Imagining Heaven

 Ellen W. Williams is a museum educator at the Katonah Museum of Art in Katonah, New York.

Table of Contents


List of Illustrations

Acknowledgments

Preface

Timeline

Introduction

 1 Through the Mists of Time­—Prehistory

 2 “In those days, in those ­far-off days”—Ancient Mesopotamia

 3 A Multimedia Guide to the Afterlife—Ancient Egypt

 4 The Bridge—Zoroastrianism

 5 The World to Come—Judaism

 6 An Afterlife for Poet, Philosopher, Painter—Ancient Greece and Rome

 7 “In My Father’s house are many mansions”—Christianity

 8 To the Garden—Islam

 9 For the Benefit of Lady Dai—China in the Second Century bce

10 The Cosmic Body—Jainism

11 In the Company of Gods—Hinduism

12 Realms of Existence—Buddhism

13 The Way of Immortality—Daoism

14 A Traveler “enters the road”—The Maya

15 Life from Death—The Aztecs

16 Becoming Huaca, a Holy Thing—The Inca

17 Where Land Meets Sky—Traditional Pacific Island Beliefs

18 The Ancestors—Traditional African Beliefs

19 At the Crossroads—The Vikings

20 Wakan Tanka, the Great Mystery—Native North Americans

21 Personal Visions—American Outsider Art

22 We Are Spirits Passing On—Swedenborg and the Rise of Spiritualism

23 A Mother There—The Church of Jesus Christ of ­Latter-day Saints

24 “What if God was one of us?”—Contemporary Western Society

25 Other Heavens in the Universe

26 The Hope of Heaven

Chapter Notes

Bibliography

Index