It's About Time: Renewal Origins, Mutations and Eros' Arrow

It’s About Time: Renewal Origins, Mutations, and Eros’s Arrow is a book by Michael Phelps that explores the structure and history of a certain class of Ideas: Reform, Rebirth, Renaissance, Revolution, and the Millennium or Apocalypse. They are used to describe, advocate, justify, or predict change over time within our personal, social, legal, or cosmic existence, and all require or imply new beginnings. Grouped as Renewal Ideas, their common structure and origins are explained, and the story of their history within Western Civilization is told. Examining key turning points, the first great mutations occurred in Early Christianity, where Reform, Personal Rebirth, and Millenarianism emerged while the vitalistic Golden Age idea was applied for Roman and Christian purposes. Later, the ideological structure of Reform, first applied to individuals, is extended to the Church, then to secular institutions eventually developing into classical liberalism. Eros, a natural tension reaching toward the Other, pushes renewal forward as its engine, adding the power and favor of reciprocity to both mystical and rational life. The structural model is applied to rethink and understand the meanings of reason, faith, and grace. The thirteenth century is declared the Age of Renewal and is treated in some detail as a case study of ideas in use before giving due attention to the so-called Renaissance and Reformation. The mutation to the idea of Revolution, which culminates in France, and the long-term influences of Joachim of Flora are detailed. The apex of institutional reform in liberalism is explored along with the alternatives of Progress, Final Catastrophe, and Evolution. Renewal’s gift of freedom as an alternative to both Pessimism and Progress is detailed throughout and featured in the conclusion. This book will be valuable to those interested in The History of Ideas, The History of Christianity, Spirituality, and Philosophy. The author says: “I trace abstract concepts of Renewal back to their notional beginnings in order to better understand their similarities. Then I follow their variegations forward in time within culture, rethinking their ever-changing uses.”