Imam Sajjad (AS) Sahifeh, one of the most valuable legacies of Islamic Thought. A collection of prayers that, in terms of document content is very authentic, Sahifeh Sajjadieh and Blessings Imam Sajjad (AS), due to the repression of political and historical situation of his time, after Uprising Ashoora, the enormous load of content exclusive to the person. This study is based on analytical methods - descriptive, and enjoying written and unwritten sources in the field, to review the status of the world and world issues addressed in the Sahifeh Sajjadieh. Studies indicate that the have been trying Sahifeh Sajadieh between this world and the hereafter, the balance should be logical and consistent, and the extremes to avoid being bitten. So the debate on secularism Sajadieh Sahifeh, according to the social and political documents have stated that, in this prayer, to help topics needy, praying for rain and drought fixes, and fix poor, the deprived, and enjoined from denying insurance, Foo and ax, helping neighbors, blessings on Muhammad and his Al (p), mutual respect optimal utilization of riches and so on, pointed out. Also pay special attention to it, lest seduced by this world and the hereafter neglected.
The concepts of secularism and religious freedom were significant for the public and leaders both before and after the independence. Among leaders, there were many who belonged to the Indian National Congress (INC), such as Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, B. R. Ambedkar, but also staunch supporters of "Hindu Rashtra": M. S. Golwalkar, Veer Savarkar, and many others. In 1928, the right to freedom of conscience, profession and practice of religion was explicitly included in the Nehru Report in order to prevent a community dominate over another. In its original meaning, secularism denotes anti-theism, but not atheism. It was a philosophical an ethical movement, negatively religious, which introduced science, technology and rationalism in the society and generated the basis of a modern secular state. During this process, it had to oppose and struggle against the clergy and vested forces of society. Therefore, the fundamentalist communal onslaughts are not secularism and secularization. During the struggle for freedom and thereafter, the Indian leaders made secularism the mantra of the nation, though each of them expressed apprehensive views in different manners, representing the aspirations of different social strata. Especially Gandhi and Nehru preferred to keep India secular in the sense that if the Indian state will have no religion, the people will be free to follow any religion of their birth or adoption. Secularism in India meant equal respect for all religions and cultures and non-interference of religion in government affairs. This paper aims to go through the different shades of Indian secularism, as found in the Constitution and the public opinion as well. The transitional phase of socio-political phenomenon and diversities in society have made the situation complex and challenging in this fast-changing global scenario of which India is an essential part.
In this paper I analyze Cecile Laborde's conception of justificatory secularism. Laborde points out that in her formulation and defense of the conception of justificatory secularism, she follows Rawls' conception of political liberalism to a certain extent. For that reason, I first provide a sketch of Rawls' conception of political liberalism. Then I focus on justificatory secularism, trying to show to what extent it displays similarities with the conception of political liberalism, but also how it differs. I am interested in whether justificatory secularism represents a better alternative to the conception of political liberalism or whether these two conceptions should be considered complementary.
In this apologetic work the author compares the "ideal types" of secular ideology (understood as superstition; Russian: sueverie) with religious ones (as trust [Rus1 sian: doverie] in God), showing the competitive and conflictive nature of their interaction. The article demonstrates the ideological and moral bankruptcy of the secular worldview, the apophatic, negative pathos of its pseudo1freedom from duties and relationships, and, as a result, from the meaning and true value of human life. The purpose of the article is to criticize the "theol1 ogy of political correctness," i.e. attempts to soften adherence to Biblical principles of moral evaluation of the atheistic way of life, as well to criticize the false "spirituality" of the New Age movement that seeks to return the civilized consumer to the pagan deification of human instincts. The separation of Church and State, bought with the lives of thousands of Protestants, is one of the major achievements of modern times. The solution to the problem of the moral degradation of society lies not in the reduction of the space of freedom, as in medieval Catholic Europe, but in the following of the moral precepts of the gospel by the Church, although not in the short1 term political order1even with a religious tinge1and in the continued fulfillment of the Great Commission.
Buddhism in the modern world offers an example of (1) the porousness of the boundary between the secular and religious; (2) the diversity, fluidity, and constructedness of the very categories of religious and secular, since they appear in different ways among different Buddhist cultures in divergent national contexts; and (3) the way these categories nevertheless have very real-world effects and become drivers of substantial change in belief and practice. Drawing on a few examples of Buddhism in various geographical and political settings, I hope to take a few modest steps toward illuminating some broad contours of the interlacing of secularism and Buddhism. In doing so, I am synthesizing some of my own and a few others' research on modern Buddhism, integrating it with some current research I am doing on meditation, and considering its implications for thinking about secularism. This, I hope, will provide a background against which we can consider more closely some particular features of Buddhism in the Chinese cultural world, about which I will offer some preliminary thoughts.
In the last decade, theorists in anthropology and other disciplines have vigorously critiqued commonplace distinctions between secularism and religion. Highlighting how secularism is a form of Western epistemology, such theorists have argued this distinction is deeply problematic because it obscures secularism's historical, political, and cultural particularity. My dissertation argues Iran is well situated to engage in this debate because its political terrain brings into relief how discussions of secularity and religiosity often fall back on an irresolvable dichotomy wherein secularism is defended without qualification or religious authoritarianism is ignored altogether. In an effort to move out of this impasse, my dissertation critiques the presumed neutrality of secularism without defending a thoroughly undemocratic Islamic Republic. Through an examination of three sites within Iranian politics since 1979, I show how alternatives to both secularism and undemocratic forms of Islam are already present in Iran. The first site that I explore is the contemporary Iranian women's movement, specifically the One Million Signatures Campaign, which seeks full gender equality within the laws of the Islamic Republic. I argue that the internal logic of rights and a specific set of socio-political conditions that arose out of the revolution in 1979 made the newly fostered cooperation between Islamic and secular feminists within this campaign possible. Utilizing critiques of rights by poststructuralist and postcolonial feminists, I arrive at a critical endorsement of women's rights in Iran that calls for nurturing more radical political imaginaries by not treating rights jurisprudence as the apex of social justice struggles. My second site focuses on the politics of time and its role in the 2009 post-election uprising as a further example of the porous boundary between secularism and religion in Iran. After surveying the history of Iran's three dominant calendars and the forty-day mourning cycle of Shi'ite Islam in the last century, I argue the Islamic Republic is founded on temporal simultaneity, a non-secular organization of time wherein past, present, and future are enfolded into one dynamic moment. I conclude that during the 2009 uprising, protesters initiated a crisis of legitimacy for the regime by reconfiguring temporal markers that comprise this symbolic foundation of the contemporary Iranian state. My final site is the visual culture in the Islamic Republic as well as Western understandings and depictions of it. I argue such analyses of artistic production in Iran by Western observers rely on a particular understanding of the state, religion, and art as discrete categories wholly separate from one another. This argument is twofold, the first part of which is a historical survey that shows how the relationship between art and the state in Iran over the last sixty years has been co-constitutive. On the basis of this history, I then explore contemporary Iranian street art, both sanctioned and illicit, to show how this convergence of art and the state has continued to unfold in the Islamic Republic. I show how the boundaries between culture and the state have not calcified under the current regime but remain dynamically in flux, albeit different ways than in the previous historical epoch. Lastly, I trace how the politics of secularism and religion both consolidates and frays the public/private divide within these three sites. Given this fact, the question of what to do with secularism and religion in Iran is ultimately a question of what to do about the divide between the private and public spheres. Taking up the issue of the double-bind structuring the public/private divide, I conclude my dissertation by surveying the ethical-politico limitations and possibilities of these alternative political imaginaries in Iran.
This paper explores the political thought during the 1920s of Lala Lajpat Rai (1865–1928), a prominent anti-colonial nationalist. It outlines the historical context under which a secular politics became vital for Rai, and elaborates the intricate internal texture of his complex, often fluid vision of secularism. The second half of the paper explores the theoretical implications of Rai's dynamic position. It illustrates how Lajpat Rai simultaneously articulated both a Hindu communal politics and a vision of secularism. By so doing, this paper challenges the long-drawn strict dichotomy between Hindu politics or Hindu 'communalism' and Indian secularism. Yet, the paper also pushes back against revisionist scholarship which, in challenging assumptions of strict mutual exclusivity between Indian secularism and Hindu communalism, has tended to overlook and undermine meaningful distinctions that still exist between these categories. This paper insists on the need to retain and respect the analytical distinctions between the two categories, even while recognising that they do not always exist in relation to each other as a strict dichotomy. Unearthing a hitherto-hidden Indian secularism articulated by this 'Hindu communal' politician, the paper will briefly explore the ways in which Rai's complex position overlaps with, and is distinct from, Western variants of secularism, India's constitutional secularism, and the Gandhian-Nehruvian vision, the latter of which became hegemonic till the 1970s. The paper ends by, very briefly, comparing Lajpat Rai's position with Hindutva nationalism – a major influence on the contemporary Hindu right – and by reflecting on the relationship between the Hindu right and secularism.
This Note discusses analogous themes in two religious public display cases, Lautsi v. Italy, recently decided by the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), and Salazar v. Buono, recently handed down by the U.S. Supreme Court. Broader critiques of ECHR religious jurisprudence are addressed in the context of the interpretation and application of the principle of neutrality and the argument that secularism is not a necessary postulate of this demand. It is this theme of the relationship between neutrality and secularism that is also prominent in the American discussion about the relationship between government and religion. Finally, this Note returns to Lautsi's themes as they are present in the American context to contend that applications of secularism and neutrality to the public square work against a preferable notion of constitutional pluralism that favors neither religious nor nonreligious public displays. The debate surrounding the Lautsi decision, particularly in its earlier iteration before the Grand Chamber's most recent decision, provides a valuable lens for scrutinizing U.S. neutrality. True pluralism maintains an equivocal demeanor with respect to both religious and nonreligious public displays. This Note offers the Lautsi case's context as a useful space in which to gain an outsider perspective with respect to how pluralism functions in U.S. religious display cases.
As recent headlines reveal, conflicts and debates around the world increasingly involve secularism. National borders and traditional religions cannot keep people in tidy boxes as political struggles, doctrinal divergences, and demographic trends are sweeping across regions and entire continents. And secularity is increasing in society, with a growing number of people in many regions having no religious affiliation or lacking interest in religion. Simultaneously, there is a resurgence of religious participation in the politics of many countries. How might these diverse phenomena be better understood? The Oxford Handbook of Secularism offers a wide-ranging and in-depth examination of this global conversation, bringing together the views of an international collection of prominent experts in their respective fields.
The place to be attributed to the phenomenon of religion in relation to secularism, has returned to the limelight in the debate on the preamble of the future European Constitution, involving the 'person', with his rights and his dignity. The reference to God is not present in any constitution of democratic countries because it can not and should not legitimize any State. This return of religion in the public sense, has been determined by three factors such as migration influx, globalization and terrorism.
Does liberal democracy require a strict separation between state and religion? In Anglophone liberal political theory, the separationist model of the First Amendment of the US Constitution has provided the basic template for the rightful relationship between state and religion. Yet this model is ill suited to the evaluation of the secular achievements of most states, including India. This Article sets out a new framework, minimal secularism, as a transnational framework of normative comparison. Minimal secularism does not single out religion as special; and it appeals to abstract liberal democratic ideals such as equal inclusion and personal liberty. Actual debates about secularism in India are shown to revolve around these ideals. The study of recent Indian controversies - about the Uniform Civil Code, the status of Muslims and the rise of BJP nationalism - also sheds light on some blind spots of western secularism and the conception of sovereignty and religion it relies on.
In contrast to the West, the term 'Secularism is commonly used in present day India to describe the relationship that exists, or which ought to exist, between the state and religion (Gupta, 1991). Technically, the secular state is a state which guarantees individual and corporate freedom of religion deals with individual as a citizen irrespective of his religion is not constitutionally connected to a particular religion nor does it seek either to promote or interfere with religion. In India the concept has been used not as state's indifference meaning towards religions but as treatment of all religions in an equal fashion and ruling out discrimination of any Indian on the ground of his religion. In its political terminology 'secularism' governing the term 'state,' that is the expression 'Secular state', implies a contradiction to 'theocratic state' or a 'state with an established church', or to imply a polity that has no any 'state religion' or which is not a 'religio-ideological state'. With the independence of India in 1947 the secular group held that the system of the country's governance should be run along purely secular lines, independently of religion, whereas the thinking of the religious group was quite the contrary. They insisted that the political system of the country should be governed in accordance with the dictates of religion. The analysis and debates of the Constituent Assembly reveals a rejection of the Western concept of secularism, that is, absolute separation of state and religion, and acceptance of the Indian concept of 'Sarva Dharma Sambhava' or equal regard for all religions (Rajarajan, 2007). At the time although secularism failed to become one of the fundamental tenets of the Constitution, yet the declaration of India as a secular state came only with the enactment of the 42 nd Amendment to the Constitution (1976) and now the Preamble proclaims India as a secular state. Key words: Secularism, Tradition, Modern Trends, Secular State and Prospect.
Mrs. Lautsi challenged the board of her children's school and consequently the Italian Republic for the legally obligatory presence of a crucifix in the school's classroom. She argued that this violated the principle of secularism. After unsuccessful attempts in regional and national courts she appealed to the European Court of Human Rights in 2006 which initially ruled in favor , but after an appeal of the Italian Government to the High Chamber, ruled against her. The Lautsi case provoked significant societal debate concerning the role of religion in public space. One of the key players in this debate is Professor Joseph Weiler, who intervened in the case on behalf of several third party states. Weiler's argumentation will be subject to Analytical Discourse Evaluation in this paper. The goal of Weiler's argument is to prove that the Chamber's initial ruling, before Italy's appeal, was based on a conceptual error of what can be regarded as 'state neutrality'. Professor Weiler argues that secularism is mistaken to be defined as neutral and Italy should be allowed to prescribe crucifixes in classrooms. The analysis shows that Professor Weiler's argumentation is flawed and this paper will present a more viable, alternative argument.
The Constitution of India envisages India as a Sovereign Socialist Democratic Republic with emphasis on ensuring justice, liberty, equality and freedom. It is often visualized that India has been threatened by the invasion of diverse religious cultures which have disintegrated the secular character. The 42nd amendment to the Constitution added the word \"secular\" and emphasized that state has no religion nor does it propagate any religion. Each individual has freedom of choice to practice profess, and propagate any religion and it has been granted by Article 25 of the Constitution of India. The conflict since between religions and people practicing the faith continue in an attempt to allure people from other faiths into one\'s own religion by convincing them, forcing them, to convert. The moot/ core issue: 1. Weather conversion is valid, permissible within the purview of Article 25 of the Constitution of India 2. Weather conversion is anti- religious and amounts to excommunication from the society. The researchers have analyzed Article 25 of the Constitution of India and its various implications to evolve few conclusions in support of the statement that everyone has Freedom of religion.
The oratio is by Werner Menski of the School of Law, University of London, speaking in June this year at the University of London in a Religare Conference. Showing his distaste for fuzzy law, he argues that "moderate secularism" is not merely another fuzzy concept, but it is "super-fuzzy," and that lawyers claiming to love certainty "have a tendency to sit in judgment over matters and even pre-judge things they know little about, including legal pluralism" leading to much irritation.