The global persecution of Christians is an urgent human rights issue that remains underreported. This volume presents the results of the first systematic global investigation into how Christians respond to persecution. World-class scholars of global Christianity present first-hand research from most of the sites of the harshest persecution as well as the West and Latin America. Their findings make clear the nature of persecution, the reasons for it, Christian responses to it - both non-violent and confrontational - and the effects of these responses. Motivating the volume is the hope that this knowledge will empower all who would exercise solidarity with the world's persecuted Christians and will offer the victims strategies for a more effective response. This book is written for anyone concerned about the persecution of Christians or more generally about the human right of religious freedom, including scholars, activists, political and religious leaders, and those who work for international organizations.

Ralf Lutzelschwab beleuchtet das spannungsreiche Verhaltnis zwischen einem in der Forschung schlecht beleumundeten Papst Clemens VI. (1342-1352) und seinen engsten Mitarbeitern, den Kardinalen. Die Auswertung bisher unedierter Quellen, v.a. der Predigten Clemens VI., zeigt die Art und Weise, wie der Papst von Avignon aus Einfluss auf das politische Geschehen in ganz Europa auszuuben versuchte. Neben dem Einblick in die spatmittelalterliche Politik ergibt sich daraus ein neues Bild Clemens VI., der sich keineswegs als so schwach und verderbt erweist, wie in der Forschung bisher angenommen wurde. Ausgezeichnet mit dem Friedrich-Meinecke-Preis der Freien Universitat Berlin 2003 fur eine hervorragende Dissertation im Bereich Geschichte und Kulturwissenschaften"

Grounded in nine years of ethnographic research on the al Muhajiroun/Ahlus Sunnah Wal Jamaah movement (ALM/ASWJ), Douglas Weeks mixes ethnography and traditional research methods to tell the complete story of al Muhajiroun. Beginning with three core events that became a primer for radical Islamic political thought in the UK, Al Muhajiroun, A Case Study in Islamic Activism traces the development of the movement form its incipient beginnings to its current status. Based on his extensive interaction with the group and its leaders, Weeks contextualizes the history, beliefs, methods, and differences between ALM/ASWJ, al Qaeda, and the Islamic State so that the group and the threat it poses is comprehensively understood.

This book theorizes a philosophical framework for educational policy and practice in the southern Philippines where decades of religious and political conflict between a minority Muslim community and the Philippine state has plagued the educational and economic development of the region. It offers a critical historical and ethnographic analysis of a century of failed attempts under successive U.S. colonial and independent Philippine governments to deploy education as a tool to mitigate the conflict and assimilate the Muslim minority into the mainstream of Philippine society and examines recent efforts to integrate state and Islamic education before proposing a philosophy of prophetic pragmatism as a more promising framework for educational policy and practice that respects the religious identity and fosters the educational development of Muslim Filipinos. It represents a timely contribution to the search for educational policies and practices more responsive to the needs and religious identities of Muslim communities emerging from conflict, not only in the southern Philippines, but in other international contexts as well.

This enlightening edited collection shows how migration shapes the lives of faith communities - and vice versa - through diverse prisms including diaspora, generational change, cultural conflict, conceptions of 'ministry' and artistic response. The contributors comprise writers, poets and artists from the three largest Abrahamic faiths (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) and beyond. They show how issues of migration are addressed through a variety of different media such as theological debate and shared community action, poetry and art. As issues of migration are an important factor in so many political and social debates, faith communities are looking for guidance on how to deepen their theological understanding of migration. This book helps them to reflect on their own practices and experiences, learn from their own traditions and engage in dialogue with diverse communities. *All royalties from book sales will be donated to The Helen Bamber Foundation - a UK-based charity that supports people who have survived extreme physical, sexual and psychological violence.*

'Dan's book demonstrates that the future will belong to the peacemakers - the true heroes among us.' - Bear Grylls When thirty-three Chilean miners stepped into the light, alive and well, after sixty-nine days entombed in the earth, the world experienced a rare treat - some good news. Was this an anomaly, or are there other untapped glimmers of hope, hidden behind the headlines? Armed with a camera, a notebook, and a perilous sense of curiosity, Dan Morrice embarks upon a global journey to meet the peacemakers - unsung heroes, forging peace in extreme environments, from war-torn nations to disaster zones. From Chilean miners to Syrian refugees, from ex-football hooligans in Britain, to revolutionaries in Israel-Palestine, Dan discovers how the most unlikely people are rediscovering Christian faith and rewriting the fractured history of our time. At the apex of his journey, Dan's interviews lead him on a five-hundred-mile walk across the Negev Desert to find their source of hope first-hand. In a generation tired of divided nations and negative news, Finding the Peacemakers tells the unreported story of a global movement overcoming the odds to build peace in troubled times. 'One of the most inspiring books I have read for many years.' - Baroness Caroline Cox

This book studies the politics of Pentecostal conversion and anti-Christian violence in India. It asks: why has India been experiencing increasing incidents of anti-Christian violence since the 1990s? Why are the Bhil Adivasis increasingly converting to Pentecostalism? And, what are the implications of conversion for religion within indigenous communities on the one hand and broader issues of secularism, religious freedom and democratic rights on the other? Drawing on extended ethnographic fieldwork amongst the Bhils of Northern India since 2006, this book asserts that ideological incompatibility and antagonism between Christian missionaries and Hindu nationalists provide only a partial explanation for anti-Christian violence in India. It unravels the complex interactions between different actors/ agents in the production of anti-Christian violence and provides detailed ethnographic narratives on Pentecostal conversion, Hindu nationalist politics and anti-Christian violence in the largest state of India that has hitherto been dominated by upper caste Rajput Hindu(tva) ideology.

Why does religion inspire hatred? Why do people in one religion sometimes hate people of another religion, and also why do some religions inspire hatred from others? This book shows how scholarly studies of prejudice, identity formation, and genocide studies can shed light on global examples of religious hatred. The book is divided into four parts, focusing respectively on: theories of prejudice and violence; historical developments of antisemitism, Islamophobia, and race; contemporary Western antisemitism and Islamophobia; and, prejudices beyond the West in the Islamic, Buddhist, and Hindu traditions. Each part ends with a special focus section. Key features include: - A compelling synthesis of theories of prejudice, identity, and hatred to explain Islamophobia and antisemitism. - An innovative theory of human violence and genocide which explains the link to prejudice. - Case studies of both Western antisemitism and Islamophobia in history and today, alongside global studies of Islamic antisemitism and Hindu and Buddhist Islamophobia - Integrates discussion of race and racialisation as aspects of Islamophobic and antisemitic prejudice in relation to their framing in religious discourses. - Accessible for general readers and students, it can be employed as a textbook for students or read with benefit by scholars for its novel synthesis and theories. The book focuses on antisemitism and Islamophobia, both in the West and beyond, including examples of prejudices and hatred in the Islamic, Hindu, and Buddhist traditions. Drawing on examples from Europe, North America, MENA, South and Southeast Asia, and Africa, Paul Hedges points to common patterns, while identifying the specifics of local context. Religious Hatred is an essential guide for understanding the historical origins of religious hatred, the manifestations of this hatred across diverse religious and cultural contexts, and the strategies employed by activists and peacemakers to overcome this hatred.

A perennial frontier for Islamic orthodoxy, Bangladesh is witnessing an alarming rise in Islamist-inspired assassinations and terrorist attacks. In July 2016, the world's attention fell upon a cafe in a leafy Dhaka neighbourhood as the barbarity of a distant 'Caliphate' was visited on this corner of South Asia. Twenty-nine died in the assault on the Holey Bakery, affixing an unbidden nightmare to the image of a supposedly tolerant Muslim nation. Joseph Allchin probes Bangladesh's recent and distant past as he investigates how it has become the latest front in world extremism. Delving into the local and global differences between political actors, he exposes the continued influence of the country's independence struggle on today's allegiances, and scrutinises the careers of two long-term rivals: current prime minister Sheikh Hasina, and Khaleda Zia, who held the office in 1991-6 and 2001-6. This unerring investigation examines the relationship between radical Islam and the Bangladeshi political class, laying bare the extremist forces that bedevil the country's present and future.

"The Final Pagan Generation" recounts the fascinating story of the lives and fortunes of the last Romans born before the Emperor Constantine converted to Christianity. Edward J. Watts traces their experiences of living through the fourth century's dramatic religious and political changes, when heated confrontations saw the Christian establishment legislate against pagan practices as mobs attacked pagan holy sites and temples. The emperors who issued these laws, the imperial officials charged with implementing them, and the Christian perpetrators of religious violence were almost exclusively young men whose attitudes and actions contrasted markedly with those of the earlier generation, who shared neither their juniors' interest in creating sharply defined religious identities nor their propensity toward violent conflict. Watts examines why the "final pagan generation"--born to the old ways and the old world in which it seemed to everyone that religious practices would continue as they had for the last two thousand years--proved both unable to anticipate the changes that imperially sponsored Christianity produced and unwilling to resist them. A compelling and provocative read, suitable for the general reader as well as students and scholars of the ancient world.

The militant Islam represented by Al-Qaeda is often described as a global movement. Apart from the geographical range of its operations and support, little else is held to define it as 'global'.Landscapes of the Jihad explores the features that Al-Qaeda and other strands of militant Islam share in common with global movements. These include a decentralised organisation and an emphasis on ethical rather than properly political action.Devji brings these and other characteristics of Al-Qaeda together in an analysis of the jihad that locates it squarely within the transformationof political thought after the Cold War. The jihad emerges from the breakdown of traditional as well as modern forms of authority in the Muslim world. It is neither dogmatic in an old-fashioned way nor ideological in the modern sense, and concernedneither with correct doctrinal practice in the present nor with some revolutionary utopia of the future. Instead it is fragmented, dispersed and highly individualistic.

In order to better understand the political conditions of the Arabic language in Israel, a comparison with the political conditions of Arabic in the Levant as well as the Diaspora is necessary. Comparison consists of macro factors, such as nation-state building, and at the micro level, the daily public usage of Arabic. While the relationship between language and nationhood is well documented, study of the unique socio-political situation of the use of Arabic in the Jewish state, and in particular language usage in East Jerusalem, has hitherto not been addressed. The removal of Arabic as an official language in Israel in 2018 has major implications for IsraeliPalestinian accommodation. Research for the book relied on ethnographic fieldwork as well as sociolinguistic literature. Investigation is wide-ranging: distinguishing the different public presences of language; the state of literacy (publishing, education); and (formal and informal) interviews with students, teachers and journalists. Linguists often consider the Levant to belong to one dialect group but post-1918 people in the Levant have had to deal with separate political realities, and language differences reflect their unique political and social circumstances. The history of European colonialism is but one influencing factor. Diaspora comparison engages with the US city of Dearborn, Michigan, home to the largest Arab American community in one locality. How does this community find meaning in both being American and a threat to national security? This dilemma is mirrored in the life of Palestinians in Israel. Security and securitisation are relational concepts (Rampton and Charalambous 2019), and language plays a large part in personal sense of belonging. Analytical tools such as the concept of seamline (Eyal 2006), and indexicality (Silverstein 1979), assist in coming to terms with the metapragmatic meanings of language. This important book reaches far beyond linguistic difference; it goes to the heart of political, social and economic despair faced by multiple communities.

In the United States, people are deeply divided along lines of race, class, political party, gender, sexuality, and religion. Many believe that historical grievances must eventually be left behind in the interest of progress toward a more just and unified society. But too much in American history is unforgivable and cannot be forgotten. How then can we imagine a way to live together that does not expect people to let go of their entrenched resentments? Living with Hate in American Politics and Religion offers an innovative argument for the power of playfulness in popular culture to make our capacity for coexistence imaginable. Jeffrey Israel explores how people from different backgrounds can pursue justice together, even as they play with their divisive grudges, prejudices, and desires in their cultural lives. Israel calls on us to distinguish between what belongs in a raucous "domain of play" and what belongs in the domain of the political. He builds on the thought of John Rawls and Martha Nussbaum to defend the liberal tradition against challenges posed by Frantz Fanon from the left and Leo Strauss from the right. In provocative readings of Lenny Bruce's stand-up comedy, Philip Roth's Portnoy's Complaint, and Norman Lear's All in the Family, Israel argues that postwar Jewish American popular culture offers potent and fruitful examples of playing with fraught emotions. Living with Hate in American Politics and Religion is a powerful vision of what it means to live with others without forgiving or forgetting.

"A tour-de-force in different fields of knowledge. It takes world-city and world-history literatures to a higher level of depth and understanding. It is difficult to imagine a more pioneering, in-depth study of world cities." Ramon Grosfoguel, Professor, Department of Ethnic Studies, University of California, Berkeley "A remarkable and original discussion of three great sacred cities across time, and their transformation by nationalism in the modern world." Immanuel Wallerstein, Yale University Far from spawning an age of tolerance, modernity has created the social basis of division and exclusion. This book elaborates this provocative claim as it explores the rich but divided histories of three cities located at the crossroads of Islam, Christianity, and Judaism. Many observers presume that violence is built into these sacred cities because their citizens cling to religious or cultural ideals of some archaic age; only when this history is overcome can citizens enter a new age of brotherhood. Samman persuades us to refocus our attention on modernity, which has instilled troubling dilemmas from the outside. He shows how these sacred places long ago entered the modern world where global political and economic forces exacerbate nationalism and regional divisions. If we are to resolve deep conflicts we must re-imagine the institutional basis on which modernity, rather than religion, is built.

As Syria imploded in civil war in 2011, Kurdish volunteers in the north rose up to free their homeland from centuries of repression and create a progressive sanctuary that they named Rojava. To the medievalists of ISIS, the emergence of a haven of tolerance and democracy on the frontier of their new caliphate was an affront. They amassed 12,000 men, heavy artillery, tanks, mortars and ranks of suicide bombers to crush the uprising. Against them stood 2,500 volunteer fighters armed with 40-year-old rifles. There was only one way for the Kurds to survive. They would have to kill the invaders one by one. A decade earlier, as a 19-year-old conscript into the Iranian army, Azad Cudi had faced being forced to fight his own Kurdish people. Instead he had deserted, seeking asylum in Britain. Now, as he returned to his homeland to help build a new Kurdistan, he found he would have to pick up a gun once more. In September 2014, Azad became one of 17 snipers deployed when ISIS, trying to shatter the Kurds in a decisive battle, besieged the northern city of Kobani. In Long Shot, Azad tells the inside story of how a group of activists and idealists withstood a ferocious assault and, street by street, house by house, took back their land in a victory that was to prove the turning point in the war against ISIS. By turns devastating, inspiring and lyrical, this is an unique account of modern war and of the incalculable price of victory as a few thousand men and women achieved the impossible and kept their dream of freedom alive.

The Dialectics of the Religious and the Secular: Studies on the Future of Religion contains the work of 15 international scholars who have wrestled with the question of the relevancy, meaning and future of religion within the context of the increasing antagonisms between the religious and secular realms of modern civil society and its globalisation. Each author indicates the possibility of mitigating or preventing the continuation of this antagonism by historically moving toward a more reconciled and humane future global society.

Why "the Muslim question" is really about the West and its own anxieties-not Islam In this fearless, original book, Anne Norton demolishes the notion that there is a "clash of civilizations" between the West and Islam. What is really in question, she argues, is the West's commitment to its own ideals: to democracy and the Enlightenment trinity of liberty, equality, and fraternity. In the most fundamental sense, the Muslim question is about the values not of Islamic, but of Western, civilization.

This book is a collection of two dozen essays published over the past four decades on American Jewish history and culture. They discuss the role that Jews have played in American culture, sports, politics, business, and religion, as well as the nature of American antisemitism. The essays argue that the Jewish experience in America has been unique and this uniqueness has encouraged Jews to define their Jewish identity in multiple ways. In no other country has Judaism and Jewishness taken on so many diverse forms. While America has not been the promised land for Jews, it has been a land of promise. Jews have prospered in America and become part of the social, cultural, political, and economic mainstream. But whether Judaism and Jewish identity have also prospered is another question.

From fleeing the Warsaw Ghetto and living underground to fighting for social justice in 1960s' Seattle and helping smash the communist system in 1980s' Poland, this is a narrative that erupts into critical moments in Jewish, Polish, and American history. It is also a story of the hidden anguish that accompanies and courses through that history, of the living haunted by the dead. The story is told through a conversation, often contentious, between Michael Steinlauf, historian of Polish-Jewish culture and child of Holocaust survivors, and the anthropologist and artist Elzbieta Janicka. It is illustrated with scores of photographs and documents.

From fleeing the Warsaw Ghetto and living underground to fighting for social justice in 1960s' Seattle and helping smash the communist system in 1980s' Poland, this is a narrative that erupts into critical moments in Jewish, Polish, and American history. It is also a story of the hidden anguish that accompanies and courses through that history, of the living haunted by the dead. The story is told through a conversation, often contentious, between Michael Steinlauf, historian of Polish-Jewish culture and child of Holocaust survivors, and the anthropologist and artist Elzbieta Janicka. It is illustrated with scores of photographs and documents.

The Muslim Brotherhood in the West remains a mysterious entity. In The Closed Circle, Lorenzo Vidino offers an unprecedented inside view into how one of the world's most influential Islamist groups operates. He marshals unique interviews with prominent former members and associates from Europe, the United Kingdom, and North America, shedding light on why and how people join and leave Western outfits of the Muslim Brotherhood. Drawing on these striking personal accounts, Vidino weaves together the experiences of individuals who participated in and later renounced Brotherhood groups. Their perspectives provide a wealth of new information about the Brotherhood's secretive inner workings and the networks that connecting the small yet highly organized cluster of Brotherhood-influenced groups. The Closed Circle examines the tactics the Brotherhood uses to recruit and retain participants as well as how and why individuals make the difficult decision to leave. Through the stories of diverse former members, Vidino paints a portrait of a highly structured, tight-knit movement. His unprecedented access and understanding of the group's activities and motivations has significant policy implications concerning Western Brotherhood organizations and also illuminates the underlying mechanisms found in a range of extremist groups.

Um uber Wechselwirkungen zwischen Religion und Politik aufzuklaren, thematisieren die Autoren religios impragnierte Kriegsauffassungen Israels und Roms, der Christen und Muslime. Sie unterrichten uber Gewalttheoreme und Gewaltgeschichten der monotheistischen Weltreligionen, deren Glaubens- und Politikbegriffe bewirkten, dass auf der Weltbuhne von heute Religionen widerspruchliche Funktionen erfullen. Religionen versohnen, um ihrer friedenstiftenden Heilsbotschaft gerecht zu werden; ihre Instrumentalisierung fur politische und militarische Zwecke macht sie zu einem Nahrboden fur Terror und Gewalt. Der zeitliche Rahmen der behandelten Themen reicht von den "Heiligen Kriegen" des antiken Judentums bis zum Weltanschauungskrieg Hitlers, den dieser im Namen der "Vorsehung" und des "Allmachtigen" fuhren wollte. Bemerkenswert bleibt, dass auch der moderne, um das Seelenheil seiner Untertanen entlastete Staat, wenn es um Krieg und Frieden ging, auf die sinn- und legitimationsstiftende Macht religioser Deutungen nicht verzichten wollte."

'A groundbreaking study ... a masterclass in how to do intellectual history, and one that nobody with an interest in radical Islam should miss' Tom Holland, New Statesman 'Readers looking for a rigorous but lucid account of Islamic State's ideas will be well-served by Maher's book ... the first of its kind' Kyle W. Orton, Wall Street Journal No topic has gripped the public imagination so dramatically as the spectre of global jihadism. While much has been said about the way jihadists behave, their ideology remains poorly understood. Shiraz Maher charts the intellectual underpinnings of salafi-jihadism from its origins in the mountains of the Hindu Kush to the jihadist insurgencies of the 1990s and the 9/11 wars. His ground-breaking introduction to salafi-jihadism recalibrates our understanding of the ideas underpinning one of the most destructive political philosophies of our time. 'Magisterial ... Essential reading' Robin Yassin-Kassab, The National 'Shiraz Maher, a leading authority on contemporary Islamic extremism, traces the evolution of the key ideas behind one of the most significant religious and political movements of our time. Comprehensive, important and timely' Jason Burke, author of Al-Qaeda 'A work of genuine interest and originality ... indispensable' David Patrikarakos, Literary Review

This book offers an in-depth presentation of traditional Jewish approaches to interpersonal conflict resolution. It examines the underlying principles, prescriptive rules, and guidelines that are found in the Jewish tradition for the prevention, amelioration, and resolution of interpersonal conflicts, without the assistance of any type of third-party intermediary. Among the topics discussed are the obligations of pursuing peace and refraining from destructive conflict, Rabbinic perspectives on what constitutes constructive/destructive conflict, judging people favorably and countering negative judgmental biases, resolving conflict through dialogue, asking and granting forgiveness, and anger management. It also includes detailed summaries of contemporary approaches to interpersonal conflict resolution, theories and research on apologies and forgiveness, and methods of anger management.