Early modern Protestant scholars closely engaged with Islamic thought in more ways than is usually recognized. Among Protestants, Lutheran scholars distinguished themselves as the most invested in the study of Islam and Muslim culture. Mehmet Karabela brings the neglected voices of post-Reformation theologians, primarily German Lutherans, into focus and reveals their rigorous engagement with Islamic thought. Inspired by a global history approach to religious thought, Islamic Thought Through Protestant Eyes offers new sources to broaden the conventional interpretation of the Reformation beyond a solely European Christian phenomenon. Based on previously unstudied dissertations, disputations, and academic works written in Latin in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Karabela analyzes three themes: Islam as theology and religion; Islamic philosophy and liberal arts; and Muslim sects (Sunni and Shi'a). This book provides analyses and translations of the Latin texts as well as brief biographies of the authors. These texts offer insight into the Protestant perception of Islamic thought for scholars of religious studies and Islamic studies as well as for general readers. Examining the influence of Islamic thought on the construction of the Protestant identity after the Reformation helps us to understand the role of Islam in the evolution of Christianity.

The paradox of religion is that it is at once responsible for both the highest achievements and the cruellest inhumanity in human history. How can we understand this enigma? Divisive religion separates person from person, and sometimes people from God. On the other hand, unitive religion has produced unparalleled heights of love, compassion, and forgiveness. This book is dedicated to encouraging and advancing dialogue among people of diverse and sometimes seemingly incompatible belief systems. If we can do this, we can improve the lives of all people and bring greater peace to the planet.

Investigating the appeal of the group Hizb ut-Tahrir (HT), the study expands on why non-violent radical forms of Islam still attract segments of Muslim communities in the West. Being one of the few comprehensive studies on HT, this book discusses how this Islamist group advocate for the caliphate and for the implementation of shari'a but also reject violence as a tool to achieve these goals. Through interviews with current HT members, observation at HT-sponsored events and social media analysis, this book leads the reader into the world of vocal radical Islamist groups, exploring their goals and activities in Western states, with a special focus on the UK and Australia. In fact, as many other non-violent Islamist groups, HT represent the choice of all those individuals who might share Islamist arguments but who reject the use of violence. Given their non-violent nature, vocal radicals are mostly free to operate in the Western world, attracting new members, conducting a relentless campaign against the "West as a system" and representing a serious source of concern not only for national authorities but for the broader Muslim community. This book stands as an original publication and paves the way to a new area of study crossing sociology, Islamic studies and political sciences. This book is one of the few contributions on vocal and radical Islamism to date.

It has been argued that the mystical Sufi form of Islam is the most sensitive to other cultures, being accommodative to other traditions and generally tolerant to peoples of other faiths. It readily becomes integrated into local cultures and they are similarly often infused into Sufism. Examples of this reciprocity are commonly reflected in Sufi poetry, music, hagiographic genres, memoires, and in the ritualistic practices of Sufi traditions. This volume shows how this often-side-lined tradition functions in the societies in which it is found, and demonstrates how it relates to mainstream Islam. The focus of this book ranges from reflecting Sufi themes in the Qur'anic calligraphy to movies, from ideals to everyday practices, from legends to actual history, from gender segregation to gender transgression, and from legalism to spiritualism. Consequently, the international panel of contributors to this volume are trained in a range of disciplines that include religious studies, history, comparative literature, anthropology, and ethnography. Covering Southeast Asia to West Africa as well as South Asia and the West, they address both historical and contemporary issues, shedding light on Sufism's adaptability. This book sets aside conventional methods of understanding Islam, such as theological, juridical, and philosophical, in favour of analysing its cultural impact. As such, it will be of great interest to all scholars of Islamic Studies, the Sociology of Religion, Religion and Media, as well as Religious Studies and Area Studies more generally.

God's Works Revealed presents a compelling, challenging, and joyful vision for living as a lesbian, gay, or bisexual Catholic today by accepting the divine gift of our sexuality and seeking to live the promises of our baptism. It draws from the deep well of traditional theology, Catholic teaching, and Sacred Scripture while also challenging assumptions that exclude LGB Catholics from the possibility of sexual expression, married life, and participation in the life of the Church. "Informed by theology and formed by the worship of the Church, Albano...engages in serious study and draws on some of the best thought on scripture and natural law theology that has formed his Church's teaching on homosexuality and homosexual actions. He presents not so much a dismissal of what the Church teaches as a critical engagement with that teaching that will point out its insufficiencies and calls for further refinement and reflection. He insists that his experience and that of other gay and lesbian Catholics be taken seriously." -from the foreword "After more than fifty years of ministry on behalf of LGBT Catholics, I have seen considerable developments in Christian understandings about sexuality and gender, which are challenging topics for politicians and Catholics alike. Written from the heart of a faith-filled Catholic gay man who is not a politician, these pages push sexual politics aside and speak to our heads and hearts in a sensible and compelling way. We'll see with new eyes the gifts that persons of various sexual orientations bring to the Church. I recommend this book for all the people of God who are walking the path of synodality with Pope Francis." -Jeannine Gramick, SL, author, and cofounder of New Ways Ministry for LGBT Catholics "God's Works Revealed offers a respectful, well-argued critique of official teachings on homosexuality and the impact on the physical and spiritual lives of LGBTQI people. It is a deeply loving, thoughtful, and ultimately, hopeful dialogue between a gay Catholic and the Church that could open pathways to needed change. Here, you will find truths that speak to your soul." -Marianne Duddy-Burke, executive director of DignityUSA Sam Albano is a writer, educator, and member of the LGBTQI Catholic community. He currently serves as the national secretary of DignityUSA, the oldest and largest organization of LGBTQI Catholics.

This book chronicles individual perspectives and specific iterations of Muslim community, practice, and experience in the Himalayan region to bring into scholarly conversation the presence of varying Muslim cultures in the Himalaya. The Himalaya provide a site of both geographic and cultural crossroads, where Muslim community is simultaneously constituted at multiple social levels, and to that end the essays in this book document a wide range of local, national, and global interests while maintaining a focus on individual perspectives, moments in time, and localized experiences. It presents research that contributes to a broadly conceived notion of the Himalaya that enriches readers' understandings of both the region and concepts of Muslim community and highlights the interconnections between multiple experiences of Muslim community at local levels. Drawing attention to the cultural, social, artistic, and political diversity of the Himalaya beyond the better understood and frequently documented religio-cultural expressions of the region, this book will be of interest to academics in the fields of Anthropology, Geography, History, Religious Atudies, Asian Studies, and Islamic Studies.

Provides an overview of the fundamental history, diverse approaches, and ideas associated with this exciting and relatively new field of study. Each chapter features engaging case studies and ends with summaries and recommendations for further study with suggested readings. Written by leading academics in the field, this will be the go-to introduction to digital religion.

Top professional speaker and sales trainer Brian Tracy found that his most important breakthrough was the discovery that it is the "psychology of selling" that is more important than the techniques and methods of selling. Learn how to double and triple your sales in any market. It's a promise of prosperity that sales guru Brian Tracy has seen fulfilled again and again. More salespeople have become millionaires by listening to and applying his ideas than from any other sales training process ever developed. In Psychology of Selling, Tracy teaches you: "The inner game of sales and selling" How to eliminate the fear of rejection How to build unshakeable confidence Tracy shows how salespeople must learn to control their thoughts, feelings and actions to make themselves more effective. Psychology of Selling gives you a series of ideas, methods, strategies, and techniques that you can use immediately to make more sales, faster and easier than ever before.

Through analysis of the Covenants of the Prophet Muhammad, which pledge protection to diverse faith communities, this book makes a profoundly important contribution to research on early Islam by determining the Covenants' historicity and textual accuracy. The authors focus on the Prophet Muhammad's relationship with other faith communities by conducting detailed textual and linguistic analysis of documents which have received little scholarly consideration before. This not only includes decrees of the Prophet Muhammad, 'Umar ibn al-Khattab, 'Ali ibn Abi Talib, and Mu'awiya ibn Abi Sufyan, but also of important Muslim rulers. They present their findings in relation to contemporaneous historical writings, historic testimonies, official recognition, archaeological evidence, historic scribal conventions, date-matching calculations, textual parallelisms, and references in Muslim and non-Muslim sources. They also provide new and revised translations of various Covenants issued by the Prophet Muhammad which were attested by Muslim authorities after him. The authors argue that the claim of forgery is no longer tenable following the application of rigorous textual and historical analysis. This book is essential reading for Muslims, Christians, Jews, Samaritans, and Zoroastrians, as well as anyone interested in interfaith relations, Islamophobia, extremist ideologies, security studies, and the relationship between Orthodox and Oriental Christianity with Islam.

This book is an ethnographic case study of Sufi ritual practice and embodied experience amongst female members of the Naqshbandi community. Drawing on fieldwork in Cape Town, South Africa, and Lefke, Cyprus (2013/2014), the author examines women's experiences within a particular performance of Sufi tradition. The focus is on the ritual named hadra, involving the recital of sacred texts, music, and body movement, where the goal is for the individual to reach a state of intimacy with God. The volume considers Sufi practice as a form of embodied cultural behavior, religious identity, and selfhood construction. It explains how Muslim women's participation in hadra ritual life reflects religious and cultural ideas about the body, the body's movement, and embodied selfhood expression within the ritual experience. Sufi Women, Ritual Embodiment and the 'Self' engages with studies in Sufism, symbolic anthropology, ethnography, dance, and somatic studies. Contributing to discussions of religion, gender, and the body, the book will be of interest to scholars from anthropology, sociology, religious ritual studies, Sufism and gender studies, and performance studies.

This book examines the works of Medieval Muslim philosophers interested in intercultural encounters and how receptive Islam is to foreign thought, to serve as a dialogical model, grounded in intercultural communications, for Islamic and Arabic education. The philosophers studied in this project were instructors, tutors, or teachers, such as Al-Kindi, Al-Farabi, Al-Ghazali, and Averroes, whose philosophical contributions directly or indirectly advanced intercultural learning. The book describes and provides examples of how each of these philosophers engaged with intercultural encounters, and asks how their philosophies can contribute to infusing intercultural ethics and practices into curriculum theorizing. First, it explores selected works of medieval Muslim philosophers from an intercultural perspective to formulate a dialogical paradigm that informs and enriches Muslim education. Second, it frames intercultural education as a catalyst to guide Muslim communities' interactions and identity construction, encouraging flexibility, tolerance, deliberation, and plurality. Third, it bridges the gap between medieval tradition and modern thought by promoting interdisciplinary connections and redrawing intercultural boundaries outside disciplinary limits. This study demonstrates that the dialogical domain that guides intercultural contact becomes a curriculum-oriented structure with Al-Kindi, a tripartite pedagogical model with Al-Farabi, a sojourner experience with Al-Ghazali, and a deliberative pedagogy of alternatives with Averroes. Therefore, the book speaks to readers interested in the potential of dialogue in education, intercultural communication, and Islamic thought research. Crucially bridging the gap between medieval tradition and modern thought by promoting interdisciplinary connections and redrawing intercultural boundaries outside disciplinary limits, it will speak to readers interested in the dialogue between education, intercultural communication, and Islamic thought. .

This book focuses on Akan-speaking Ghanaians in London and explores in detail the experience of African migrants living in Britain, investigating how they construct their British citizenship through their membership of the church. Building on extensive ethnographic research in London and Ghana, the author explores the relationship between religion and citizenship, the emergence of transnational subjectivities, and the making of diaspora aesthetics among African migrants. Starting from the understanding that citizenship is dialogical, a status mediated by a subject's multiple and intersecting identities, the author highlights the limitations of existing conceptualisations of migrant citizenship. Anchored in a case study of the British/Ghanaian Methodist Church as a transnational religious organisation and cultural polity, the book explores diasporic religious subjectivities as both cosmopolitan and transnational, while being configured in emotionally and morally significant ways by the Methodist Church, as well as family, ethnicity, and nation. Interdisciplinary by nature, this book will be of interest to a wide range of researchers and scholars across the social sciences and humanities working in the fields of anthropology, religion, sociology, postcolonial studies, and African studies, and additionally policy makers interested in diaspora and migration studies.

This volume offers new insights into ancient figurations of temporality by focusing on the relationship between gender and time across a range of genres. Each chapter in this collection places gender at the center of its exploration of time, and the volume includes time in treatises, genealogical lists, calendars, prophetic literature, ritual practice and historical and poetic narratives from the Greco-Roman world. Many of the chapters begin with female characters, but all of them emphasize how and why time is an integral component of ancient categories of female and male. Relying on theorists who offer ways to explore the connections between time and gender encoded in narrative tropes, plots, pronouns, images or metaphors, the contributors tease out how time and gender were intertwined in the symbolic register of Greek and Roman thought. Narratives of Time and Gender in Antiquity provides a rich and provocative theoretical analysis of time-and its relationship to gender-in ancient texts. It will be of interest to anyone working on time in the ancient world, or students of gender in antiquity.

Based on never previously explored personal accounts and archival documentation, this book examines life and death in the Theresienstadt ghetto, seen through the eyes of the Jewish victims from Denmark. "How was it in Theresienstadt?" Thus asked Johan Grun rhetorically when he, in July 1945, published a short text about his experiences. The successful flight of the majority of Danish Jewry in October 1943 is a well-known episode of the Holocaust, but the experience of the 470 men, women, and children that were deported to the ghetto has seldom been the object of scholarly interest. Providing an overview of the Judenaktion in Denmark and the subsequent deportations, the book sheds light on the fate of those who were arrested. Through a micro-historical analysis of everyday life, it describes various aspects of social and daily life in proximity to death. In doing so, the volume illuminates the diversity of individual situations and conveys the deportees' perceptions and striving for survival and 'normality'. Offering a multi-perspective and international approach that places the case of Denmark into the broader Jewish experience during the Holocaust, this book is invaluable for researchers of Jewish studies, Holocaust and genocide studies, and the history of modern Denmark.

Music and Temple Ritual in South India: Performing for Siva explores the musical practices of the periya melam, a South Indian instrumental temple ensemble of professional musicians. The book is much more than a rich and vivid ethnographic description of a local tradition. It also develops a comprehensive and original analytical model, in which music and performance are understood as both situated and creative practices and where the fluid relationship between humans and non-humans, in this case divine beings, is truly taken into consideration.

The Trajectory of Holocaust Memory: The Crisis of Testimony in Theory and Practice re-considers survivor testimony, moving from a subject-object reading of the past to a subject-subject encounter in the present. It explores how testimony evolves in relationship to the life of eyewitnesses across time. This book breaks new ground based on three principles. The first draws on Martin Buber's "I-Thou" concept, transforming the object of history into an encounter between subjects. The second employs the Jungian concept of identity, whereby the individual (internal identity) and the persona (external identity) reframe testimony as an extension of the individual. They are a living subject, rather than merely a persona or narrative. The third principle draws on Daniel Kahneman's concept of the experiencing self, which relives events as they occurred, and the remembering self, which reflects on their meaning in sum. Taken together, these principles comprise a new literacy of testimony that enables the surviving victim and the listener to enter a relationship of trust. Designed for readers of Holocaust history and literature, this book defines the modalities of memory, witness, and testimony. It shows how encountering the individual who lived through the past changes how testimony is understood, and therefore what it can come to mean.

First published in 1990, Brookline: The Evolution of an American Jewish Suburb explores how Brookline became home to one of America's most vibrant Jewish communities. For over a century, Brookline, Massachusetts, was one of the oldest and most elite suburbs in America. By the end of the Second World War, its transformation into a distinctly Jewish suburb had begun. Through the use of sociological oral history, the book seeks to present the social world of Brookline Jews as they experienced it. Combined with a variety of documentary resources, such as newspapers and congregational "bulletins", it contextualises the accounts of the informants consulted to provide both factual and ethnographic validation and a detailed insight into the process by which this elite Yankee suburb became a core Jewish community.

First published in 1982, The Triangular Connection explores the relationship between two countries, the USA and Israel, and Jews resident in America. Spanning from British Colonial times until 1949, the year in which Israel was admitted to the United Nations, the book traces the interaction between America's Christians and Jews with Zionism and the modern state of Israel. It also details the reasons for America's support of Israel in the past, as well as debating its continued support in the future.

- the first edition consistently sells 50-100 copies each year - presents complex arguments clearly and accessibly

At a time when biblical authority was under challenge from the Higher Criticism and evolutionary science, 'what providence meant' was the most keenly contested of questions. This book takes up the controversial subject of Dickens and religion, and offers a significant contribution to the interdisciplinary area of religion and literature. In a close study of major novels, it argues that networks of biblical allusion reveal the Judeo-Christian grand narrative as key to his development as a writer, and as the ontological ground on which he stands to appeal to 'the conscience of a Christian people'. Engaging the biblical narrative in dialogue with other contemporary narratives that concern themselves with origins, destinations, and hermeneutic decipherments, the inimitable Dickens affirms the Bible's still-active role in popular culture. The providential thinking of two twentieth-century theorists, Bakhtin and Ricoeur, sheds light on an exploration of Dickens's narrative theology.

The gospels and ancient historians agree: Jesus was sentenced to death by Pontius Pilate, the Roman imperial prefect in Jerusalem. To this day, Christians of all churches confess that Jesus died 'under Pontius Pilate'. But what exactly does that mean? Within decades of Jesus' death, Christians began suggesting that it was the Judaean authorities who had crucified Jesus--a notion later echoed in the Qur'an. In the third century, one philosopher raised the notion that, although Pilate had condemned Jesus, he'd done so justly; this idea survives in one of the main strands of modern New Testament criticism. So what is the truth of the matter? And what is the history of that truth? David Lloyd Dusenbury reveals Pilate's 'innocence' as not only a neglected theological question, but a recurring theme in the history of European political thought. He argues that Jesus' interrogation by Pilate, and Augustine of Hippo's North African sermon on that trial, led to the concept of secularity and the logic of tolerance emerging in early modern Europe. Without the Roman trial of Jesus, and the arguments over Pilate's innocence, the history of empire--from the first century to the twenty-first--would have been radically different.

This volume showcases a wide range of contemporary approaches to the identification of literary structures within Qur'anic surahs. Recent academic studies of the Qur'an have taken an increasing interest in the concept of the surah as a unity and, with it, the division of complete surahs into consecutive sections or parts. Part One presents a series of case studies focussing on individual Qur'anic surahs. Nevin Reda analyzes the structure of Surat Al 'Imran (Q 3), Holger Zellentin looks at competing structures within Surat al-'Alaq (Q 96), and A.H. Mathias Zahniser provides an exploration of the ring structures that open Surat Maryam (Q 19). Part Two then focusses on three discrete aspects of the text. Nora K. Schmid assesses the changing structural function of oaths, Marianna Klar evaluates how rhythm, rhyme, and morphological parallelisms combine in order to produce texture and cohesion, while Salwa El-Awa considers the structural impact of connectives and other discourse markers with specific reference to Surat Taha (Q 20). The final section of the volume juxtaposes contrasting attitudes to the discernment of diachronic seams. Devin Stewart examines surah-medial oracular oaths, Muhammad Abdel Haleem questions a range of instances where suggestions of disjointedness have historically been raised, and Nicolai Sinai explores the presence of redactional layers within Surat al-Nisa' (Q 4) and Surat al-Ma'idah (Q 5). Bringing a combination of different approaches to Qur'an structure into a single book, written by well-established and emerging voices in Qur'anic studies, the work will be an invaluable resource to academics researching Islam, religious studies, and languages and literatures in general. Chapter #6 of this book is freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license available at http://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/e/9781003010456

This book offers a comprehensive exploration of key issues in contemporary global migration and considers the theological implications for Christianity, in general, and for Christian faith and practice in various parts of the world, in particular. Migrant Christians, who make up the majority of believers on the move and in diaspora, play an increasingly vital role in world Christianity today. Drawing on cases from across the globe, Gemma Tulud Cruz considers how Christians are faced with immense gifts and tremendous challenges brought by the ever-increasing presence of migrants in their midst and the conditions that characterize contemporary global migration. Migrant Christians themselves face multiple challenges, which have been made more stark by the coronavirus pandemic. The volume will be relevant to scholars of religion and of migration who are interested in a closer examination of what happens to Christians and Christianity, (faith) communities, and nation-states in the age of migration.

This volume examines heritage-making and Islam in the context of current happenings in Europe, as well as analysing past developments and future possibilities. Presenting work based on ethnographic, historical and archival research, chapters are concerned with questions of diversity, mobility, decolonisation, translocality, restitution, and belonging. By looking at diverse trajectories of people and things, this volume encompasses multiple perspectives on the relationship between Islam and heritage in Europe, including the ways in which it has played out and transformed against the backdrop of the 'refugee crisis' and other recent developments, such as debates on decolonising museums or the resurgence of nationalist sentiments.

This collaboration between two scholars from different fields of religious studies draws on three comparative data sets to develop a new theory of purity and pollution in religion, arguing that a culture's beliefs about cosmological realms shapes its pollution ideas and its purification practices. The authors of this study refine Mary Douglas' foundational theory of pollution as "matter out of place," using a comparative approach to make the case that a culture's cosmology designates which materials in which places constitute pollution. By bringing together a historical comparison of Ancient Near Eastern and Mediterranean religions, an ethnographic study of indigenous shamanism on Jeju Island, Korea, and the reception history of biblical rhetoric about pollution in Jewish and Christian cultures, the authors show that a cosmological account of purity works effectively across multiple disparate religious and cultural contexts. They conclude that cosmologies reinforce fears of pollution, and also that embodied experiences of purification help generate cosmological ideas. Providing an innovative insight into a key topic of ritual studies, this book will be of vital interest to scholars and graduate students in religion, biblical studies, and anthropology.