Knowledge to Die For: Transmission of Prohibited and Esoteric Knowledge Through Space and Time

Program:

Monday 2 May
10.00 Welcome address: Jürgen Renn (MPIWG, Berlin)
10.30 Michael Stone (Hebrew University, Jerusalem): Secret Books and Secret Traditions in Ancient Judaism
11.30 coffee

12.00 Boris Uspenskij (Naples Oriental University): The Glagolitic alphabet as a Manifestation of Sacred Knowledge
12.45 lunch
14.00 Gebhard Selz (University of Vienna): Remarks on Mesopotamian esotericism and the limits of wisdom: from Enoch to Job
14.45 Cale Johnson (FU Berlin): Dreaming of regime change: The role of oneiromancy in Mesopotamian coups d’état.
15.15 Tal Ilan (FU Berlin): The Torah of the Rabbi to live for, the Knowledge of Women to die for: Timtinis and the Rabbis
16.00 tea

16.30 Alexander Kulik (Hebrew University, Jerusalem): Proto-Gnostic Traditions in Apocalyptic Literature
17.15 Angelika Neuwirth (FU Berlin): Orality as a theologumenon: Communicating hidden knowledge in the Qur’an
Free evening

Tuesday 3 May
10.00 Hans Kippenberg (Jacobs University, Bremen): The practice of dissimulating one’s religious identity in ancient Christianity, Gnosticism and Early Islam
10.45 Dimitri Gutas (Yale University, New Haven, Conn) Knowledge to Lie For: Medieval Affectations of Esoteric Philosophy and Modern Scholarship
11.30 coffee

12.00 Paul Unschuld, Charité-Universitätsmedizin Berlin: The different levels of secret knowledge in Chinese medicine
12.45 lunch

14.00 Antonio Panaino (University of Bologna): A ritual esoteric simulation of the ascent to Paradise in the 3rd c. inscriptions of the Sasanian High Priest Kirder
14.45 Maria Macuch (FU Berlin): Heresy and Esoterism in Sasanian Iran
15.30 tea

16.00 Velizar Sadovski (Austrian Academy of Sciences): Knowledge of magic – magic of knowledge: Atharva-Veda and systematization of universe in sacred tradition of Indo-Iranian
16.45 Jens Braarvig (University of Oslo): Secrecy and open access in historical India – some cases
17.30 (short paper)
Matteo Martelli (HU Berlin):1 Enoch and the first book of alchemy
Dinner for Speakers and Chairpersons 7.00 pm

Wednesday 4 May
10.00 Desmond Durkin-Meisterernst (Brandenburg Academy of Sciences): What did Manichaeans think of dying for your beliefs?
10.45 Yuri Stoyanov (SOAS, London): Dualism as a Proscribed and Secreted Knowledge in pre-modern heterodox forms of Christianity – provenance and evolution
11.30 coffee

11.45 David Shankland (Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, London): Ritual, secrecy, and the creation of Alevi-tradition in Anatolia
12.30 Closing discussion

Program