الفهرس 
Approaching the Phenomenon
The CreedOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
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Abstract
The research work aims to reach a new approach for understanding the meaning of the architectural transformation of sacred space in Late Antiquity. It is an approach which is different from both practical and classical ones, if the transformation process of the sacred space is complex and has many layers. The complexity is related to the ontological understanding of the ordinary people of their cosmos, what was shaping their identity, and what was inherited through social memory despite the change in the perception of religion. This new perspective is based on recent studies in multiple disciplines, the study used the tools of ethnographic descriptions, iconographic representations, archaeoastronomical studies and archaeological examinations for applying a thematic analysis within the hermeneutic phenomenology as a methodological approach.
-The research consists of eight chapters:
Chapter One: It is an introduction to the research, aims, assumptions, and the methodology used in the study.
Chapter Two: It is a historical review of the complexity of the targeted historical era highlighting the political challenges as well as the social changes accompanying the religious shift from polytheism to monotheism.
Chapter Three: It deals with the traditional Egyptian religion, using the approach of the phenomenological analysis of the religious experience.
Chapter Four: Introduces the new mood as the shift towards supracultural religions, starting with Judaism then christianity, ending by identifying the traditional features of the Coptic christianity.
Chapter Five: It covers all the features of the traditional Egyptian temple, its mythical position within the sacred landscape, its role as a space designed in significant way to reflect a complex symbolic system and serving special rituals.
Chapter Six: It is a review of the temple vision in the Jewish and christian traditions reaching the Coptic church with a special focus on the iconographic representation of the cosmic vision.
Chapter Seven: it focuses on the transformation of the sacred space as the final phase of the interpretation process after the previous chapters, this chapter traces the transformation of key cases that demonstrated the totality of all the themes that were produced till the final stage.
Chapter Eight, the research analysed the meanings of the significant ontological value of the sacred spaces to common inhabitants before and after the change of the perception of religion, by the interpretations of the symbolic manifestations that were represented within the architectural and iconographical realm. Both were parts of the transformation process. The research recommended that the history of each temple should be studied individually following an interpretational approach to its traditional previous status and the meaning of its sanctity within the social memory.