Contacts between the Major Religious Traditions during their Expansion. An Introduction

Abstract

This chapter illustrates the imbrications between exogenous and endogenous factors of religious expansion. It highlights the concrete settings that accelerated or impeded such forms of transfer - be it patronage, institutional consolidation or active propagation - and defines the effect such movements had upon different religious traditions - for example in the form of systematization or adaptation. Both dynamic nodes of religious transfer such as monasteries, courts or centres of education and push-factors such as mission or the translocation of sacred places facilitated and enhanced the expansion of religious ideas both within and between Europe and Asia. Keywords:Asia; Europe; religious expansion; religious traditions; religious transfer processes