Now available in an updated addition: ""Integrating concepts of time derived from the physical sciences and world religions, "The Becoming of Time" examines ...

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Books ReceivedThe Act of Being: The Philosophy of Revelation in Mullā Sadrā. By Christian Jambet. Brooklyn: Zone Books, 2006. Pp. 497. Hardcover $38.95.Analysis in Śaṅkara Vedānta: The Philosophy of Ganeswar Misra. Edited by Bijayananda Kar. New Delhi: Indian Council of Philosophical Research, 2006. Pp. xxv + 190. Hardcover Rs. 240.00.Bhakti and Philosophy. By R. Raj Singh. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2006. Pp. 112. Hardcover $65.00.Brahman and the Ethos of Organization. (...) By Leonard R. Silos. Paseo de Roxas: Asian Institute of Management, 2006. Pp. xix + 344. Price not given.Buddhist Inclusivism: Attitudes Towards Religious Others. By Kristin Beise Kiblinger. Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing Company, 2005. Pp. viii + 145. Hardcover $89.95.Classical Northern Wu Style Tai Ji Quan: The Fighting Art of the Manchurian Palace Guard. By Tina Chunna Zhang and Frank Allen. Berkeley: Blue Snake Books, 2006. Pp. xiii + 203. Paper $21.95.Classical Sāṃkhya and Yoga: An Indian Metaphysics of Experience. By Mikel Burley. London and New York: Routledge, 2007. Pp. xiv + 226. Price not given.Comparative Philosophy and Religion in Times of Terror. Edited by Douglas Allen. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2006. Pp. xiv + 257. Hardcover $62.00. Paper $32.00.Contemplative Science: Where Buddhism and Neuroscience Converge. By B. Alan Wallace. New York: Columbia University Press, 2007. Pp. vii + 211. Hardcover $29.50, £19.00.Contexts and Dialogue: Yogācāra Buddhism and Modern Psychology on the Subliminal Mind. By Tao Jiang. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2006. Pp. xi + 198. Paper $20.00.Dialogue Transcultural. Edited by Yue Diayun et al. Nanjing: Jiangsu Peoples Press, 2006. Pp. 335. Price not given.Dōgen on Meditation and Thinking: A Reflection on His View of Zen. By Hee-Jin Kim. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2006. Pp. xiii + 169. Hardcover $65.50. Paper $21.95.The Garden of Loneliness: A Translation of Jayshankar Prasad's Āṅsū, "Tears." By Charles S. J. White. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 2006. Pp. xv + 136. Hardcover Rs. 295. [End Page 608]The Happening of Tradition: Vallabha on Anumāna in Nyāyalīlāvatī. By Anna-Pya Sjödin. Stockholm: Elanders Gotab, 2006. Pp. 195. Price not given.Head, Eyes, Flesh, and Blood: Giving Away the Body in Indian Buddhist Literature. By Reiko Ohnuma. 2006. Pp. xvii + 372. Hardcover $45.00, £29.00.Hwa Yu T'ai Chi Ch'uan: Unlocking the Mysteries of the Five-Word Song. By Glenn D. Newth. Berkeley: Blue Snake Books, 2007. Pp. xiii + 160. U.S. $18.95. Can $24.95.A Jewish Philosopher of Baghdad: 'Izz al-Dawla Ibn Kammūna (d. 683/1284) and His Writings. By Reza Pourjavady and Sabine Schmidtke. Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2006. Pp. xii + 274. Hardcover $130.00, €100.Letting Be: Fred Dallmayr's Cosmopolitical Vision. Edited by Stephen F. Schneck. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 2006. Pp. x + 382. Paper $35.00.Myth and the Existential Quest. By Vassilis Vitsaxis and translated by Deborah Brown Kazazis and Vassilis Vitsaxis. Boston: Somerset Hall Press, 2006. Pp. 301. Hardcover $49.95. Paper $39.95.Nietzsche-Buddha-Zarathustra: Eine West-Ost Konfiguration. By Michael Skowron. Daegu: Kyungpook National University Press, 2006. Pp. 293. Paper $18.00, Won 17,000.Popularizing Buddhism: Preaching as Performance in Sri Lanka. By Mahinda Deegalle. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2006. Pp. xiii + 241. Hardcover $65.00. Paper $21.95.Ramana Maharashi: The Sage of Arunachala. By Arvind Sharma. New Delhi: Penquin Group, 2006. Pp. 215. Hardcover Rs. 295.Readings in Han Chinese Thought. Edited and translated by Mark Csikszentmihalyi. Indianapolis and Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company, 2006. Pp. xxx + 220. Hardcover $39.95. Paper $14.95.Religions of Korea in Practice. Edited by Robert E. Buswell Jr. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2007. Pp. xx + 542. Paper $24.95, £15.95.The Scripture on Great Peace: The Taiping jing and the Beginnings of Daoism. By Barbara Hendrischke. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006. Pp. x + 410. Hardcover $60.00, £38.95.The Self 's Awareness of Itself: Bhaṭṭa Rāmakantha's Arguments against the Buddhist Doctrine of No-Self. By Alex Watson. Vienna: Sammlung de Nobili, 2006. Pp. 433. Price not given... (shrink)

This selection of new approaches to the comparative study of religious ethics provides an accessible introduction to the most current research in the field. The essays in this book show that a variety of approaches to religious ethics are worth pursuing in our contemporary, profusely interconnected world. They also demonstrate that many sorts of analysis are shaped by comparison and comparative interests, even when they focus on a single topic or question, as long as they are informed by (...) analogous studies of other traditions, cultures, or religions. The volume exemplifies a thought-provoking, multidisciplinary engagement with global ethics today. (shrink)

Emergent religious groups (ERGs) are an innovative but chronically understudied and misunderstood realm of contemporary religion. This may be due to notorious difficulties encountered when estimating the size of populations involved with emergent religious groups at any given time. The purpose of this article is to estimate the percentage of the U.S. population involved with ERGs over the past 50 years. Findings from three national surveys suggest .2-2.2% of the United States population involved with ERGs regardless of (...) year. ERGs are a viable case for quantitative sociologists of religion, which has hitherto been dominated by qualitative case study, although creativity and further research is needed to verify the findings. (shrink)

Emergent religious groups (frequently referred to as new religious movements) are constantly changing over time, and it is often difficult for academics to follow the many shifts of the tide. One such major change currently underway is a bitter schism within the Unification movement, which has received consistent scholarly attention in the past. Up until this point, though, there has been little academic work focusing exclusively on the ongoing split, and the various organizational reasons as to why (...) it has occurred. Through historical content, qualitative interview, and participant observation analysis of the contemporary Unification movement, we rectify this omission. Findings such as niche mechanics suggest that religious organization ecology is a relevant theory to understand schism in religious organizations and could help reintroduce structure and comparison to cultural studies of religion. Recently spotlighted in Religion Watch, see the links below. (shrink)

The essence of religion was once widely thought to be a unique form of experience that could not be explained in neurological, psychological, or sociological terms. In recent decades scholars have questioned the privileging of the idea of religious experience in the study of religion, an approach that effectively isolated the study of religion from the social and natural sciences. Religious Experience Reconsidered lays out a framework for research into religious phenomena that reclaims experience as a central (...) concept while bridging the divide between religious studies and the sciences. Ann Taves shifts the focus from "religious experience," conceived as a fixed and stable thing, to an examination of the processes by which people attribute meaning to their experiences. She proposes a new approach that unites the study of religion with fields as diverse as neuroscience, anthropology, sociology, and psychology to better understand how these processes are incorporated into the broader cultural formations we think of as religious or spiritual. Taves addresses a series of key questions: how can we set up studies without obscuring contestations over meaning and value? What is the relationship between experience and consciousness? How can research into consciousness help us access and interpret the experiences of others? Why do people individually or collectively explain their experiences in religious terms? How can we set up studies that allow us to compare experiences across times and cultures? Religious Experience Reconsidered demonstrates how methods from the sciences can be combined with those from the humanities to advance a naturalistic understanding of the experiences that people deem religious. (shrink)

The word "freedom" at all times was worried by progressive humanity. The notion of "freedom of conscience" is one of the specific varieties of the word. At the end of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. He was interpreted in all ways abroad and in Russia in particular. Declared by the manifesto of the king in 1905, the freedom of conscience, according to many, did not bring the expected release of "religious slavery." For several decades, the Soviet ideologues have (...) argued that only the Leninist decree on freedom of conscience, church and religious organizations, or, in other words, the Decree on the separation of church from state and school from the church, issued in 1918, marked a new era in the spiritual life of the people. (shrink)

During the 19th century, various frameworks were established in Germany for the purpose of providing Jewish students with religious education. The article deals primarily with the orthodox Congregation Adass-Isroel Religious School. Established in 1869 in Berlin, the school had a major impact on the development of supplementary religious instruction throughout Germany and served as a model in this area. The school's background, history, basic principles and method of instruction, as well as study subjects are discussed and compared (...) to corresponding religious schools. Research is based on the school's annual reports, archival material, scholarly literature, memoirs, and newspapers. (shrink)

Violence is essential to religion, while religion holds the promise of transcending violence. The designation religious refers not to a type of violence, but to a specific issue of violence, namely the claim to higher justification. This religious aspect is not confined to religion; it is also evident in the secular domain. A critique of religious violence needs to show the gap between violence and its justifications, experienced affectively in horror. This horror in response to the unspeakable (...) is structurally akin to mystical experience, the temporal structure of which indicates the failure of the theodical justification for violence. (shrink)

Analysis of individual differences in religious observance in a Belizean community showed that the most religious (pastors and church workers) reported more illnesses, and that there was no tendency for the religiously observant to restrict their interactions to family or extended family. Instead, the most religiously observant tended to have community roles that widened their social contact: religion did not aid isolation – thus violating a key assumption of the parasite-stress theory of sociality.

Intrigued by the possible paths that the evolution of religious capacity may have taken, the authors identify a series of six major building blocks that form a foundation for religious capacity in genus Homo. Homo neanderthalensis and Homo sapiens idaltu are examined for early signs of religious capacity. Then, after an exploration of human plasticity and why it is so important, the analysis leads to a final building block that characterizes only Homo sapiens sapiens, beginning 200,000–400,000 years (...) ago, when all the other cognitive and neurological underpinnings gradually came together. Because the timing of cognitive evolution has become an issue, the authors identify the time periods for these building blocks based on findings from modern cognitive science, neuroscience, genomic science, the new cognitive archaeology, and traditional stones-and-bones archaeology. The result is a logical, and even a likely story 55–65 million years long, which leads to the evolution of religious capacity in modern human beings. (shrink)

Religious exclusivism is the biggest threat for multi-religious society at the same time, ambivalent thoughts among religion in religious pluralism due to religious diversity often yields religious violence. In both of the extreme, (religious exclusivism and religious pluralism) there is the possibility of religious violence, i.e., religious riots, terrorism, mob lynching, and communalism. The objective of this paper is to discuss the significance of interreligious dialogue (IRD), its basic principle, how (...) IRD will help us for addressing the problems of humanity (i.e., Religious diversity and contradictory thoughts in major religions, Religious Dogma, superstition, and terrorism). If there is any biggest challenge for religion in the 21st century, is this one that how religion can deal with these problems and became a good tool for establishing peace and prosperity in the region. (shrink)

Religious naturalism refers here to a view of reality, and it will be contrasted with versions of supernaturalism and of atheistic naturalism. Naturalistic religion refers to certain varieties of religion, especially some inspired by the universality of science and the need for a global ethics. In this essay I explicate why a religious naturalist need not advocate a naturalistic religion. Rather, a religious naturalist can build upon the heritage of religious traditions and be open to, but (...) at the same time be agnostic about, the idea of a nonnatural ground of reality. The religious naturalism I defend has been criticized from various directions: one reviewer in this journal considered it too much indebted to the traditions, and hence “reactionary” and supernaturalistic; another considered it too minimalist in its religion (“virtually nonexistent”) as a consequence of the preference for a too sober version of naturalism. My distinction between religious naturalism and naturalistic religion may answer some of these objections. (shrink)

This book is the result of years of collaboration between the authors on work in religious ethics. The collaboration started when we published the first edition of The Blackwell Companion to Religious Ethics with William Schweiker as editor and David Clairmont as project assistant. Through the encouragement of our publisher, Rebecca Harkin of Wiley-Blackwell, it was decided that a basic text was needed on the meaning and method of religious ethics, and, further, a book that could be (...) used in connection with the Companion at several levels of academic instruction: undergraduate, graduate, and in the training of religious leaders. Religious Ethics: Meaning and Method is that book. It elaborates and expounds the account of religious ethics developed by William Schweiker as a multidimensional theory of the religious and moral life for our global times. (shrink)

The present study focuses on the religious minority arising from the implementation of the Gregorian calendar in Romania. Christian religious community of the Old Style is defined both historically and through psycho-social elements that caused the secession of belivers together with clerics from the Romanian Orthodox Church. Special attention is given to magical-religious beliefs observed with ethnological research tools, including: magical perception of time and especially of the agrarian calendar, faith in miraculous natural signs, survivals of (...) animist religion. The study of this religious community provides information on internal mechanisms for the appearance and development of minority phenomenon. The research is conducted beyond the issue of minority ethnic differentiations that has dominated multiculturalism studies. On the contrary, the existence of this religious minority in the third millennium, that is intra-ethnic developed and defined by ethno-cultural values eminently conservative, may explain a specific paradox of the strong Romanian religiosity which is essentially a rural and traditionalist one. (shrink)

Religion constitutes an important element in every society as regards coping with the demands as well as vicissitudes of life. Mental health issues are becoming a recurrent decimal in societies overwhelmed by stress and other social factors. This paper examines how the presence of religious beliefs affects how some Christians respond to cases that have to do mental health. At the same time, it surveys how a near absence of religious attitude, that is, clinical medicine approach to (...) mental health issues betters the state of those suffering from these psychopathologies. This work sees participatory partnership approach as an effective means of correcting unhealthy biases that prevent a better understanding of mental health care. Sociological theory of structural functionalism will be used in assessing how religion can reinvent itself in areas that are associated with mental health. Ethnographic methodology through quantitative analysis of administered questionnaire is used as a research tool for this research. Three persons were also interviewed. The research findings show that religion is a crucial agent of socialization that can change how religious beliefs impact on mental health and there is need for medical professionals to collaborate with pastoral agents. (shrink)

Spiritual/religious coping has proven to be a fertile ground for investigating health-related spirituality in action. Ken Pargament and his colleagues have successfully demonstrated that spiritual/religious coping differs significantly from previously identified coping strategies. While much has been accomplished to date, there are undeveloped theoretical and methodological avenues that appear to provide important promise for understanding the complexities of this critical domain of coping. Some scholars have failed to conceptualize and research spiritual/religious coping as a contextual, temporally bounded (...) process. This paper explores the theoretical and methodological advantages of adopting a contextually embedded, process-oriented epistemology—contextual action theory. We propose that doing so will not only address some of the inadequacies of the extant literature but also aid researchers in exploring novel dimensions of spiritual/religious coping. From a contextual action-theory perspective, spiritual/religious coping is viewed as intentional, goal-directed behaviour that is embedded in a social and relational context. This teleonomic reconceptualization enables researchers to understand the constitution and development of intentions involved in the process of spiritual/religious coping over time. Further, a contextual action theory perspective transcends the narrow, individualistic lens of coping and explores joint and collective coping processes that emerge as people draw upon spiritual/religious practices to cope with distress. Thus, spiritual/religious coping is embedded in social and relational context and as part of personal, intentional goal-directed processes over time. The novel contributions of a contextual theoretical perspective to spiritual/religious coping research and theory are illustrated through a case example. (shrink)

In recent years feminist scholarship has increasingly focused on the importance of the body and its representations in virtually every social, cultural, and intellectual context. Many have argued that because women are more closely identified with their bodies, they have access to privileged and different kinds of knowledge than men. In this landmark new book, Paula Cooey offers a different perspective on the significance of the body in the context of religious life and practice. Building on the pathbreaking work (...) of Elaine Scarry in The Body in Pain, Cooey looks at a wide range of evidence, from the Argentine prison narrative of Alicia Partnoy, to the novels of Toni Morrison and the paintings of Frida Kahlo. Drawing on current social theory and critique, cognitive psychology, contemporary fiction and art, and women's accounts of religious experience, Cooey relates the reality of sentience to the social construction of reality. Beginning with an examination of the female body as a metaphor for alternative knowledge, she considers the significance of physical pain and pleasure to the religious imagination, and the relations between sentience, sensuality, and female subjectivity. Cooey succeeds in bringing forward a sophisticated new understanding of the religious importance of the body, at the same time laying the foundations of a feminist theory of religion. (shrink)

There have recently been a number of high profile political incidents, and legal cases, that raise questions about hate speech. At the same time, the tensions, and perceived conflicts, between religion and sexuality have become controversial topics. This paper considers the relationship between religious freedom, free speech and equality through an analysis of recent case law in Great Britain, Canada and the United States. The paper starts with a discussion of how conflicts between these values arise in areas (...) such as hate speech and explores the differences between the European and US approach to this issue. In Council of Europe member states there is an increasing use of the criminal law to regulate hate speech. This paper argues that criminalisation of hate speech poses a distinct risk to the values of free speech and proposes alternative non-legal responses such as a greater use of cultural policy. The paper also explores a range of cases where the religion and sexual orientation conflict has arisen in areas such as the workplace. An analysis of these cases suggests that although there is no perfect resolution of this issue, it is possible to develop a set of principles that encourage a balance between the values of religious freedom, free speech and equality even in difficult situations where there is a conflict between religion and sexuality. The paper concludes with some practical recommendations for managing the tensions or conflicts between religious freedom, free speech and equality in liberal democracies. (shrink)

Religious tolerance continues to grow today, but at a moderate pace. Even afterthe International Conference of Religious Tolerance in the Light of Human Rights in 1995in the capital of Bulgaria – Sofia the question of studying religious tolerance between differentreligious communities arose. New times open a wider horizon of worldview andnew generations become more responsive and tolerant of new personalities and religionmovements. In the increasingly global world in which we live, we are confronted every daywith different attitudes (...) in the relations between different religious communities, their traditionsand customs. Unfortunately, there is both religious tolerance and religious intolerance.This study aims to show religious tolerance now and how different religious groupslive together side by side. Many new religious movements have emerged in the last fewyears. These religious movements are more or less accepted by different generations society.The sooner we seek answers to important questions such as peace and harmony betweendifferent religious communities and its implementation the sooner other answerswill emerge. We are all different as individuals, different in religion and understanding oflife. This is a root of the secret of our earthly path in the application of sharing, tolerance,respect of each other. However, there is still an imposition in human relationship. Quantitativemethod was used. Secondary data analysis is performed. Religious tolerance willalways be a leading topic for reflections between the struggle between good and evil, thedifference between white and black or the meaning of the eastern symbol “yin and yang”.Above all leading should be what kind of person you define yourself and what is your attitudeto the color world around you. (shrink)

In The Ethico-Religious Concepts in the Qur'án Toshihiko Izutsu analyses the guiding spirit of the Islamic moral code, the basic ethical relationship of man to God. Izutsu asserts that, according to the Qur'anic conception, God is of an ethical nature and acts upon man in an ethical way. The resulting implications for man are enormous, requiring devotion not merely to God but to living one's life ethically.Izutsu shows that for the Qur'an our ethical response to God's actions is religion (...) itself; it is at the same time both ethics and religion. Izutsu explores these themes by employing ethnolinguistics, a theory of the interrelations between linguistic cultural patterns, to analyse the semantic structure of major concepts in the Quar'an. Islam, which arose in the seventh century, represents one of the most sweeping religious reforms ever to appear in the East.The Quar'an shows in vividly concrete terms how time-honoured tribal norms came into bloody conflict with new ideals of life, and finally yielded to the rising power. This transitional epoch is of particular importance in the whole of Islamic thought, a time during which the key terms of a traditionally fixed system of values were transformed in their connotative structure, modified in their combinations, and finally integrated into an entirely different system.Originally published in 1959 as The Structure of the Ethical Terms in the Koran and revised under the current title in 1966 this 2002 reprint makes this classic work of Islamic studies once again available. (shrink)

The article proves the necessity to correct methodological approaches available in the arsenal of Ukrainian academic religious scholars. Scientists are called upon to timely analyze the trends of changes which the socio-religious sphere of Ukraine is undergoing during the Russian-Ukrainian war, which defined the security challenges threaten the Church, the state, and society. The authors insist on the urgency to include religious security in the national security strategy and to update those areas of state-church, inter-confessional and socio- (...) class='Hi'>religious relations which are critical today. It should be said, in particular, about perceived parity between freedom of belief and national security; finding a reasonable balance between individual (person) and collective (community) interest; fair regulation of relations between the religious majority and the religious minority; a clear definition of the main threat to national security from pro-Russian religious structures or pro-Russian members of certain religious organizations; and the earliest possible formation of a concept of religious security from scientific, methodologically verified positions, which will form the basis for the modernization of Ukrainian and international legislation in this area. The authors conclude that religious security as a fundamental, existentially important, axiologically formulated, sacredly attested, religiously defined segment of national security has turned out to be relevant not only for Ukraine. It has become a global challenge for the entire civilized world, which has faced the problem of protecting both democratic values, in particular freedom of conscience, and national security. International documents developed by the world community are aimed at harmonizing personal and collective interests in the sphere of socio-religious relations. Recommendations written in peacetime and for peacetime are of a preventive nature and do not work in a war situation. The invaluable experience which Ukraine gained during the Russian-Ukrainian war, the civilizational war between totalitarianism and democracy, should be studied and used to improve socio-religious relations both in Ukraine and abroad. (shrink)

The philosophy of religion and theology are related to the culture in which they have developed. These disciplines provide a source of values and vision to the cultures of which they are part, while at the same time they are delimited and defined by their cultures. This book compares the ideas of two contemporary philosophers, John Hick and Seyyed Hossein Nasr, on the issues of religion, religions, the concept of the ultimate reality, and the notion of sacred knowledge. On (...) a broader level, it compares two world-views: the one formed by Western Christian culture, which is religious in intention but secular in essence; the other Islamic, formed through the assimilation of traditional wisdom, which is turned against the norms of secular culture and is thus religious both in intention and essence. (shrink)

In this essay I try to motivate and formulate the main epistemological questions to ask about the phenomenon of religious disagreement. I will not spend much time going over proposed answers to those questions. I address the relevance of the recent literature on the epistemology of disagreement. I start with some fiction and then, hopefully, proceed with something that has at least a passing acquaintance with truth.

This Element examines what we can learn from religious disagreement, focusing on disagreement with possible selves and former selves, the epistemic significance of religious agreement, the problem of disagreements between religious experts, and the significance of philosophy of religion. Helen De Cruz shows how religious beliefs of others constitute significant higher-order evidence. At the same time, she advises that we should not necessarily become agnostic about all religious matters, because our cognitive background colors the (...) way we evaluate evidence. This allows us to maintain religious beliefs in many cases, while nevertheless taking the religious beliefs of others seriously. (shrink)

The article defines the nature of the Russian war against Ukraine in the context of social and state transformations of the 20th — 21st centuries. It is emphasized that this is a war of different worlds, mentalities, worldviews, ways of life, values, etc., which has been going on for many centuries in various forms (direct and mediated, open and veiled, hot and cold). The role of the religious-legal factor in the Russian war against Ukraine at various stages of Ukrainian (...) state formation (periods of the Ukrainian People’s Republic, Soviet, modern) is revealed. It is emphasized that it was during the time of the Ukrainian People’s Republic that the legal basis for the organization of the Ukrainian Local Orthodox Church, confessional differentiation and the establishment of freedom of conscience and interconfessional tolerance in Ukrainian society was created. Emphasized attention is paid to the fact that in the Soviet period, the Russian war against Ukraine continued in a new, veiled, hidden, invisible (at first glance) form with the active use of the religious factor. The results of this period have been determined, namely: rampant militant/ scientific atheism, radical extermination, Russification of Ukrainian Orthodoxy, liquidation of the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church and the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, etc. Special attention is paid to the Soviet secular/political religion (Marxism-Leninism) as a key basis for the implementation of an aggressive policy regarding the historical memory and cultural identity of the Ukrainian people and a manipulative tool for the destruction of Ukrainian history, culture, worldview, nation, state and law in the information, hybrid, total, full-scale and other Russia’s wars against Ukraine. The article substantiates that improved legislation with an effective legal mechanism for its implementation, a strong civil society with developed institutions, including the institution of religion (church), adequate guarantees of religious rights and freedoms are important factors in ensuring state, national, religious security and victory of Ukraine (at the current stage) in the war waged against it by the Russian Federation. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Early Religious Freedom The Eve of Revolution Luther and Liberalism John Knox and the Scottish Enlightenment Natural Law Toward Religious Freedom Conclusion Discussion.

Muslim youths must shun free sexual behaviours. However, these actions are highly prevalent, especially among the Muslim youth. This study aimed to determine the effect of qanun (local regulations based on Islamic law), religiosity and religious education on the sexual activity of Muslim youth. The study used a case-control design carried out in the province of Aceh, which applies the qanun, and in the province of North Sumatra, which does not apply the qanun. Researchers interviewed 552 Muslim youths using (...) the snowball method and disseminating online questionnaires; data were analysed through logistic regression using Jeffeys’s Amazing Statistics Program 16 (JASP) with a confidence interval (CI) of 95%. The results of this study indicated that qanun ( p < 0.001; Exp B = 4.628), always prayed five times every day in the last 3 months ( p = 0.027; Exp B = 1.616), and looking for various information about Islamic topics ( p = 0.01; Exp B = 1.747) is associated with the prevention of sexual activity of Muslim youth. Qanun affected the prevention of sexual activities among youth; these activities were 4628 times higher in areas that do not have qanun for preventing sexual activities in Muslim youth. Muslim youth looking for various information about Islamic topics also affected the prevention of sexual activity among youth – it was 1747 times higher than those who did not seek information about various Islamic topics on preventing sexual activity in Muslim youth. Muslim youth in qanun areas were proven to have a lower sexual activity. Furthermore, Muslim youth with high religiosity (those who pray diligently and look for various information about Islamic topics) were proven to be able to prevent sexual activity. Therefore, it is necessary to increase the religiosity of Muslim youth. Contribution: This article is expected to explain the impact of qanun, religiosity, religious education and the prevention of sexual activity among Muslim youth. This research is expected to be one of the solutions that can be applied to prevent sexual activity in Muslim youth, which is occurring increasingly. (shrink)

In the contemporary study of religion there seems to be an exaggeration of the distinction between religion and spirituality, not only to the point of separation, but worse still, in terms of a superiority-inferiority hierarchy that gives rise to a value judgement between spirituality and religion. Could this be a sign of the persisting Western hegemony in the study of religion? This article suggests that the consideration of religion and spirituality as disparate entities may be necessary in some societies but (...) not sufficient for a global perspective. Could there be an integrative model that would lend itself for an inclusive exchange in the study of religion and spirituality? Basing itself particularly within the literature of the psychological study of religion, this essay develops a multidimensional matrix of religion and/or spirituality that attempts to be, at the same time, parsimonious and comprehensive, which includes constructs like ‘religious-spirituality’. Religious-spirituality is suggested to be similar to Allport’s concept of ‘intrinsic religiosity’, having a three dimensional movement marked by an upwardly-directed vertical spirituality, inwardly-directed interior spirituality, and outwardly-directed horizontal spirituality. (shrink)

This chapter aims to lay out a map of the diverse epistemological perspectives within the Islamic theological tradition, in the conceptual framework of contemporary analytic philosophy of religion. In order achieve that goal, it aims to consider epistemological views in light of their historic context, while at the same time seeking to “translate” those broadly medieval perspectives into contemporary philosophical language. In doing so, the chapter offers a succinct overview of the main epistemic trends within the Islamic theological tradition (...) concerning religious epistemology. The chapter is divided into two main sections designated for discussions of differing accounts found in distinct trends of the tradition, namely the Rationalist and Traditionalist trends. The discussion concerning the Rationalist trend focuses on the philosophical-theologians of the dominant Mu’tazilite, Ash’arite, and Maturidite schools. The section on Islamic Traditionalism focuses on the Atharite scripturalism of Ibn Qudāma, and in particular the thought of Ibn Taymiyya. In order to map out these historic positions in light of contemporary religious epistemology, reference is made to a threefold typology of current views in the literature: (1) theistic evidentialism, (2) reformed epistemology, and (3) fideism. As such, the remainder of the chapter will attempt to outline the different approaches toward religious epistemology in the Islamic theological tradition with this threefold typology in mind. (shrink)

Historical analysis confirms the home-grown character of Nigeria’s conflicts and the complexity of their peaceful resolution. Religious leaders have traditionally contested political space with other actors and continue to do so. But the religiosity of popular culture is such that Nigerian religious leaders can make a substantive contribution to peace building and countering religious extremism if given the time, space and tools to do so. Elections have been critical moments in the evolution of religious tensions (...) and conflicts owing to the country’s geographical demographic and history, and the popular hope of correcting injustice that they evoke. There is a need to distinguish between genuine religious conflicts and conflicts that are essentially socio-economic or about competition for political power which become “religionised.” The evolution of the terrorist organisation, Boko Haram, can be traced back to intra-Muslim conflicts and anti-Sufi movements. But it reflects no less the underdevelopment and poverty of the Northeast and the impact of corruption on the perception of state and national government. The crude and violent narrative of Abubakar Shekau, its leader, shows a deterioration beyond that of its founder Malam Yusuf, who was able to offer financial and economic inducements over and above a rejection of most aspects of modernity and Western education. Increasingly, efforts are being made by religious leaders at both national, and local levels through formal, and grassroots networks to build better understanding and awareness between faiths to change and challenge narratives. With the appropriate support, these networks have great potential for improving communal relations and overcoming Boko Haram’s narratives of hate. (shrink)

Türkiye'de din eğitimi bilimi, Ankara Üniversitesi İlahiyat Fakültesi'ndeki akademik disiplinler içinde doğmuş ve alanın ilk akademisyenleri bu fakültede yetişmiştir. Fakültenin açılışından uzun bir süre sonra kurulan Din Eğitimi Anabilim Dalı, yeni kurulan ilahiyat fakültelerinin din eğitimi akademisyenlerini yetiştirmede öncü rol oynamıştır. Bu makalede, alanında ilk ve lider olmasından dolayı Ankara Üniversitesi İlahiyat Fakültesi üzerine yoğunlaşılarak, din eğitiminin Türkiye'de bilimsel bir disiplin olarak gelişmesi tartışılmaktadır. Ayrıca, Türkiye'deki mevcut din eğitiminin genel kurumsal görünümü ile ilgili bilgi verilmektedir. Araştırmada, din eğitimi bölümünün tarihsel (...) gelişimini ortaya koymak amacıyla Ankara Üniversitesi İlahiyat Fakültesi arşivleri incelenmiştir. İlk elden bilgiler, Yönetim Kurulu, Profesörler ve Fakülte Kurulu karar defterlerinden alınmıştır. Din Eğitimi Bölümü'nün karakteristik özellikleri, bilimsel yönelimleri ve katkıları incelenirken, bölümün akademisyenleri tarafından yürütülen bilimsel çalışmalar ve onların lisans ve lisansüstü öğrencilerine atıfta bulunulmuştur. In this article, the theoretical and practical contributions concerning the rise and development of religious education science, its basic characteristics, orientations and fields as an academic discipline in Turkey are discussed. Religious education made its first step into academic disciplines at the Ankara University Divinity Faculty. And first academicians in the field of religious education were taught at this faculty. Department of Religious Education, which was established after a long time, took the lead in educating religious education academicians in newly established divinity faculties. Moreover; the end of this article, information is given in relation to the general institutional appearance of religious education in nowdays Turkey. During the research, in order to reveal the historical development of department of religious education, archives of Ankara University Divinity Faculty were examined. First-hand information was derived from decision books of Administrative, Professors and Faculty Board. When exploring the characteristic features, scientific orientations and contributions of Department of Religious Education, the scientific works carried out by department’s academicians and their graduate and postgraduate students were referred to. (shrink)

Forty four years after the publication of Harvey Cox‟s The Secular City that celebrated “the progressive secularization of the world as the logical outcome of Biblical religion” (Newsweek)1, we almost feel the bones of religious fundamentalism cracking under the pressure of secularization. At the same time, however, the Hegelian dialectic holds ground as both refuse to be crushed by either; and any compromising stance only begets another rival; to the effect, that it can be said that fundamentalism is (...) never a phenomenon that may be extinguished. (shrink)

I first offer some reflections on the term religious naturalism. I then outline how moral thought might be configured in the context of religious naturalism. It is proposed that the goal of morality is to generate a flourishing community and that humans negotiate their social interactions using moral capacities that are cultivated in the context of culture. Six such capacities are considered: strategic reciprocity, humaneness, fair–mindedness, courage, reverence, and mindfulness. Moral capacities are contrasted with moral susceptibilities, fueled by (...) self–interest, and brought to the fore in times of stress and humiliation. The essay is in two parts. I first respond to Jerome Stone's query as to the nature of religious naturalism. This is followed by the text of my presentation at the 2001 AAR meeting. (shrink)

À partir de la période hellénistique, les inscriptions grecques concernant des fondations ou des régulations cultuelles permettent de saisir le développement d’un discours religieux particulier qui inclut des éléments hymniques, anciens et modernes, ainsi que de nouveaux topoi qui ne relèvent pas de la tradition hymnique. Ce nouveau discours religieux se développe en intégrant de nouveaux traits de la religion gréco-romaine, fortement influencés par des « religions orientales », tout en étant conscient des nouvelles tendances philosophiques qui infusent la religion (...) de ce temps. Depuis le iiie siècle avant notre ère, au moins, des inscriptions « sacrées » attestent des précédents pour des éléments bien présents dans la prose littéraire sacrée du iie siècle de notre ère. La présente étude analyse les principaux topoi de ce nouveau discours religieux, en se penchant tout particulièrement sur ceux qui concernent le fondateur de l’institution sacrée ou de la norme instituée, le dieu ou les dieux honoré(s) et les acteurs du culte, ainsi que les topoi concernant le contenu des règles de fondation et des ressources invoquées pour les faire respecter. (shrink)

This paper redefines religious discourse not in terms of doctrinal content, but in terms of where constitutive authority is located within a discourse. Drawing on Sequential Time Theory–Critical Review (STT-CR), it distinguishes L2 (operational ground), L1 (theoretical description), and L3 (metaphysical superaddition), and defines religious discourse as a discourse form that grants Over-Θ constitutive authority over L1/L2. On that basis, the paper reconstructs orthodoxy and heresy as Over-Θ+ / Over-Θ−, explains the structural undecidability of religious conflict, (...) and analyzes pseudo-verification through examples involving mercy, prayer, and healing. The central claim is that religious conflict should be read not primarily as a conflict over truth-contents, but as a conflict over constitutive authority. STT-CR does not dissolve such conflicts from outside; rather, it makes visible where Over-Θ has displaced empirical admissibility and where scientific, metaphysical, and religious discourse have been conflated. (shrink)

Religion is an important element of end-of-life care on the paediatric intensive care unit with religious belief providing support for many families and for some staff. However, religious claims used by families to challenge cessation of aggressive therapies considered futile and burdensome by a wide range of medical and lay people can cause considerable problems and be very difficult to resolve. While it is vital to support families in such difficult times, we are increasingly concerned that deeply held (...) belief in religion can lead to children being potentially subjected to burdensome care in expectation of ‘miraculous’ intervention. We reviewed cases involving end-of-life decisions over a 3-year period. In 186 of 203 cases in which withdrawal or limitation of invasive therapy was recommended, agreement was achieved. However, in the 17 remaining cases extended discussions with medical teams and local support mechanisms did not lead to resolution. Of these cases, 11 (65%) involved explicit religious claims that intensive care should not be stopped due to expectation of divine intervention and complete cure together with conviction that overly pessimistic medical predictions were wrong. The distribution of the religions included Protestant, Muslim, Jewish and Roman Catholic groups. Five of the 11 cases were resolved after meeting religious community leaders; one child had intensive care withdrawn following a High Court order, and in the remaining five, all Christian, no resolution was possible due to expressed expectations that a ‘miracle’ would happen. (shrink)

Religion was always perceived as the threshold between two worlds. It is a space where individuals are supposed to be connected to a different reality through the mediating power of a particlular ritual, at a specific time and in a certain space. A new space of appearance is the expected outcome along with this relocation from profane to sacred. Religious broadcasting could be conceptualized as a visual and acoustic “altar”. The ritual, space and time are the pillars (...) of this audio-visual “cathedral” the very space that could build the bridge between sacred and profane, and the means for this mediated, symbolic transfer. This paper tries to outline the power of media representation in the context of religious broadcasting that uses ritual and imagination to maintain and negotiate the distinction between sacred and profane and to generate alternative narratives. In this regard, the religious broadcasting, presuming the sacerdotal role to represent, mediate and interpret the relationship between sacred and profane is being conditioned by a ritualized medium. As a result, the religious messages could end up as a ritualized mystification that would jeopardize the production of meaning. (shrink)

In this book, Paul K. Moser offers a new approach to religious experience and the kind of evidence it provides. Here, he explains the nature of theistic and non-theistic experience in relation to the meaning of human life and its underlying evidence, with special attention given to the perspectives of Tolstoy, Buddha, Confucius, Krishna, Moses, the apostle Paul, and Muhammad. Among the many topics explored in this timely volume are: religious experience characterized in a unifying conception; religious (...) experience naturalized relative to science; religious experience psychologized in merely psychological phenomena; and religious experience cognized relative to potential defeaters from evil, divine hiddenness, and religious diversity. Understanding Religious Experience will benefit those interested in the nature of religion and can be used in relevant courses in religious studies, philosophy, theology, Biblical studies, and the history of religion. (shrink)

In the recent past, attempts to revitalize historico-religious studies have challenged the charismatic appeal of some of the most celebrated scholars of the twentieth century. At the same time, the old and ideological frameworks that characterized the field have been critically analyzed and deconstructed. The disciplinary status quo, taken for granted for quite a long time, has been shaken to its foundation, paving the way for new approaches. However, the postmodern tenet of problematizing any authority has also (...) become a convenient shortcut to blur the distinction between scientific signal and nonepistemic noise. Despite this troublesome feature, some scholars have deployed postmodern and poststructuralist tools to study the genealogy, reception, implementation, and diffusion of cultural representations within the aforementioned academic discipline. The present article briefly reviews one of the most recent and remarkable examples of such scholarship, that is, The Scientification of Religion: An Historical Study of Discursive Change, 1800–2000. (shrink)