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Muslims have known & used the term 'da'wa' throughout the history of Islam. The concept, or rather concepts, of da'wa has been elaborated upon since the early centuries of Islam. Muslims have applied the term to various specific activities of theirs. The broadly known explanation in Europe & North America for da'wa is that it constitutes activities, which in the Christian context fall under the term 'missions' or 'missionary activities.' Recently, however, there has been much discussion whether da'wa at all can be rendered as 'missionary activity,' for it is argued by some Muslims as well as non-Muslim scholars that da'wa distinctly differs from what in the Christian tradition 'missions' have encompassed. From the available historical evidence, it appears that after Muhammad's death Muslims did not immediately embark upon da'wa activities -- during & after the rapid conquests of the Byzantinian & Persian lands, they little if at all ventured to preach to local non-Muslims about the virtues of Islam. Da'wa in the sense of inviting non-Muslims to embrace Islam was not yet on conquering Muslims' agenda. The first waves of conversions to Islam from among the indigenous populations of the conquered lands took place with virtually no Muslim missionary activities in the background. But the concept of da'wa was not lost even on the early Muslims. They were very much aware of it & indeed capitalized on its exploitation. Yet, this first was done on the intra-community level, among the Muslims themselves. The term da'wa came into wider usage almost a hundred years after Muhammad's death, in the wake of the 'Abbasid propaganda against the then ruling Ummayad clan in the 720's. However, the 'Abbasid da'wa ceased as soon as the 'Abbasids were in power -- the fact that attests to its political nature. Da'wa as a truly missionary activity, albeit still within the Muslim Umma, appeared in the form of the Isma'ili da'wa of the 9th through 13th centuries. Isma'ilis, in many ways, can be seen as the pioneers of the organized Muslim missionary activities: their highly institutionalized & sophisticated da'wa structure has hardly been repeated until today. Moreover, for the Isma'ilis, da'wa was a state priority. The Isma'ili da'wa encompassed extra- & intra-ummaic forms & blended both theology & politics. The focal point of this article is the inter-relatedness of da'wa & politics on both theoretical & practical levels. On the one hand, the Quran nowhere directly implies da'wa to be a political activity. On the other hand, Muslims made it a part of their political theory (through relating da'wa to jihad) & life (using the concept of da'wa in their political agendas). Taken in general, the intertwining of da'wa & politics, then, has been a feature throughout the Muslim history, though practical implications of this have been different in different ages. [Abstract shortened by ProQuest.]. Adapted from the source document.

With the so-called war on terror launched by the USA in 2001, a new era started in one of the fields of the propaganda war -- the Internet. Ability to disseminate information to as wide as possible audience due to globality of the Internet has become a powerful mean of influence. Many Muslim politically engaged religiously motivated groups, who perceive themselves to be in the state of such war, create their own elaborate web-sites. "KavkazCenter" is just one of them. "KavkazCenter" declares itself to be a product of the Chechen Independent International Islamic Internet Agency, which was set up in 1999 in Grozny by the Chechen National Center for Strategic Research & Political Technologies. However, its content is somewhat problematic, as the site appears to have been solely a propaganda tool for the Chechen Jihadist group Riyadhu as-Salihin, led by the late Shamil Basayev, who often boasted about his organized bloody attacks, frequently against civilians. Lithuania first noticed the site in early 2003, when it started being serviced by a Lithuanian firm "Microlink Data," which at the time hosted the site on its server. Back then the Lithuanian State Security Department (SSD) declared the site to be free from terrorist propaganda & insisted it did not pose any threat to Lithuania, though it was known that the site had been earlier closed down in the USA & the UK. However, half a year later the very same SSD confiscated the server of the firm "Elneta," which at that time hosted the site, thus shutting down its operations from Lithuania. This launched a long marathon of legal deliberations going all the way up to the Constitutional Court. The case divided the Lithuanian public into two parts -- those, who considered the "KavkazCenter" to be an information agency of independence-seeking Chechen freedom fighters & those, who considered the site to contain terrorist propaganda. The "defenders" group was championed by some MPs, Soviet-era dissidents, while the "accusers" group was led by the SSD. The unfolding of the case revealed that both sides were ill-prepared to meet the challenge the site "KavkazCenter" had caused. One can argue that even state institutions were taken by surprise by it. This first of all applies to the SSD, who showed itself at its worst -- its lack of professionalism was astonishing. At the same time, gaps in legislation & by extension in the work of courts were exposed. Most journalists, who took to bashing of the SSD for presumed persecution of media on the freedom of expression grounds, displayed ignorance & lack of deeper insight into the case. The general public was left puzzled. Moreover, Russia's involvement, though often referred to in the media, has never been fully revealed. The epopee of the "KavkazCenter" in Lithuania sucked both the Lithuanian government & the general society into the whirlpool of the global information wars. And though the experience shows that most of the actors were ill-prepared or not prepared at all, the very experience is very useful -- it allowed for identifying of the weaknesses in political, legal & social life of the country. Learning from its mistakes, the society can progress & improve. It is plausible to hope that in the event of another "kavkazcentr," the Lithuanian government & non-state actors will be better informed & equipped to tackle the issue. Adapted from the source document.

The logic of civil religion consists of minimizing community in order to maximize pluralism. Every modern society needs pluralism on the one hand, and securing of its foundations on the other. Still, civil religion may raise suspicion with regard to use of religion for political purposes. And instrumentalization is contradictory to the character of religion, although the latter always has political consequences as well. Civil religion serves politics with the aim of educating citizens. Perhaps, however, it can also be perceived as preparation of totalitarian beliefs and liturgies, such as are known to us from the first half of the 20th century. Civil religion can go hand in hand with excessive nationalism, proselytism, and Satanization of enemies. Such undesirable consequences of civil religion are discussed in this article on the basis of examples from the time of the French Revolution. The Revolution was largely marked by civil religion, the former even legitimized the latter. Four examples from the history of the French Revolution are analyzed: human rights as civil religion; cult of reason and of the supreme being; worship of the Revolution's "martyr" Jean-Paul Marat, and, finally, Satanization of enemies. Following his expose, the author confronts these questions: Is the confusing element of civil religion the fact that it wants to utilize religion per se for political purposes? What is it that protects civil religion from degenerating into nationalism and proselytism? Or else civil religion can be both: the basis of a tolerant pluralist democracy as well as the preparatory stage of totalitarianism? Adapted from the source document.

The author looks into the relation between politics, state and religion from the political-science perspective, as part of an analysis and evaluation of tasks, achievements and failures of polity, policy or politics from the standpoint of normative-constructive philosophy of equity. At present the central task of policy is to stimulate and strengthen the Western political culture based on the fundamental distinction between "reasonable" and "unreasonable" pluralism. "Reasonable" pluralism rests on the assumption that the state is a just power, the sovereignty of which can be recognized in distinguishing the "public" and the "private", the just and the good, and, in connection therewith, it is almost self-understandable that such a liberal guaranteed private sphere must be the primary arena of religious practice and religious freedoms. The crucial trait of the relation between state and religion is manifest in the fact that only the legal state and the liberal constitution are competent to state what the freedom of individuals consists of within the framework of norms of what is just. The author defines "religion" in the comprehensive sense as central to the processes of forming cultural identity, and he deems that cultural policy (which, in principle, has to do with relations between state and religion), as policy of equitable integration of multi-culturally shaped political unities, must be oriented toward stimulation of those attitudes and values which make possible the reasonable pluralism defined according to Rawls. Since the political encompasses also the possibility to make enemies, the author advocates the cultural policy of "weakening the feelings of enmity" (N. Elias). In this way, a systematic concept of policy would be created, one which would reflect and preserve the conditions of reasonable pluralism. On the policy level and, in particular, on the politics level, cultural policy is a very demanding project. Perhaps it is precisely Switzerland, with its special prospects of civil democracy, that offers promising cultural-policy opportunities for activity, which are as yet still insufficiently researched. Adapted from the source document.