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Husbands who physical abuse their wives are not a rare phenomenon. In fact, this type of domestic violence exists in all societies and social strata. This paper investigates the matter through interviews with Lebanese religious authorities who are familiar with relevant court cases.

It appears that we are witnessing a debate taking root between Muslim scholars or "propagandists" and the state over the issue of domestic violence which is a form of violence. These brothers see the proposed draft law to be at odds with Islamic law and use the latter to ensure that a woman is obedient to her husband. This is what little I read in the press. In the absence of the integral text refuting the law, you cannot take a position, especially if you are a non-Muslim. I expect there will be major divisions not only among the various religious communities, but also within one and the same religious community.

Almost every age in human history has developed philosophies of ethical and political pacifism which endeavor to treat in their own peculiar way questions raised by the realities of power and violence in human politics. The modern age being no exception, this essay has for its purpose an examination of the conceptions held by two major schools of pacifism in the political thought of the twentieth century. Although their philosophies are closely akin, they are yet sufficiently dissimilar in context and approach to justify separate treatment. With roots deep in the historic soil of past philosophies of non-violence, the twentieth-century interpretations yet strike a note of their own and pose in sharp form some of the most troublesome problems of modern politics.The first is Hindu pacifism. At its heart is Hindu religious philosophy, which holds to the conception of a world in which individuals are separated from the whole, or from God. Desire and lust after the things of the world constantly keep men from losing themselves in the Reality which this world tends to hide or make obscure. The universe is dualistic: the material is evil, the non-material, or spiritual, good.

Over the last decade we can observe a growing political and cultural renaissance of minority consciousness: US Blacks and now the Indians, the Kurds subdivided in three different countries, the Scots and the Welsh, but religious minority identifications as well — from Philippine Muslims to Northern Irish Catholics. Switzerland, one of the most sophisticated countries in dealing with ethnic diversity, recently had to grant another minority a new canton, the Jura, but only after years of political conflict marked by — among other things — terrorist violence. The rise of so many minorities to general socio-political consciousness tends to be accompanied by 'terrorism' as apparently the only effective way to be heard in a society of nation-states. The desperate plea of the Palestinians over the years is the most dramatically known case, recently involving political partisans within metropolitan countries in similar acts of violence and/or terrorism. Behind this phenomenon lies some thing structural which goes far beyond immediate grievances: it is a challenge to the modem nation-state and a form of mediated class consciousness which challenges social inequalities differently from in the past. We are likely to experience even more national and inter national violence/terrorism along ethnic/religious/racial lines, so long as those coincide with socio-economic inequalities and discriminations. And this in turn seems unavoidable.

The appearance of John Yoder's exegetical defense of pacifism, The Politics of Jesus, has reopened the question of the relationship between violence and religious values (cf. Stanley Hauerwas's "Messianic Pacifism," Worldview, June, 1973). Even those who have carefully and decisively rejected the pacifist option will be disturbed once more by this magistral summation of the New Testament tradition. The source of this unease will be Yoder's informed and dispassionate examination of the question: What is the significance of Jesus' death for the contemporary Christian? His reminder that the passion, death and resurrection of Jesus constitute the form of Christian existence is persuasive in its very simplicity. He argues, principally on the basis of St. Luke's Gospel, but with corroboration from virtually all the New Testament writings, that a life unscarred by defeat cannot be called Christian. There can be no following of Jesus that does not go by way of the cross, nor any hope that resurrection will occur outside a tomb. Starkly, Yoder calls us back to the basics, asking: What is the cross in your political life?

The efforts of the Communist Party of the USSR to eliminate religious ties in the country are investigated. It is noted that there is little information on church membership or religious beliefs, since no official material is published in the USSR; certainly, however, religious belief is 'less widespread today than it was before the Bolshevik Revolution.' Some obstacles to accurate measurement of the effectiveness of gov propaganda are considered: (1) The selection of adequate definitions, to include & distinguish between religious practices, religious beliefs as distinct from ritual observances, & ethical beliefs. It is thought that Soviet propagandists are only now beginning to understand diff elements of religion & diff's in the level of resistance of those elements. (2) The presence of anti-religious weapons other than propaganda, such as the threat of violence, fear of loss of job, & restriction of church activities. (3) The lack of a control group is noted; there is a tendency elsewhere for religious activity to decrease as modernization increases. (4) The indicators of the success or failure of atheist propaganda include (a) responsive action, (b) participant reports, (c) questionaire commentaries, & (d) indirect indicators (taken from D. Lerner's 'Effective Propaganda: Conditions and Evaluations,' in PROPAGANDA AND COLD WAR CRISIS, D. Lerner, Ed, New York, NY: Stewart, 1951). Criticisms of atheist propaganda, found in Soviet authorities' sources, include the failure of the propaganda to reach the believers because the content of material used is generally too abstract & `detached from life,' as well as being geared to sensationalism, The nonintellectual aspects of religious belief are too often ignored for successful propaganda. Some pertinent findings of Western res are reviewed, as investigations into COMM, opinion formation & opinion change are applied to the USSR. One of the basic conclusions reached by Western res 'is that persuasive mass COMM's function far more frequently as an agent of reinforcement than as an agent of change.' Furthermore, believers often avoid any contact with anti-religious propaganda. Tentative hyp's are presented in the light of the apparent lack of success or of probable success of the antireligious forces: the propaganda, which is irrelevant to the believer, may be highly functional to the atheist; & propaganda is carried out because any alternate policy involves great risks. A. Heinrich.

This seminar has dwelt, in the papers presented, on general—universal if you will—aspects of the ethical dilemmas of violence, revolution, and reform. I want to address myself to the personal problems involved in the ethical response to these same issues. I am not a theologian and therefore cannot speak with authority on the religious, at least the doctrinal, aspects of that ethical response. For me personally, the touchstone of any religion is not its revelations but its ethical teachings. I therefore see no essential difference between the religious and the ethical response to the questions of violence, revolution, and reform. Thus, I can speak to you only as what I am: an historian whose outlook upon revolution.has been determined by the study of history and by living in this revolutionary age.

Religion is a fact of life in the United States for the vast majority of people. Whether in childhood or adulthood, most people have had some association with a faith tradition.For some it has been positive; for others, negative. But many retain and rely on values and doctrines that they received within a faith community. Because of the extraordinary diversity within the United States, many different traditions exist among us: Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus, Native Americans, and many varieties of Christians including Roman Catholics, Evangelicals, Mainline Protestants, Pentecostals, and so on.One chapter cannot do justice to the richness of these many traditions. Rather, here we provide a discussion of the basic understanding of the place of religion in addressing domestic violence, illustrated through three western religious traditions: Christianity, Judaism, and Islam.