This study focuses on tractate Baba Mesi‘a’ of the Mishnah, which deals primarily with contracts of various kinds. Lapin's book focuses both on the literary traits of the tractate and, more importantly, attempts to tease out some of the implications of the tractate's depiction of social and economic relationships for an understanding of the history of later Roman Palestine.
This book provides a coherent and conceptual portrayal of aspects of the theological research theme, entitled Ecodomy (literally meaning to ‘build a house’). In its figurative meaning the term Ecodomy addresses the theme, ‘life in its fullness’. This fullness of life entails a polarity which is inherently part of life, namely its brokenness and its wholeness. From various theological di…
The Quechan people live along the lower part of the Colorado River in the United States. According to tradition, the Quechan and other Yuman people were created at the beginning of time, and their Creation myth explains how they came into existence, the origin of their environment, and the significance of their oldest traditions. The Creation myth forms the backdrop against which much of the tr…
"This volume explores aspects of yoga over a period of about 2500 years. In its first part, it investigates facets of the South Asian and Tibetan traditions of yoga, such as the evolution of posture practice, the relationship between yoga and sex, yoga in the theistic context, the influence of Buddhism on early yoga, and the encounter of Islam with classical yoga. The second part addresses aspe…
In recent decades, traditional methods of philology and intellectual history, applied to the study of Islam and Muslim societies, have been met with considerable criticism from rising generations of scholars who have turned to the social sciences, most notably anthropology and social history, for guidance. This change has been accompanied by the rise of new fields, studying, for example, Islam …
"Holy Russia, Sacred Israel examines how Russian religious thinkers, both Jewish and Christian, conceived of Judaism, Jewry and the ‘Old Testament’ philosophically, theologically, and personally at a time when the Messianic element in Russian consciousness was being stimulated by events ranging from the pogroms of the 1880s through two Revolutions and World Wars to exile in Western Europe. …
This volume, the first collection to examine critically the relationship between Jewish education and Jewish identity, makes two important interventions. First, it offers a critical assessment of the relationship between education and identity, arguing that the reification of identity has hampered much educational creativity in the pursuit of this goal, and that the nearly ubiquitous employment…
This book explores the interaction between religion and nationalism in the Chinese societies of mainland China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong. Cheng-tian Kuo analyzes the dominant religions, including Chinese Buddhism, Tibetan Buddhism, Daoism, Christianity, Islam, and folk religions, but he also goes beyond that, showing how in recent decades the Chinese state has tightened its control over religion t…
Sacrifice seems to belong to a religious context of the past. In Sacrifice in Modernity: Community, Ritual, Identity it is demonstrated how sacrificial themes remain an essential element in our post-modern society. The shaping of community, performing rituals and the search for identity, three main characteristics of traditional sacrifice, are dynamics of our modern times as well which cannot b…
This book reflects on the implications of neurobiology and the scientific worldview on aspects of religious experience, belief, and practice. Just as interest in the neurosciences and related fields has burgeoned in contemporary society, interest in the fields of neuroscience and cognitive studies is also growing within the religious studies academy, and reflection on these shifts is well overd…