Investigation of Aspects of Religious Beliefs of the People of Guilan from Prehistory to the Historical Period (North of Iran)

ABSTRACTFuture changes in extreme rainfall arising from climate change may have a significant influence on flood and water erosion control and management strategies to a great extent. The maximum daily rainfall time series were projected for 2020–2049 using six general climate models and two scenarios through artificial neural networks for 22 stations across the north of Iran. The results indicate a reduction of between −3.0 and −0.2% in maximum rainfall for the selected stations and five out of six of the general climate models. The changes in the frequency and magnitude of extreme rainfall were then investigated by fitting a generalized extreme value distribution to the historical (from 1981 to 2010) and projected maximum rainfall. The location parameter of the generalized extreme value distribution fitted to the projected maximum rainfall does not show a significant change while the scale and shape parameters exhibit significant changes compared to the historical period. Estimating the 2, 50 and 100 year return periods showed that the maximum rainfall will have a reduction in the probability of large amounts across the region compared with the base period while the number of extraordinary extreme events may show growth. As a region vulnerable to flash floods and water erosion due to rainfall characteristics and land use change from forest to agriculture, the results may send an alarm to define long term and effective strategies for future flood control management in the region.

Drought is a complex, multi-dimensional, and recurrent natural hazard that impacts on the Earth hydrological and biological systems. The cause–effect relationship of meteorological and hydrological droughts induced the study to aim at evaluating capability of a copula-based joint meteorological–hydrological drought index (MHDI) in identifying overall status of droughts at upstream and downstream of the Kasilian basin. Using three meteorological drought indices (MDIs) including standardized precipitation index (SPI), standardized precipitation evapotranspiration index (SPEI), and reconnaissance drought index (RDI) and one hydrological drought index (i.e., standardized drought index (SDI)), three different combinations of MHDI including SPI–SDI, SPEI–SDI, and RDI–SDI were constructed at the upstream and downstream of the basin. Results of the dependence measures such as Kendall’s τ and chi-plot showed that there were relatively high correlation structure between MDIs and SDI at both upstream and downstream. Evaluation of fitting six popular copula functions on dependence structure of different combinations of meteorological and hydrological drought revealed that the normal, Frank, Gumbel, and Joe copulas were the best-fit functions in most cases, respectively. MHDIs appropriately detected the onset and persisting of historical drought periods at both upstream and downstream of the basin. They satisfactorily responded to joint meteorological and hydrological drought indices. Establishing the normal meteorological (hydrological) condition in the basin could modify the extreme hydrological (meteorological) droughts when employing them in the framework of MHDI.

China’s northern Fujian, as one of the spatial carriers of renowned traditional Chinese cultures such as Minyue, Zhu Xi’s Neo-Confucianism, tea, and porcelain, has preserved a wealth of tangible cultural relics, showcasing a profound cultural heritage and possessing strong research value and development potential. This study employs GIS spatial statistical analysis and map visualization technology to unveil the evolutionary processes of cultural heritage sites in northern Fujian, focusing on their spatial types, forms, and densities across different historical periods. Based on this foundation, the research further delves into the intrinsic relationships between the spatial distribution characteristics of cultural heritage sites in northern Fujian during various historical periods and the local natural and cultural environment. The results indicate that: (1) the spatial distribution of cultural heritage sites in northern Fujian varies across different historical periods, with the highest concentration and quantity observed during the Ming and Qing periods. In contrast, the Qin, Han, Wei, Jin, Northern and Southern Dynasties period exhibits the lowest quantity and a more dispersed distribution. (2) Cultural heritage sites in northern Fujian are mainly distributed in the relatively flat terrain below 400 m above sea level, including middle to low-altitude mountain basins, river valleys, and low hills. In terms of distance from rivers, cultural heritage sites exhibit a clear distribution pattern along rivers, with a large number of them located within 0–6 km from the riverbanks. (3) The spatial distribution of cultural heritage sites in northern Fujian is influenced not only by macro-environmental factors such as topography, altitude, and rivers but also by micro-shaping from social and cultural elements like Minyue culture, tea and porcelain ancient road culture, Zhu Xi’s Neo-Confucianism culture, religious beliefs and customs culture, and red revolutionary culture across different historical periods. This study contributes to the establishment of a model correlating cultural heritage sites with historical periods and provides an interdisciplinary methodological framework to understand the relationship between cultural heritage sites and the geographical environment.

The article examines the place of religious identity, and moral or value components as part of such identity, in artistic texts devoted to the theme of war, in ‘Museum of Abandoned Secrets’ by O. Zabuzhko, and ‘Internat’ by S. Zhadan. These texts deal with wartime in different historical periods and offer us distinct, almost opposite models of the functioning of religion and morality in wartime discourse, which becomes a point of crisis for established identifications, values, and behavior. O. Zabuzhko addresses the events of the Second World War and focuses on the Ukrainian insurgent army fighters. The main character, through the prism of which the story is depicted, offers a model where religious beliefs are organically intertwined with national beliefs, strengthening the ability to endure during the most difficult episodes; morality and values, although transformed considering the military narrative (that is, loyalty and community are defined as the greatest good), remain unchanged: respect for the spiritual remains, for example, prayer, holidays and traditions, the value of human life and the definition of good are recognized. Other characters, to a lesser extent, but in the same way, demonstrate an inextricable connection between religious beliefs and the ability to withstand the war, and in some episodes even the necessity of the presence of a ‘religious’ (Father Yaroslav during the death and burial of one of the soldiers). S. Zhadan forms a model in which belonging to a religion does not play a necessary role for national identification. Religion identity cannot become a marker of self-identification with one of the two flags that collide in the novel. Most likely, the reason is that the inhabitants of the border areas had similar religious beliefs, which did not contribute to a clear national identification (most religious visual markers are associated with Orthodoxy). The churches, although new, are empty, and in front of the crosses that appear occasionally in the text, everyone is baptized in the same way, despite their belonging to the flag. Morality also goes through the transformation of the war chronotope: human life is devalued due to many deaths, and the greatest evil is not even the murder or betrayal itself, but the lack of involvement and the refusal to decide which side you chose as ‘yours’ and take responsibility for it. However, the author nevertheless turns to biblical phenomena and images in the text to describe groups of characters belonging to one of the sides of the war, thus giving them a positive connotation. So, on the one hand, we have common features: the war becomes a challenge to the identity of the characters, reformats certain established human values and morality (definition of good and evil, etc.); the main value is defined as responsibility for one's own decision, community with characters who are on the same side. However, on the other hand, the authors offer different models of the place of religious identity: O. Zabuzhko demonstrates the constructive role of religious beliefs, on the other hand, S. Zhadan demonstrates the emptiness of the religious system, which does not become a way of separation and decision-making. Most likely, such different modeling of religious identity and its role in wartime is due to the different depicted periods and regions of Ukraine.

Melayu: The politics, poetics and paradoxes of Malayness Edited by MAZNAH MOHAMAD and SYED MUHD KHAIRUDIN ALJUNIED Singapore: NUS Press, 2011. Pp. 370. Plates, Notes, Bibliography, Index. doi: 10.1017/S0022463413000428 Is Melayu (or Malayness) a category of ethnicity? Race? Nation? Politics? Culture? Language? Geography? The answer seems to be all of the above. Melayu signifies differently in different countries of Southeast Asia, and its meanings are constantly being redefined for various ideological purposes. It can only be explored, not comprehended or defined (Maier, p. 321). Due to the confusing nature of the term it is tempting to throw up one's hands (and some scholars have!). Nevertheless the field of Malay studies has expanded recently, with several books, articles, and special issues of journals published in the last decade. The difficulty of defining Melayu does not diminish its significance; rather, the problematic nature of the term is precisely the reason for its continued interrogation. To the scholars who have thrown up their hands, Malayness as an ethnic category is no more problematic than any other ethnic category. And the stakes are high. Malayness as a marker of ethnic identity signifies everyday struggles over the nature and practice of citizenship, community, and rights. The essays in this book attempt to move the question away from the primordialist colonial discourse about 'who or is (a) Malay?' to Malayness as a discursive practice: 'Who (defines) Malayness?' and 'When was (is) Malayness used as a category for grouping people together and for what ideological purposes?' The authors do not ignore primordialist claims, but interrogate them as constructed categories in particular social contexts: 'Who gets to enjoy the privileged status of Malayness and who is excluded from those privileges?' These questions are deeply grounded in historical and material contexts: 'What conditions made it possible to think about being Malay in particular ways and not others?' The introduction ably demonstrates that Malayness cannot be conceptualised as a single entity. For example, the book begins with three epigraphs from different historical periods and geographical locations, in which Malayness is represented in terms of race, kinship, and nationhood. The solution to understanding Melayu, as proposed by the editors Maznah Mohamad and Syed Muhd Khairudin Aljunied, is to 'view Melayu as a signifier that brings to mind a whole array of associations--places, languages, families, communities, nation-states, cultural symbols, events, texts, collectives, political parties and religious beliefs' (p. xiv). The book constitutes twelve chapters arranged in four geographical areas: Malaysia (5), Singapore (3), Indonesia and the Philippines (2), and across nations (2). Melayu does not circumscribe a geographical place, but it does take place in specific places. Further, although the latter two chapters are subsumed within the 'across nations' section, several other chapters deal with trans-local topics (for example, the chapters by Aljunied, van der Putten, and Curaming). In addition to the geographic organisation of chapters, the book emphasises three 'dimensions which illuminate the various associations by which Malayness is built upon': politics, poetics, and paradoxes (p. xv). These 'dimensions' intersect and so it is difficult to pinpoint exactly which chapters align with which dimensions. Politics refers to not only who is granted privileges based on being defined as Malay (for example, in Malaysia, where Malays are 'first among equals'), but also the institutions that grant 'the right to define and determine the boundaries of Malayness' (p. xv). Poetics refers to narratives of Malayness in colonial texts and contemporary novels and poetry. Politics and poetics are deeply imbricated: discourses about Melayu are expressed in different ways according to historical and political contexts, and forms of expression can be mined for political meanings. …

Introduction Kathryn Hellerstein (bio) In 1890, the Hebrew Haskalah poet Judah Leib Gordon asked, "Jewish woman, who knows your life? / In darkness you have come, in darkness do you go." Nashim no. 19 offers an illuminating response to this poetic pronouncement of 120 years ago. During the centuries that they were muses, subjects, addressees and readers of poetry by men, Jewish women themselves wrote poems that revealed their lives and endure as living artifacts of Jewish culture. They wrote and published in the Jewish languages—Yiddish, Ladino and Hebrew among them—as well as in the languages of the wider world—including English, German, French, Spanish, Italian, Arabic and Persian. However, as late as the mid-twentieth century, Jewish women poets rarely found large audiences, and most of their poetry survived in obscurity. Until recently, too, this vast body of work was ignored as a topic of scholarship; but, once studied, its value becomes evident. Poems by Jewish women record the lives they led, their religious beliefs, aesthetic and political ideologies, sexual practices, education and work in the world. Far beyond their contributions to socio-historical knowledge, however, the poems survive as works of art that expand the range of Jewish culture. Nashim 19 presents nine scholarly articles that engage issues of gender across languages, cultures, and historical periods. We also feature previously unpublished poems and translations by nine women poets and translators. The issue opens with literary tradition. Anne Lapidus Lerner's "Back to the Beginning" explores the roles played by Eve and the Garden of Eden in four contemporary poems, by two American and two Israeli women poets. Each reclaims Eve and reinterprets Genesis. In sequences of poems about Eve in Eden, American poets Linda Pastan and Kim Chernin invoke traditions of English poetry through gendered tropes of gardens and eroticism. In contrast, Israeli poets Techiyah Bat-Oren and Ruḥama Weiss summon classical Jewish literature. Thus, in Bat-Oren's "She Finally Speaks," Eve [End Page 5] challenges the rabbinic condemnation, conveyed in the seventeenth-century Yiddish midrashic compilation Tsenerene, that threatened women with death in childbirth unless they lit the Sabbath candles to atone for her disobedience. Wendy Zierler's "Race and Gender in Modern Hebrew Poems about Numbers 12" extends the dialogue between modern poets and biblical texts into a political discourse, by way of three Hebrew poets who reread Numbers 12, where Miriam responds to Moses' "taking" a Cushite woman. A ballad-sermon by the American Hebrew poet Ephraim Lisitzky, modeled both on "Negro sermons" and on Jewish midrash, "indicts Miriam" as a racist of the American South. Two poems by the Israeli Yokheved Bat-Miriam champion Miriam as an icon for modern Jewish women and celebrate her demand for recognition as a prophet. A 1988 poem by the Israeli Rivka Miriam comments on the Cushite woman as a marker of clarity against the Israelites' wanderings in the white desert—and perhaps also as a symbol of the struggles of the Ethiopian Jews then arriving in Israel. In "A Boat of Light: Zoharic Images in Zelda's Poetry," Nitza Kann considers how Jewish mystical imagery figures in the poems of the twentieth-century Israeli poet Zelda. Through close readings of Zelda's modern poems in conjunction with the kabbalistic texts of the Zohar, Kann discusses the role of both types of texts in "aspir[ing] to express the inexpressible." Through hermeneutics, Kann argues that Zelda's poems call forth "the diverse character of the divine female, the Shekhinah," as a trope for "the female's vantage point upon herself." Naomi Brenner expands Jewish literary tradition to include Yiddish and Hebrew modernism in her article "Slippery Selves: Rachel Bluvstein and Anna Margolin in Poetry and in Public." Brenner interrogates the perceptions and self-representations of women poets through the works of modernist poets Rachel Bluvstein, in Hebrew, and Anna Margolin, in Yiddish, who, she argues, are "remembered … first and foremost as women." Yet both poets used the minimalist aesthetics of Russian Acmeism to create "sophisticated lyric personas," which contemporary critics, blinded by conventional ideas of femininity, mostly failed to perceive. Developing the question of how women Yiddish poets are perceived, Rebecca Margolis, in "Remembering Two...

As the history of science has matured as an intellectual discipline, its practices have gone beyond the mere chronology of change to a deeper analysis of the relationships among ideas, beliefs, institutional structures, and broad cultural currents.' Such analyses have tended to concentrate on the research programs the professional scientific activities of those scientists principally involved in significant change. This is of course reasonable, since it is in research notebooks and specialized publications that the major contributions are to be found. Attempts to discover the influences on a scientist's work have focused on the educational background of the individual being studied and his/her private correspondence with professional colleagues.2 An additional source of insight into the nature of science that has received little attention from historians is the scientist's relationship with the public, in terms of both lectures, articles, and books intended for nonprofessional audiences, and correspondence with members of the lay public concerning the content of published material. Analysis of the "popular works" of scientists may reveal philosophical positions, religious beliefs, and social concerns that were not stated in their more specialized publications, but that nevertheless played a role in their professional accomplishments. The degree to which such analysis is fruitful depends not only on which scientist or group of scientists is being studied, but also the historical period under consideration. The distinction between popular and professional

This chapter examines how in the immediate aftermath of the Revolution of 1789 Chateaubriand sought an overarching explanation for all revolutions. In his Essai sur les révolutions, where he considers different countries and historical periods, he concludes that revolution springs from a perennial human sense of lack, or melancholy. Following the renewal of his Christian faith he argues in the Génie du christianisme that this sense of lack is best assuaged not by progressive politics but by religious belief, which he sees as the foundation of a new monarchical order in society. For him poetry—in the sense of literature of the imagination that appeals particularly to sentiment—provides the most effective means of inspiring and sustaining Christian faith, as he seeks to demonstrate in the poetic prose of Atala and René.

Two hundred years after Marcus Aurelius’ death, Christianity was no longer the religion of a persecuted minority. Roman Catholicism had become the official state religion of Rome and was rapidly replacing Stoicism as the dominant personal philosophy of Romans of all classes, from slaves to the very wealthy (Brown, 2012). Christianity changed the way that the ancient world thought about the fundamentals of life and has had an enormous impact on Western philosophy and psychology ever since.

The article reveals the importance of folklore material as a source for studying the material components of the traditional culture of the Yakuts, examines the complex of traditional women's jewelry depicted in the Yakut heroic epic olonkho. The relevance and novelty of the research is due to the fact that this topic has not been sufficiently studied in the Yakut folklore studies. For the first time, the Yakut olonkho acts as a means of broadcasting the development of blacksmith's craft, religious beliefs and ethnocultural values of the Sakha people, and also confirms the antiquity of the existence of certain women's jewelry made of metals. As part of the study, a linguocultural analysis of women's traditional jewelry from olonkho texts was carried out. Women's traditional jewelry of the Yakuts, united according to the principle of their location on certain parts of the human body, is divided into the following groups: head jewelry, neck-chest ornaments, loincloths, hand ornaments and sewn-on ornaments. The following conclusion was made: the complex of women's traditional jewelry concentrates in itself the Yakut mentality, formed over a long historical period. The rich material olonkho contains important information not only about the types of jewelry, but also reveals the functional characteristics of jewelry, the shape and material of their manufacture. Yukut jewelry as an important component and integral part of the traditional costume in olonkho is described in one formulation. In the texts of the epic, traditional jewelry complements the image of kuo women, heroic women and udagan women. Olonkho heroines wear jewelry on special occasions, such as when welcoming honored guests, on holidays, and as protective gear in combat. The epic olonkho is characterized by a high degree of aesthetic attitude to reality; in this sense, women's traditional jewelry acquires the features of a holistic artistic generalization.

This paper addresses the relationship between geology and religion in Portugal by focusing on three case studies of naturalists who produced original research and lived in different historical periods, from the eighteenth to the twentieth century. Whereas in non-peripheral European countries religious themes and even controversies between science and religion were dealt with by scientists and discussed in scientific communities, in Portugal the absence of a debate between science and religion within scientific and intellectual circles is particularly striking. From the historiographic point of view, in a country such as Portugal, where Roman Catholicism is part of the religious and cultural tradition, the influence of religion in all aspects of life has been either taken for granted by those less familiar with the national context or dismissed by local intellectuals, who do not see it as relevant to science. The situation is more complex than these dichotomies, rendering the study of this question particularly appealing from the historiographic point of view, geology being by its very nature a well-suited point from which to approach the theme. We argue that there is a long tradition of independence between science and religion, agnosticism and even atheism among local elites. Especially from the eighteenth century onwards, they are usually portrayed as enlightened minds who struggled against religious and political obscurantism. Religion—or, to be more precise, the Roman Catholic Church and its institutions—was usually identified with backwardness, whereas science was seen as the path to progress; consequently men of science usually dissociated their scientific production from religious belief.

In Prehistoric times, the regions of Osroene were the center of simple societies. Later, with the historical periods, the belief in polytheism spread among the peoples of the region, such as the Hurrians, which manifested itself in natural phenomena and a holy city such as Haran, which is associated with Abraham. There was also the emergence of the Sabeans, which was a religious group, and continued until the Islamic era. On the other hand, the city has been the center of the worship of the moon god Sin since ancient times. These factors became the reasons which led the area, especially the capital Edessa, to become a holy place for Christians. As a result, the first Christianity spreads were associated with King Abgar V of the Osroene Kingdom, making it a holy city for Christians.

Speak in professional terms, a museum about Lithuanian book, which is undergoing the period of establishment, is a kind of a book museum, a new kind of the museum at all, and can be called Lithuanian book museum. Its main objective should be to collect, store, preserve, research and exhibit such a complex and multiform phenomenon as Lithuanian book, revealing its main features from the historical as well as from the modern point of view. The exposition should reflect the overall cycle of book existence in the society, that part of Lithuanian cultural and material life, which should witness the appearance of the book, its development and existence dating back to the first facts of documentary communication until the present day. What is Lithuanian book, what is the 19th century Lithuanian book, what should the exposition contents of this particular historical period in Lithuania be? Lithuanian book embraces all the printed matter in all the languages (not only in Lithuanian) published in the territory of Lithuania, including manuscripts as well, especially for the analysis of the very early stages of book development. Thus, matter, published in Lithuania and beyond its borders, to satisfy the needs of Lithuanian inhabitants with heterogeneous cultural background and language and different religious beliefs. The 19th century Lithuanian book is a complicated subject both for researchers of book history and founders of book museums as well. Historiography of book research has an agreed structural division of Lithuanian book identifying books in Lithuanian and foreign language, Minor Lithuania’s and Great Lithuania’s and emigrants’ books. This division seems to be suitable for the exposition in a book museum. Having existed in different conditions and having their own peculiarities the books of emigrants and those of Minor and Great Lithuania could be exhibited separately on their own, presenting the history of book in a chronological order. Creating the 19th century Great Lithuania book exposition, special attention should be made to the periods of book development and its peculiarities. The bottom line of the 19th century book history is the year of 1795, when Lithuania was integrated into Russian Empire after the third division of Polish-Lithuanian State and the country experienced the occupation period of over a hundred years. The development of the book as well as the overall life in the state was under the influence of dynamic and complicated political, economic and cultural changes. The policy of tolerance towards political and cultural identity on the newly annexed territory was changed into the policy „of destruction and annihilation of the origins“, which used to differentiate the territory from Russia, or „reestablishment“ of them. The consequence of this were the crucial changes in control and surveillance measures of the printed matter, the restriction on the usage of the Polish and Lithuanian languages and the introduction of the Russian language into the public life of the country. At the same time Lithuanian as well as other European countries were experiencing the period of rebirth and revival. The beginning of ethno-cultural movement modified the approach towards national languages and the publication of books in those languages. The top part of 19th century book development is the year of 1904. That time saw the abolishment of the ban on printed matter in Latin script, the latter fact having had the fatal influence on the existence of the book in the second part of the 19th century. The 40-year ban on printed matter sets itself apart in the development of the book and should comprise a separate part in the exposition of the 19th century book of Great Lithuania.

What is (or was) the distinctive feature of postmodern thinking? Despite the heterogeneity of postmodern approaches, there are two features which are not necessarily constitutive but paradigmatic for many postmodern approaches. The first feature refers to the assumption that a certain x is either impossible or nonexistent (truth, objectivity, historical facts, education for autonomy, etc.), a feature often rather selectively ascribed to a certain domain or problem (e.g. objective facts do not exist, but climate change does). The second feature (which is, in a way, the performative affirmation of the first feature) consists in a philosophical and sociological diagnosis that provides a justificatory and metaphorical framework to make sense of the first feature (such as the grand narrative of the end of grand narratives), in many cases without, however, actually providing arguments for the relevant positions, whose truth is just more or less dogmatically assumed (‘That’s just the way it is, things will never be the same …’). This rather paradoxical combination of dogmatism and anti-dogmatism, anti-realism and realism and universalism and relativism which is distinctive of many postmodern approaches expresses itself in an almost religious belief in the epistemological and evaluative framework that grounds one’s own position and an equally radical disbelief in the potential power of arguments that may question this framework. Taking this into account, it is perhaps a less ironic peculiarity of the postmodern project, that it aimed at the deconstruction and critique of all normative, metaphysical and epistemological foundations, but in most cases abstained from applying this project to its own theoretical assumptions and core values. Along these lines, it has often been argued that postmodernity as a philosophical and political movement is itself expressive of radicalised versions of modern conceptions of individual liberty and autonomy (Taylor, 1989), that bear a striking resemblance to neo-liberal interpretations of these values which emerged at the same historical period. This is also why many allegedly ‘postmodern’ critiques of autonomy and liberty as educational aims are not postmodern in a strict sense, because they cannot plausibly be understood as complete departures from Enlightenment ideals (Culp, 2017). Thus, it is not very surprising that many postmodern approaches have inherited some of the predominant tensions of modernity (such as potential tensions between the value of autonomy and authenticity), without providing the conceptual and theoretical tools to make sense of these tensions. As a philosophical and political project that aimed at a fundamental critique of modernity and modern philosophy, postmodernism has certainly posed a variety of important questions concerning the justification of ethical, political, epistemic and aesthetic validity claims. This project, however, ultimately failed, among others, because it was not able to provide a plausible account and justification of its own evaluative foundations.

Sensory studies is an interdisciplinary field connecting insights from history, anthropology, sociology, philosophy, religion, literature, and art to the scientific study of human perception. Though research in this field draws upon a wide variety of methodologies and focuses on different historical periods and geographical areas, it is unified through a core tenet: that the human sensorium is as much a cultural, historical, and aesthetic phenomenon as it is an environmental and a biological one. Social mores, geographies, religious beliefs, and individual abilities shape perception in uniquely cultural ways. Put more succinctly, sensory studies, as a field, argues for the cultural study of the senses and the sensuous study of culture. And language is squarely at the center of scholarly questions about perception; literary studies thus provides useful methodological tools for understanding not only how we represent visceral experiences (such as sensation) to others through language but also how these strategies have changed over time. The study of literature and the senses emphasizes the important role of language in representing visceral experience and the important role of aesthetics and history in shaping literary representations.