This chapter contains sections titled: Medieval monasticism and learning The Dominicans The Franciscans Conclusion.

I. The Dominicans -- II. The Franciscans -- III. The Augustinians and the Carmelites-- IV. The Benedictines and the Cistercians -- V. The friars, philosophy and theology at papaland royal courts.

Sanskrit text with English commentary on the administrative and religious rules for four pithas (monastries) propounded by Śaṅkarācārya.

Sanskrit text with Hindi translation on administrative and religious rules for four pithas (monastries) propounded by Śaṅkarācārya.

Augustine in Iconography: History and Legend has a threefold design: exploration of literary sources; reviews of pertinent archeology; and accounts of individual and cyclical illustrations. One hundred and thirty-two topics in the iconography of the bishop of ancient Hippo, both historical and legendary, are ascertained and analyzed; the historical and archeological background of Augustine's career, cult, and monastic influence are surveyed; four Augustinian cycles are examined; and various individual portraits of Augustine are studied.

The scholar and his public in the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance.--Thomism and the Italian thought of the Renaissance.--The contribution of religious orders to Renaissance thought and learning.--Bibliography (p. [115]-120).

"The Bodhisattva's Practice of Moral Virtue" is an English translation of two of the most important Buddhist canon textual sources for understanding the universal standards of moral conduct which reigned throughout nearly the entire history of Mahayana Buddhism in China, Korea, and Japan. Part one of "The Bodhisattva's Practice of Moral Virtue" consists of Bhikshu Dharmamitra's English translation of the Chinese-language "Brahma's Net Sutra Bodhisattva Precepts" (Taisho Tripitaka No. 1484, fascicle 2, pages 1003a15 thru 1010a23) together with a translation of (...) the semi-monthly bodhisattva precepts recitation ceremony also drawn from the Taisho Tripitaka. Part Two consists of the same translator's English translation of Arya Nagarjuna's explanation of the Perfection of Moral Virtue (sila paramita) drawn from the Chinese translation of his Mahaprajna-paramita-upadesa or "Exegesis on the Mahaprajna-paramita Sutra," (Taisho Tripitaka No. 1509, pages 153b02 thru 164a27). (shrink)

This paper traces back the sources of our present legal system and of market economy to Medieval Europe which itself benefited from Hellenistic and Roman legal culture and commercial practices. Roman provinces placed Rome in the wider Greek cultural and commercial world. If Aristotle was already transcending the narrow polis-based conceptions of his predecessors, after him Hellenistic Civilization saw the emergence of a new school of philosophy: Stoicism. The legal thought in the Latin West will hence be characterized by Cicero’s (...) writings and its Stoic sources. The Roman legal system was similar to the later northern European customary law and the English common law; Roman law was evolutionary and customary. The rise of Western individualism, whether it dates back to St. Augustine in the fifth century, or to the two Papal Revolutions of Gregory I (establishing the nuclear family as the core of individualism) and of Gregory VII, also played a crucial role in shaping the western legal tradition. The paper describes the main forces that led to this second (Gregorian) revolution. Monasticism is one of them. Benedictine monasticism plaid a leading role in the Peace of God Movement. Hence collective oath-taking by groups in the name of peace was essential in the founding of cities and in the formation of guilds. Europe’s economic resurgence in the Eleventh Century was on the basis of the creation of the rule of law by the Peace of God movement. This movement also allowed for Europe’s agricultural economy to progress. Indeed, the European Middle Ages is one of the major periods of technological innovation in the history of the world. The Gregorian Revolution itself was supported and financed by the Commercial Revolution: Italian bankers sustained Papal reformers against the Emperors. The independence of the Italian cities and provinces reveals one of the most important consequences of the Gregorian Revolution: the polycentricism of Western Europe. This Revolution also witnessed the first large number of political pamphlets in European history; the Gregorian clergy emphasizing a compact theory of government. Soon after, the order of Cistercians was founded (1098) and underwent spectacular growth during the next two centuries. The Cistercians accepted no rents or labor services from feudal donors but would take only full possession of land to do with it as they wished.These monasteries were the most economically effective units that had ever existed in Europe, and perhaps in the world, before that time. Finally, the Magna Carta (1215) that will be so influential on modern political thought can be seen as a direct consequence of the Gregorian Revolution. (shrink)

Die Bettelorden der Franziskaner und Dominikaner sahen sich ab 1250 gezwungen, ihre Existenz und ihre Aktivitaten in Predigt und Theologie zu rechtfertigen. In diesen auf hohem intellektuellen Niveau ausgefochtenen Kontroversen spielte der 1252 von Koln nach Paris berufene Thomas von Aquin eine herausragende Rolle, die in der hier vorgestellten Studie im einzelnen untersucht wird. Das zentrale Dokument ist die vom Autor analysierte Schrift des Aquinaten Contra impugnantes, die zugleich Apologie und Programm ist, in dem sich das Selbstverstandnis einer neuen Elite (...) mit neuen Aufgaben in der Kirche artikuliert. Das Buch ist zunachst ein Beitrag zu einem wichtigen Thema der Frommigkeitsgeschichte, dann aber auch eine Untersuchung zu den Fundamenten der uberaus folgenreichen Armuts- und Bettelordensbewegung. Entstanden ist eine genetische Darstellung aller mit der Existenz und der Funktion des Dominikanerordens verbundenen Themen, wie es sie bisher noch nicht gab.". (shrink)

The Cistercian order, which had its origins in the late eleventh century, transformed the spiritual landscape of western Europe. The order's insistence on a return to the austerity and simplicity that had originally informed Benedictine life reenergized monasticism, spawning hundreds of new abbeys within decades. By the beginning of the thirteenth century, the Cistercians dominated monastic life, surpassing their black-robed predecessors in terms of popularity and replacing them among patrons as favored recipients of donations. Yet, while a sizable body (...) of historiography exists concerning the ability of men's houses to translate this appeal into spiritual and material success, questions remain regarding the order's female members. In particular, some scholars have constructed a narrative of financial difficulties and eventual decline for Cistercian nunneries, one that began in the thirteenth century and accelerated throughout the late Middle Ages. According to this narrative, such difficulties, by-products of the secondary status of religious women, manifested themselves in small monastic complexes and limited patrimonies. In her work on English Cistercians, Sally Thompson argues that religious women were dependent upon men because of their inferior position in medieval society and generally lacked a true religious vocation, characteristics that led to smaller, impoverished houses. Cistercian nunneries are portrayed in monastic histories as constantly struggling and are often “lumped together as being poor, scandalous, passive institutions which were eschewed by medieval patrons.” The majority of their houses are characterized by modern historians as enjoying a perilous existence at best, permanently poised on the brink of extinction and beset by a host of financial and spiritual difficulties. (shrink)

In this research, the key elements of lectio divina, which is a Western spiritual practice, were tried to be mentioned. Many new practices emerged in the transition from desert monasticism, where early Christian monasticism emerged, to the settled monastic order, which attached little importance to reading other than the Bible. The habit of reading has also become one of the indispensable elements of the monastery after the transition to the settled monasteries. The entry of this term into monastic (...) literature dates back to St. Benedict (480-547), who included it in the daily monastic calendar as a kind of monastic discipline. The lectio practice applied in monasteries brought along some questions such as what the content of this reading activity is, how long it lasts and how it should be practiced. In this regard, the contributions of Cassiodorus (490-583), who was also a contemporary of St. Benedict, to the monastic literature and the ideal of the monastic school, are important. In addition, in this study, information is given about the monastery copying activities, which have an important place to be directly related to the lectio and ensuring the preservation of knowledge and transferring it to the next generations. From this point of view, it has been tried to examine the comments made by the monastic leaders from the early period to the 12th century on the pagan literature, which is not included in the Bible and religious works read in the monastic libraries. Lectio divina gained popularity among monasteries affiliated with the Roman Catholic Church, and by the 12th century it had developed into the four-stage reading process known today by Guigo II. The details of this four-stage process were tried to be given in the last section and the study was concluded after the evaluations made in the conclusion section. (shrink)

* With a Latin text and a facing-page translation of the Rule, Regulations for a Monastery, and Letter 211 The Rule of Augustine, very likely the oldest monastic rule with western origins, provides daily inspiration for more than 150 Christian communities. In giving an account of Augustine's distinctive contributions to the monastic spirituality of the late Roman world, and in particular of his achievement as a monastic legislator, Augustine of Hippo and his Monastic Rule fills a long-standing gap in Augustinian (...) studies. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:CATHOLICISM, PUBLIC THEOLOGY, AND POSTMODERNITY: ON RICHARD JOHN NEUHAUS'S " CATHOLIC MOMENT" DAVID L. SCHINDLER University of Notre Dame HAT CATHOLICS should assume.their rightful place m the task of forming a culture, and indeed shaping a public philosophy in and for a pluralistic, dernocrwtic society, is ia suggestion which has not often been heard in the history of American culture, and certainly not from. nonCatholics. It is a suggestion (...) thrut Richard John Neuhaus, a Lutheran pastor, nonetheless makes with eloquence and wit in The Catholic Moment.1 The book makes for enjoyable and even exciting reading. It is difficult for a Catholic, even of a non-itriumphalistic sort, nort rto be moved by his suggestion: not to be stimulated into rserious ~efl.ection upon the meaning of Catholic identity, particularly now in the pT"esent cultural situation in America and indeed the West, which seems-note the subtitle of Neuhaus's book-aptly described in terms of a modernity giving way to posrtmodernity, a modernility searching for genuinely postmodern patterns of thought. Neuhaus is insistent-and the insistence is refresb.ing-,that this reflection be carried through with integri,ty (cf., e.g., p. 150) : the Catholicism. for which our-a postmodern-culture [.g ripe is and must be ·a Caitholicisrn which is fiaithful to the Gospel and to tits own tradition. This double intention of Neuhaus to speak on behalf of a Catholicism which is in and for a postmodern world sets.the context for.the questions I wish to pose in the present inquiry. The meaning of Neuhaus's Catholic moment is twofold: 1 The Catholic Moment: The Parado11J of the Church in the Postmodern World, by Richard John Neuhaus (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1987). All references in the text are to this book. 107 108 DAVID L. SCHINDLER [It] is the moment in which the Roman Catholic Church in the world can and should be the lead church in proclaiming and exemplifying the Gospel. This can and should also be the moment in which the Roman Catholic Church in the United States assumes its rightful role in the culture-forming task of constructing a religiously informed public philosophy for the American experiment in ordered liberty (p. 282). In.the light of this ~statement, and indeed of the overarching context md[ca;ted by the suhbitle of his book, I wish to direct attention in whait follows to three issues: what Neuhaus takes to be an authentic Catholic Christianity ·and Catholic Christian rtheology (tha;t is, a Christianity which iis f.aithful in" proc1aiming and exemplifyiing the Gospel ") ; what he takes to be the proper sense (the sense required by Ca.tholic Christianity) of the itask of forming ·a culture and " constructing a religiously informed public philosophy" in and for a plumlistic, democrrutic society such as that of America; and finally what he takes to be the ·appropriate sense of this fask in a world which he distinguishes as postmodern. Now Neuhaus develops his response to these issues in terms of wha;t he calls a paradoxical relation between the Church and the world. My purpose in what follows, therefore, will be to e:x;amine the meaning he accords " Catholic, " public," ·and "postmodern," m terms of this central notion of " paradox." I. In his discussion of the relation betwen rthe Church and the world, Neuhaus provides a sketch of the five types proposed by H. Richard Niebuhr (pp. 16ff.). These are: the Church against the world, the Church of the world, the Church above the world, the Church and the world in paradox, and the Church as the transformer of the wor1cl. The first, "the Church against the world," iis what is often identified as a sectarian model, evident for ex;ample in monasticism and in such communities ·as the Hutterites and Mennonites. The second type, " The Church of the world," can be exemplified in nmeitrenth century l.iberial theology 00:d its promotion of a THE CATHOLIC MOMENT 109 " cultural Protesitantism," wherein " rel[gion W18iS to be placed at the service of the besrt in the evolution of society" (p. 19). The model which views: the- Chur'Ch ia;s a transformer of the world "smacks... (shrink)

Die Münchener Texte und Untersuchungen zur deutschen Literatur des Mittelalters (MTU), seit Band 102 beim Max Niemeyer Verlag, machen bisher nicht oder ungenügend erschlossene Texte, Stoffe und Gattungen zugänglich. Neben höfischem und Heldenepos und der Lieddichtung des Hohen und Späten Mittelalters sind vor allem auch Prosaschriften des weltlichen und geistlichen Bereichs, vom theologischen Traktat über die Mystik bis zum Spiel und zur Sachliteratur aus der mittelalterlichen Alltagswelt vertreten. Die Auswahl der publizierten Werke besorgt ein internationales Gremium von Mediävisten verschiedener Disziplinen.

A fundamental question in philosophy of religion is whether religious belief must be based on evidence in order to be properly held. In recent years two prominent positions on this issue have been staked out: evidentialism, which claims that proper religious belief requires evidence; and Reformed epistemology, which claims that it does not. Evidence and Religious Belief contains eleven chapters by prominent philosophers which push the discussion in new directions. The volume has three parts. The first part (...) explores the demand for evidence: some chapters object to it while others seek to restate it or find space for compromise between Reformed epistemology and evidentialism. The second part explores ways in which beliefs are related to evidence; that is, ways in which the evidence for or against religious belief that is available to a person can depend on that person's background beliefs and other circumstances. The third part contains chapters that discuss actual evidence for and against religious belief. Evidence for belief in God includes the so-called common consent of the human race and the way that such belief makes sense of the moral life; evidence against it includes profound puzzles about divine freedom which suggest that it is impossible for a being to be morally perfect. (shrink)

Forty four years after the publication of Harvey Cox‟s The Secular City that celebrated “the progressive secularization of the world as the logical outcome of Biblical religion” (Newsweek)1, we almost feel the bones of religious fundamentalism cracking under the pressure of secularization. At the same time, however, the Hegelian dialectic holds ground as both refuse to be crushed by either; and any compromising stance only begets another rival; to the effect, that it can be said that fundamentalism is never (...) a phenomenon that may be extinguished. (shrink)

Aspiring to deal with the full complexity of the Catholic reformation, the May 2012 workshop in Bologna placed a particular focus on the reform of religious orders in the first half of the sixteenth century. While it is true that internal reform initiatives instigated by the Church or highly placed Church officials were important and should be considered, this, in my view, is an issue that should not only be addressed from a narrow institutional perspective. For this reason, the (...) Libellus ad Leonem X provides a good example of the reformist aspirations cutting across the Church in this particular period. However, it would be a mistake to assume that the reform impulse came solely from the Church. We should also.. (shrink)

This work provides an overview of attempts to assess the current condition of the concept of creation order within reformational philosophy compared to other perspectives. Focusing on the natural and life sciences, and theology, this first volume of two examines the arguments for and against the beauty, coherence and order shown in the natural world being related to the will or nature of a Creator. It examines the decay of a Deist universe, and the idea of the pre-givenness of norms, (...) laws and structures as challenged by evolutionary theory and social philosophy. It describes the different responses to the collapse of order: that given by Christian philosophy scholars who still argue for the idea of a pre-given world order, and that of other scholars who see this idea of stable creation order and/or natural law as redundant and in need of a thorough rethinking. It studies the particular role that reformational philosophy has played in the discussion. It shows how, ever since its inception, almost a century ago, the concepts of order and law (principle, structure) have been at the heart of this philosophy, and that one way to characterise this tradition is as a philosophy of creation order. Reformational philosophers have maintained the notion of law as 'holding' for reality. This book discusses the questions that have arisen about the nature of such law: is it a religious or philosophical concept; does law just mean 'orderliness'? How does it relate to laws of nature? Have they always existed or do they 'emerge' during the process of evolution? (shrink)

The study was carried out in order to reveal the problems of hearing-impaired students, who have an important place in our society and the reli-gious coping methods they use to cope with their problems. In the first part of the study, the problems of the hearing impaired students and their religious coping methods were examined. In the second part, the findings obtained as a result of the interviews were interpreted under two headings as the participants' problems and religious (...) coping methods. In accordance with the purpose of the study, semi-structured interview technique, which is one of the qualitative research methods, was used. The study group of the research, which was designed according to the phenomenology method, one of the qualitative research methods, consisted of 11 students, 9 boys and 2 girls, studying at the 9th, 10th, 11th and 12th grades of Çorum Special Education Vocational High School. The data obtained in the study were analyzed by content analysis method. As a result of the study, it was seen that hearing-impaired students frequently resort to positive religious coping methods to overcome their problems. It is also concluded that the students are willing to share their problems; religious thoughts, feelings and behaviors have an important effect on coping with their problems; they use religious coping methods such as trust in Allah, prayer and worship while coping with their problems but they are open to support from the environment; they try to overcome the problems not with complaints but with patience. It has been observed that hearing-impaired students sometimes question why they are disabled rather than others, and they feel uneasy in this situation. For hearing-impaired individuals to protect their mental health, necessary training should be provided without neglecting the religious aspect of their problems. (shrink)

This article examines resistance discourses created and disseminated by a religious minority in Indonesia called Gerakan Ahmadiyah Indonesia (GAI) to counter any negative portrayals and religious-based discriminations. Ahmadiyah is a self-defined sect of Islam that has been the target of physical attacks and discursive discrimination in Indonesia. This analysis focuses on identifying discourse topics raised and strategies employed by one of the Ahmadiyya groups in the country called GAI to reveal their resistance and defend their ‘Islamic’ faith. Various (...) texts produced in different genres namely statements and comments published in media, books, speeches and various articles published online in GAI’s official websites are used as the data which were collected during field research in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. The analysis found that, in order to counter discriminatory discourses, the GAI Ahmadis present various resistance discourse themes such as distinguishing themselves from Jemaat Ahmadiyah Indonesia, justifying their Islamic understanding by highlighting religious freedom discourse, including themselves as Muslims and presenting themselves as peaceful movement. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Conversion and Religious Identity in Buddhism and ChristianityJohn D'Arcy MayA Benedictine abbey that has been involved in exchanges with Buddhist monks since 1979 was an appropriate setting for serious discussion of double identity and change of identity between Buddhists and Christians. The European Network holds its conferences every two years, and after experiencing the Benedictine hospitality of St.Ottilien once again it was decided that every second conference should (...) be held here in the future, with the intervening ones in different centers throughout Europe. Br.Josef Götz OSB introduced the conference by telling the story of the intermonastic encounters with monks of the Soto, Rinzai, and Shingon traditions over the last twenty-five years at St. Ottilien. Participants in these agreed that they had never learned so much about their own traditions as when they were engaged in dialogue at a spiritual and experiential level with their monastic "others." One Zen monk told the Benedictines, "Working with your carpenter, I understand Christianity," and another asked for baptism in order to participate more fully in the liturgy.The situation in the Buddhist countries of Asia, however, is not necessarily so harmonious, as reports by Fr. Thomas Timpte OSB from Korea and Dr. Elizabeth Harris from Sri Lanka made clear. Just to hear about the religious situation in South Korea, the "great unknown" of East Asian Buddhism, was worthwhile. Though four traditions—Shamanism, Buddhism with elements of Daoism, Confucianism, and Christianity—coexist largely peacefully, the advent of Christianity caused tensions arising from both persecutions and conversions. Though many Koreans would find no contradiction in being both Confucianist (at least in a cultural sense) and Christian, Buddhism itself is coming to be seen as a cultural phenomenon, and those earnestly seeking peace of heart turn to Christianity. Almost half the members of [End Page 189] parliament are either Catholic or Protestant, though there is little evidence of Christian ethics in political practice. Nevertheless, Buddhism is now the fastest-growing religion, as Catholics in particular find themselves attracted to the temple environment, which is experienced as "a kind of homecoming." "Christian in the head, Shamanist in the belly, Buddhist in the heart," though a simplification, sums up the situation.In Sri Lanka, on the other hand, things are considerably more fraught, and with the passage of anticonversion legislation the conference theme of conversion and identity is a charged topic. Elizabeth Harris illustrated the lengths to which certain Christians are prepared to go to win converts, such as working the camps of tsunami survivors. Though British evangelical missionaries had originally been afforded remarkable hospitality by the Buddhists—even being invited to preach in temples —their insistence that if Christianity is right, Buddhism must be wrong polarized relations, and the great public debate of 1815 still sets a precedent. Thus even for contemporary Christian inheritors of the fusion of the European Enlightenment with evangelical Christianity, both the conviction of sin and rational argument assure the superiority of Christianity. In the ethnic conflict presently raging, the religions are "not innocent," with Tamils and Christians being conflated into the "other" against which Sinhalese antipathy is directed. This is all the more tragic in that most Sri Lankan Buddhists accept the traditional ethic of tolerance.Jørgen Skov Sørensen and Kajsa Ahlstrand illuminated the religious situation in Scandinavia from different perspectives. Sørensen reflected on the "soft boundaries" that actually exist in many pluralistic societies, something that puzzled both civil servants and missionaries even in colonial India. There is a danger that contemporary Christians will try to impose the same unambiguous boundaries on postmodern Europe as they did in their former colonies. Ahlstrand's report on an empirical study done in Sweden showed how unrealistic this is. Dual identity as both Buddhist and Christian was more common than complete identification with either, and 42 percent of those who identified completely with Christianity said they did not believe in God!The centerpiece of the conference was a vigorous debate between Paul Williams, a prominent British Buddhist and professor of Indian and Tibetan philosophy who announced his conversion to Catholicism in a provocative book, The Unexpected Way, and two protagonists who disagreed with his reasoning from... (shrink)

The Ecclesiastical History of Orderic Vitalis has been called `the greatest of all medieval chronicles'. Written in Normandy between 1114 and 1141, it is a detailed history of the Norman people and their conquests, full of vivid, often penetrating portraits of the lives and characters of kings and queens, lords and bishops, simple knights, and humble villagers. The chronicle gives a unique, authentic picture of feudal society during a period of rapid change in church and state which saw the emergence (...) of the Anglo-Norman realm, the spread of new forms of monasticism, and the launching of the Crusades. Published in 1968, volume II of Marjorie Chibnall's six-volume edition of the Ecclesiastical History is now available for the first time in paperback. `a superbly edited Latin text and a unique English translation of the work of a major historian' American Historical Review `Mrs Chibnall is giving us... her edition of a classical medieval text which will itself become a classic of medieval scholarship.' Times Literary Supplement. (shrink)

The article deals with the activities of of Roman Catholic Religious Orders in the territory of Kyiv-Zhytomyr Diocese, their role and place on contemporary conditions of Ukrainian state.

For centuries pilgrimages are present in Christianity. For Catholics, the importance of devotions and visits to the Marian sanctuaries is indisputable. The number of visitors and pilgrims to these temples make the local economy an important destination of religious tourism. In order to understand the economic determinants of religious tourism, two sanctuaries were studied, namely, Aparecida and Fatima. Given the large collection of statistical information of the Portuguese Sanctuary, it was verified through the Vector Autoregressive model that Gross (...) Domestic Product and Unemployment have a causal unidirectional relation with the pilgrimages. The Autoregressive Distributed Lag model revealed that an increase in Gross Domestic Product and international arrivals in the short term positively impacts the number of pilgrims. Through the Ordinary Least Squares regression, significant statistical relationships between climatic factors and visitors in the Sanctuary of Fatima were found. The Seasonal Autoregressive Integrated Moving Average forecast method was applied to the number of monthly visitors to the Sanctuary of Aparecida and to the number of pilgrims in the Sanctuary of Fatima, the results show a strong seasonality and that the first and last months of the year are periods of low demand. The results of this study allow a new look at religious tourism in the Marian context, the empirical results allow those responsible for establishing public policies, tourism agents and the administration of the Sanctuaries to direct their actions. Measures planned and executed jointly between the various agents can benefit residents, visitors, pilgrims, the tourism sector, the local economy and the Sanctuaries themselves. (shrink)

“Those are my principles, and if you don’t like them...well, I have others.”Groucho MarxWe also know of another superstition of that time: that of the Man of the Book. On some shelf in some hexagon (men reasoned) there must exist a book which is the formula and perfect compendium of all the rest: some librarian has gone through it and he is analogous to a god.... How could one locate the venerated and secret hexagon which housed Him? Someone proposed a (...) regressive method: To locate book A, consult first book B which indicates A’s position; to locate book B, consult first a book C, and so on to infinity... In adventures such as these, I have squandered and wasted my years.2 J.L. Borges, The Library of Babel. (shrink)

The place of gilds in urban politics has recently attracted considerable interest. Scholars have come to view these organizations, especially those associated with the crafts, as powerful vehicles for influencing municipal affairs. No agreement about the nature of this influence has yet emerged; indeed, gilds have been variously interpreted as promoters of political brotherhood, allies of worker interests, and devices used by urban elites to control artisans and laborers. The prevalence of a different sort of influence has gone largely unnoticed, (...) however. In many English towns of the late Middle Ages a single fraternity came to dominate local government. (shrink)

We argue that the use of the term “supernatural” is problematic in philosophy of religion in general, and in the contribution by Thornhill-Miller and Millican in particular. We address the disturbing parallel between Hume’s case against the rationality of belief in miracles and his dismissal of reports of racial equality. We do not argue that because Hume was a racist therefore his view against miracles is faulty, but we draw attention to how Hume sets up a framework that, for similar (...) reasons, discounts evidence of black intelligence and divine intelligence. We go on to argue against TMM’s revision of Hume on miracles. We then argue that empirical testing on the veracity of petitionary belief is impossible for there is no control case and that empirical testing can no more evaluate the evidential merits of most religious experiences than it can assess the merits of any robust philosophical position in epistemology, metaphysics, value theory, logic and mathematics. We express doubts about the integrity and scope of how one might enjoy the good of religion without belief. In a final section we offer a defense of the rationality of believing in specific religious traditions based on religious experience along with what we refer to as sufficient philosophical reasoning. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Mental Disorder and Religious ExperienceThe Need for a Humble, Pragmatic PluralismWarren Kinghorn, MD (bio)Mohammed Abouelleil Rashed follows Charles Taylor’s argument that in the “therapeutic turn” of modernity, “certain human struggles, questions, issues, difficulties, problems are moved from a moral/spiritual to a therapeutic register,... from a hermeneutic of sin, evil or spiritual misdirection, to one of sickness” (Taylor, 2007, pp. 619–620). While the project of construing mental disorder in (...) naturalistic, non-religious terms carries the risk of subsuming “the rest of life” into the realm of the medical, it is nonetheless needed in order “to protect a region of illness and incapacity from the reach and excesses of the hermeneutic disciplines with their tendency to over-interpretation, and from cultural traditions, including religious discourse, that can implicate the person in narratives of evil, sin, faithlessness, spiritual misdirection, and moral deviance.” Rashed notes, however, that this medical narrative is challenged not only by religious communities but also by various forms of identity-based activism including the Mad Pride and Neurodiversity movements. He argues that strict illness/purpose, deficit/value, mechanism/meaning dichotomies have become “unstable” and encourages scholars to focus their attention on resolving the apparently contradictory realities that people sometimes demand and require medical forms of care while investing significance in the sociocultural and existential context of their distress and refusing reductionistic constructions of their distress as illness.I agree wholeheartedly with Rashed’s conclusion that clinicians and scholars must move beyond a strict mechanism/meaning dichotomy with respect to unwanted and/or disvalued experience and behavior, and must remain open to the social and contextual interpretations that particular cultural communities—including religious communities—offer. But as a psychiatrist who is also [End Page 215] a Christian theological ethicist, I suggest that this sensible conclusion can be reached more straightforwardly by adopting a more flexible approach to “religious experience” and by abandoning the assumptions that mental disorder is “a fully areligious type of suffering” and that religious experience and mental disorder are “fundamentally separate apprehensions of our experience.”Although Rashed never defines religious experience, he posits a distinction between “psychological distress or anomalous experience that has a religious origin, content, or end (purpose)” and “psychological distress or anomalous experience that has no religious origin, content, or end (purpose).” He then helpfully describes how Islamic tradition narrates psychological suffering as deviation from fitrah and as God’s trial, arguing that in Islamic perspective “mental disorder cannot be disentangled from the person’s religious situation and from the religious origin, content, or end (purpose) of his distress.” I make no claim about Rashed’s interpretation of Islam, but would observe that many voices within Christian tradition resist both the equation of psychological suffering with wrongdoing and the assertion that God is the direct cause of psychological suffering (see, for example, John Paul II, 1984). Suffering may instead have to do with being sinned against (as in the case of war, assault, or oppression), or the experience of living in a fallen world that God will one day make right. When the psalmist cries, “Save me, O God, for the waters have come up to my neck” (Psalm 69:1, NRSVue), many Christians observe that it is the psalmist’s enemies, not God, who are the proximate cause of the psalmist’s distress. That is to say, Christian tradition allows for a broad range of interpretations about the cause of distress, including distress resulting from injury, physical illness, and oppression. Christians are encouraged to regard all of their lives as in some way related to God as the creator, sustainer, and orienting end of life—and so in that sense all experience is “religious” in nature. But at least for Christians this does not preclude more naturalistic or sociological interpretations of distress and suffering.Rashed is right that a “fully areligious type of suffering” with “no religious origin, content, or end (purpose)” can only be invoked from a secular standpoint—if “secularity” is taken in Charles Taylor’s first sense of “public spaces... [that] have been allegedly emptied of God, or of any reference to ultimate reality” (Taylor, 2007, p. 2). This is not because... (shrink)

The article investigates the development of discourses related to freedom of religion and discrimination against religious minority in current Indonesia by identifying the discourse constructions of Ahmadiyya in various texts and talks produced and disseminated by government institution and the Indonesian Council of Ulama (the MUI). This study aims to reveal these institutions’ views and perspectives on Ahmadiyya issue using various discourse strategies. The data analysed are some legal proclamations issued and personal views delivered by the officials of these (...) two institutions. The CDA theoretical framework employed is to examine the positive-self and negative-other presentations. The finding reveals that the issue of Ahmadiyya is addressed through discourses related to Indonesian national interest and discourses related to religious matters. in these discourses, the two institutions and their officials present themselves positively and portray the Ahmadiyya sect negatively. The sect followers are negatively presented as the troublemaker, blasphemer, and the destroyer of religious harmony and social order. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:1. The impetus of Herbert Grundmann's work on researching the religious lives of women in the thirteenth century has led to a reinterpretation of many aspects of this complex subject. Even today, some points remain unclear. At times it seems as if we are confronted with a play in which the actors – the sisters, friars and the papal curia – move in a manner which is difficult (...) to decipher and could even be described as contradictory.In particular, Herbert Grundmann carried out a study on the development of female forms of monastic life which were linked with both the Franciscan and Dominican Friars; however, he neglected to give sufficient attention to the role of the papal curia in both Orders. The action of the papacy was considered merely an answer to demands made by nuns or friars – without grasping the fact that such decisions were due to a complex papal design in the reorganization of regular life.The history of the development of regular communities of religious women has a clear and systematic development. The women originally known as the pauperes dominae inclusae were not institutionally linked to the Order of Friars Minor until 1227, indicating the emergence of Apostolic guidelines to establish and build a new form of monastic life for women which was directly subject to papal authority. Until now, this aspect of religious foundations has not been the subject of scholarly attention, which has instead focused on the initiatives of the "founders" and risked taking the actual work out of context.The present article outlines the steps in the gradual legalization of the "Dominican" Sisters. Its findings are largely based on Jordan of Saxony's correspondence, which has not been given adequate scholarly consideration. Jordan was a Parisian master who entered the Order in 1220. He was subsequently elected Provincial Superior of Lombardy and in the following year until his death in 1237 was General Master of the Order. He also played a significant role in the foundation of the monastery of St. Agnese in Bologna.2. The complexity of the correspondence poses various problems. Not only because its very composition is based on continual discovery but also because of an almost total absence of historical information, which makes certain aspects difficult to interpret. Despite this, there is great interest in the reconstruction of significant moments in the constitutional history of the Order of Friars Preachers – a subject which has been enriched by the studies of Gert Melville as well as those of Sonderforschungsbereich himself.Jordan of Saxony's correspondence is composed of thirty-seven letters addressed to Diana of Andalo, who had professed religious vows before Dominic, and had played a leading role in creating the convent of St. Agnese in Bologna . Five of Jordan's letters were sent to Diana's convent and a further eight were sent to the general community.Beginning with the valuable observations of Angelo Walz, the most studied aspect of the correspondence has been feminine religious life with a particular focus on the spiritual themes which were elaborated on by Jordan. This is evident simply by referring to the observations of Raoul Manselli and Andrea Tilatti. The survival of Jordan's letters is due to the need to prove both their origins and their institutional link to the Order of Preachers. Since the 1430s, the nuns understood that by convincing both the Order and the Roman Curia of this, they might avoid the danger of losing the continued cura of the friars.Using this collection as a starting point, I intend to consider the institutional developments of the Bolognese Monastery, as well as female monasticism linked to the Order of Preachers.3. The Vita beatae Dianae was composed shortly after the middle of the thirteenth century. Despite its title, it primarily.. (shrink)

Edward Nieznanski developed in 2007 and 2008 two different systems in formal logic which deal with the problem of evil. Particularly, his aim is to refute a version of the logical problem of evil associated with a form of religious determinism. In this paper, we revisit his first system to give a more suitable form to it, reformulating it in first-order modal logic. The new resulting system, called N1, has much of the original basic structure, and many axioms, definitions, (...) and theorems still remain; however, some new results are obtained. If the conclusions attained are correct and true, then N1 solves the problem of evil through the refutation of a version of religious determinism, showing that the attributes of God in Classical Theism, namely, those of omniscience, omnipotence, infallibility, and omnibenevolence, when adequately formalized, are consistent with the existence of evil in the world. We consider that N1 is a good example of how formal systems can be applied in solving interesting philosophical issues, particularly in Philosophy of Religion and Analytic Theology, establishing bridges between such disciplines. (shrink)

The key to this study lies in my own identity as a researcher who specializes in the fifteenth century and Franciscan reforms, especially the confrontation in eastern Central Europe between the theory of the via media based on a return to the Martianian Constitutions, and the Observance sub vicariis brought by Giovanni of Capistrano when he crossed the Alps in 1451.2 The major aspect of this is a view on the “pre-history” of the Libellus ad Leonem, which was written in (...) 1513 by Paolo Giustiniani and Pietro Quirini in preparation of the Fifth Lateran Council. This “pre-history” concerns a century of transformations of the links between the Observant reforms, humanist culture and the.. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:220 THEATRE AND RELIGIOUS HYPOTHESIS* We are placed in this world, as in a great theatre, where the true springs and causes of every event are entirely concealed from us.... David Hume La collection des idées s'appelle imagination, dans la mesure où celleci désigne, non pas une faculté, mais un ensemble des choses, au sens le plus vague du mot, qui sont ce qu'elles paraissent: collection sans album, (...) pièce sans théâtre, ou flux des perceptions.. Gilles Deleuze In Part III of Hume's Dialogues concerning Natural Religion the character Demea contests the analogy drawn by Cleanthes between an orderly world and a coherent, articulate speech, stating that, When I read a volume, I enter into the mind and intention of the author: I become him, in a manner, for the instant; and have an immediate feeling and conception of those ideas, which revolved in his imagination, while employed in that composition. To begin reading Hume's Dialogues with such false and naive premises would inevitably result in a failure to pick up on all the different voices in this text. In fact, no written text can really enable a reader "to enter into the mind and intention of the author." Moreover, such a predisposition on behalf of a naive reader will become further complicated by the processes of 'distanciation' and avoidance of a central point of view, which are brought into play by Hume in this text, where religion is being considered from a purely speculative point of view. Hume has in fact given the reader a clue in the introduction as to how 221 to approach reading the Dialogues. when Pamphilus, the narrator, expounds to his friend Hermippus the advantages of presenting a discussion in the form of a dialogue rather than as a direct statement. He argues that by using a dialogue it is possible to avoid any overtones of an author addressing his reader, or a pedagogue his pupil (D 127). Confronted with a text that is paradoxically both lucid and unclear, any reader whose attitude is still limited by certain metaphysical categories might very well want to know who is actually Hume's spokesman and who he is really addressing in this discussion on the nature and existence of God. These questions are in fact related to traditional oppositions, such as that between a central and subsidiary point of view in a dialogue; between the essential and non-essential of a discussion. In his Dialogues, Hume creates a second degree of separation between himself and the characters involved in the discussion by using the literary process of 'distanciation', when he introduces the fictitious character Pamphilus, who tells Hermippus of the discussions he has heard. From this point of view the style of the text is immediately more disconcerting than Cicero's De Natura Deorum, (which inspired Hume's text), as Cicero does identify himself with his narrator, such that any effect of distanciation is far smaller. Cicero's narrator does, however, emphasize that the multiplicity of points of view in this text results in a certain degree of scepticism and suspension of judgement: "Though it is possible that they are all of them false, it is impossible that more than one of them is true" (p. 71). As Hume does in his Dialogues, Cicero here tries to avoid imposing a 222 central point of view or a single authoritative angle to his discussions, as if given by a teacher; in fact, "in a discussion of this kind our interest should be centred not on the weight of the authority but on the weight of the argument" (p. 73). Thus, wearing the mask of Pamphilus, Hume can play an ironic role, without having to give a central point of view, by having his character present the idea that "reasonable men may be allowed to differ, where no one can reasonably be positive" (D 128). These two texts therefore use the same process of disassociation from a central truth by using a supposedly neutral narrator. When reading the Dialogues one can rely neither on the authority of the author, as he has hidden himself away in the shadows backstage, nor on that... (shrink)

This focus issue is a conversation at and about the interface of feminist ethics and religious ethics, in order to show what these multifaceted fields of intellectual endeavor and practical import have to say to each other, to teach and to learn. The seven essays approach that dialogue from a variety of angles and traditions, reflecting the fecundity of both fields and the wide-ranging concerns of colleagues in religious ethics who share commitments and methods with feminist ethics.