"Radical theology" and "political theology" are terms that have gained a lot of currency among philosophers of religion today. In this visionary new book, Jeffrey W. Robbins explores the contemporary direction of these movements as he charts a course for their future. Robbins claims that radical theology is no longer bound by earlier thinking about God and that it must be conceived of as postsecular and postliberal. As he engages with themes of liberation, gender, and race, Robbins moves beyond the usual canon of death-of-God thinkers, thinking "against" them as much as "with" them. He presents revolutionary thinking in the face of changing theological concepts, from reformation to transformation, transcendence to immanence, messianism to metamorphosis, and from the proclamation of the death of God to the notion of God's plasticity.

Why did many religious leaders-Moses, Old Testament prophets, Zoroaster-claim they heard divine voices? Why do ancient civilizations exhibit key similarities, e.g., the "living dead" (treating the dead as if they were still alive); "speaking idols" (care and feeding of effigies); monumental mortuary architecture and "houses of gods" (pyramids, ziggurats, temples)? How do we explain strange behaviour such as spirit possession, speaking in tongues, channelling, hypnosis, and schizophrenic hallucinations? Are these lingering vestiges of an older mentality? Brian J. McVeigh answers these riddles by updating "bicameralism." First proposed by the psychologist Julian Jaynes, this theory postulates that an earlier mentality existed: a "human" (the brain's left hemisphere) heard voices of "gods" or "ancestors" (the brain's right hemisphere). Therefore, ancient religious texts reporting divine voices were recounting of audio-visual hallucinations-a method of social control when early populations expanded. As growing political economic complexity destabilized god-governed states in the late second millennium BCE, divine voices became inadequate. Eventually, humans had to culturally acquire new cognitive skills (modern religions) to accommodate increasing social pressures: selves replaced the gods and history witnessed an "inward turn." This psychological interiorization of spiritual experience laid the foundations for the world's great religions and philosophies that arose in India, China, Greece, and the Middle East in the middle of the first millennium BCE.

Even as the number of unbelievers continues to rise, religion in America still gets unwarrantably good press. The tenets and teachings, however nonsensical, of each and every "community of faith" may not be attacked. Secular academics who would never be caught in a synagogue, church, or mosque seldom fail to manifest politically correct reverence for the creeds, codes, and cults of the religious. Unfortunately, the central religious concept of the "sacred" proves, upon closer inspection, to be fictitious. The understandably popular "holy" times, places, deities, peoples, books, laws, and scenarios for the afterlife are fantasies projected into everyday experience by human beings trapped in time and unwilling to accept their own transiency and long-term insignificance. This book surveys the various traditional "fortresses" of the sacred and finds them all empty and indefensible.

International Conflict Analysis in South Asia: A Study of Sectarian Violence in Pakistan analyzes the ideological relationship of the Muslim identity to its perceived practice of Islam among the Shia and Deobandi sects. A Muslim identity, defined as the parameters of who is and who isn't a Muslim has led to the political conundrum of Pakistan to an anticipated single interpretation of Islam causing severe sectarian violence across the country. Sectarianism has been rooted in Pakistan's affairs since 1953, but most recently the country has been victimized by political and sectarian Islamic movements. The collective mobilization and propaganda campaigns of these movements have led exclusion of certain religious minorities and their practices. The study takes root in Punjab Pakistan among twenty seven interviews where the Deobandi sect and the Shia sect face severe fatalities and undefined conflict.

The Seductions of Pilgrimage explores the simultaneously attractive and repellent, beguiling and alluring forms of seduction in pilgrimage. It focuses on the varied discursive, imaginative, and practical mechanisms of seduction that draw individual pilgrims to a pilgrimage site; the objects, places, and paradigms that pilgrims leave behind as they embark on their hyper-meaningful travel experience; and the often unforeseen elements that lead pilgrims off their desired course. Presenting the first comprehensive study of the role of seduction on individual pilgrims in the study of pilgrimage and tourism, it will appeal to scholars of anthropology, cultural geography, tourism, heritage, and religious studies.

"Sharot makes a substantial contribution to the maturation of the comparative sociology of religion. A distinctive feature of the book is its accent on popular religion, a much studied phenomenon these days ."Martin Marty

The many books on the world's religions typically emphasize doctrine ( religion "in the air"), while sociology of religion books typically emphasize behavior (religion "on the ground"). Stephen Sharot does both in this masterful study, the product of many years of research. His book should have great classroom potential as well as a prominent place on religion scholars' bookshelves."--Phillip Hammond, D. Mackenzie Brown Professor of Religious Studies, University of California Santa Barbara

"This book belongs in libraries of all sorts. It strikes me as a paradigm of analytical comprehension that should set a standard for the field."
-- "Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion," September 2002

"This is a commendably ambitious project...The coverage is excellent."
--"Journal of Religion"

"In his fine study Sharot succeeds in discerning a specific trajectory of popular religions. He has assembled a tremendous amount of evidence and arguments in favor of the independent existence and development of popular religion, effective still in the secularized world."
--"History of Religions"

"He is adept at articulating overarching patterns of similarity and differences, and furnishes a much-needed synthesis of recent scholarship concerning many of the major religious traditions."
--"Contemporary Sociology"

A Sociology of World Religions presents a comparative analysis of the world's religions, focusing on the differences and interrelationshipsbetween religious elites and lay masses. In each case the volume contextualizes how the relationships between these two religious forms fit within, and are influenced by, the wider socio-political environment.

After introducing the book's major themes, the volume introduces and builds upon an analysis of Weber's model of religious action, drawing on Durkheim, Marxist scholars, and the work of contemporary sociologists and anthropolgists. The following chapters each focus on major religious cultures, including Hinduism, Buddhism, Catholicism, Protestantism, Islam, Judaism, and the religions of China and Japan. This ambitious project is the first to offer a comparison of the popular, or folk, forms of religion around the world.

Sharot's accessible introductions to each of the world religions, synthesizing a vast literature on popular religion from sociology, anthropology, and historians of religion, make the project ideal for course use. His comparative approach and original analyses will prove rewarding even for experts on each of the world religions.

The book attends to a historical question - how to account for the high numbers of renouncers (sadhvis) mentioned in medieval and ancient texts - which has been acknowledged and raised, but left unaddressed within Jain studies. It does so through ethnographic data gathered through extensive fieldwork among the sadhvis in Delhi and Jaipur. The volume foregrounds the primacy of 'choice' and 'agency'- upheld by the nuns themselves, who associate asceticism with autonomy, freedom, joy, spiritual well-being, self-worth and peace, and grihastha (household) with loss of independence, fettered existence, degradation, burdensome familial obligations and social responsibilities. It also examines whether it may be apt to term Jain nuns as practitioners of an 'indigenous mode of feminism'. The book challenges the existing sociological theories of renunciation and tests the feminist concepts of agency and autonomy by investigating the culturally coded roles ascribed to women in Jainism, which are variegated, and examines how a fractured discourse and reality is resolved in the subjectivities and identities of female ascetics. The very legitimacy of the institution of female asceticism, and the way in which the society (samaj) upholds and sustains it, renders female asceticism into a socially approved alternative institution - albeit one that allows Jain nuns to create spaces of relative and autonomy and even prestige for themselves.

In Introduction to Religious Studies, Harvey J. Sindima provides an unconventional approach to the study of world religions. Often, books and courses on religious studies focus on the major world religions. This approach, however, frequently ignores other religious experiences, such as those of various African groups as well as the indigenous people of the Americas and Australia. These less widespread religions are commonly described in pejorative terms such as 'primitive religions' or 'non-literate religions.' Focusing solely on well-known religions is an approach that impoverishes religious studies and deprives students of the enormous wealth of religious knowledge of the world. Introduction to Religious Studies pulls together the diverse religious experience of Africans, Native Americans, and the indigenous peoples of Australia in order to provide a comprehensive introduction to the study of religion and broaden the horizons of religious studies students. Under each theme or topic, examples are drawn from religions of salvation as well as African and Native American religious traditions. This book provides students with a deep, wide, and very rich introduction to religious studies.

Ascetic practices are a common feature of religion in Japan, practiced by different religious traditions. This book looks at these ascetic practices in an inter-sectarian and inter-doctrinal fashion, in order to highlight the underlying themes common to all forms of asceticism. It does so by employing a multidisciplinary methodology, which integrates participant fieldwork - the author himself engaged extensively in ascetic practices - with a hermeneutical interpretation of the body as the primary locus of transmission of the ascetic 'embodied tradition'. By unlocking this 'bodily data', the book unveils the human body as the main tool and text of ascetic practice. This book includes discussion of the many extraordinary rituals practiced by Japanese ascetics.

For good or ill, most, if not all, of the great institutions which have formed the framework of society have had their roots in the idea of Deity as a beneficent providential order of transcendental reality. In being handed down through countless generations the beliefs, concepts and customs have assumed a great variety of new outward forms in the process of transmission and development. To determine their true meaning and function as a cohesive force and as an expression of ultimate reality, the comparative and historical methods can be employed with considerable advantage. This book, first published in 1950, provides a valuable comparative study of religion.

Practical Mysticism in Islam and Christianity offers a comparative study of the works of the Sufi-poet Jalal al-Din Rumi (1207-1273) and the practical teachings of the German Dominican, Meister Eckhart (c1260-1327/8). Rumi has remained an influential figure in Islamic mystical discourse since the thirteenth century, while also extending his impact to the Western spiritual arena. However, his ideas have frequently been interpreted within the framework of other mystical, philosophical, or religious systems. Through its novel approach, this book aims to reformulate Rumi's practical mysticism by employing four methodological principles: a) mysticism is a coherent structure with mutual interconnection between its parts; b) the imposition of alien structures to interpret any particular mysticism damages its inward coherency; c) practical mysticism consists of two main parts, namely practices and stages; and d) the proper use of comparative methodology enables a deeper understanding of each juxtaposed system. Eckhart's speculative mysticism, which differs from and enjoys similarities with the love-based mysticism of Rumi, provides a "mirror" that highlights the special features of Rumi's practical mysticism. Such comparison also allows a deeper comprehension of Eckhart's practical thought. Offering a critical examination of practical mysticism, this book is a valuable resource for students and scholars of Islamic studies, comparative mysticism, and the intellectual history of Islam.

Religious Ways of Experiencing Life: A Global and Narrative Approach surveys world religions, using the narratives and discourses of each tradition to describe it in its own terms. Carl Olson examines each tradition's practices, teachings, material culture, roles of women, and path to salvation, as well as the experiences of its followers. The exploration of lived experience draws out and emphasizes the plural nature of religious traditions. The volume includes chapters on all current major world religions, as well as material on ancient religions of the Mediterranean, indigenous North American and African spiritual traditions, and New Age and new religious movements. Featuring timelines and suggestions for further reading, this text will be of interest to undergraduate students seeking a broad introduction to World Religion or Lived Religion.

"Are they really Muslims?" Islam in China reveals the struggle for identity of the small yet vital Muslim community of China, a little studied minority on the fringes of the Islamic world now thrust into the spotlight by the opening of China to the world and the rise of independent Muslim republics on China's western borders. Both timely and important, the multifaceted essays-- collection of over twenty years of Raphael Israeli's scholarship on Chinese Muslims-offer detailed insight into the relationship between China's non-Muslim majority and an increasingly self-confident guest culture. The work uncovers a history of uneasy ethnic, philosophical, and ideological coexistence, the gradual sinification of the Chinese Muslim creed, and the increasing accommodation of Islam by a modern, westernizing China. In addition, it highlights a religious group riddled with sectarianism; factional rifts that reveal the doctrinal, social, and political diversity at the core of Chinese Islam.

Modern Psychology and Ancient Wisdom, 2nd edition, brings together experts who explore the use of ancient healing techniques from Buddhism, Christianity, Goddess, Shamanism, Taoism, and Yogic traditions as well as the mystical practices of Judaism and Islam and their application to modern counseling and therapy professions. Each chapter lays out time-tested techniques used by teachers, guides, and practitioners to facilitate psychological healing, embraces a wide variety of cultural perspectives, and offers a large, varied, and meaningful view of the world. This new edition includes added material on Islam, indigenous, and shamanic healing perspectives and practices, as well as new findings in the fields of neuropsychology and epigenetics. With its vast offerings of new treatment methods from a variety of perspectives-from therapeutic metaphors and breathing exercises to meditation and yoga techniques-this book will be of use to mental health professionals, social workers, and pastoral caregivers.

What are we to make of the Latina schoolteacher who considers herself a good Catholic, rarely attends Mass, but meditates daily at her home altar (where she mixes images of the Virgin of Guadalupe with those of Frida Kahlo, and traditional votive candles with healing crystals), yet feels particularly spiritual while preparing food for religious celebrations in her neighborhood? Diverse religious practices such as these have long baffled scholars of contemporary religion, whose research started with the assumption that individuals commit, or refuse to commit, to an entire institutionally defined package of beliefs and practices. Social surveys typically ask respondents to self-identify by denominational or other broad religious categories. Sociologists attempt to measure religiosity according to how well individuals conform to the official religious standards, such as frequency of church attendance, scripture-reading, or prayer.
In this book, Meredith McGuire points the way forward to a new way of understanding and studying religious behavior. Rather than try to fit people into pre-arranged packages, she argues, scholars must begin to study religion as it is actually lived and experienced in people's everyday lives. Drawing on her own extensive fieldwork, as well as recent work by other scholars, McGuire explores the many ways that people express themselves spiritually and shows that they rarely fit neatly into the categories we've developed. Challenging those who see declining church attendance as the death of religion in the Western world, McGuire demonstrates that religion is as widespread, potent, and vital as ever, if you know where to look.

How colonial categories of race and religion together created identities and hierarchies that today are vehicles for multicultural nationalism and social critique in the Caribbean and its diasporas. When the British Empire abolished slavery, Caribbean sugar plantation owners faced a labor shortage. To solve the problem, they imported indentured “coolie” laborers, Hindus and a minority Muslim population from the Indian subcontinent. Indentureship continued from 1838 until its official end in 1917. The Deepest Dye begins on post-emancipation plantations in the West Indies—where Europeans, Indians, and Africans intermingled for work and worship—and ranges to present-day England, North America, and Trinidad, where colonial-era legacies endure in identities and hierarchies that still shape the post-independence Caribbean and its contemporary diasporas. Aisha Khan focuses on the contested religious practices of obeah and Hosay, which are racialized as “African” and “Indian” despite the diversity of their participants. Obeah, a catch-all Caribbean term for sub-Saharan healing and divination traditions, was associated in colonial society with magic, slave insurrection, and fraud. This led to anti-obeah laws, some of which still remain in place. Hosay developed in the West Indies from Indian commemorations of the Islamic mourning ritual of Muharram. Although it received certain legal protections, Hosay’s mass gatherings, processions, and mock battles provoked fears of economic disruption and labor unrest that led to criminalization by colonial powers. The proper observance of Hosay was debated among some historical Muslim communities and continues to be debated now. In a nuanced study of these two practices, Aisha Khan sheds light on power dynamics through religious and racial identities formed in the context of colonialism in the Atlantic world, and shows how today these identities reiterate inequalities as well as reinforce demands for justice and recognition.

This new study looks at how non-human animals have been viewed in the Buddhist and Christian religious traditions. The concept of speciesism, coined in 1970 as an analogy to racism and discussed almost exclusively within philosophical circles, is used to explore very basic questions about which animals, human or otherwise, were significant to early Buddhists and Christians. Drawing on scriptures and interpretive traditions in Christianity and Buddhism, Waldau argues that decisions about human ethical responsibilities in both religions are deeply rooted in ancient understandings of the place of humans in the world and our relationships with other animals in an integrated cosmos. His study offers scholars and others interested in the bases for ethical decisions new insights into Christian and Buddhist reasoning about animals as well as what each might have to offer to the current discussions about animal rights and environmental ethics.

Hindu and Christian debates over the meanings, motivations, and modalities of 'conversion' provide the central connecting theme running through this book. It focuses on the reasons offered by both sides to defend or oppose the possibility of these cross-border movements, and shows how these reasons form part of a wider constellation of ideas, concepts, and practices of the Christian and the Hindu worlds. The book draws upon several historical case-studies of Christian missionaries and of Hindus who encountered these missionaries. By analysing some of the complex negotiations, intersections, and conflicts between Hindus and Christians over the question of 'conversion', it demonstrates that these encounters revolve around three main contested themes. Firstly, who can properly 'speak for the convert'? Secondly, how is 'tolerating' the religious other connected to an appraisal of the other's viewpoints which may be held to be incorrect, inadequate, or incomplete? Finally, what is, in fact, the 'true Religion'? The book demonstrates that it is necessary to wrestle with these questions for an adequate understanding of the Hindu and Christian debates over 'conversion.' Questioning what 'conversion' precisely is, and why it has been such a volatile issue on India's political-legal landscape, the book will be a useful contribution to studies of Hinduism, Christianity and Asian Religion and Philosophy.

This volume offers an interdisciplinary approach to some pivotal topics of (de-) colonization. It examines the early modern debate on just war, transatlantic conquest and slavery, followed by the shift of the debate in the 18th and 19th centuries towards assertions of racial hierarchies based on supposed matters of fact, and finally the philosophical discussion regarding decolonization. Two central themes emerge: first, the political circumstances and the exploitation of the available terminology resulted in the production of new meanings or "translations" during the 17th and 18th centuries, and second, the adoptions of established justifications of colonial activities and enslavement brought about models of natural science that increasingly developed a momentum of their own.

The Karamazov Correspondence: Letters of Vladimir S. Soloviev represents the first fully annotated and chronologically arranged collection of the Russian philosopher-poet's most important letters, the vast majority of which have never before been translated into English. Soloviev was widely known for his close association with Fyodor M. Dostoevsky in the final years of the novelist's life, and these letters reflect many of the qualities and contradictions that also personify the title characters of Dostoevsky's last and greatest novel, The Brothers Karamazov. The selected letters cover all aspects of Soloviev's life, ranging from vital concerns about human rights and the political and religious turmoil of his day to matters related to family and friends, his love life, and early drafts of his works, including poetic endeavors.

A comprehensive and accessible textbook which explores the traditions and beliefs of the world's living religions - the fully updated and revised new edition The World Religions Reader is an inclusive, student-friendly examination of the history, teaching, practices, and appeal of the world's major religions. Covering both the fundamentals and complexities of each religious tradition, this popular textbook brings together significant texts from scriptures and scholars, as well as writings from philosophers and other significant thinkers throughout history. Students are provided with an introduction and overview of the tradition, taken through its primary texts, and presented with a text which seeks to persuade the student of the tradition's merits. This new edition has been thoroughly updated to be even more accessible for students new to interreligious engagement and to reflect current trends and developments in religions worldwide. Every chapter opens with a substantial overview which orients the new student and then flows into a carefully chosen set of texts - a regular textbook is now combined with a Reader. New content examines areas such as the Rastafarian tradition, while revised chapters cover secular humanism and indigenous and emerging religious traditions. The methodology of the book focuses on an empathetic approach - representing each tradition from the perspective of a conventional adherent - enabling students to develop understanding of each tradition and appreciate similarities and differences in their most typical forms. Invites students to study each tradition from the perspective of a follower, aiming to understand why the tradition is popular and powerful Explores representative passages, world-views, rituals and institutions, ethical expressions and modern outlooks for each religion Features discussions of interfaith perspectives on the role of women in religious traditions and the impact of world events and politics on interfaith communication Encourages students to consider questions of truth, the relation of religion and society, and the changing nature of a tradition in the modern world Includes a complete set of pedagogical tools and instructor resources, including end-of-chapter fact sheets, topic summaries, key term sections, and essay and discussion questions The World Religions Reader, Fourth Edition is an ideal textbook for undergraduate and graduate courses in religion, especially for liberal arts and non-affiliated colleges, as well as general readers wishing to increase their knowledge of the world's religious traditions.

Analysing both fraud and religion as social constructs with different functions and meanings attributed to them, this book raises issues that are central to debates about the limits of religious toleration in diverse societies, and the possible harm (as well as benefits) that religious organisations can visit upon society and individuals. There has already been a lively debate concerning the structural context in which abuse, especially sexual abuse, can be perpetrated within religion. Contributors to the volume proceed from the premise that similar arguments about ways in which structure and power may be conducive to abuse can be made about fraud and deception. Both can contribute to abuse, yet they are often less easily demonstrated and proven, hence less easily prosecuted. With a focus on minority religions, the book offers a comparative overview of the concept of religious fraud by bringing together analyses of different types of fraud or deception (financial, bio-medical, emotional, breach of trust and consent). Contributors examine whether fraud is necessarily intentional (or whether that is in the eye of the beholder); certain structures may be more conducive to fraud; followers willingly participate in it. The volume includes some chapters focused on non-Western beliefs (Juju, Occult Economies, Dharma Lineage), which have travelled to the West and can be found in North American and European metropolitan areas.

A comprehensive survey of how religions understand death, dying, and the afterlife, drawing on examples from Christian, Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist, and Shamanic perspectives. * Considers shared and differing views of death across the world s major religions, including on the nature of death itself, the reasons for it, the identity of those who die, religious rituals, and on how the living should respond to death * Places emphasis on the varying concepts of the self or soul * Uses a thematic structure to facilitate a broader comparative understanding * Written in an accessible style to appeal to an undergraduate audience, it fills major gap in current textbook literature

While history reveals numerous attacks against Freemasonry since its founding, some of the most potentially damning assaults in this century have been launched in the last two or three years. Religious leaders, such as Ron Carlson and Pat Robertson, have singled out the Order for attack. Basing his premise on a misrepresentation of Masonic texts, Carlson has convinced many of his followers that Freemasonry is rooted in heresy. Masons, who have traditionally chosen to remain silent in the face of criticism - no matter who the detractors were, what their motives were, or the stakes involved - have generally proved to be an easy target. In The Boy Who Cried Wolf Richard P. Thorn, M.D., shows that the current charges against Masonry come not from ignorance but deliberate misrepresentation. And he is convinced that it is the duty of Freemasons not to turn the other cheek this time but to set the record straight. Using the same texts on which Carlson bases his accusations, Dr. Thorn demonstrates, point by point, how the material has been deliberately manipulated and misquoted to denounce the Order. Thorn proves that conflicts between Freemasonry and religious beliefs are pure fabrication. He unequivocally refutes such nonsensical and fraudulant charges (which have unjustly garnered attention in recent times) as Freemasonry was instituted as a religion; it has its origin in the Mystery cults, and its members are taught to practice sun worship, nature worship, and astrology; it is a secret society; and Freemasons believe that good works are a substitute for faith in a Supreme Deity. Dr. Thorn ably demonstrates through his compassionate defense that Freemasons are commanded to act in a spirit ofreconciliation rather than division, following the Masonic principles of Brotherhood, Relief, and Truth.