Kosmoi Conference
21-23 October 2019
Good – Better – Best: Asceticism and the Ways to “Perfection”
Organisers: Joseph Verheyden, Ann Heirman, Johan Leemans, Geert Roskam
Venue
Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies
St-Michielsstraat 4
B-3000 Leuven
Collegium Veteranorum – Room 02.10 (Romerozaal)
Registration
Registration is mandatory for practical reasons. For details about the modalities, please contact Thomas Valgaeren at thomas.valgaeren@kuleuven.be
Programme
21 October
13.45-14.00 Welcome
14.00-15.10 Xenia Zeiler (Helsinki), Re-negotiating Hindu Widows’ Asceticism
15.10-15.40 Break
15.40-16.50 James Benn (McMaster University, Hamilton, Ont.), Is Buddhist Self-Immolation a Form of Asceticism?
16.50-17.50 Offered papers (2)
Tillo Detige (independent scholar), Transnational Lay Asceticism? Seeking Perfection through Mental Purification in Contemporary Vipassana Praxis (17.30-18.00)
Dylan Esler (Bochum), Perfection Beyond Technique: The Notion of Effortless Spontaneity in Tibetan Dzogchen (18.00-18.30)
17.50-18.30 Plenary discussion
19.00 Dinner
22 October
09.00-10.10 Kurt Lampe (Bristol), Divination and Becoming Divine in Stoicism
10.10-10.40 Break
10.40-11.50 Dominic O’Meara (Fribourg), Pagan Philosophical Asceticism in Late Antiquity. Does It Differ from the Christian Asceticism of the Period?
11.50-12.50 Offered papers (2)
Thomas Valgaeren (Leuven), God as a Role Model: Practical Homoiosis in the Works of the Cappadocians (11.50-12.20)
Thibaut Lejeune (Leuven), Assimilation to God: Living the Ascetic Life in Late Neoplatonism (12.20-12.50)
13.00 Lunch
14.00-15.10 Brouria Bitton Ashkelony (HU Jerusalem), Early Christian Monastic Tradition
15.10-16.20 Niki Clements (Rice University), Technologies of the Ascetic Self: Telos in John Cassian and Michel Foucault
16.20-16.45 Break
16.45-17.55 Ishay Rosen Zvi (Tel Aviv), Rabbinic Asceticism. The Case of the Struggle with Yetzer Hara (Evil Inclination)
17.55-18.30 Plenary discussion
19.15 Dinner
23 October
09.00-10.10 Mette Bjerregaard Mortensen (Copenhagen), Ascetic Traditions and Practices according to the Qu’ran
10.10-10.40 Break
10.40-11.50 Rob Faesen (Leuven), Asceticism and Perfection in Medieval Christian Mysticism
11.50-12.50 Offered papers (2)
Maxim Venetskov (Leuven), John Climacus: Fasting Measures and Excesses in the Ladder (11.50-12.20)
Joachim Yeshaya (Leuven), Pietism and Poetry: Jewish Ascetic Practices in Medieval Egypt (12.20-12.50)
13.00 Lunch
14.00-15.10 Patrick Benjamin Koch (Hamburg), Asceticism and Perfection in Sixteenth-Century Kabbalah
15.10-15.40 Break
15.40-16.50 Hedwig Schwall (Leuven), Fighting the other to Find the Other? V. Woolf’s To the Lighthouse and A. Burn’s Milkman
16.50-17.20 Plenary discussion and Conclusion
18.30 Dinner