Religion as a Conversation Starter is the first comprehensive analysis of the present state of interreligious dialogue for peacebuilding in Southeast Europe. It is based on empirically grounded and policy-oriented research, carried out throughout the Balkans. The study maps recent interreligious relations in this part of the world, throwing light on both the achievements and challenges of interreligious dialogue for peacebuilding in particular, and offering a set of up-to-date policy recommendations, whilst contributing to a greater understanding of the local particularities and how they relate to broader trends transnationally. Interreligious dialogue has been a central tool in the continuous international efforts to promote peaceful living together in multicultural and multireligious societies. This fascinating monograph explores the place of interreligious dialogue as a primary method in conflict resolution and peacebuilding, and will be of interest to scholars of religious and peace studies, as well as those who advocate and carry out organized interventions in religion-related spheres.

Nineteen American and Balkan scholars examine the role of religion in the war in Bosnia and Herzgovina. Representing Muslim, Orthodox, Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, and secular traditions, some authors regard religion as marginal to the conflicts while others assign it a pivotal role in the social and political divisions and confrontations in the region. Collectively, they offer a bold exploration of the religious dimensions of genocide and contemporary ethnic warfare.

In a thought-provoking and challenging enterprise to rethink inter-human relationships, this book brings together a range of international scholars and peace practitioners who share their expertise and knowledge about the relationship between religion, conflict, and violence. Focusing on images of enmity, they show fascinating possibilities of how these images might be transformed into perspectives of hope and peace. (Series: ContactZone. Explorations in Intercultural Theology - Vol. 15)

Maluku in eastern Indonesia is the home to Muslims, Protestants, and Catholics who had for the most part been living peaceably since the sixteenth century. In 1999, brutal conflicts broke out between local Christians and Muslims, and escalated into large-scale communal violence once the Laskar Jihad, a Java-based armed jihadist Islamic paramilitary group, sent several thousand fighters to Maluku. As a result of this escalated violence, the previously stable Maluku became the site of devastating interreligious wars. This book focuses on the interreligious violence and conciliation in this region. It examines factors underlying the interreligious violence as well as those shaping post-conflict peace and citizenship in Maluku. The author shows that religion-both Islam and Christianity-was indeed central and played an ambiguous role in the conflict settings of Maluku, whether in preserving and aggravating the Christian-Muslim conflict or supporting or improving peace and reconciliation. Based on extensive ethnographic fieldwork and interviews as well as historical and comparative research on religious identities, this book is of interest to Indonesia specialists, as well as academics with an interest in anthropology, religious conflict, peace and conflict studies.

We may think we know what defines religious fanaticism: violent action undertaken with dogmatic certainty. But the term fanatic, from the European Reformation to today, has never been a stable one. Then and now it has been reductively defined to justify state violence and to delegitimize alternative sources of authority. Unknowing Fanaticism rejects the simplified binary of fanatical religion and rational politics, turning to Renaissance literature to demonstrate that fanaticism was integral to how both modern politics and poetics developed, from the German Peasants' Revolt to the English Civil War. The book traces two entangled approaches to fanaticism in this long Reformation moment: the targeting of it as an extreme political threat and the engagement with it as a deep epistemological and poetic problem. In the first, thinkers of modernity from Martin Luther to Thomas Hobbes and John Locke positioned themselves against fanaticism to pathologize rebellion and abet theological and political control. In the second, which arose alongside and often in response to the first, the poets of fanaticism investigated the link between fanatical self-annihilation-the process by which one could become a vessel for divine violence-and the practices of writing poetry. Edmund Spenser, John Donne, and John Milton recognized in the fanatic's claim to be a passive instrument of God their own incapacity to know and depict the origins of fanaticism. Yet this crisis of unknowing was a productive one. It led these writers to experiment with poetic techniques that would allow them to address fanaticism's tendency to unsettle the boundaries between human and divine agency and between individual and collective bodies. These poets demand a new critical method, which this book attempts to model: a historically-minded and politicized formalism that can attend to the complexity of the poetic encounter with fanaticism.

Nestor Makhno has been called a revolutionary anarchist, a peasant rebel, the Ukrainian Robin Hood, a mass-murderer, a pogromist, and a devil. These epithets had their origins in the Russian Civil War (1917-1921), where the military forces of the peasant-anarchist Nestor Makhno and Mennonite colonists in southern Ukraine came into conflict. In autumn 1919, Makhnovist troops and local peasant sympathizers murdered more than 800 Mennonites in a series of large-scale massacres. The history of that conflict has been fraught with folklore, ideological battles and radically divergent cultural memories, in which fact and fiction often seamlessly blend, conjuring a multitude of Makhnos, each one shouting its message over the other. Drawing on theories of collective memory and narrative analysis, Makhno and Memory brings a vast array of Makhnovist and Mennonite sources into dialogue, including memoirs, histories, diaries, newspapers, and archival material. A diversity of perspectives are brought into relief through the personal reminiscences of Makhno and his anarchist sympathizers alongside Mennonite pacifists and advocates for armed self-defense. Through a meticulous analysis of the Makhnovist-Mennonite conflict and a micro-study of the Eichenfeld massacre of October 1919, Sean Patterson attempts to make sense of the competing cultural memories and presents new ways of thinking about Makhno and his movement. Makhno and Memory offers a convincing reframing of the Mennonite / Makhno relationship that will force a scholarly reassessment of this period.

'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

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."

Within the next decade, China could be home to more Christians than any country in the world. Through the 150-year saga of a single family, this book vividly dramatizes the remarkable religious evolution of the world's most populous nation. Shanghai Faithful is both a touching family memoir and a chronicle of the astonishing spread of Christianity in China. Five generations of the Lin family-buffeted by history's crosscurrents and personal strife-bring to life an epoch that is still unfolding. A compelling cast-a poor fisherman, a doctor who treated opium addicts, an Ivy League-educated priest, and the charismatic preacher Watchman Nee-sets the book in motion. Veteran journalist Jennifer Lin takes readers from remote nineteenth-century mission outposts to the thriving house churches and cathedrals of today's China. The Lin family-and the book's central figure, the Reverend Lin Pu-chi-offer witness to China's tumultuous past, up to and beyond the betrayals and madness of the Cultural Revolution, when the family's resolute faith led to years of suffering. Forgiveness and redemption bring the story full circle. With its sweep of history and the intimacy of long-hidden family stories, Shanghai Faithful offers a fresh look at Christianity in China-past, present, and future.

The flow of migrants from south to north and east to west carries with it growing concerns about the economic integration, political incorporation, and social inclusion of newcomers and their children. But what happens when a group of people deliberately excludes themselves from mainstream society? How can social policies, human services, and communities best understand and respond to them? In Out of Place, Luann Good Gingrich explores social inclusion and exclusion in relation to the approximately 60,000 Low German-speaking Mennonites who have migrated from traditionally self-sufficient and agrarian colonies in Latin America to rural areas of Canada. By examining the free-market principles that organize the human services industry the author exposes the inherent conflict that arises when this "market logic" is imposed on a group that does not embrace these ideals. The author's innovative approach to social policy and human services which emphasizes the relationship between dominant and subordinate cultures, encourages us to find new ways to authentically engage with difference and bridge the gaps that divide us.

Manichaeism is a world religion that was widespread between Europe and China in various periods between the 3rd and 12th/13th centuries. Sources in Central Asia led scholars to realize that under the influence of other religions, special syncretic forms of the religion had arisen. This volume contains the papers of an international workshop on the history of the genres and works of the literature of Central Asian Manichaeism.

Established in 1542, the Roman Inquisition operated through a network of almost fifty tribunals to combat heretical and heterodox threats within the papal territories. Whilst its theological, institutional and political aspects have been well-studied, until now no sustained work has been undertaken to understand the financial basis upon which it operated. Yet - as The Business of the Roman Inquisition in the Early Modern Era shows - the fiscal autonomy enjoyed by each tribunal was a major factor in determining how the Inquisition operated. For, as the flow of cash from Rome declined, each tribunal was forced to rely upon its own assets and resources to fund its work, resulting in a situation whereby tribunals increasingly came to resemble businesses. As each tribunal was permitted to keep a substantial proportion of the fines and confiscations it levied, questions quickly arose regarding the economic considerations that may have motivated the Inquisition's actions. Dr Maifreda argues that the Inquisition, with the need to generate sufficient revenue to continue working, had a clear incentive to target wealthy groups within society who could afford to yield up substantial revenues. Furthermore, as secular authorities also began to rely upon a levy on these revenues, the financial considerations of decisions regarding heresy prosecutions become even greater. Based upon a wealth of hitherto neglected primary sources from the Vatican and local Italian archives, Dr Maifreda reveals the underlying financial structures that played a vital part in the operations of the Roman Inquisition. By exploring the system of incentives and pressures that guided the actions of inquisitors in their procedural processes and choice of victims, a much clearer understanding of the Roman Inquisition emerges. This book is an English translation of I denari dell'inquisitore. Affari e giustizia di fede nell'Italia moderna (Turin: Einaudi, 2014).

The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) ruled Mosul from 2014-2017 in accordance with its extremist interpretation of sharia. But beyond what is known about ISIS governance in the city from the group's own materials, very little is understood about the reality of its rule, or reasons for its failure, from those who actually lived under it. This book reveals what was going on inside ISIS institutions based on accounts from the civilians themselves. Focusing on ISIS governance of education, healthcare and policing, the interviewees include: teachers who were forced to teach the group's new curriculum; professors who organized secret classes in private; doctors who took direct orders from ISIS leaders and worked in their headquarters; bureaucratic staff who worked for ISIS. These accounts provide unique insight into the lived realities in the controlled territories and reveal how the terrorist group balanced their commitment to Islamist ideology with the practical challenges of state building. Moving beyond the simplistic dichotomy of civilians as either passive victims or ISIS supporters, Mathilde Becker Aarseth highlights here those people who actively resisted or affected the way in which ISIS ruled. The book invites readers to understand civilians' complex relationship to the extremist group in the context of fragmented state power and a city torn apart by the occupation.

With the theory of secularization increasingly contested as a plausible development at a global scale, this book focuses on the changing significance of the religious element within a context of complex diversity. This concept reflects the rationale behind the deep transformations that have taken place in the dynamics of social change, giving way to a recombination of social, political and cultural cleavages that overlap and compete for legitimacy at a national and supranational level. Far from disappearing with modernization, new forms of religious diversity have emerged that continue to demand specific policies from the state, putting pressure on the established practices of religious governance while creating a series of normative dilemmas. European societies have been a testing ground for many of these changes, but for decades Canada has been viewed as a pioneering country in the management of diversity, thus offering some interesting similarities and contrasts with the former. Accordingly, the book deals with the diverging routes that political secularization has followed in Europe and Canada, the patterns of religious governance that can be recognized in each region, and the practices for accommodating the demands of religious minorities concerning their legal regulation, the management of public institutions, and the provision of social services.

Yezidis in Syria: Identity Building among a Double Minority traces the development of Yezidi identity on the margins of Syria's minority context. This little known group is connected to the community's main living area in northern Iraq, but evolved as a separate identity group in the context of Syria's colonial, national, and revolutionary history. Always on the bottom of the socio-economic hierarchy, the two sub-groups located in the Kurdagh and the Jezira experience a period of sociological and theological renewal in their quest for a recognized and protected status in the new Syria. In this book, Sebastian Maisel transmits and analyzes the Yezidi perspective on Syria's policies towards ethnic and religious minorities.

Much like our world today, Late Antiquity (fourth-seventh centuries CE) is often seen as a period rife with religious violence, not least because the literary sources are full of stories of Christians attacking temples, statues and 'pagans'. However, using insights from Religious Studies, recent studies have demonstrated that the Late Antique sources disguise a much more intricate reality. The present volume builds on this recent cutting-edge scholarship on religious violence in Late Antiquity in order to come to more nuanced judgments about the nature of the violence. At the same time, the focus on Late Antiquity has taken away from the fact that the phenomenon was no less prevalent in the earlier Graeco-Roman world. This book is therefore the first to bring together scholars with expertise ranging from classical Athens to Late Antiquity to examine the phenomenon in all its complexity and diversity throughout Antiquity.

A history of mainline Protestant responses to immigrants and refugees during the twentieth century Open Hearts, Closed Doors uncovers the largely overlooked role that liberal Protestants played in fostering cultural diversity in America and pushing for new immigration laws during the forty years following the passage of the restrictive Immigration Act of 1924. These efforts resulted in the complete reshaping of the US cultural and religious landscape. During this period, mainline Protestants contributed to the national debate over immigration policy and joined the charge for immigration reform, advocating for a more diverse pool of newcomers. They were successful in their efforts, and in 1965 the quota system based on race and national origin was abolished. But their activism had unintended consequences, because the liberal immigration policies they supported helped to end over three centuries of white Protestant dominance in American society. Yet, Pruitt argues, in losing their cultural supremacy, mainline Protestants were able to reassess their mission. They rolled back more strident forms of xenophobia, substantively altering the face of mainline Protestantism and laying foundations for their responses to today's immigration debates. More than just a historical portrait, this volume is a timely reminder of the power of religious influence in political matters.

From ISIS attacks to the conflict between Israel and Palestine, Sacred Fury explores the connections between faith and violence in world religions. Author Charles Selengut looks at religion as both a force for peace and for violence, and he asks key questions such as how "religious" is this violence and what drives the faithful to attack in the names of their beliefs? Revised throughout, the third edition features new material on violence in Buddhism and Hinduism, the rise of ISIS, "lone wolf terrorists," and more. This up-to-date edition draws on a variety of disciplines to comprehend forms of religious violence both historically and in the present day. The third edition of Sacred Fury is an essential resource for understanding the connections between faith and violence.

"I picked up this book soon after making a commitment to Christ. At first I was shocked by the images of Christians suffering and dying for their faith. But soon I was drawn into the accounts of how these ordinary men and women--no different from you or me--could face every kind of opposition rather than deny their Lord. Reading their stories marked me and helped me resolve to follow Christ no matter what the cost."
--Mark Mittelberg, Executive Director of Evangelism for the Willow Creek Association and author of Becoming a Contagious Church
From the first-century stoning of Stephen through his own perilous time--Reformation-era England--John Foxe recounts the lives, sufferings, and triumphant deaths of dozens of Christian martyrs. Some were people of rank and influence. Some were ordinary folk. Some were his friends.] Four centuries later, these deeply moving accounts of faith and courage mark a path for modern Christians to measure the depth of their commitment.
This edition, edited by William Byron Forbush (1868-1927), contains Foxes original material as well as some later additions (see chapters 5, 6, & 10 particularly).
Hendrickson Christian Classics is planned to include all the timeless books that generations of believers have treasured. Each volume in the series is freshly retypeset, while thoughtful new prefaces explore their spiritual and historical contexts. For contemporary readers, here is an essential library of Christian wisdom through the ages.