Religions in the Modern World: Traditions and Transformations, Third Edition is the ideal textbook for those coming to the study of religion for the first time, as well as for those who wish to keep up-to-date with the latest perspectives in the field. This third edition contains new and upgraded pedagogic features, including chapter summaries, key terms and definitions, and questions for reflection and discussion. The first part of the book considers the history and modern practices of the main religious traditions of the world, while the second analyzes trends from secularization to the rise of new spiritualities. Comprehensive and fully international in coverage, it is accessibly written by practicing and specialist teachers.

Rabbi on the Ganges: A Jewish-Hindu Encounter is the first work to engage the new terrain of Hindu-Jewish religious encounter. The book offers understanding into points of contact between the two religions of Hinduism and Judaism. Providing an important comparative account, the work illuminates key ideas and practices within the traditions, surfacing commonalities between the jnana and Torah study, karmakanda and Jewish ritual, and between the different Hindu philosophic schools and Jewish thought and mysticism, along with meditation and the life of prayer and Kabbalah and creating dialogue around ritual, mediation, worship, and dietary restrictions. The goal of the book is not only to unfold the content of these faith traditions but also to create a religious encounter marked by mutual and reciprocal understanding and openness.

This detailed book is a resource for students, practitioners, and leaders interested in how the major world religions have understood poverty and responded to the poor. Poverty is a universal phenomenon across history, regardless of country or culture. Today, the demographics of the poor are on the rise globally: it is a critical issue. Religious traditions are another universal aspect of human societies, and nearly all religions include directives on how to respond to the poor and systemic poverty. How do the various religious traditions conceptualize poverty, and what do they view as the proper response to the poor? Poverty and the Poor in the World's Religious Traditions: Religious Responses to the Problem of Poverty brings together specialists on the religions of the world and their diverse viewpoints to identify how different religious traditions interact with poverty and being poor. It also contains excerpts of religious texts that readers can use as primary documents to illustrate themes such as identifying the poor, religious reasons for being poor, and responses (like charity and development) to the existence of poverty. This book serves as a powerful resource for students of subjects like international development, missiology, comparative religion, theology, social ethics, economics, and organizational leadership as well as for any socially concerned clergy of various faiths.

In every culture, in every epoch, human beings have yearned for heaven--the kingdom of God, abode of the elect, fount of enlightenment, mirror of hopes and desires. Now, in The Book of Heaven, Carol and Philip Zaleski provide the first wide-ranging anthology of writings about heaven, drawing from scriptures, myths, epics, poems, prayers, sermons, novels, hymns and spells, to illuminate a vast spectrum of beliefs about the world beyond.

The Zaleskis present a fascinating array of ancient and modern, solemn and comic meditations, as they explore such topics as the often treacherous journey to heaven, heaven's colorful inhabitants, its topographic features, and its moral architecture. The emphasis is on great literature, with substantial excerpts taken from classic works such as The Iliad, St. Augustine's Confessions, The Prose Edda, The Divine Comedy, Paradise Lost, and The Pilgrim's Progress; from sacred texts such as the Bible, the Upanishads, the Qu'ran, the Tibetan Book of the Dead, and the Bhagavata Purana; and from diverse writers such as Plato, Cicero, Thomas Traherne, Henry Fielding, Emanuel Swedenborg, Percy Bysshe Shelley, John Henry Cardinal Newman, Hans Christian Andersen, William James, G. K. Chesterton, C. G. Jung, Rupert Brooke, and Arthur Conan Doyle. Selections highlight both the diversity and the universality of reflection on heaven: the sacred chants of the Buddhist Pure Land sutras reverberate alongside John Donne's holy sonnets, and Shaker songs complement Jewish mystical hymns.

From the words of Sioux holy man Black Elk, to a sermon by Jonathan Edwards, to humorous musings by Mark Twain and fantastical passages from The Chronicles of Narnia, this rich anthology will deepen our understanding of the myriad ways in which human beings have envisioned heaven.

Aristotle accurately characterized humans as political animals. Whether through birth or from choice, people naturally cluster into groups for protection, advancement, and the pursuit of well-being. But Aristotle's description does not hint at the powerful binary tension within this human tendency. Leaders enhance a social group's sense of identity by appealing to the members' commitments and shared traditions, to their hopes, strengths, sacrifices, and fears. Often, however, they cultivate not only an awareness of difference but even a sense of superiority, since for every social group there are those outsider, the "them". Maintaining a group's solidarity can too easily lead to the righteousness of intolerance towards those who are excluded. The reinforcement of group-identity in this way runs so deep in human nature that holding up a mirror to ourselves inevitably reveals a split image: the people we want to see and the people we're glad we're not. Intolerance: Political Animals and Their Prey presents stark examples of how the "us" have treated the "them". The papers in this volume hold up various unflattering mirrors of intolerance from the areas of History, Law, Philosophy, Political Science, and Religion. The authors of these scholarly studies do not condemn. Rather, their research compels us to look at ourselves as the political animals we are. Intolerance: Political Animals and Their Prey is the product of a year-long multi-disciplinary collaboration between faculty members of Bard College and the United States Military Academy at West Point. The project involved parallel seminar courses at both institutions along with Joint Sessions, all focused on the central theme of intolerance, and culminated in a three-day academic Conference at Bard in the Spring of 2015. This volume inaugurates a new series being published by Hamilton Books under the general title, Dialogues on Social Issues: Bard College and West Point.

SPECIAL INTRODUCTORY PRICE! (Valid until 3 months after publication) No collection of this sort has yet been conceived of, let alone accomplished, in this field. In part that may well be due to the extraordinarily nascent character of the field of comparative religious ethics, described as that (as opposed to Christian ethics, for example). Yet the aim is not simply to gather together a number of pieces, but -- with the appropriate modesty and tentativeness -- to offer one picture of how the field ought to understand itself: its past, present, and perhaps its future. A critical mass of scholars has now emerged in this area, and the institutional dynamics of religious studies departments, which are increasingly seeing the attractions of classes in "comparative ethics," are favorable as well. By gathering together both "classic" statements, exemplifying paradigmatic approaches in the field, and recent, ground-breaking and innovative works, the ambition is to make this collection the gold standard for anyone working on the field of comparative religious ethics in coming decades.

On the seventh day, God rested and thus completed his creation. Likewise, man should rest on the seventh day and every seven years leave the fields fallow to rest. If you like, a divine economic and environmental programme is encountered here. "Subdue the earth" is not to be misunderstood as a mandate to subjugate and exploit, but on the contrary as a call to preserve God's "very good" creation. Its current explosiveness illustrates precisely this fundamental relationship. Even secular circles now speak of the "integrity of creation" as a matter of course. And in Muslim countries, scholars and activists are preparing to launch a "green Islam", based of course on Quranic principles. At the same time, faith communities and churches with their commitment to nature and to a just world of work are moving into the concrete focus of public attention and are serious players in the current discourse. Reason enough, then, to get to the bottom of the concept of "environment" in the world religions. How do religions position themselves on the ecological question? What are the foundations of their decisions? And can they make a significant contribution to the current problem and to the enquiries of many people?

In this daring debut, Zayin Cabot challenges the wise homebodies of academia. A profoundly interdisciplinary approach to comparative scholarship, Ecologies of Participation offers a methodology whereby we can face our shared planetary predicament. It is grounded in process philosophy, and asserts the importance of a new ontology of agency. It traces the importance of Levy-Bruhl and Levi-Strauss's early work, while offering new insight into the ontological turn in anthropology. This book sets out to destabilize modern reductionist trends toward scientific materialism, without falling into postmodern cultural constructivism. It does not assume the givenness of nature or culture. By advancing a multi-ontology approach, this work offers robust interventions into decolonial and critical studies. Cabot takes contemporary scholarship in new and exciting directions-offering an unstable ground from which to examine our shared worlds, both human and other. Throughout the last chapters of the book, these threads are illuminated through a detailed ethics of comparison and participation.

A reprint of Evelyn Underhill's timeless study on the the nature and principles of worship and the main forms in which they find expression in Christianity. In the belief that religious experience is the starting point of theological reconstruction, the author analyses here the nature, characteristics and principles of how man relates to God. The way and degree in which ritual, symbol, sacrament and sacrifice become part of worship is also examined and, subsequently, its principles are illustrated, as embodied in the main types of cults.

New religious movements (NRMs) and other minority faiths have regularly been the focus of legal cases around the world in recent decades. This is the first book to focus on important aspects of the relationship of smaller faiths to the societies in which they function by using specific legal cases to examine social control efforts. The legal cases involve group leaders, a groups' practices or alleged abuses against members and children in the group, legal actions brought by former members or third parties, attacks against such groups by outsiders including even governments, and libel and slander actions brought by religious groups as they seek to defend themselves. These cases are sometimes milestones in the relation between state authorities and religious groups. Exploring cases in different parts of the world, and assessing the events causing such cases and their consequences, this book offers a practical insight for understanding the relations of NRMs and other minority religions and the law from the perspective of legal cases. Chapters focus on legal, political, and social implications. Including contributions from scholars, legal practitioners, actual or former members, and authorities involved in such cases from various jurisdictions, this book presents an objective approach to understanding why so many legal actions have involved NRMs and other minority faiths in recent years in western societies, and the consequences of those actions for the society and the religious group as well.

First published in 1996. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

The object of this book is to provide an opportunity for voices of other religions to be heard as Australia celebrates its first Catholic saint, Mary MacKillop of the Cross. It is the first publication that seeks to bring together a representative collection of contributions. Here are reflections on sainthood and heroes of faith from within different religious traditions and different Christian denominations. The direction given to contributors was that they illustrate how holy persons and heroes are esteemed in their own tradition and how this might frame that tradition's appreciation of Mary MacKillop. From this, it is hoped that the collection will provide an example of how she might contribute to the wider Australian religious landscape. Herein, the reader will find critical yet appreciative reflections from Catholic and Seventh Day Adventist to Jewish and Muslim writers. Some have taken the brief as an opportunity to reveal more of the heroes and saints of their own tradition and how they came to be esteemed. Others have directly described how their own tradition esteems saints and heroes in general in order to bring distinct and evocative appreciations of Mary MacKillop, now given hues from a Protestant, Orthodox or Lutheran palette. But whether Baptist or Anglican or traditions beyond Christianity, the writers have extended the capacity of Australians to appreciate Mary MacKillop as an Australian saint and hero, albeit remaining within a religious framework.

The present volume of Key Concepts in Interreligious Discourses offers a fascinating insight into the history, the main ideas and current developments in economic thought from the perspective of the three major monotheistic faiths Judaism, Christianity and Islam. The reader encounters topics such as price control in rabbinic Judaism, Christian monks elaborating the foundations of modern accounting, and the latest innovations in Islamic banking. Each article has been written by a renowned expert on the subject and offers a historical overview over the development of the concept, the theological and philosophical principles in the Holy Scriptures of each faith, an outline of the practical application of the concept in the present, its significance for the future, and many more.

The second volume of the series "Key Concepts in Interreligious Discourses" points out the roots of the concept of ''human rights'' in Judaism, Christianity and Islam. It shows how far the universal validity of ''human rights'' opposes in some crucial points with religious traditions. The volume demonstrates that new perspectives are introduced to the general discussion about human rights when related to religious traditions. Especially the interreligious viewpoint proves that a new kind of debate about human rights and its history is necessary.

Sexuality, Religion and the Sacred is a thoughtful collection of bisexual, polysexual and pansexual scholarship on religion and spirituality. It examines how religious and spiritual traditions address sexuality, whilst also exploring the ways in which bisexually-, polysexually-, and pansexually-active people embrace religious and spiritual practice. The volume offers a comprehensive analysis of these prevalent themes by focusing on five main areas of discussion: Christian and Unitarian Discourses; Indigenous and Decolonizing Spiritual Discourses; Feminist Spiritual Discourses; Buddhist Discourses; and Neo/Pagan Discourses. Sexuality, Religion and the Sacred offers an accessible yet scholarly treatment of these topics through a collection of critical essays by academics of theology, humanities, cultural studies and social sciences, as well as sexology professionals and clergy from various faith and spiritual traditions. It gives readers an insight into the intersection of sexualities and spiritualities, and attempts to disrupt this very dichotomy through its careful consideration of a wide variety of discourses. This book was originally published as a special issue of the Journal of Bisexuality.

Aristotle accurately characterized humans as political animals. Whether through birth or from choice, people naturally cluster into groups for protection, advancement, and the pursuit of well-being. But Aristotle's description does not hint at the powerful binary tension within this human tendency. Leaders enhance a social group's sense of identity by appealing to the members' commitments and shared traditions, to their hopes, strengths, sacrifices, and fears. Often, however, they cultivate not only an awareness of difference but even a sense of superiority, since for every social group there are those outsider, the "them". Maintaining a group's solidarity can too easily lead to the righteousness of intolerance towards those who are excluded. The reinforcement of group-identity in this way runs so deep in human nature that holding up a mirror to ourselves inevitably reveals a split image: the people we want to see and the people we're glad we're not. Intolerance: Political Animals and Their Prey presents stark examples of how the "us" have treated the "them". The papers in this volume hold up various unflattering mirrors of intolerance from the areas of History, Law, Philosophy, Political Science, and Religion. The authors of these scholarly studies do not condemn. Rather, their research compels us to look at ourselves as the political animals we are. Intolerance: Political Animals and Their Prey is the product of a year-long multi-disciplinary collaboration between faculty members of Bard College and the United States Military Academy at West Point. The project involved parallel seminar courses at both institutions along with Joint Sessions, all focused on the central theme of intolerance, and culminated in a three-day academic Conference at Bard in the Spring of 2015. This volume inaugurates a new series being published by Hamilton Books under the general title, Dialogues on Social Issues: Bard College and West Point.

Based on the How to Be a Perfect Stranger: A Guide to Etiquette in Other People's Religious Ceremonies. The handbook for how to respond in an appropriate way when someone dies—no matter what their faith or denomination. Few of us are ever prepared for the loss of a relative, friend or colleague. This stressful situation can be made worse if we are unfamiliar with the practices and rituals of the deceased person's religious tradition. This complete guide provides all the answers you need to express your condolences and show your respect in the appropriate way regardless of the religious tradition involved, addressing many common concerns, including: Will there be a ceremony—what will it be like, and how long will it last? What should I wear? What should I avoid doing, wearing, saying? Are flowers appropriate? What is the appropriate behavior if viewing the body? These are just a few of the basic, very practical questions answered in this unique etiquette guide covering all the major (and many minor) denominations and religions found in North America—from Hindu to Presbyterian, from Mennonite to Sikh—helping you to do the right thing in a difficult situation. Covers all the major (and many minor) denominations and religions found in North America: African American Methodist Churches • Assemblies of God Baha’i • Baptist • Buddhist • Christian and Missionary Alliance • Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) • Christian Congregation • Christian Science (Church of Christ, Scientist) • Church of the Brethren • Church of the Nazarene • Churches of Christ • Episcopalian and Anglican • Evangelical Free Church • Greek Orthodox • Hindu • International Church of the Foursquare Gospel • International Pentecostal Holiness Church • Islam • Jehovah’s Witnesses • Jewish • Lutheran • Mennonite/Amish • Methodist • Mormon • (Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) • Native American/First Nations • Orthodox Churches • Pentecostal Church of God • Presbyterian • Quaker (Religious Society of Friends) • Reformed Church in America/Canada • Roman Catholic • Seventh-day Adventist • Sikh • Unitarian Universalist • United Church of Canada • United Church of Christ • Wesleyan

Keys to understanding our shrinking world

A generation ago almost everyone a Christian encountered went to church--or at least knew he or she should. Today, with the world at America's doorstep, evangelical Christians more than ever need to understand their neighbors and their changing beliefs.

The Compact Guide to World Religions is a complete, easy-to-use handbook of the origins, basic beliefs, and evangelistic challenges and opportunities of the world's major religions in clear, easy-to-use chapters and charts.

Religious diversity is an ever present, and increasingly visible, reality in cities across the world. It is an issue of immediate concern to city leaders and members of religious communities but do we really know what ordinary members of the public, the people who live in the city, really think about it? Major news items, inter-religious violence and notorious public events often lead to negative views being expressed, especially among those who would not consider themselves to have a religious identity of their own. Martin Stringer explores the highly complex series of discourses around religion and religious diversity that are held by ordinary members of the city; discourses that are often contradictory in themselves and discourses that show that attitudes to religion vary considerably depending on context and wider local or national narratives. Drawing on examples from UK (particularly Birmingham, one of the UK's most diverse cities), Europe and the United States, Stringer offers some practical suggestions for ways in which discourses of religious diversity can be managed in the future. Students in the fields of religious studies, sociology, anthropology and urban studies; practitioners involved in inter-religious debates; and church and other faith leaders and politicians should all find this book an invaluable addition to ongoing debates.

Religious diversity is an ever present, and increasingly visible, reality in cities across the world. It is an issue of immediate concern to city leaders and members of religious communities but do we really know what ordinary members of the public, the people who live in the city, really think about it? Major news items, inter-religious violence and notorious public events often lead to negative views being expressed, especially among those who would not consider themselves to have a religious identity of their own. Martin Stringer explores the highly complex series of discourses around religion and religious diversity that are held by ordinary members of the city; discourses that are often contradictory in themselves and discourses that show that attitudes to religion vary considerably depending on context and wider local or national narratives. Drawing on examples from UK (particularly Birmingham, one of the UK's most diverse cities), Europe and the United States, Stringer offers some practical suggestions for ways in which discourses of religious diversity can be managed in the future. Students in the fields of religious studies, sociology, anthropology and urban studies; practitioners involved in inter-religious debates; and church and other faith leaders and politicians should all find this book an invaluable addition to ongoing debates.

This timely work addresses sensitive issues and relations between Muslims and Christians around the world. The book uniquely captures the opportunity for Christians and Muslims to come together and discuss pertinent issues such as pluralism, governance, preaching, Christian missionary efforts, and general misperceptions of Muslim and Christian communities. Joint authorship and discussion within the book is used to offer dialogue and responses between different contributors. This dialogue reveals that Christians and Muslims hold many things in common while having meaningful differences. It also shows the value of honestly sharing convictions while respecting and hearing the beliefs of another.

This collection of essays explores the complex relationship between religion and multiculturalism and the role of the state and law in the creation of boundaries. Western secular democracies are composed of increasingly religiously diverse populations. The idea of "multiculturalism" was formed as a constructive response to this phenomenon, but, in many areas of the globe, support for multiculturalism is challenged by attempts to preserve the cultural and legal norms of the majority.
The State of Israel offers a particularly pertinent case study, and is a central focus of this collection. The contributors to this volume address the concepts of religious difference and diversity, as well as the various ways in which states and legal systems understand and respond to them. Mappingthe Legal Boundaries of Belonging shows that, as a consequence of a purportedly secular human rights perspective, state laws may appear to define religious identity in a way that contradicts the definition found within a particular religion. Both state and religion make the same mistake, however, if they take a court decision that emphasizes individual belief and practice as a direct modification of a religious norm: the court lacks the power to change the internal authoritative definition of who belongs to a particular faith. Similarly, in the pursuit of a particular model of social diversity, the state may adopt policies that imply a particular private/public distinction foreign to some religious traditions.
This volume, which includes contributions from leading scholars in the field, will be an invaluable resource to anyone seeking to understand the legal meaning and impact of religious diversity.

The documentary hypothesis of the Rabbinic canon of late antiquity maintains that complete documents form the smallest whole building blocks of the Rabbinic system. These two volumes undertake a concrete exercise in the realization of the documentary hypothesis. It compares the rhetorical/formal and exegetical traits of two entire, kindred documents. Then, through a side by side chart, it compares each component of the two documents' treatment of the same extended segment of Scripture, Numbers 19. Whole documents are to be described and analyzed through a process of systematic description, comparison, and contrast. What makes the study fresh is that the author compares the two documents of the rabbinic canon that are most alike-the two Sifres on Numbers. What makes it surprising is the result: they have nothing in common. Each is autonomous, and except for the scriptural foundation systematically shared by both, neither intersects in an appreciable measure with the other. Volume One (Chapters One and Two) deals with forms. In Chapter One, the author surveys the forms of Sifre to Numbers and identifies and classifies the formal patterns that govern throughout. Then, with the formal and propositional program of Sifre to Numbers as a base, in Chapter Two he does the same with Sifre Zutta to Numbers. Volume Two (Chapters Three through Five) deals with exegesis and systematic comparison of whole segments of documents. Chapters Three and Four describe and compare the exegetical patterns of the base-documents, with special reference to the utilization of the verses of Scripture as foci of coherent discourse. In Chapter Five, the author compares the treatment of Huqqat, that is, a single passage of Scripture read by the two commentaries respectively.

Sustainability is now key to international and national policy, manufacture and consumption. It is also central to many individuals who try to lead environmentally ethical lives. Historically, religion has been a significant part of many visions of sustainability. Pragmatically, the inclusion of religious values in conservation and development efforts has facilitated relationships between people with different value structures. Despite this, little attention has been paid to the interdependence of sustainability and religion, and no significant comparisons of religious and secular sustainability advocacy. Religion and Sustainability presents the first broad analysis of the spiritual dimensions of sustainability-oriented social movements. Exploring the similarities and differences between the conceptions of sustainability held by religious, interfaith and secular organizations, the book analyses how religious practice and discourse have impacted on political ideology and process.

This volume represents the first trilateral exploration of medieval scriptural interpretation. Judaism, Christianity, and Islam are often characterized as religio-cultural siblings, traditions whose origins can be traced to the same geographical region and whose systems of belief and institutional structures share much in common. A particularly important point of commonality is the emphasis that each of these traditions places upon the notion of divine revelation, especially as codified in the text. During the medieval period the three exegetical traditions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam produced a vast literature, one of great diversity but also one of numerous cross-cultural similarities. The three sections of this book, each of which begins with an introduction to one of these exegetical traditions, explore this rich heritage of biblical and qur'anic interpretation.