As the news shows us every day, contemporary American culture and politics are rife with people who demonize their enemies by projecting their own failings and flaws onto them. But this is no recent development. Rather, as John Corrigan argues here, it's an expression of a trauma endemic to America's history, particularly involving our long domestic record of religious conflict and violence. Religious Intolerance, America, and the World spans from Christian colonists' intolerance of Native Americans and the role of religion in the new republic's foreign-policy crises to Cold War witch hunts and the persecution complexes that entangle Christians and Muslims today. Corrigan reveals how US churches and institutions have continuously campaigned against intolerance overseas even as they've abetted or performed it at home. This selective condemnation of intolerance, he shows, created a legacy of foreign policy interventions promoting religious freedom and human rights that was not reflected within America's own borders. This timely, captivating book forces America to confront its claims of exceptionalism based on religious liberty--and perhaps begin to break the grotesque cycle of projection and oppression.

This collection of seventeen essays by leading researchers is published with a companion volume to celebrate the sixty-fifth birthday of Jonathan Riley-Smith, the leading British historian of the Crusades. The subjects focus on the theory and practice of crusading and the contributions which were made by the military orders.

Christian princes waged the first pan-European war from 1618 to 1648. Brought about in part by the entrenched passions of the Reformation and Counter Reformation, the Thirty Years War inevitably drew in the Society of Jesus, or Jesuits, who stood at the vanguard of Catholic Reform. This book investigates for the first time the Jesuits' role during the war at the four Catholic courts of Vienna, Munich, Paris, and Madrid. It also examines the challenge to the Jesuit superior general in Rome to lead a truly international organization through a period of rising national conflict.

How Long O Lord? The prophet s ancient cry for justice sounds as plaintively and passionately today as it ever has. In this penetrating and provocative collection of essays, Maurine and Robert Tobin have brought together a group of peacemakers Christian, Jewish, and Muslim whose religious convictions compel them towards a common aim: a just peace for Israel/Palestine. Anyone looking for easy answers to one of the most complicated political and religious struggles on the globe will not find them here. Instead, the voices of these women and men challenge and confront many commonly held assumptions. They disturb and unsettle comforting illusions of order and security, and they unmask and name powers and principalities for what they are perpetrators of injustice and evil. Those who pray with their Bibles in one hand and the newspaper in the other will find this book an invaluable aid in active prayer and engagement.

The subjects in this volume focus on the history of the Latin East and its place in the context of Mediterranean trade and near eastern political developments.

Two American families in the not-so-distant future decide to flee their homeland in the wake of new laws that limited their religious freedoms. It seemed that this religious intolerance as well as the moral decay of their society had made them apprehensive about the future of their families and their country and, so, the adventure started. It led them and a number of others who joined them on a dangerous journey filled with challenges and danger to a new land far from their native shores. It is an adventure that you will not soon forget. This book is in the apocalyptic spirit of Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkin's "Left Behind" series with the edginess of William P. Young's "The Shack.

Margaret Murray was an anthropologist who upset the comfortable consensus of her day with the idea that Western Europe did not convert 'en masse' to Christianity. Using contemporary accounts she was able to show that, while European rulers and nobles were successfully targeted by Christian missionaries, the majority of the population held tenaciously to the Old Religion. These far older beliefs centred upon the worship of Cernunnos, the figure of a male, horned god. The result was centuries of conflict between Christianity and 'Paganism' in which the adherents of the Cross gradually gained the ascendant. And following the general principle that 'the God of the old religion becomes the Devil of the new', the Christian 'Evil One' was given the characteristics of the pagan deity - horns and all. Those who stubbornly held to the Old Ways were seen as devil-worshippers, witches, followers of the left-hand path who fully deserved the stake and death by purging fire. Margaret Murray gives a convincing account of this God of the witches, and shows how many famous characters in European history - among them William Rufus, Joan of Arc and Thomas a Beckett - must be counted as members of The Old Religion. A book for all those interested in the roots of Wicca and neo-paganism.

Contrary to conventional wisdom, violent episodes involving cults are rare historically. But their potential to affect and disrupt civic life looms large and efforts to manage these incidents involve controversial issues of religious freedom, politics, state intervention, and public security. The interpretive challenge of this book is to provide a social scientific explanation for these rare events. The authors conclude that they usually involve some combination of internal and external dynamics through which a new religious movement and society become polarized.

Leading figures at the dawn of the sixteenth-century Reformation commonly faced the charge of "judaizing": 72 In His Name concerns the changing views of four such men starting with their kabbalistic treatment of the 72 divine names of angels. Johann Reuchlin, the first of the four men featured in this book, survived the charge; Martin Luther's increasingly anti-semitic stance is contrasted with the opposite movement of the French Franciscan Jean Thenaud whose kabbalistic manuscripts were devoted to Francis I; Philipp Wolff, the fourth, had been born into a Jewish family but his recorded views were decidedly anti-semitic. 72 In His Name also includes evidence that kabbalistic beliefs and practices, such as the service for exorcism recorded by Thenaud, were unwittingly recorded by Christians. Although the book concerns early modern Europe, the religious interactions, the shifting spiritual attitudes, and the shadows cast linger on.

Contrary to conventional wisdom, violent episodes involving cults are rare historically. But their potential to affect and disrupt civic life looms large and efforts to manage these incidents involve controversial issues of religious freedom, politics, state intervention, and public security. The interpretive challenge of this book is to provide a social scientific explanation for these rare events. The authors conclude that they usually involve some combination of internal and external dynamics through which a new religious movement and society become polarized.

Despite the widespread trends of secularization in the 20th century, religion has played an important role in several outbreaks of genocide since the First World War. And yet, not many scholars have looked either at the religious aspects of modern genocide, or at the manner in which religion has taken a position on mass killing. This collection of essays addresses this hiatus by examining the intersection between religion and state-organized murder in the cases of the Armenian, Jewish, Rwandan, and Bosnian genocides. Rather than a comprehensive overview, it offers a series of descrete, yet closely related case studies, that shed light on three fundamental aspects of this issue: the use of religion to legitimize and motivate genocide; the potential of religious faith to encourage physical and spiritual resistance to mass murder; and finally, the role of religion in coming to terms with the legacy of atrocity.

Despite the widespread trends of secularization in the 20th century, religion has played an important role in several outbreaks of genocide since the First World War. And yet, not many scholars have looked either at the religious aspects of modern genocide, or at the manner in which religion has taken a position on mass killing. This collection of essays addresses this hiatus by examining the intersection between religion and state-organized murder in the cases of the Armenian, Jewish, Rwandan, and Bosnian genocides. Rather than a comprehensive overview, it offers a series of descrete, yet closely related case studies, that shed light on three fundamental aspects of this issue: the use of religion to legitimize and motivate genocide; the potential of religious faith to encourage physical and spiritual resistance to mass murder; and finally, the role of religion in coming to terms with the legacy of atrocity.

In 1590 three hundred Scottish 'witches' were tried for plotting the murder of their King, James VI of Scotland (soon to be James I of England). James is known to have suffered from a morbid fear of violent death, and the trial heightened his anxiety over this apparently treasonous 'un-Christian' sect, and stimulated him to study the whole subject of witchcraft. 'Daemonologie' is the result of this royal research, detailing his opinions on the topic in the form of a Socratic dialogue between the sceptic Philomathes and witch-averse Epistemon, who reveals many aspects of witch-craft. The book consists of three sections, on magic, on sorcery and witchcraft, and on spirits and ghosts, and ends with a lurid account of the North Berwick witch trials, based on the evidence of Dr John Fian, the alleged head of the coven, whose 'confession' was obtained with the aid of thumbscrews, the Boot, and by the ripping out of his fingernails.

This is a powerful and inspirational challenge to the Western Church to take the systematic, symbolic and comprehensive attacks on Christians of all denominations around the world seriously. That Christians are persecuted in various parts of the world is well-known. Less often documented are the violent, systematic attacks on churches and holy sites. Part of an historic process, places of Christian worship have been destroyed over the centuries, from the middle ages through the Armenian genocide and the assaults on Christians in the Middle East and Turkey through to the present day. This book focuses on the continuing attacks on Christian communities in many parts of the world today. Baroness Cox presents graphic photographs and survivors' accounts as testimony to widespread destruction, and provides powerful documentary evidence of contemporary persecution. This is a powerful challenge to the rest of the Church, and advocates of religious freedom, to take these attacks on Christians of all denominations seriously. She writes, 'no other belief tradition has suffered such sustained assaults - or been so silent about violence perpetrated against its own people.' Though painful, the contents combine to provide a moving celebration of the resilience of the human spirit and the Christian faith.

In 1992, a group of academics at the National University of Malaysia (UKM) organized a seminar titled "Seminar Ahli Sunnah dan Syiah Imamiyyah" ("Seminar on Ahl al-Sunnah and Imami Shi'ism") in Kuala Lumpur. It aimed to demonize Shi'a Muslims and ban Shi'ism, effectively escalating sectarianism in Muslim society. A Deobandi presenter at the seminar by the name of Muhammad Asri Yusoff put forth arguments about Shi'ism, which later became the "intellectual base" for the discrimination and repression of Shi'a Muslims by Islamic authorities in Malaysia. This repression continues till the present day, and other religious leaders-particularly those with a Salafi orientation-take part in this. While much attention has been given to those who have escalated sectarianism, there have also been efforts to de-escalate sectarianism. These efforts come from groups such as Persatuan Ulama Malaysia, and individuals such as Abdul Hadi Awang of PAS, former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, the leader of International Movement for a Just World, Chandra Muzaffar, as well as Malaysian academic, Syed Farid Alatas. Nevertheless, the roots of sectarianism have been deeply laid since the seminar in 1992. Unsurprisingly, the sectarian campaign against Shi'as is aligned with the agenda of extremist and terrorist organizations such as ISIS. The sectarian campaign thus arguably emboldens such groups and puts Malaysia and the entire Southeast Asia at risk.

This is the first work in any language that offers both an overarching exploration of the flight and evacuation of Soviet Jews viewed at the macro level, and a personal history of one Soviet Jewish family. It is also the first study to examine Jewish life in the Northern Caucasus, a Soviet region that history scholars have rarely addressed. Drawing on a collection of family letters, Kiril Feferman provides a history of the Ginsburgs as they debate whether to evacuate their home of Rostov-on-Don in southern Russia and are eventually swept away by the Soviet-German War, the German invasion of Soviet Russia, and the Holocaust. The book makes a significant contribution to the history of the Holocaust and Second World War in the Soviet Union, presenting one Soviet region as an illustration of wartime social and media politics.

Facing issues of violence and conflict, authors of textbooks for Religious Education (RE) choose a range of different strategies. While some try to write as non-controversially as possible about such issues, other authors choose to leave them completely out. Even in the academic study of religions, a well-established perspective is that religion is primarily something good, and important for societies as well as for human development. Such basic presumptions/perspectives are often nurtured by an apologetic orientation to the representation of religion. In some cases, religious violence and conflict are therefore considered disruptive forces that destroy what is "true," "authentic" and "valuable" in religion.Textbook Violence offers critical perspectives on how textbooks deal or not deal with issues of conflict and violence in religions. The volume's contributions provide examples from textbooks for university level as well as from RE in schools, and include discussions of conflict and violence in a range of different religious traditions. The contributors bring issues of religious violence and conflict into focus through such questions as: In what way is violence and/or conflict treated? Who are the authorial voices? What are their aims? Who is the reader being addressed? How are the representations of religions framed by value judgments?Beyond certain obvious ideological considerations (e.g., nationalism; the interests of religious pedagogues who contribute to textbooks in some countries), there are a number of different factors shaping representations of religions in textbooks - from commercial considerations and statutory stipulations to situations where publishers and national examination boards work closely together to produce textbooks with contents keyed to national exams. This means that authors have to face different expectations and considerations when writing textbooks. Textbook Violence will also include reflections on the choices such authors are facing.

In the Spring of 2015, a post-modern version of the Salem witchcraft trials took place at Connecticut College on the Thames River. Only this time instead of sorcery it was Zionism; instead of punishing in the name of God's law it was in the name of anti-hate speech and inclusive excellence; instead of young teenage girls leading the hysteria it was college-aged social warriors stampeding 200 professors into sacrificing one of their colleagues, and thereby contributing to a wave of administration-promoted hate-speech at their college. The Pessin affair offers us a case study in a tendency towards "public shaming" that not only deeply compromises the integrity of academia, but increasingly spreads to many aspects of our society, so susceptible to media-driven feeding frenzies.

In the spring of 1575, Holland's Northern Quarter--the waterlogged peninsula stretching from Amsterdam to the North Sea--was threatened with imminent invasion by the Spanish army. Since the outbreak of the Dutch Revolt a few years earlier, the Spanish had repeatedly failed to expel the rebels under William of Orange from this remote region, and now there were rumors that the war-weary population harbored traitors conspiring to help the Spanish invade. In response, rebel leaders arrested a number of vagrants and peasants, put them on the rack, and brutally tortured them until they confessed and named their principals--a witch-hunt that eventually led to a young Catholic lawyer named Jan Jeroenszoon. Treason in the Northern Quarter tells how Jan Jeroenszoon, through great personal courage and faith in the rule of law, managed to survive gruesome torture and vindicate himself by successfully arguing at trial that the authorities remained subject to the law even in times of war. Henk van Nierop uses Jan Jeroenszoon's exceptional story to give the first account of the Dutch Revolt from the point of view of its ordinary victims--town burghers, fugitive Catholic clergy, peasants, and vagabonds. For them the Dutch Revolt was not a heroic struggle for national liberation but an ordinary dirty war, something to be survived, not won. An enthralling account of an unsuspected story with surprising modern resonance, Treason in the Northern Quarter presents a new image of the Dutch Revolt, one that will fascinate anyone interested in the nature of revolution and civil war or the fate of law during wartime.

Crusading fervour gripped Europe for over 200 years, creating one of the most extraordinary, vivid episodes in world history. Whether the Crusades are regarded as the most romantic of Christian expeditions, or the last of the barbarian invasions, they have fascinated generations ever since, and their legacy of ideas and imagery has resonated through the centuries, inspiring Hollywood movies and great works of literature. Even today, to invoke the Crusades is to stir deep cultural myths, assumptions and prejudices. Yet despite their powerful hold on our imaginations, our knowledge of them remains obscured an distorted by time. Were the Crusaders motivated by spiritual rewards, or by greed? Were the Crusades an experiment in European colonialism, or a manifestation of religious love? How were they organized and founded? With customary flair and originality, Christopher Tyerman picks his way through the many debates to present a clear and lively discussion of the Crusades; bringing together issues of colonialism, cultural exchange, economic exploitation, and the relationship between past and present. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.

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 provocative and insightful analysis that sheds new light on one of the most puzzling and historically unsettling conundrums

Why the Germans? Why the Jews? Countless historians have grappled with these questions, but few have come up with answers as original and insightful as those of maverick German historian Gotz Aly. Tracing the prehistory of the Holocaust from the 1800s to the Nazis' assumption of power in 1933, Aly shows that German anti-Semitism was--to a previously overlooked extent--driven in large part by material concerns, not racist ideology or religious animosity. As Germany made its way through the upheaval of the Industrial Revolution, the difficulties of the lethargic, economically backward German majority stood in marked contrast to the social and economic success of the agile Jewish minority. This success aroused envy and fear among the Gentile population, creating fertile ground for murderous Nazi politics.

Surprisingly, and controversially, Aly shows that the roots of the Holocaust are deeply intertwined with German efforts to create greater social equality. Redistributing wealth from the well-off to the less fortunate was in many respects a laudable goal, particularly at a time when many lived in poverty. But as the notion of material equality took over the public imagination, the skilled, well-educated Jewish population came to be seen as having more than its fair share. Aly's account of this fatal social dynamic opens up a new vantage point on the greatest crime in history and is sure to prompt heated debate for years to come.

Terrorism is an extreme form of radicalization. In this ground-breaking and important book, Clark McCauley and Sophia Moskalenko identify and outline twelve mechanisms of political radicalization that can move individuals, groups, and the masses to increased sympathy and support for political violence. Co-authored by two psychologists both acknowledged in their field as experts in radicalization and consultants to the Department of Homeland Security and other government agencies, Friction draws on wide-ranging case histories to show striking parallels between 1800s anti-czarist terrorism, 1970s anti-war terrorism, and 21st century jihadist terrorism. Altogether, the twelve mechanisms of political radicalization demonstrate how unexceptional people are moved to exceptional violence in the conflict between states and non-state challengers. In this revised and expanded edition, McCauley and Moskalenko use the twelve mechanisms to analyze recent cases of lone-wolf terrorists and illustrate how individuals can become radicalized to jihadist violence with group influence or organizational support. Additionally, in the context of the Islamic State's worldwide efforts to radicalize moderate Muslims for jihad, they advance a model that differentiates radicalization in opinion from radicalization in action, and suggest different strategies for countering these diverse forms of radicalization. As a result, the authors conclude that the same mechanisms are at work in radicalizing both terrorists and states targeted by terrorists, implying that these conclusions are as relevant for policy-makers and security officers as they are for citizens facing the threat of terror today.