Religions, Volume 13, Issue 11 (November 2022) – 122 articles

The True Form Charts of the Man-Bird Mountain (人鳥山真形圖, or TFCMBM) are important ritual images created by ancient Taoists. Scholars envisage them as the “fairy mountain map” (仙山圖) or “fairyland picture” (仙境圖) imagined by ancient Taoists. However, TFCMBM is actually a description of the mechanism of the “convergence of celestial and terrestrial qi”(天地氣交) in the human body. According to ancient Chinese medicine, the mechanism of the inter-induction of qi (氣交) controls the transmission and transformation of food, circulation of qi-blood in the body, and generation and storage of vital essence. Ancient Taoist priests referred to the mechanism of the inter-induction of qi as “regulating qi in Central Yellow” (黃中理炁) and as a kind of image, “the true shape of the human bird mountain” to guide novice Taoists in meditation (存思) and activating qi (行氣). This study argues that the TFCMBM is a portrayal of the mechanism of the inter-induction of qi and reveals the Taoist method of writing sacred knowledge and its cognitive nature. Full article

In this paper I examine the relationship between phenomenology and metaphysics by reassessing the relationship between phenomenological and metaphysical transcendence. More specifically, I examine the notion of phenomenological transcendence in Husserl and the early Heidegger: Husserl defines transcendence primarily as the mode of givenness of phenomena that do not appear all at once, but must be given in partial profiles; Heidegger defines transcendence primarily as Dasein’s capacity to go beyond entities toward being. I argue that these divergent understandings of phenomenological transcendence have resulted in a significant difference in reception among French phenomenologists of religion. These thinkers assert that phenomenology, when properly conceived and utilized, can make room for the divine and its revelation, i.e., for a metaphysical transcendence. I further argue that these thinkers prefer Heidegger’s phenomenology to Husserl’s because they understand Heidegger’s transcendence as the subject’s openness to being, while they understand Husserl’s transcendence as a limit, as the inability to capture worldly objects. I take up Jean-Luc Marion’s phenomenology of givenness as a “case study” to illustrate this point. Finally, I argue that this preference for Heidegger over Husserl is misplaced and should be reversed. A close reading of Heidegger’s Phenomenology of Religious Life shows that Dasein is confined to its own possibilities and cannot be open to a relationship with the divine. By contrast, Husserl’s phenomenology provides the radical openness necessary to welcome revelation. While Husserl cannot envision a “worldly God,” the structures of horizonality and temporality characterize a subject capable of an authentic openness to revelation. Full article

James Sterba has recently argued that the free will defense fails to explain the compossibility of a perfect God and the amount and degree of moral evil that we see. I think he is mistaken about this. I thus find myself in the awkward and unexpected position, as a non-theist myself, of defending the free will defense. In this paper, I will try to show that once we take care to focus on what the free will defense is trying to accomplish, and by what means it tries to do so, we will see that Sterba’s criticism of it misses the mark. Full article

Relationship-oriented questions have always been at the crossroads of ethnoreligious identity, religious freedom, religious conversion, religious prejudice, and religious pluralism throughout Muslim-Buddhist co-existence in the sixth century within the Malay Archipelago. Other faiths could be freely practised except for propagation towards Muslim communities with Islam being the religion of the federation. This study aimed to explore Muslim-Buddhist relation types and the issues underpinning the following themes: history, identity, and concerns. Content and thematic analysis as well discourse analysis were utilised as the study method for data collection and evaluation. The data were thematically analysed with ATLAS.ti, a qualitative analysis software. Resultantly, the Muslim-Buddhist interaction pattern in Malaysia has occurred (culturally and religiously) from the early establishment of both religious communities. This relation, which has shifted in ethnoreligious orientation at every interaction level, opens more avenues and complexities requiring holistic management. Full article

Following the COVID-19 outbreak in 2020, the Korean government announced restrictions on religious activities such as worship services and small group gatherings. Unlike their Buddhist and Catholic counterparts, who responded relatively pliably to the government’s quarantine guidelines, Protestants were divided in their responses: some churches actively complied with the government’s instructions, while other churches voiced opposition. This study analyzes the cases of two churches that responded differently to the government’s quarantine restrictions. The goal is to analyze the characteristics of changes in Korea’s ‘state-religion’ relationship in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. The first characteristic of the changing state-religious relationship is that the state-church relationship can no longer be divided into a progressive or conservative dichotomy like before but rather is individualized for each church. The second is that the state-church relationship differs by issue and that regional variables play a bigger role than before. Local churches, in particular, are more likely to become influenced by their region in their relationship with the government than those in Seoul and other metropolitan areas. This is because these churches are able to exert more influence in the region with their human and material resources. The local church’s response to the COVID-19 quarantine guidelines showed how the church could either bond with or confront the government in dealing with natural and social disasters, as well as local problems. The changes and characteristics of the state-church relationship in the COVID-19 pandemic in Korea provide insight into future analyses of state-religious relations. Full article

It is well-documented that patients’ religious characteristics may affect their health and health care experiences, correlating with better health and psychological well-being. Likewise, health care providers are impacted by religious characteristics that affect their attitudes and behaviors in a clinical setting. However, few of these studies examine non-theist, non-Western, or Indian-based traditions, and none have examined Jainism specifically, in spite of the high representation of Jains in medicine. Drawing upon a quantitative survey conducted in 2017–2018 of Jains in medical and healthcare fields, I argue that Jains physicians and medical professionals demonstrate a “reflexive ethical orientation”, characterized by: (1) adaptive absolutes emphasizing nonviolence, a many-sided viewpoint, and compassion; (2) balancing personally mediated sources of authority that evaluate and integrate Jain insights alongside cultural and legal sources, and clinical experience; and (3) privileging the well-being of five-sensed humans and animals. Full article

This article calls for an examination of the spirituality of Jesus in light of the unique historical and theological distinctives of the Pentecostal-Charismatic movement. Although the topic of spirituality is wide and deep, this study will approach it as personally transformative Christian experiences and practices that enrich one’s life and the lives of others. By drawing from the research of statisticians and social scientists, I will discuss notable ways in which the Pentecostal-Charismatic movement has the potential to make the spirituality of Jesus accessible to the unchurched and the unaffiliated (nones) in the United States. The results of my research reveal that, although such persons do not regularly attend church, they are, in part, open to religious experiences and desire a deeper spirituality. A such, this paper shows that the experience-based, supernaturally empowered, every-member-is-a-minister nature of the Pentecostal-Charismatic movement may indeed appeal to and meet the needs of certain unchurched and the unaffiliated persons. Furthermore, this paper will conclude by presenting suggestions for reform that may enhance this movement’s ability to reach the unchurched and unaffiliated in days to come. In the final analysis, this paper provides a historical foundation and theoretical framework from which Pentecostal-Charismatic influences upon such groups can be further assessed. Full article

Pacifism is a complex and significant moral, political, religious, and philosophical idea. There is an evolving conversation about peace and nonviolence that occurs among secular scholars, religious figures, and activists. This paper explores this conversation, while employing a five-part thematic frame of analysis that attempts to distinguish secular and religious visions of peace and pacifism. The result of this analysis provides a ready framework for making that distinction. But it also demonstrates that the task of distinguishing secular and religious approaches is complicated and difficult. The paper also shows, through a brief genealogy of pacifism, how secular and religious voices are in conversation with one another. Full article

For at least a century the Bible played a significant, positive role in Native American letters starting with the eighteenth-century writings of Samson Occom. A product of the Great Awakening, Occom’s engagements with the Bible resembled those of other Protestant thinkers and writers of his time, although his sermons were sometimes specifically tailored for Indian audiences and topics. After Occom, Indian authors in the nineteenth century such as Elias Boudinot and William Apess drew upon the Bible to make arguments against removal and “scientific racism.” In the twentieth century writers like Zitkala-Ša and Charles Alexander Eastman cast a critical eye on Christianity and reconsidered the virtues of traditionalism. John G. Neihardt’s Black Elk Speaks (1932) was the century’s fullest literary depiction of a traditional religion, but it came at the cost of concealing Black Elk’s actual religion, Catholicism. During the 1960s and 70s oral tradition was privileged over sacred scripture, as seen in N. Scott Momaday’s House Made of Dawn (1968). While the Bible makes fewer appearances than it used to in Native American literature, it would be premature to suggest that Christianity is finished in Indian country. Full article

This article reflects upon how LGBTQIA+ Christians and their allies within the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and its predecessor denominations ‘called the question’ on their right to and responsibility for membership, ordination, and marriage by simultaneously (1) practicing apologetic ‘ministries of presence’ and (2) grounding their ecclesio-juridical arguments in the church’s long-standing polity principles. It is commonly argued that advocates for full inclusion pushed the church to change historic norms, while ‘conservative’ voices called for the maintenance of time-honored principles. In an effort to problematize such reductionistic accounts, this article begins by sketching the historical trajectory of U.S. Presbyterian theology and polity, with special emphasis on the Adopting Act of 1729 and the tradition that proceeds from it. Building upon its survey of the debates that shaped the church’s history between the early eighteenth and mid-twentieth centuries, the text then shows how LGBTQIA+ Presbyterians and their allies acted within the traditional discursive patterns of their faith community when they advocated for the repeal of the exclusive policies that arose in the second half of the twentieth century. Inspired by the work of advocates and allies alike, when the PC(USA) and its predecessor denominations articulated an inclusive stance toward openly LGBTQIA+ members in 1978/1979, removed barriers to their ordination in 2011, permitted same-sex marriages within Presbyterian communities in 2015, and opened the church to receiving new theological insights from queer people via the adapted version of the ‘Apology Overture’ in 2016, the church’s collective discernment drew on historic Presbyterian principles of theology and governance to respond (often imperfectly) to contemporary challenges. The church’s multi-generational self-critique thus created a space in which queer Christians could ‘re-de-normalize’ their experiences of life and faith in ways that may open doors for post-apologetic reconstructive theological engagement in the years to come. Full article

The four principles of Western medical bioethics, i.e., autonomy, nonmaleficence, beneficence and justice, published by Beauchamps and Childress in their seminal ‘Principles of Biomedical Ethics’, are understood as universal. However, Non-Western governments argue that they refer to Western cultural contexts, neglecting specifics of Non-Western, for instance Islamic, civilizations. This paper addresses the claim of bioethical universality of both the West’s and Iran’s Shīʿī Islamic bioethics. We describe the historical development and the normative sources of Western and Shīʿī bioethics, i.e., common morality, the ontogeny of human morality and Shī’ī Islamic religious foundation. Both concepts support nonmaleficence and justice yet diverge with respect to beneficence, autonomy and normative justification. The Iranian screening program for ß-thalassemia major exemplifies the differences in both concepts. We conclude that nonmaleficence and justice are universal moral rules based on the ontogeny of morality. Beneficence can be characterized as a universal moral ideal. In contrast, autonomy, appreciated in the West, is neither justified by common morality nor the ontogeny of morality and has no equivalent in more communitarian-oriented societies. It thus fails to quality as a universal norm. Full article

The relationship between History and the Islamic revelation has been debated in Academia over the last few decades; its complex framework has usually been investigated in aspects such as the form, the language and the facets of structure that have not always been considered as relevant in the analysis of a historical milieu [...] Full article

This paper examines the epistemic value of non-religious mystical experiences. By taking a non-religious angle, it adds a complementary perspective to the context in which mystical experiences are generally discussed, i.e., the context of theological questions or perspectives informed by the philosophy of religion. While I am pessimistic about the possibilities of such experiences providing propositional knowledge about the external world, this discussion is largely bracketed. Instead, I focus on a different type of knowledge, arguing that what these experiences can provide is a certain type of subjective knowledge, namely experiential knowledge. I further argue that such experiences involve a feeling of concern about a very general object, something such as existence, the world, or reality as a whole. Consciously experiencing this type of feeling or emotion is rare, since it is a background emotion about a very general object relatively far removed from personal flourishing. Nevertheless, in this type of experiences, it is directly experienced. The experiential knowledge obtained through such experiences is what this general concern about existence as a whole feels like. I contend that both the insight on what this feels like as well as the feeling itself can be seen as valuable. Full article

The scale of the representation of the Islamic head covering has increased exponentially over the last decade because of a range of factors, including growth in the modest fashion business sector and increased visibility of Muslim women in hijab in the public space. Social media has played a big role in changing perceptions of the Islamic head covering, via promotion and advertising. Meanwhile, the mainstream fashion industry has included options targeting the modest Muslim female market further, adding to changes in the representation and perception of the hijab. This research will examine the impact of social media and mainstream retail on Australian Muslim women’s perceptions and expressions of hijab. Using interviews and online surveys it explores the links between the fashion industry, social media, and changes in how Muslim women view the hijab. The majority of Australian Muslim women spoken to followed various hijabi bloggers or influencers although only a small proportion adopted recommendations from these hijabi bloggers or influencers (such as purchasing products, or incorporating suggestions on modest clothing or modest style trends). They believed migration, liberalism, social media marketing, and the inclusion of Muslim women in mainstream fashion has contributed to a form of commodification and commercialisation of the hijab. Furthermore, using hijab models as promotional tools to market the products, as well as the use of social media bloggers and influencers to represent them was perceived as tokenistic and disingenuous. Full article

The major aim of the religious person is to obey God’s injunctions and follow His ways. If he or she shall do so, he or she will attain success in this world or in the world-to-come. Thus, the Abrahamic religions have come to center on precepts involving man’s relationship with God and an occupation with spirituality. Accordingly, the central figures and those who head the religious hierarchy are rabbis (in Judaism), priests and monks (in Christianity), and Imams (in Islam), who are practiced and proficient in religious spiritual life. This means that the religions are primarily occupied with spirituality. In addition, monotheism portrays an abstract God, such that those who wish to resemble Him must necessarily strive for spirituality. As a result, the occupation with material matters was completely marginalized. Due to the prime place given to “spirituality”, this article seeks to examine the attitude to corporeal work in the Abrahamic religions. The conclusion - in contrast to the initial-intuitive outlook–the religions are not occupied exclusively with spirituality. In Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, the worship of God includes corporeal work, both as a subsistence need and as a religious value. Full article

Contrary to the majority of contemporary analytic philosophers of religion, James Sterba argues in his book Is a Good God Logically Possible? (2019) that Alvin Plantinga with his famous free will defense has not succeeded in solving the logical problem of evil. However, Sterba is not alone in disputing this generally accepted view in analytic philosophy of religion. D. Z. Phillips (1934–2006) has argued that the logical problem of evil has not been solved and he further holds that it has not even got off the ground. The aim of this article is to explore Phillips’ criticism of the free-will defense and mainstream theodicies. His critique is relevant for Sterba’s atheistic stance because Phillips’ arguments are partly applicable to forms of philosophical atheism that share the same assumptions with philosophical theism. In the first part of the article, I will briefly describe the starting points of the best-known solutions to the problem of evil in analytic philosophy of religion and refer to some aspects of Sterba’s arguments. After that I will explore Phillips’ ethical and conceptual criticism against frameworks used in the discussion of theodicy. Finally, I will pay attention to Phillips’ Wittgensteinian view of the task and the aim of philosophy in order to clarify some problematic aspects of his thought. Full article

After many years of neglecting the religious dimension within intercultural education, today there is a broad consensus in Europe that religious education represents an important dimension in the intercultural education of young people. Awareness of the connection between intercultural and interreligious learning is becoming increasingly stronger and more present. One of the important questions related to intercultural education in general, and especially to the religious dimension of that education, relates to the qualification of the confessional religious education teachers with regard to the achievement of intercultural goals and especially the qualification to develop intercultural competence in students. This paper consists of two parts. The theoretical part elaborates on issues related to the development of intercultural competence in confessional religious education. The second part presents some of the results of the quantitative research (descriptive statistics methods were used), which was carried out in the Republic of Croatia and aimed to examine the attitudes and opinions of religious education teachers regarding the necessary intercultural competence for work in schools. The results have revealed that religious education teachers highly value the development of intercultural competence in students, as well as great motivation and openness of religious education teachers of confessional classes for the development of intercultural education. At the same time, they point to the relative scarcity of methods within religious teaching that promote intercultural and interreligious learning. Full article

The offence and violence surrounding episodes like the Salman Rushdie Affair and the Danish cartoon controversies have furnished Western critique of Islam. While important work has challenged this criticism of Islam by interrogating the secular foundations of critique, the relationship between violence and critique remains troubling. Through reflecting on an excerpt from an attempted murder trial following an attack in purported retaliation for offending Islam in an English prison, this article considers an expanded notion of violence that recognizes the structural conditions behind violence and the political stakes that prioritize the psychological and ideological drivers that service criticism of Islam. This article builds on scholarship that explored the State and the violent actions of non-State actors and the critical studies of hate crimes, Islamist extremism, and radicalization to reflect on the role of critique in the aftermath of violence and to ask: “Is violence critique?” It argues for an approach to violence-as-critique by recognizing how emotion and violence are not merely resident inside the fanatical body that protrudes outwards but are instead part of the wider, circulating, and unstable affective economies of structural violence where violences can be mutually reinforcing. Full article

“Liberationism”, a term derived from Liberation theology (LT), is an analytical concept used by religious historians and sociologists as a generic designation for Latin American post-conciliar Catholicism. “Theology of the People” (TP) designates a theological school created in Argentina during the late 1960s by the Episcopal Pastoral Commission (COEPAL), although the term used by its members was not TP but “Popular Pastoral theology” (TPp). Successive generations of theologians developed new versions of TPp (“popular piety theology”, “theology of culture”, etc.). I call those versions the diachronic variants of TP, and I regard TP as their synchronic representation. TP has been called the “Argentine School of Liberation Theology”, but there are substantial differences between TP and TL. In this paper, I argue that it is inaccurate to use the term “liberationism” to refer to TP because that term alludes to LT’s model of inter-relations between religion and social change, a model explicitly rejected by the creators of TP. I frame the theoretical discussion on the use of analytical and native concepts in Quentin Skinner’s linguistic contextualism perspective and I explain the differences between TP and TL in the context of the theological–political debates in late-1960s Argentina around the issue of popular Catholicism. Full article

This paper examines how megachurch congregations in South Korea responded to governmental measures to control the COVID-19 pandemic in terms of religious governance. This empirical study of Saeronam Church (SC) in Daejeon shows that the unexpected crisis forced its congregants to look back on their faithfulness in terms of self-reflection, and hence, made them more committed to their congregation socially and organizationally. The theologically and politically conservative megachurch congregants tend to regard the pandemic crisis as a God-planned ordeal which must be endured not only through self-reflection and repentance, but also through protection of their congregation from secular authorities. This attitude made it easier for conservative congregants to protest against governmental quarantine measures more explicitly and collectively. While some argue that the COVID-19 pandemic basically accelerated secularity by shrinking religious influence on society, this paper finds this aspect remarkably opposite in Korean conservative churches like SC, and emphasizes how a secular challenge, like the recent quarantine measures, can intensify megachurch Christianity. In this sense, it claims that the second-generation Korean megachurches like SC cannot be explained entirely by traditional theories of urbanization, marketing strategies, and church growth. Full article

This essay investigates the role of uncertainty in post-Reformation Catholicism. It argues that one of the reasons why uncertainty was so central to early modern Catholic discourse lies in the complex and multifaced relationship between believing—that is, the act of holding as true something that we are unable to verify as such by means of reason—and knowing—that is, the act of holding something as true on the basis of a reasonable and reasoned assessment. By providing a brief analysis of printed and manuscript sources, this essays shows how some of the theological, religious, and intellectual tensions in articulating the relationship between things that need to be believed by faith and things that need to be known by reason, both in the works of influential theologians such as Augustine and Francisco Suárez, and in the elaboration of a wider sector of the Catholic population. Full article

Chinese spiritual traditions such as Buddhism, Confucianism, and Taoism all emphasize the cultivation of idealistic mentalities (IMs) which are (1) not yet achieved, (2) clear in value judgment, (3) systematic and stable, and (4) cultivated with systematic training. While IMs are of interest to positive psychology, the methodology of positive psychology limits research on IMs. Fundamentally, positive psychology focuses on widely existing positive concepts and emphasizes being value-free, which conflicts with the features of IMs. Positive psychological studies relevant to IMs also suffer from methodological limitations: (1) recruiting samples without a spiritual background (realistic assumption); (2) ignoring qualitative differences between levels of actualization of IMs (linear assumption); (3) dividing systematic mental patterns into separate elements (reductionism); and (4) lacking value clarification during interventions. In summary, this article illustrates the methodological limitations of positive psychology in research on IMs. It encourages further research on IMs and supports the necessity of developing a new idealistic psychology for better research on IMs. Full article

Negativity is an important dimension in both Adorno’s inverse theology and the theological thought of pre-Qin Daoism. Firstly, both have a negative thinking and approach. Adorno inherited the Jewish idea of “forbidden images” and negative theology, and his negative dialectics is just a negative method. The pre-Qin Daoist description of the Dao and its laws are also negative. Secondly, in terms of negative language, Adorno insists on a negative discourse, arguing that concepts cannot fully express objects, and that the purpose of philosophy is to “express the inexpressible”. The pre-Qin Daoist idea of “no name” is also a negative discourse. Adorno and Zhuangzi both attempted to express truth in a non-conceptual language. Finally, negativity is the essence of social criticism and redemption. Both Adorno and the pre-Qin Daoists were in the midst of social collapse. Adorno argued that redemption could only be expected from an inner criticism of society and through the art of negativity. And the philosophy of Laozi and Zhuangzi was ultimately understood as the spirit of Chinese art. However, Adorno’s negativity contains the idea of intermediation, while the negativity of Laozi and Zhuangzi’s thought is based on the idea of interconversion. The ideas of the two can be informed by each other. Full article

This article brings Chosŏn dynasty (1392–1910) Korea into the discussion about the various roles of Daoism in East Asian cultures in which it has, unfortunately, all too often been absent. Based primarily on art-historical methodology and literary analysis, the article offers an overview of the many sorts of sources and materials that determine the perspectives we have of Daoism-related beliefs and concepts during the late Chosŏn. In contrast to earlier interpretations of Daoist practices as exclusively expressing a desire to retreat from public life, the materials discussed in this article advance a more subtle understanding of the pervasiveness of Daoism in late Chosŏn society, ranging from Daoist divination texts and rituals at religious shrines to the construction of artificial mountains for theater performances and the establishment of government office gardens that served as conduits for spiritual rejuvenation and display of cultural cachet. Full article

This research contributes to the scarce literature that exists on the perception that Catholics have about the Eucharist online, which was continued through various digital platforms, but once the emergence of the COVID-19. In this way, the perception of Catholics is identified, regarding their spiritual experience, their satisfaction, and their intention to continue attending this type of religious practice in the future, but online. For this, a quantitative study was carried out through the PLS program with a sample of 1423 parishioners in the city of Bogotá, Colombia. Bearing in mind that Latin America has the largest number of Catholics in the world, the results of this study help the Catholic Church to generate possible strategies that can be developed in various parts of the world, to combine this type of religious services with the various virtual platforms. Full article

The poets in question belong to different generations, as well as different cultural, ethnic, and even religious backgrounds. Ethnically Mordvinian Zavyalov (b. 1957), who is also a noted scholar and translator from Ancient Greek and Latin, and ethnically Russian Chernykh (b. 1969), who is trained as a librarian and grew up among hippies, are both Eastern Orthodox Christians. Jaan Kaplinski (1941–2021), half Polish and half Estonian, was born and died a Roman Catholic, yet for a considerable part of his life, until his gradual switch from the Estonian language to Russian, considered himself a “pagan.” The article focuses on these poets’ different forms of engagement with the Holy Scripture and practices of the Christian Church. Zavyalov’s groundbreaking experimental poem Advent: Leningrad, 1941 (Рождественский пост, 2009) intertwines fragments of liturgical services and recommendations for fasting around the time of Christmas with the voices of the besieged city, dying from famine during WW II. His poem’s cathartic effect is remarkable: the death is negated by Christ’s birth and history starts anew. His most recent poem I Saw Jesus: And He Was Christ (Я видел Иисуса: и Он был Христос, 2022), which will be discussed in this article, engages with the Holy Scripture and the practices of the Russian Orthodox church in an even more direct way. Chernykh’s poetry of recent decades deals with the relevance of the Bible for a practicing Christian in a largely non-Christian world. Furthermore, Kaplinski’s posthumous Russian collection Winged Fingerprint (Отпечаток крылатого пальца), which is to be published in 2022, can be described as a dialog with the Biblical God and death “after the end of everything.” The most prominent voice in Estonian letters, Kaplinski transforms his later lyrical poetry written in Russian into a spirited prayer for the salvation of everything seemingly “insignificant”, left out of “larger history”. Full article

The body and blood of Christ are essential to Christian liturgy and passion devotion. In medieval devotional books, this came to the fore in an overtly material way. The skin of the pages, the red ink, the words, and the images constituted more than a symbolic representation of the body of Christ. The corpus of the book was experienced as the Corpus Christi, the living Savior. This is particularly evident in one specific manuscript from the British Library, BL MS Egerton 1821, in which the skin of several folios was covered with red ink almost as if the pages have seeped in the blood from Christ’s wounds. The article investigates the material, fluid, hyperreal, and mechanical strategies that animated the body of Christ in the hands of the owner, focusing in particular on blood and milk as the substances of life. Full article

Prof. Stephen Strehle’s recent study suggests that modern politics is informed by secularism, which tends to promote hostility toward religion and the desire to purge religion from the public sphere. This essay considers one of the founding documents of secularism and modern political thought, Spinoza’s Theologico-Political Treatise. Spinoza’s account is ambiguous: his theology raises doubts about the truth of revelation even as he argues that salvation, as taught by the Bible, requires the practice of caritas. Spinoza also attempts to separate religion and politics. He grounds political life on universal natural rights and directs it toward the pursuit of comfort and security rather than salvation. This teaching appears to neglect the extraordinary possibilities and peaks of human life, both intellectual and spiritual. Spinoza’s account appears to support Prof. Stehle’s concern that such a single-minded focus on material comfort will lead ultimately to a debasement of humanity, and a confusion or denial of the distinction between high and the low. Full article

This article seeks to demonstrate how the Egyptian scholar Nasr Hamid Abu Zayd (d. 2010) challenges the concept of divine sovereignty (ḥākimiyya), or the rule of God, developed during the twentieth century, primarily by Sayyid Qutb and Abul Ala Mawdudi—a concept that has inspired many Sunni Islamist movements. The article first explores key aspects of the concept of ḥākimiyya as presented by these two thinkers. Then, key components of Abu Zayd’s humanistic hermeneutics are explained briefly. The article argues that Abu Zayd uses this hermeneutic to challenge the concept of ḥākimiyya and the three main ideas associated with it: (1) the notion of divine sovereignty; (2) the associations between divine sovereignty, the Prophet, and the Qurʾān; and (3) the necessity of implementing Sharia. The article concludes that while challenging the concept of divine sovereignty, Abu Zayd argues for a political theory which seeks to de-politicize Islam—a theory which emphasizes that the state should take a neutral position toward the religious orientation of its citizens and the state law should not necessarily be derived from religious principles. Full article

The Sutra of Perfect Enlightenment, also known as Yuanjuejing 圓覺經 or, in full, Dafang guangyuanjue xiuduoluo liaoyijing 大方廣圓覺修多羅了義經, is a mindfulness meditation sutra with a particularly high reputation that has been the subject of a great deal of annotations and commentaries throughout the history of East Asian Buddhism. However, hitherto, the literature has not systematically organized and studied these annotations and commentaries. The aim of this paper is to organize the Chinese commentaries on this sutra from the 8th to the 17th centuries systematically and tointroduce the different situations by the commentaries produced by different schools of Buddhism. Briefly, these works mainly include the commentaries by Weique 惟愨, Wushi 悟實, Jianzhi 堅志, Daoquan 道詮, and Tsung-mi 宗密 during the Tang Dynasty (618–907); the commentaries of the Huayan 華嚴宗, Tiantai 天臺宗, and Chan 禪宗 schools during the Song Dynasty (960–1279); and the literal interpretations and collected commentaries produced during the Ming and Qing Dynasties (1368–1912). Full article