Babylon is a surprisingly multivalent symbol in U.S. culture and politics. Political citations of Babylon range widely, from torture at Abu Ghraib to depictions of Hollywood glamour and decadence. In political discourse, Babylon appears in conservative ruminations on democratic law, liberal appeals to unity, Tea Party warnings about equality, and religious advocacy for family values. A composite biblical figure, Babylon is used to celebrate diversity and also to condemn it, to sell sexuality and to regulate it, to galvanize war and to worry about imperialism. Erin Runions explores the significance of these shifts and contradictions, arguing that together they reveal a theopolitics that tries to balance the drive for U.S. dominance with the countervailing ideals and subjectivities of economic globalization. Examining the confluence of cultural formations, biblical interpretations, and (bio)political philosophies, The Babylon Complex shows how theopolitical arguments for war, sexual regulation, and political control both assuage and contribute to anxieties about waning national sovereignty. Theoretically sophisticated and engaging, this remarkable book complicates our understanding of how the Bible affects U.S political ideals and subjectivities.

"Recent scholarship has demonstrated the value of speech act theory for biblical studies; for example, the studies of Walter Houston, Jim Adams, and Steven Mann have established its worth for Old Testament studies, exploring the declarative power of the prophetic word and the formative power of self-involved readings of the text. Additionally, John Searle and Daniel Vanderveken note that illocutionary acts seldom occur alone but rather in larger speech acts. The biblical text is replete with these larger speech acts; the book of Jeremiah provides an excellent example of such complicated larger speech acts. How, then, are we to study these complex speech acts? How can understanding these complex speech acts better inform our understanding of a text and of how a larger text employs smaller text portions or smaller illocutions within that complex speech act? In this study, I propose that speech act theory can help us understand complex texts and begin to answer these questions. More specifically, I propose that a more complex use of speech act theory--a multilevel speech approach--can help us study complex speech acts, such as the text of Jeremiah, by identifying the multiple smaller speech acts which make up the more complex speech acts. Furthermore, such an approach informs the understanding of both the smaller and larger speech acts and how the larger, more complex speech act employs the smaller speech acts toward the formation of the more complex act. In order to test and demonstrate this multilevel speech act approach, I will apply it to the oracle against Babylon in MT Jer 50-51 and examine the illocutionary force of that oracle at some of its performative levels"--

This is a history of goddess-worship. Written like a graphic novel, this well-researched book shows how goddess worship "morphed" through the centuries until it climaxed in its present most common form: the worship of the Virgin Mary. In different cultures, the names were different, but the goddess was the same. She was the Queen of Heaven, the mother of the god. She became the Mediatrix through whom all must go to reach their god.Author David Daniels is a stickler for research, so no one will be surprised to find a 30-page section of End Notes, as well as annotated bibliography. You can check out his facts for yourself! It's a heavy subject, but the illustrations by Jack T Chick help to make the story flow, and a lot easier for the casual reader to understand.

This lavishly illustrated volume sheds light for the first time on the true wonders of this ancient city and the echoes and images that have grown up around it over thousands of years. The authors bring together a wealth of art works inspired by this ancient city. Alongside these evocations of an imagined Babylon, they present the reality of the city, exploring the architecture, history, culture, and religious life of the time as well as Babylon's legacy today--in astronomy, astrology, and much more.

The “Great Whore” of the Book of Revelation—the hostile symbolization used to illustrate the author’s critique of empire—has attracted considerable attention in Revelation scholarship. Feminist scholar Tina Pippin criticizes the use of gendered metaphors—“Babylon” as a tortured woman—which she asserts reflect an inescapably androcentric, even misogynistic, perspective. Alternatively, Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza understands John’s rhetoric and imagery not simply in gendered terms, but in political terms as well, observing that “Babylon” relies on conventionally coded feminine language for a city. Shanell T. Smith seeks to dismantle the either/or dichotomy within the “Great Whore” debate by bringing the categories of race/ethnicity and class to bear on John’s metaphors. Her socio-cultural context impels her to be sensitive to such categories, and, therefore, leads her to hold the two elements, “woman” and “city,” in tension, rather than privileging one over the other. Using postcolonial womanist interpretation of the woman Babylon, Smith highlights the simultaneous duality of her characterization—her depiction as both a female brothel slave and as an empress or imperial city. Most remarkably, however, Smith’s reading also sheds light on her own ambivalent characterization as both a victim and participant in empire.

Lod Airport, Israel: Two Concorde jets take off for a U.N. conference that will finally bring peace to the Middle East. Covered by F-14 fighters, accompanied by security men, the planes carry warriors, pacifists, lovers, enemies, dignitaries -- and a bomb planted by a terrorist mastermind. Suddenly they're forced to crash-land at an ancient desert site. Here, with only a handful of weapons, the men and women of the peace mission must make a desperate stand against an army of crack Palestinian commandos -- while the Israeli authorities desperately attempt a rescue mission. In a land of blood and tears, in a windswept place called Babylon, it will be a battle of bullets and courage, and a war to the last death.

"Babylon Steel, ex-sword-for-hire, ex ... other things, runs The Red Lantern, the best brothel in the city. She's got elves using sex magic upstairs, S & M in the basement and a large green troll cooking breakfast in the kitchen, and she'd love you to visit, except ... She's not having a good week. The Vessels of Purity are protesting against brothels, girls are disappearing, and if she can't pay her taxes, Babylon's going to lose the Lantern. She'd given up the mercenary life, but when the mysterious Darask Fain pays her to find a missing heiress, she has to take the job. And then her past starts to catch up with her in other, more dangerous ways.