The prominence of religion in recent debates around politics, identity formation, and international terrorism has led to an increased demand on those studying religion to help clarify and contextualise religious belief and practice in the public sphere. While many texts focus on the theoretical development of the subject, this book outlines a wider application of these studies by exploring the role of religious studies scholars and theologians as public intellectuals. -/- This collection of essays first seeks (...) to define exactly what makes an intellectual "public". It then goes on to deal with a few questions of concern: How do public intellectuals construct knowledge in religious and theological scholarship? What is the link between public intellectuals of higher education and their role in society? Do higher education institutions have a responsibility to endorse public intellectualism? -/- Looking at the individual and collective role of religious studies scholars and theologians in public life, this book will be of great interest to all scholars and academics involved in religious studies and theology across the academy. (shrink)

Ethics for OCR Religious Studies: The Complete Resource for AS and A2 is the perfect guide for students taking AS and A2 courses in the OCR GCE Religious Studies specification. Ethics for OCR provides a rigorous and accessible introduction to both historical and contemporary ethical debates. Drawing on insights from recent examiners’ reports and mark schemes, and following the OCR course outline closely, Mark Coffey and Dennis Brown’s landmark book includes: - Up-to-date discussions of key debates (...) in religious ethics - Ethical theories set in their historical context - Attention given to contemporary developments in law, science, technology, and society - A thorough guide to writing the perfect exam answer - A detailed exposition of OCR’s assessment criteria and how best to meet them - Profiles of leading ethical, philosophical and religious thinkers, a chapter by chapter glossary, and helpful chapter summaries - Discussion points, activity boxes and past paper questions The most comprehensive book on the market, Ethics for OCR Religious Studies provides a rigorous and accessible introduction to both historical and contemporary ethical debates, including chapters on sexual and environmental and business ethics. Written with verve and clarity, the book’s user-friendly style and attention to detail will help students of all abilities to achieve their best. (shrink)

From a field primarily of interest to specialist orientalists, the study of Buddhism has developed to embrace inter alia, theology and religious studies, philosophy, cultural studies, anthropology and comparative studies. There is now greater direct access to Buddhism in the West than ever before, and Buddhist studies are attracting increasing numbers of students. This eight-volume set brings together seminal papers in Buddhist studies from a vast range of academic disciplines, published over the last forty (...) years. With a new introduction by the editor, this collection is a unique and unrivalled research resource for both student and scholar. (shrink)

Discusses three concepts crucial to an understanding of the nature of religion: anxiety, guilt, and freedom. The various essays examine these from the viewpoint of several different religious traditions, movements and thinkers. Contents: Editor's Preface. Donald Gard: A Personal Perspective. Part I. Guiltless Morality; The Family of Changing Woman: Nature and Women in Navaho Thought; The Sacraments as 'Fear-provoking' and 'Awe-inspiring' Rites in the Greek Fathers; The Doctrine of Karma; Two Concepts of Predestination in Current Islamic Thought. Part II. (...) The Spirit of Medieval Penitents; The Evolution of Freedom as Catholicity in Catholic Ethics; Agape and the Liberation Movements. Part III. Calvin's Idea of Freedom in the Ethics of Schleiermacher and Barth; Creativity and Freedom in the Thought of Martin Buber; The Liberating Visions of C. G. Jung; 'The World's Most Perverse Habit'; Appendix: Study Questions. (shrink)

The author nationally recognized for the quality and depth of his teaching in religious studies has written the first full-scale introduction to the history and methods of the study of religion.

The lack of academic religious studies in India has several causes: the choice of the secular University of London as model for the first universities in India in 1857, the secular constitution, the secularist approach of the first prime minister of India, Jawaharlal Nehru, and the explosive relation between major faith traditions. However, with the waning of the Indian secularist framework and the continued power and influence of Hindutva ideology, there is a need to discuss different models for (...) religious studies in India. In this article, the point of departure is Banaras Hindu University, one of the few universities in India that has religious studies, but also a faculty of Hindu theology. The focus is on the history of BHU and the recommendations of several educational commission from the 1930s to the 60s, with a note on recent attempts at BHU of renewing value education. The aim is to highlight one alternative for developing religious studies in India, whose primary goal is the formation of good citizens enabled by a set of universal human values instantiated in local traditions. (shrink)

What is the relationship between religious studies and theology? Do both have a place within the university? This paper will argue that no clear distinction can be drawn between religious studies and theology on the level of the methods they employ. Each is multidisciplinary and each is able to address questions of religious truth. They can be distinguished only by asking `What is the question which each is attempting to answer?'. Religious studies addresses (...) the question of the meaning and truth of any religion. Theology is interested in the question of the meaning and truth of one particular faith. By adopting the language of one particular faith, the theologian is able to explore particular religious questions in some depth. (shrink)

Ukrainian religious studies has recently entered the world scientific community. Acquaintance with Western science, which has proven to be heterogeneous, often based on different methodological approaches and methodological means, has coincided with difficult internal transformations that have undergone all humanitarian knowledge in Ukraine after worldviews and political changes in society. In pursuit of its identity, domestic religious studies went, on the one hand, by contrasting itself with theology, and on the other, by distinguishing itself from scientific (...) atheism. At first, the emergence of religious studies from the bosom of ideologized social science was more relevant. In the form of a critical study of religion, Soviet-era religious studies were included in scientific atheism. Therefore, religious studies came not as knowledge of religion, but as its critique. (shrink)

In the Department of Religious Studies at the Institute of Philosophy of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, which is currently the only academic institution in the country, the President of Ukraine Viktor Yanukovych, with his approval, adopted in his Annual Address to the Verkhovna Rada the provision on "ensuring the teaching of all forms of education in higher education institutions since September 2011" academic religious studies as a normative philosophical discipline, and in secondary school (...) - a comparative history of religions. " The clericalization of education, to which, contrary to the Constitution of Ukraine, the political-mindedness and polyconfessional nature of its citizens, the V. Yushchenko during his years of presidency, and the Ministry of Education, was at his discretion, was unclear to us, and thus unacceptable. Therefore, we did not participate in the work of the various commissions, which, according to Yushchenko's instructions, began to act at the ministerial level, and especially instilled in educational structures in the western region of the country. We go to secular modern Europe, and we strive to live in the time of its Middle Ages. (shrink)

The contributors to this volume argue that we can, and they offer a new way: the "participatory turn," which proposes that individuals and communities have an ...

In a recent defence of what he calls "study by religion," Robert Ensign suggests that alleged divine revelations represent public forms of knowledge, which should not be excluded from the academy. But at least according to two major Christian thinkers, namely Thomas Aquinas and John Calvin, revelation is received by an act of faith, which rests on evidence that is person-relative and therefore not open to public scrutiny. If religious studies is to remain a public discipline, whose arguments (...) may be evaluated by believers and non-believers alike, it should maintain its defeasible but not yet defeated presumption of naturalism. (shrink)

This article aims to enlarge the conversation about religion and public education by inviting readers to think about the benefits to be gained in society by providing a comprehensive religious studies curriculum in our public schools. In such a program, students will develop knowledge and understanding about various religious traditions, forge greater respect for the religious (and nonreligious) other, and think through existential concerns that have interested human beings for thousands of years. While recognizing that such (...) a program is deeply contentious, we nevertheless reason that students, as participants in a democracy as well as members of a global community, must have the skills, tools, and knowledge to function in a religiously diverse world. (shrink)

The liberation of religious studies from mechanical inclusion into the structure of the so-called scientific-atheistic theory of Marxism, the isolation and designation of it into an independent branch of humanitarian knowledge, actualized the issue of the correlation of religious studies disciplines, in particular the philosophy of religion, and theology or theology. The last terms we use here are unambiguous. Historically, the first one serves to define the theological theory of Catholicism and Protestantism, and the second one (...) is Orthodoxy. (shrink)

Religious studies, as a complex of academic academic disciplines, studying the social nature of religion - its history, development and place in culture and society, is being created today. Religious knowledge is formed, the controversy of reports at conferences, in the pages of monographs and professional journals takes place. An all-Ukrainian scientific journal Mandrivets, a joint project of the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy and the Mandrivets publishing house, is included in the list of scientific specialties in (...) philology, history, philosophy, in this context. (shrink)

Ukrainian religious studies has recently entered the world scientific community and the educational process. Along the way, many difficulties awaited him. First, it was necessary to determine the content, structure, representation of Ukrainian religious studies, to navigate the world of foreign science of religion, in the existing teaching methods. Secondly, to outline the forms of entry of Ukrainian religious studies into the international scientific and teaching community. Acquaintance with Western science, which proved to be (...) heterogeneous, based on various methodological approaches and methodological means, coincided with difficult internal transformations that underwent all humanitarian knowledge in Ukraine after world-view and political changes in society. In pursuit of its identity, domestic religious studies went, on the one hand, by contrasting itself with theology, and on the other, by actively distinguishing itself from so-called scientific atheism. As a result of these processes, domestic religious studies was eventually constituted as a coherent, structured science of religion, seeking to develop its own models of teaching religious studies. (shrink)

Ukrainian religious studies have deep roots. We find the elements of it in the written descendants of the writings of Kievan Rus. From the prince's time, the universal way of vision, understanding and appreciation of the world for many Ukrainian thinkers becomes their own religious experiences. The main purpose of their works is not the desire to create a certain integral system of theological knowledge, but the desire to convey their personal religious-minded perception of the divine (...) nature, harmony, beauty and perfection of God created the world. (shrink)

Ukrainian Religious Studies - Ancient and at the same time relatively young branch of humanitarian knowledge. Ancient because it has its roots yet Kievan Rus. It is then that there are written works in which religious processes are described in certain religious denominations in the ancient Ukrainian lands. Thus, in the "Tale of the Times of the Years", the process of the introduction of Christianity in Rus'-Ukraine is described, the historical, psychological and ideological foundations of choice (...) are revealed. Volodymyr the Great faith for his people. Young because it does not have its deep professional tradition and, as a separate sphere of scientific knowledge, begins to develop only in the second half of the nineteenth century in the creative work of the ideologists of the communal movement and is primarily associated with the names of M. Drahomanov and O. Pobetny. To this religious studies we developed mainly in its theological form, not at the level of professional employment, but as an addition to the study of other problems of social or spiritual life, the study of the history of Ukraine. (shrink)

This volume argues that Wittgenstein’s philosophy of religion and his thought in general continue to be highly relevant for present and future research on interreligious relations.

Report to the Minister of Education and Science of Ukraine Dm. TABACHNIKU In the Department of Religious Studies of the Institute of Philosophy of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, which is currently the only academic institution in the country, with great acceptance adopted the position of President Viktor Yanukovych initiated in his Annual Letter to the Verkhovna Rada of "providing teaching in all forms of higher education in September 2011" the property of academic religious (...) class='Hi'>studies as a normative philosophical discipline, and in secondary school - a comparative history of religions. ". (shrink)

First Published in 1996. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Problems of the essence of religion, its place in the history of spiritual and cultural life of the Ukrainian people were not in the field of direct scientific interests of the famous Ukrainian philosopher, long-time director of the Institute of Philosophy by H.S. Skovoroda of NAS of Ukraine, academician Myroslav Popovych. He referred to them only when comprehending the history of culture in Ukraine, some in the analysis of the twentieth century as a bloody period of world history, some in (...) explaining the problems of being human. Thus the scientist considers religion as a component of culture, and it is a complex of material, spiritual, intellectual and emotional features of society, includes the basic rules of human existence, system of values, traditions and beliefs. The article deals with the religious factor in the life of the ancient Slavs, the role of the Bible in the formation of the religious consciousness of ancient Ukrainians, the nature and evolution of the Christian doctrine. The author analyzes Popovich's thinking about the perception of Christianity by the people's consciousness with its doctrine and rituals, about finding by Christians a balance between Eros and Thanatos, about austerity, holiness, etc. (shrink)

The essays in this volume give an account of how the agenda for theology and religious studies was set and reset throughout the twentieth century - by rapid and at times cataclysmic changes, by new movements of thought, by a bounty of archaeological discoveries, and by unprecedented archival research. Further new trends of study and fresh approaches have in more recent years generated new quests and horizons for reflection and research. Theological enquiry in Great Britain was transformed in (...) the late nineteenth century through the gradual acceptance of the methods and results of historical criticism. New agendas emerged in the various sub-disciplines of theology and religious studies. Some of the issues raised by biblical criticism, for example Christology and the 'quest of the historical Jesus', were to remain topics of controversy throughout the twentieth century. In other important and far-reaching ways, however, the agendas that seemed clear in the early part of the century were abandoned, or transformed and replaced, not only as a result of new discoveries and movements of thought, but also by the unfolding events of a century that brought the appalling carnage and horror of two world wars. Their aftermath brought a shattering of inherited world views, including religious world views, and disillusion with the optimistic trust in inevitable progress that had seemed assured in many quarters and found expression in widely influential 'liberal' theological thought of the time. The centenary of the British Academy in 2002 has provided a most welcome opportunity for reconsidering the contribution of British scholarship to theological and religious studies in the last hundred years. (shrink)

Science and education are different phenomena, but they must be closely interconnected. It is impossible to say that we currently have it in Ukraine. They are practically the process of their formation in parallel. What do we have here?