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Many attempts have been made to explain the rise of religious phenomena based on evolutionary models, which attempt to account for the way in which religion can constitute a useful system to increase the fitness of both the individual and the group. These models implicitly mean that beliefs are simply effective adaptations to the environment and in this sense they cannot be truly accepted by those who adhere to the religions in question. In this paper, I use the evolution of culture model elaborated by Cavalli Sforza to propose an approach that can explain the change of institutionalized religions over a more limited time frame than the long times of biological evolution. This model could be heuristically effective in the study of religious phenomena and could also be applicable in terms of theology and philosophy of religion. Given the limits of space, I will only try to take a few steps in this direction, trying to answer some of the major questions that arise about such an approach. In particular, one may ask whether, unlike others, the evolution of culture model applied to religions can make it possible to put into brackets - or to remain agnostic about - the value and the truth of the beliefs and precepts of the religion which is studied.

This dissertation investigates the debate between Karl Löwith, Hans Blumenberg and Carl Schmitt on the issue of 'secularization' and the problematic place of religion in modernity. Besides reconstructing their philosophical positions, this study also analyzes and evaluates the significance of their contributions in the historical development of the broader German secularization debate. It explores how 'secularization' functioned as a key concept in the German societal-intellectual discourse from the 1950s to the 1980s and how their accounts were involved in a grand intellectual struggle to either 're-root' modern society in a religious past or to break free' from past traditions. As it traces the development of the German secularization debate, this study also focusses on how, after the turbulent year of 1968, this discourse became more overtly political, centering now on Schmitt's notion of political theology. The political-theological stage of the secularization debate will be exemplified in this investigation by an analysis of the dispute between Jacob Taubes and Odo Marquard. Finally, this study also aims to reflect on the philosophical significance of the contributions of these protagonists for any kind of theorizing on the issue of secularization and modernity. It does so by examining parallels between the German secularization debate and the more recent discourse of postsecularism, and by reflecting on what contemporary (post)secularization theories might gain from knowledge of this German debate.

Borchardt, C F A, & Vorster, W S (eds) 1988. South African Theological Bibliography vol 3. Suid-Afrikaanse Teologiese Bibliografie deel 3. Pretoria: University of South Africa.Goba, Bonganjalo 1988. An agenda for black theology: hermeneutics for social change. Johannesburg: Skotaville.Maimela, Simon 1987. Proclaim freedom to my people. Essays on religion and politics. Johannesburg: Skotaville.Samuel, Vinay, & Sugden, Chris (eds) 1987. The Church in response to human need. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.Womer, Jan L (ed & tr) 1987. Morality and ethics in early Christianity. Philadelphia: Fortress Press.Smit, Dirkie 1988. Hoop in lewe en lyding … Oordenkings en Bybelstudie uit 1 Petrus. Kaapstad: Lux Verbi.Johnson Luke T 1986. The writings of the new Testament. An interpretation. Philadelphia: Fortress Press.Welch, Claude 1985. Protestant thought in the Nineteenth Century vol 2, 1890-1914. New Haven: Yale University Press.Vosloo, W 1986. Méér as net 'n storie. Pretoria: NGK-Boekhandel Transvaal.Van Schoor, M 1986. Wat is kommunikasie? Pretoria: Van Schaik.Deist, Ferdinand 1988. Laat my volk trek! Kaapstad: Tafelberg.Stackhouse, Max L 1988. Apologia. Contextualization, globalization, and mission in theological education. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.Marsden, George M 1987. Reforming fundamentalism. Fuller Seminary and the new evangelicalism. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.Wink, Walter 1986. Unmasking the powers. The invisible forces that determine human existence. Philadelphia: Fortress Press.James, Eric 1987. A life of Bishop John A T Robinson. Scholar, pastor, prophet. London: Collins.

Political metaphors condition social reality and mediate authority. One repeatedly used metaphor in discourses about migration and refuge is the misconception that 'the state is a house. Far from only defining the modalities of inclusion and exclusion, metaphors of houses and housing evoke patriarchal political relationships between guests and hosts, homeless and homeowners, the households head and his subjects, and the man and his women. Houses present themselves to us in ambiguous, even contradictory ways in that they both shelter and imprison. Furthermore, in spite of a general need for accommodation the state fails to provide material housing, only feigning the imagination of security. Therefore, 'housing appears to be a key paradox of nationalist and chauvinist discourse. Figurative language is, however, unfinished, which is why our images of houses, charged with the theology, anthropology, politics, and language of foundations, buildings, and walls, may be challenged by critique and interpretation. Developing a critical metaphorology, committed to analyzing the framed arguments and underlying contexts of said discourses justifying patriarchy and nationalism, we describe the choice between inhabiting and abandoning 'the house. Ultimately, we present counter-narratives about decaying structures of power and pro-pose ways to take 'housing issues to the streets. ; (VLID)5762969 ; Version of record

This introductory essay presents the framework for a collection of papers, published together here, that originated in the IAHR Special Conference Religions, Science and Technology in Cultural Contexts: Dynamics of Change, held at The Norwegian University of Science and Technology on March 1–2, 2012. There exist numerous studies of the relationship between religion, science and technology, held in general terms as well as applied in specific case studies. Although this collection spans widely diverse cases – geographically, historically, culturally, topically – it makes a distinct contribution to the field through the combined focus on global 'systemic' communication and transformations, and the dynamic, even instrumental, relations between ontology and politics. Thus, we show that boundaries between 'religion' and 'science' are in constant flux, subject to people's objectives as well as state policy. We can show this by including both descriptive studies and applied, constructive argumentation for specific interpretations of 'religious' materials. Some might argue that 'application' has no place in Religious studies, only in Theology. However, Religious studies discourses are themselves implicated in constructing boundaries between 'religion' and 'science', which change over time. Including 'application studies' therefore does not make us 'theologians'. Rather, it adds analytical insights into how ontology and cosmology has been, and still is, employed to achieve scientific objectives, which in turn are politically informed.

This book investigates the substantial and growing contribution which African Independent and Pentecostal Churches are making to sustainable development in all its manifold forms. Moreover, this volume seeks to elucidate how these churches reshape the very notion of sustainable development and contribute to the decolonisation of development. Fostering both overarching and comparative perspectives, the book includes chapters on West Africa (Nigeria, Ghana, and Burkina Faso) and Southern Africa (Zimbabwe and South Africa). It aims to open up a subfield focused on African Initiated Christianity within the religion and development discourse, substantially broadening the scope of the existing literature. Written predominantly by scholars from the African continent, the chapters in this volume illuminate potentials and perspectives of African Initiated Christianity, combining theoretical contributions, essays by renowned church leaders, and case studies focusing on particular churches or regional contexts. While the contributions in this book focus on the African continent, the notion of development underlying the concept of the volume is deliberately wide and multidimensional, covering economic, social, ecological, political, and cultural dimensions. Therefore, the book will be useful for the community of scholars interested in religion and development as well as researchers within African studies, anthropology, development studies, political science, religious studies, sociology of religion, and theology. It will also be a key resource for development policymakers and practitioners.

Newman returned again and again to reflect on the nature of conviction. The very process of ongoing reflection was itself fundamental: the cultivation of a contemplative cast of mind open to complexity and diversity, and resistant to relativism. Attention to such a way of thinking was the safeguard of integrity and a check on solipsistic individualism. This was crucial for the interrelationship between thought and action, and the functioning of an engaged and responsible civil society. In an increasingly pluralistic religious culture, understanding well-considered difference could strengthen faith and underpin effective action in a way that appeals to bland consensus or to a generic natural theology could never do. Whilst Newman argued for the essential consistency of principle with which he approached these questions throughout his life, projected onto his conversion was a series of cultural and political anxieties, refracted through the lens of a gendered and sexualised anti-Catholicism, of which Kingsley was a prominent exponent. However, this language was part of a much wider – and developing – contemporary discourse, involving a range of thinkers (including Maurice, Ruskin and Matthew Arnold), who deployed gender to constructive critical effect, adding to the dynamic force of diversity, which Newman harnessed. Such ways of thinking retain their pertinence in confronting questions of value in a liberal society.

This article seeks to examine the dialectic of Sufism orientation and Kalam with a special focus on the intersection between these two realms during the First and Second Hijri centuries. Consequently, three aspects, which are the background and chronology of the intersection, the issues that arose in it, as well as the associated characteristics, were emphasized. The study revealed that the political, sociological, intellectual, and academic factors became the background of the intersection between Sufism and Kalam in the First and Second Hijri centuries. Also, the main issues developed were faith or īmān, infidelity, or kufr, and the problems of human deeds, known as af'āl al-'ibād. Other issues were the relationship of the essence or dhāt, as well as the divine attributes or ṣifāt of Allah. Meanwhile, the three characteristics of the intersection that were mapped were, first, the interrelation of doctrine and political attitudes. This interrelation means that a strong correlation, or even integration, exists between the doctrine of a sect, known as firqah, and political attitudes. Second, a thematic theological interconnection signified that there were common issues discussed in matters of theology. Third, a rational debate based on rational approaches indicated that the conflict of thoughts that occurred was essentially a dialogue as it was not on a different study line but in the same area.

Die Option für die Armen und Anderen hat nichts an Dringlichkeit verloren. Doch es ist eine "Entgiftung" des heroischen Befreiungspathos im Gange, etwa durch genderbezogene, intersektionale oder postkoloniale Kritik. Soziales Engagement und befreiende Theologie sind im 21. Jahrhundert vielfältiger, komplexer, aber auch wirklichkeitsnäher geworden. Die solidarische und Leben gebende Kraft des Evangeliums ereignet sich weniger im "Dagegen" als im "Dazwischen". Man kann das als postheroischen Transformationsimperativ verstehen. Statt sich im selbstgewissen Kampf gegen das Falsche der richtigen Identität zu versichern, geht es um postheroische Ereignisse des Richtigeren im Falschen, auf deren verwandelnde Dynamik eine christlich affizierte Hoffnung setzen darf. Das bedeutet ein offeneres Verhältnis von Glaube und Solidaritätshandeln, offen für eine entdeckungsbereite theologischeNeugier in den Feldern sozial und politisch engagierter Praktiken.The option for the poor and others has lost nothing of its urgency. But a "detoxification" of the heroic pathos of liberation is necessary, for instance through gender-related, intersectional or postcolonial critique. Social commitment and liberating theology have become more diverse, more complex, but also more realistic in the 21st century. The solidary and life-giving power of the gospel occurs less in "against" than in "in between". One can understand this as post-heroic imperative of transformation. Instead of asserting the right identity against the wrong in a self-confident fight against the wrong, it is about post-heroic events of the right in the wrong, on whose transforming dynamics a Christianinfluenced hope may rely. That means a more open relationship between faith and solidarity action, open to a theological curiosity ready to discover in the fields of socially and politically engaged practices.

In June 1918, seven leaders of the International Bible Students Association (IBSA), a small but high profile Christian community, were convicted under the United States Espionage Act and sentenced to twenty years in prison. The conviction stemmed from the unique position on Christianity and war propagated by Charles Taze Russell, the Bible Students' fountainhead. The refusal of the IBSA leaders to countenance the hypernationalism which accompanied America's entry into World War I in April 1917 but instead to circulate widely antiwar literature made them a target for governmental authorities intent on silencing those opposed to America's involvement, particularly communities invoking the Bible to condemn militarism and conflict. This article argues that the fundamental differences between the IBSA's antiwar position and those of the historic peace churches made them a particular challenge to the American political and religious establishment, which regarded Bible Student theology as explicitly political and cast their literature as a potent weapon against America's prosecution of the war. It ultimately aims to write the IBSA into the history of opposition to war not in spite of but because of their unusual position on Christianity and armed conflict. By doing so, the article also reveals the origins of conscientious objection for Jehovah's Witnesses, as the Bible Students are now called, known worldwide for their refusal to perform military service.

Julius Pflug (1499–1564) był dyplomatą, politykiem i biskupem, i we wszystkich tych swoich zadaniach troszczył się o jedność ówczesnego Kościoła, którą uważał za konieczną do zbawienia. Jego zaangażowanie cieszyło się wielkim szacunkiem zarówno u katolików, jak i protestantów. Pflug występował na rzecz reformy Kościoła, ale był przeciwny jego rozdarciu. Współcześnie może zostać zaliczony do czołowych przedstawicieli teologii mediacji XVI w. W jego działaniach nie można zaliczyć go ani do obiegowych schematów historycznych, ani zakwalifikować do kategorii społecznego zdyscyplinowania. Artykuł przedstawia biografię Pfluga i opisuje jego program teologiczny, głównie jego starania o jedność i reformę Kościoła. ; Julius Pflug (1499–1564) was a diplomat, politician and bishop, and in all this functions he took care of the unity of the Church in his time which he considered as necessary for salvation. His involvement is acclaimed both by Catholics and Protestants. Pflug worked for the reform of the Church but he was against their split. Today he can be numbered among the leading representatives of theology of mediation of 16th century. In his activities he can neither be marked to the general historical schemata nor to the category of social discipline. The present article presents the biography of Pflug and describes his theological program, especially his efforts for the unity and reform of the Church.

This study is situated in the context of South Carolina in the United States. This is a region that has seen rapid diversification over the past four decades. It is also situated in a political context where otherness, where difference, is vilified and feared. This study, then, aims to understand current relations between Latin@s and Euro-Americans in the churches of South Carolina and to then propose methods of creating mutual encounters between Latin@s and Euro-Americans that will enhance intergroup perception and cross-cultural commitment. First, this project lays out a justification for intercultural mixing in theology and church. This includes a critique of both the homogeneous unit principle and the multicultural church, arguing instead for an understanding of the church as border. Second, this research aims to understand the ways in which different types of church borderlands express themselves in South Carolina and the kinds of people who attend such churches. Third, it asks how churchgoers perceive the "other" and then seeks to understand if there is any correlation between these three components. Finally, it recounts an attempt to test if it is possible for churches to create liminal, third-space encounters between Latin@s and Euro-Americans that can lead to greater cross-cultural commitment and a better intergroup perception.

Witness to Marvels traces the development of a unique genre of Sufi-inspired Bengali romances called pir kathas, whose protagonists and plots are wholly fictive. For five centuries these fabulations have parodied indigenous and Hindu textual traditions. Both mimicking and mocking, these parodies adopted a subjunctive tone, exploring a magical world of 'what-if'. They created an Islam-inflected space within a traditional Bengali cultural environment without trying to legislate what ideally 'should be' according to tropes common to Islamic history, theology, and law. The tales' discursive arena, the imaginaire, delineated the realm of possibility for how these tales might exercise the imagination to integrate Hindu and Islamic cosmologies. Tales insinuated themselves into locally relevant discourses through elaborate intertextual connections, subtly shifting presuppositions about the way the world works and what counts as religious authority. As Allah looked on from heaven, the tales routinely assigned Sufi saints, both pirs and bibis, to the pivotal role of avatar, the periodic descent of divinity, equating them to the Hindu god Narayan. Adopting a semiotic strategy to interpret these tales yields a bold new perspective on the subtle ways Islam assumed its distinctive form in Bengal and suggests how we need to reimagine conversion in this region.

This paper discusses the origins of Mahdiism (al-Mahdi al-Muntaẓar) that are constructed using the mahdawiyyah ḥadīth with the status of aḥad (single transmitter) and ḍa'īf (weak). Nevertheless, this belief (Mahdiism) has deep roots in the theological reason of Muslims. By the historical approach, the finding shows that Mahdiism has roots in millenarianism (belief of the saviors' presence) that had existed in pre-Islamic traditions, such as Jewish and Christian. The elementary form of Islamic millenarianism is the concept of prophethood, but when the prophethood concept was deemed finished, it continued into the concept of Mahdiism. The first emergence of Mahdiism is in line with the emergence of mahdawiyyah ḥadīth. The emergence context of the mahda­wiyyah ḥadīth revolves around the power transition from the Umayyad dynasty to the Abbasid dynasty, which always involved Shiite followers as the political victims. The contact between Shiites with the Jewish former and Christian former during the conflict at that time influenced the style of Shiite theology, like as millenarianism. The Shi'ites propagate the presence of al-Mahdi, as the savior from descendants of the prophet (Ahl al-Bait) described through the mahdawiyyah hadiths. Among the narrators of mahdawiyyah ḥadīth are Jewish former (Ka'ab al-Aḥbar) and Christians former (Wahb b. Munabbih). They were the pioneers who incorporated the millenarianism into the Mahdiism.

Der Artikel befasst sich mit einigen Werken, die in Deutschland anlässlich des 500-jährigen Reformationsjubiläums erschienen sind. Zahlreiche Biographien des 'Christen' Luther liegen vor, welche oftmals über Abbildungen verfügen, die der Gemeinschaft der Gläubigen die Grundsätze der Reformtheologie vermittelten. Daneben gibt es Studien, die die Reformation aus einem umfassenderen Blickwinkel nicht nur als europäisches und deutsches Problem im besonderen, sondern auch in ihren außereuropäischen Wirkungen betrachten. In diesem Zusammenhang kristallisieren sich einige Grundaspekte heraus, die viele der hier diskutierten Werke auszeichnen, so die Konzentration auf die Bedeutung, die die Reformation und der Protestantismus heute besitzen, oder die Frage, ob eine kritische Analyse der Sprengkraft, die vom Ende der Einheit der Christen in Europa ausging, auch zum Verständnis des heutigen religiösen Fundamentalismus beizutragen vermag. Die italienische Historiographie hat sich ebenfalls mit dem Thema der Reformation auseinandergesetzt, sowohl in Form von Lutherbiographien, aber auch mit überzeugenden, traditionelle Ansätze überwindenden Versuchen, über die Folgen der Reformation in Italien nachzudenken. ; This survey examines some works published in Germany for the anniversary of the Reformation. Alongside numerous biographies of Luther as a 'Christian', often accompanied by illustrations used to communicate to the faithful the principles of Reformed theology, these include works that take a broader approach, examining the Reformation not just as a European and specifically German issue, but also tackling its effects in areas outside Europe. Many of the studies considered here share some significant features: the question of the significance of the Reformation and Protestantism today and, on the other hand, the issue of whether or not the critical study of the enormous impact, including on a political level, of the end of Christian unity in Europe may help us to understand some of the features of contemporary religious ...