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Books > Religion & Spirituality > General > Religious intolerance, persecution & conflict > General
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."
"Foreigners and Their Food" explores how Jews, Christians, and
Muslims conceptualize "us" and "them" through rules about the
preparation of food by adherents of other religions and the act of
eating with such outsiders. David M. Freidenreich analyzes the
significance of food to religious formation, elucidating the ways
ancient and medieval scholars use food restrictions to think about
the "other." Freidenreich illuminates the subtly different ways
Jews, Christians, and Muslims perceive themselves, and he
demonstrates how these distinctive self-conceptions shape ideas
about religious foreigners and communal boundaries. This work, the
first to analyze change over time across the legal literatures of
Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, makes pathbreaking contributions
to the history of interreligious intolerance and to the comparative
study of religion.
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"
Misuse of the Bible has made hatred holy. In this provocative book,
Adrian Thatcher argues that debates on sexuality currently raging
through the churches are the latest outbreak in a long line of
savage interpretations of the Bible. He claims they should be
exposed, not least because they continue an anti-tradition in
Christianity that has discriminated against many minorities,
including people of color, slaves, women and children. He asks how
Christians have been able to conduct, in public and on a global
scale, arguments which have exposed so much hatred and
misrepresentation that the very mission of the church has been
severely compromised.
The answer lies largely in particular attitudes towards the
Bible and the misuse of biblical passages. Informed by wide-ranging
debate, and drawing on numerous examples, this balanced book breaks
new ground in the well-ploughed territories of sexual ethics and
biblical interpretation. It unmasks this savage tradition and
offers instead an alternative, faithful and peaceable reading of
the Bible; one which is faithful to the Triune God and rooted in
the early church. It is fascinating reading for anyone concerned
about the future of Christianity.
State sponsorship of terrorism is a complex and important topic in
today's international affairs - and especially pertinent in the
regional politics of the Middle East and South Asia, where Pakistan
has long been a flashpoint of Islamist politics and terrorism. In
Islamism and Intelligence in South Asia, Prem Mahadevan
demonstrates how over several decades, radical Islamists, sometimes
with the tacit support of parts of the military establishment, have
weakened democratic governance in Pakistan and acquired
progressively larger influence over policy-making. Mahadevan traces
this history back to the anti-colonial Deobandi movement, which was
born out of the post-partition political atmosphere and a
rediscovery of the thinking of Ibn Taymiyyah, and partially
ennobled the idea of `jihad' in South Asia as a righteous war
against foreign oppression. Using Pakistani media and academic
sources for the bulk of its raw data, and reinforcing this with
scholarly analysis from Western commentators, the book tracks
Pakistan's trajectory towards a `soft' Islamic revolution.
Envisioned by the country's intelligence community as a solution to
chronic governance failures, these narratives called for a
re-orientation away from South Asia and towards the Middle East. In
the process, Pakistan has become a sanctuary for Arab jihadist
groups, such as Al-Qaeda, who had no previous ethnic or linguistic
connection with South Asia. Most alarmingly, official discourse on
terrorism has been partly silenced by the military-intelligence
complex. The result is a slow drift towards extremism and possible
legitimation of internationally proscribed terrorist organizations
in Pakistan's electoral politics.
In 2017, Myanmar's military launched a campaign of violence against
the Rohingya minority that UN experts later said amounted to a
genocide. More than seven hundred thousand civilians fled to
Bangladesh in what became the most concentrated flight of refugees
since the Rwanda genocide of 1994. The warning signs of impending
catastrophe that had built over years were downplayed by Western
backers of the political transition, and only when the exodus began
did the world finally come to acknowledge a catastrophe that had
been long in the making. In this updated edition of the book that
foreshadowed a genocide, Francis Wade explores how the manipulation
of identities by an anxious ruling elite laid the foundations for
mass violence. It asks: who gets to define a nation? How can
democratic rights be weaponised against a minority? And why, at a
time when the majority of citizens in Myanmar had begun to
experience freedoms unseen for half a century, did much-lauded
civilian leaders like Aung San Suu Kyi become complicit in the most
heinous of crimes?
Donna M. Lanclos writes about children on the school playgrounds of
working-class Belfast, Northern Ireland, using their own words to
show how they shape their social identities. The notion that
children's voices and perspectives must be included in a work about
childhood is central to the book. Lanclos explores children's
folklore, including skipping rhymes, clapping games, and "dirty"
jokes, from five Belfast primary schools (two Protestant, two
Catholic, and one mixed). She listens for what she can learn about
gender, family, adult-child interactions, and Protestant/Catholic
tensions. Lanclos frequently notes violent themes in the folklore
and conversations that indicate children are aware of the reality
in which they live. But at the same time, children resist being
marginalized by adults who try to shield them from this reality.
For Lanclos, children's experiences stimulate discussions about
culture and society. In her words, "Children's everyday lives are
more than just preparation for their futures, but are life itself."
A volume in the Rutgers Series in Childhood Studies edited by Myra
Bluebond-Langner
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