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" Central Ethiopian monasticism, 1974-1991 : "
Persoon, Joachim Gregor
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Latin Dissertation
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| Record Number
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1095663
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TLets406214
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| Main Entry
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Persoon, Joachim Gregor
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| Title & Author
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Central Ethiopian monasticism, 1974-1991 :\ Persoon, Joachim Gregor
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| College
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School of Oriental and African Studies (University of London)
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| Date
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2003
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| student score
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2003
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| Degree
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Ph.D.
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| Abstract
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This dissertation is based on field research involving visits to approximately 100Monasteries in Ethiopia Israel and Eritrea and numerous interviews. Consequently itstresses the importance of lived experience, post-modem, interactive and contingentreasoning is used with a focus on local variations, and metaphors relating toconsciousness and treating culture as a process. Symbolic interactionism and theagency structure relationship are applied in terms of Bourdieu's concern for habitusand field. This integrates human activity into a singular conceptual movement astructural theory of practice connecting action to culture, structure, and power. Acomprehensive view is formed by linking spirituality and mysticism with social andpolitical processes, exploring the intriguing middle ground of integration betweencultural practice and faith in which the discourses of indigenous religious belief ariseand are contested. A post-modem sense of wonder for the Ethiopian tradition avoidsthe disenchantment of mechanistic reductionism. A special concern for somaticexperience, gender and alternative ways of conceptualising time and space giveinsight into the lived reality of the monastic tradition.Christian Orthodoxy tends to conceptualise itself as an unchanging entity. However,current thought undercuts static wholes through the notion of agency and practice bywhich the transient sense of a permanent systematic structure is constantly created anewemergent in performance. Two key symbols in Ethiopian Christianity help us to graspthe essential functions of Ethiopian monasticism in recreating faith structures: Sacreddance heightens the emotion of the believers, and holy water is a symbol of immediatecontact with inexplicable divine power. As experiential frameworks, they exemplify theaspirations of the monastic life: a more intense experience of the vocation of allChristians to a transformed sacred life and personal regeneration. The `journey intoselfhood' is a common theme of recent works on African studies. It is reflected in thesearch for perfection of monastic spirituality, in which paradoxically the self wasformed and shaped through renouncing the self. Ethiopian monasticism's sacred self isfollowed through consecutive concentric circles of interaction, typifying the traditional Ethiopian conception of space. Examples from specific monasteries illustrate how thiswas experienced in practiceThe competitive hegemonic discourse of the revolution struggling for symbolicpower opened up a space for a counter discourse of subversive resistance. In theinterstices of the confrontation the monastic community suffered materialimpoverishment, but rediscovered both its potentially vitalising force in society andthe transforming power of its spiritual technology. The function of monasticismrevealed itself in the encounter with communism. Communism and monasticism arethe antithesis of each other, each embodying utopian visions of the future: the oneusing political force whereas the other has an eschatological character. Monasticismbecame the `salt', which did not allow the world to absorb Christianity and subject itto itself, creating an alternative space of hope in the desolate landscape of totalitarianoppression. Mystic spirituality was central for challenging repressive structures ofthe self and society. Ethiopian monks are traditionally linked with the angels whoguard the tabot, symbolising the unapproachable God, totally giving himself yetveiled by the brilliance of his light, representing the central `still point' in the circleof worldly action where understanding and being coincide. Monasticism's ability tomanifest transcendence and alterity, were instrumental in empowering thecommunity of faith and ensuring its survival.
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School of Oriental and African Studies (University of London)
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