated with
>technological
>> > maintenance in the past? There is so much rich material to work
>with
>> > and I would be surprised if I'm the first to look into this.
>>
>> Whitehead's theory of God in _Process and Reality_ pictures a God who
>> is both actively "building" the universe and "patient" with it.  It's
>> a mix between Leibniz's God as an architect and Spinoza's God as
>being
>> the nature itself in the becoming. As far as I can remember,
>Whitehead
>> does not refer to technical maintenance or to "repairing", but his
>all
>> vision resonates with technical maintainance issues a lot (or perhaps
>> that's just me).
>>
>> 2 cents,
>>
>> --
>>  Bastien
>>
>
>
>-- 
>David Zvi Kalman
>PhD Candidate
>Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations
>University of Pennsylvania
>-- 
>Sent from phone

-- 
Sent from my Android device with K-9 Mail. Please excuse my brevity.
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