"Sacred gaze" denotes any way of seeing that invests its object—an image, a person, a time, a place—with spiritual significance. Drawing from many different fields, David Morgan investigates key aspects of vision and imagery in a variety of religious traditions. His lively, innovative book explores how viewers absorb and process religious imagery and how their experience contributes to the social, intellectual, and perceptual construction of reality. Ranging widely from thirteenth-century Japan and eighteenth-century Tibet to contemporary America, Thailand, and Africa, The Sacred Gaze discusses the religious functions of images and the tools viewers use to interpret them. Morgan questions how fear and disgust of images relate to one another and explains how scholars study the long and evolving histories of images as they pass from culture to culture. An intriguing strand of the narrative details how images have helped to shape popular conceptions of gender and masculinity. The opening chapter considers definitions of "visual culture" and how these relate to the traditional practice of art history. Amply illustrated with more than seventy images from diverse religious traditions, this masterful interdisciplinary study provides a comprehensive and accessible resource for everyone interested in how religious images and visual practice order space and time, communicate with the transcendent, and embody forms of communion with the divine. The Sacred Gaze is a vital introduction to the study of the visual culture of religions.

Eight hundred years ago, Clare of Assisi advised a correspondent to gaze into the mirror of the crucified Christ and study her own face within it. A hundred years ago, sociologist Charles Horton Cooley said we can know our self only as it is reflected to us by others. Contemplation is the choice to find our reflection in the divine Mirror. In The Sacred Gaze, Susan Pitchford explores how a false self is created by distortions in the mirrors around us. Drawing from the mystical and sociological traditions, and with practical suggestions for how to begin, Pitchford shows how gazing into the face of Christ can reveal to us who we really are. When the true self is known, and known as God’s beloved, the way is opened to radical freedom and joy.

Eight hundred years ago, Clare of Assisi advised a correspondent to gaze into the mirror of the crucified Christ and study her own face within it. A hundred years ago, sociologist Charles Horton Cooley said we can know our self only as it is reflected to us by others. Contemplation is the choice to find our reflection in the divine Mirror. In The Sacred Gaze, Susan Pitchford explores how a false self is created by distortions in the mirrors around us. Drawing from the mystical and sociological traditions, and with practical suggestions for how to begin, Pitchford shows how gazing into the face of Christ can reveal to us who we really are. When the true self is known, and known as God s beloved, the way is opened to radical freedom and joy.

Publisher Description

"Exploring a dazzling variety of religious imagery, David Morgan shows how vision functions as an active, physical process, embedded in bodily experience and profoundly shaped by social practice. Morgan's bold, thoughtful interpretations will fascinate art historians and students of visual culture as well as historians of religion.” -Pepe Karmel, Department of Art History, New York University "The Embodied Eye is an important and truly groundbreaking book. It represents a substantive and quite fascinating extension of David Morgan's previous work- especially as it impressively shows us how 'seeing' is the primary medium of social life, and materially integrates the body of the individual and the body of the group. Morgan is unquestionably the pioneering theorist in the whole emergent field of Visual and Culture Studies as it relates to religion and art." -Norman Girardot, University Distinguished Professor, Lehigh University “Under David Morgan’s inspiring guidance, readers are taken on a dazzling journey through religious images that mediate worlds of faith. Embedding vision in the body, this book stands out with its thought-provoking approach to religious media as material and embodied interfaces that underpin the social construction of the sacred.” -Birgit Meyer, Professor of Religious Studies, Utrecht University

Informative and provocative, this book introduces readers to debates in the contemporary study of religion and suggests future research possibilities.

Drawing from the fields of music, sociology, theology, philosophy, psychology, and aesthetics, VISUAL PIETY is the first book to bring to specialist and lay reader alike an understanding of religious imagery's place in the social formation and maintenance of everyday American life--from Warner Sallman's 'Head of Christ" to velvet renditions of DaVinci's "Last Supper" to prayer card illustrations, and much more. 69 illustrations.