Religious Arguments Research Articles

Re-Thinking a Matrilineal Myth of Healing: Tuareg Medicine Women, Islam, and the Market in Niger

Abstract This article explores the changing metaphoric logic and contextual uses of a mythical-historical popular religious account of matrilineal origins of herbal medicine women among Tuareg in northern Niger. Medicine women both reproduce and modify this origin myth’s motif in their Tamajaq-speaking, Muslim, traditionally ranked, and semi-nomadic communities, where many have faced religious, socioeconomic, and political upheavals challenging local women’s material wealth and symbolic/cultural capital of authoritative medico-ritual healing. How is medicine women’s healing legacy evoked and re-interpreted in encounters with Qur’anic healing and western biomedicine, as impacted by recent religious debates, neoliberal structural adjustments, droughts, sedentarization, and political violence? The Tuareg data offer fresh perspectives on how religion and economy co-produce each other in some contexts, but contradict each other in others. More broadly, this article critically disrupts categories of sacred and secular, tradition and modernity, and brings mythico-histories into discussions of intertwining religious and economic idioms, practices, and infrastructures.

Islam, Religious Confrontation and Hoaxes in the Digital Public Sphere: Comparison of Bangladesh and Indonesia

Religion has a considerable contribution to the creation of present Bangladesh and Indonesia. Historically, religious communalism is common in these two regions and its presence is visible to date. Like other countries, both countries are moving more toward digitalization with a good number of digital migrants, making the internet a digital public sphere. Like offline society, online is now becoming a place of religious dakwah and contentions as well. Digital space offers both opportunities and challenges for the democratic religious public sphere. This article discusses the similarity and differences of online religious public spheres between Indonesia and Bangladesh. The research was conducted in 2021 observing social media particularly Facebook. This research finds that the online religious public sphere witnesses online piety, religious deliberation, the spread of religious hoaxes, and Islamism. While in Bangladesh, online disinformation leads to religious communalism and offline violence against religious minorities, in Indonesia, the digital public sphere is largely dominated by religious discourses argumentation among Muslims and the rise of post-Islamism. The online public sphere of both countries similarly witnesses the rise of hoaxes, post-truth, and banal religion.

@Indonesiatanpafeminis.id as a Challenge of Feminist Movement in Virtual Space.

The fast-growing social media in Indonesia has opened up opportunities for spreading feminist ideas to a wider and more diverse audience. Various social media accounts especially Instagram that focus on gender advocacy and feminism such as @indonesiafeminis, @lawanpatriarki, and @feminismanis have developed in Indonesia. However, the development of the social media platform also presents groups that oppose feminists. One of the accounts of women’s groups that oppose feminists is @indonesiatanpafeminis.id (@indonesiawithoutfeminist.id). The research objectives are namely to analyze the diversity of issues and reveal the discourse contestation that developed in the @indonesiatanpafeminis.id, and dynamic relationships on the online and offline spaces between groups of feminists and anti-feminists or the other interest. This research employed the digital ethnography method that utilized observation, interview, and literature study as data collection techniques. This study found that the online conversations at @indonesiatanpafeminis.id revealed misconceptions on feminism from a group of women with a religious identity. Furthermore, the conversation also tends to strengthen patriarchal values with religious arguments that are gender-biased. However, the @indonesiatanpafeminis.id serves as a public space for open debates and education on feminist issues. The anti-feminist group behind the @indonesiatanpafeminis.id are women who identify themselves in a certain Muslim circle that has political, cultural, and religious agendas. One of the agendas is to influence the public to reject the Sexual Violence Eradication Bill. This study also noted the Muslim supporters of anti-feminism in Indonesia are less popular compared to progressive religious-based Muslim women organizations such as Aisyiyah (Muhammadiyah), Muslimat NU (Nahdlatul Ulama), and Rahima (Center for Education and Information on Islam and Women’s Rights). The study also evokes discussion on how the feminist and anti-feminist discourses can be utilized to criticize and develop the women’s movement or feminism in a multicultural context.

Empire of Hell: Religion and the Campaign to End Convict Transportation in the British Empire, 1788-1875, by Hilary Carey

Reviewed by: Empire of Hell: Religion and the Campaign to End Convict Transportation in the British Empire, 1788–1875 by Hilary Carey Ann Curthoys (bio) Empire of Hell: Religion and the Campaign to End Convict Transportation in the British Empire, 1788–1875, by Hilary Carey; pp. xii + 359. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2019, $99.99, $34.99 paper, £75.00, £26.99 paper. Hilary Carey’s Empire of Hell: Religion and the Campaign to End Convict Transportation in the British Empire, 1788–1875 provides a fresh, detailed perspective on British and colonial [End Page 458] debates over convict transportation. The notion of Britain’s transportation system and its penal colonies as a hell on earth was a powerful one in the period and retains considerable hold today. In tracing the political, religious, and cultural contexts of the system’s creation and dissemination, Carey unsettles a good deal of popular understanding and academic scholarship. The 1780s to the 1870s saw intense, troubled debates in Britain and its penal colonies over how lawbreakers should be punished, with varying views on the role and effectiveness of physical punishment, the penitentiary, and transportation. Entwined with debates over the advantages of one system or another was the question of what purposes punishment should serve. Should it be designed primarily to deter further crime? Was it best seen as a necessary form of retribution and justice? Or should it aim to reform the offender? Supporters and opponents of transportation could emphasize its horrors: the former so that fear of transportation would deter further crime, and the latter to secure reform or, increasingly, abolition of the system altogether. With religious figures and ideas prominent among both the architects and opponents of transportation, religion becomes in Carey’s hands an excellent lens through which to rethink the history of British convict transportation. Carey’s detailed study begins with Anglican Evangelicals who thought imprisonment should aim to reform the offender. These Evangelicals could be found among both opponents and supporters of transportation. Evangelical members of Parliament joined with Whig and Liberal reformers to form the Prison Discipline Society in 1816, which campaigned against transportation and for improved prison discipline. Yet one of the chief managers and defenders of transportation, George Arthur, was also an Anglican Evangelical. As governor of Van Diemen’s Land from 1823 to 1837, he firmly believed that transportation could achieve reform and, under his regime, clergy participated in the reforming project. As a penal administrator, Carey writes, Arthur was “scrupulous and fair-minded” (57) and much admired by two visiting Quakers, James Backhouse and George Washington Walker, who were “travelling under concern” in the Australian penal colonies (80). Quakers figured variously in the debates over punishment; while those who had visited the colonies generally supported transportation, those campaigning in Britain, such as Elizabeth Fry, sought and to some degree achieved prison reform at home. In the early 1830s, Governor Arthur engaged in a major dispute over transportation with the Anglican Archbishop of Dublin, Richard Whateley, a dispute that Carey characterizes as “the intellectual high point in religious debate” on transportation (71). Whateley strongly disagreed with Arthur’s view that religion had a role to play in reform of the convict through transportation and wanted the system abolished entirely. Transportation’s chief purpose, deterrence against further crime, was undermined, he argued, by the uncertainty and slowness of the system and the fact that, for the poor, it was less something to be feared than a chance for a new life. Another important figure, Reverend William Ullathorne, Roman Catholic Vicar General of New South Wales, originated the term the “horrors of transportation” after a visit to a Norfolk Island penal settlement in 1834 (148). Appalled by what he witnessed, Ullathorne became an eloquent opponent of the system, characterizing convicts as slaves without earnings and magistrates as having far too much power over convict lives. He was, in Carey’s view, exceptional [End Page 459] for his absence of contempt for the culprit; he asked that the convict be “imagined not as a social outcast but as a penitent whose physical torments recalled the suffering body of Christ” (142–43). One valuable chapter in Empire...

Political Claims, an Extensible Name, and a Divine Mission: Ideology of Russian Expansion in Siberia

Abstract This article examines the ideology of Russian expansion in Siberia from the second half of the sixteenth to the early eighteenth century, focusing on several interrelated pillars that shaped this ideology. The first is the category of political-legal-force. Based on the legal incorporation of the Siberian Khanate into Muscovy in 1555 the Russians began to move further east, until they reached the Pacific and the borders of China and Mongolia. These territories were also declared parts of Siberia, and the Russians consequently believed they had a legal claim to its possession. Thus, one could say that Siberia as a territory was amorphous—the boundaries of the region “ended” wherever the Russians came up against powerful entities capable of opposing their expansion. The second pillar of Russian expansion drew on religious arguments. However, the Church followed in the wake of the explorers and tended not to pursue goals of its own.

The Role of Catholicism in Shaping a Culture of Sustainable Consumption

The paper presents the potential of religions, in particular Christianity, in shaping a culture of sustainable consumption (a culture of moderation). It focuses on the contribution of the Catholic tradition, which is, to some extent, complemented by statements representing other Christian denominations. Based on an analysis of relevant sources, it identifies risks arising from the prevalence of a consumer culture, which results in the primacy of “having” over “being” and reduces man to a Homo consumens. Moreover, the widespread culture of consumerism is associated with a so-called throwaway culture dominated by a disposable mentality making use of things and people. It also points to one of the key elements of consumer culture (a culture of overuse) in the form of so-called neophilia, resulting in the weakening of interpersonal relationships, the atomization of societies, and depletion of the Earth’s resources, combined with reckless wastefulness. An analysis of consumer culture leads to the identification of elements that underpin a culture of moderation, being an antidote to dangers arising from the prevalence of consumer culture. The most important elements shaping a model of culture that is man- and environment-friendly include a new model of progress, a mentality of communion, and a new lifestyle. It is a model of progress, which is not limited merely to economics, but takes into account the need for integral human development and appreciates the spiritual and cultural sphere of life. In order to build a culture of moderation, a communion mentality is needed to restore interpersonal relationships and make man aware of his relation to the whole community of life. Another important element of a culture of moderation is a new lifestyle which takes into account all human needs, respects the potential of the natural environment, and is characterized by intra-generational and inter-generational responsibility. There is much to suggest that Christianity has the potential to make a significant contribution to reducing the culture of overuse and promoting a culture of moderation. The influence of Catholic thought on shaping a culture of sustainable consumption is illustrated by the introduction of restrictions on Sunday shopping in Poland in 2018. This case study shows the importance of religious arguments in introducing legal changes and their impact on promoting a culture of moderation.

Animal Care and Ethics in Contemporary Religious Debates

Can religious worldview help humans respect non-human-animals, and achieve a better, more balanced environment? Since Lynn White wrote a damming essay against the Judeo-Christian religion, the answer to the question among most environmental ethicists has often beenon the negative. Lynn White had accused the Western Judeo-Christian worldview as been anthropocentric. Anthropocentrism is the worldview that places humanity at the center of all moral concern, hence, such a worldview enhances the conditions for human exploitation of non-human animals. The Judeo-Christian worldview specifically holds that the Universe was created and fine-tuned for the creation of the human species in particular. On a personal level, this ideology drives the fragile Human ego to think that the God of the Universe created everything on earth for human consumption and domination. Hence, many scholars believe that such a worldview is seen and dominant among most religions across the world. This paper attempt to join the contemporary debates on religious worldview and Animal ethics.Against the popular notion, this paper argues that mostReligious traditions have often been the primary movers of a compassionate engagement with other lives. Thus, religious persons can still respect and conserve animals irrespective of their religion.

Response of Millennial Muslims to Religious Minority Groups in Indonesia

Religious minority groups have historically been positioned as the trigger for religious and social disharmony. This paper aims to explore the millennial Muslims’ basis for their positioning towards minority groups in Indonesia. The data collected through questionnaires, interviews, and document studies were analyzed and then converted into narrative form, tables, diagrams, and charts. The findings show that there are two millennial Muslim responses towards religious minority groups. First, some are responding with acceptance of non-Islamic affiliated minority groups. Of the 412 surveyed respondents, 280 or 67, 96% stated their acceptance based on the juridical-constitutional reason that every citizen has the same rights and obligations, including the rights to live and obey the law. Representing the second millennial response, most respondents also rejected Islamic-affiliated minority groups. 383 respondents (93%) stated this rejection noting that they believe in the existence of these groups damaging Islam’s image. The different forms of response are based on theological, juridical, and cultural reasons that can be found in religious arguments, legislation, and values of the local wisdom of the Indonesians. This study proposes the need of building better understanding among millennial Muslims regarding social diversity in Indonesia, and finding common ground for these differences that can be applied to avoid religious conflicts in the future.

Women in Public Sphere after The Implementation of Islamic Sharia in Aceh

This article discusses several activities intended for Acehnese women after the implementation of Islamic sharia. Activities aimed at women in public spaces have an impact on the marginalization and narrowing of women's public spaces. This article also explicitly provides an overview and analysis of what actually happened to Acehnese women so that it appears that there is a problem of the domination of male power over women based on religious, cultural, and political arguments. The purpose of this article is for the public to understand that the Aceh government has made policies aimed at women in the public sphere with the support of Wilayatul Hisbah, which has an impact on the marginalization of women. It is found that after the implementation of Islamic law in 2001 until now, in Aceh, there have been domestication of women with various regulations (qonuns) as well as text interpretations which are used as legitimacy by the power of conservative ideology on progressive understanding. This article makes Aceh a focus area. This article is based on the literature as a secondary source as well as interviews with experts.

Ahlus Sunnah Views of COVID-19 in Social Media: The Islamic Preaching by Gus Baha and Abdus Somad

The Covid-19 pandemic, which occurred in line with the massive transformation of digital media, was a significant moment that enabled diverse Islamic preachers to use media to advance their own interests. However, little has been discussed regarding the religious responses to the COVID-19 performed by Ahlus Sunnah community members or those who are not inclined to participate in radical activities. By analyzing two important Ahlus Sunnah figures, Gus Baha and Abdus Somad, this article focuses on the group’s COVID-19 views on social media, which represents their motives, perspectives, strategies, and theological views to encourage Muslims to have certain mindsets on the virus. Given that Abdul Somad Official account around $1400- 21,700 per month with 950 thousand subscribers and Gus Baha Official account around $5-75 with 500 thousand subscribers, this article investigates their religious/ theological perspectives on COVID-19 and the extent to which they represent religious moderate viewpoints as the solution of the COVID-19. It argues that their YouTube or Facebook channels have enabled the birth of religious moderate arguments on COVID-19 rooted in the Ahlus Sunnah movement. Unlike well-established scientific perspectives on Covid-19 that spread out through official government channels or television, Gus Baha and Abdus Somad’s viewpoints have been relatively independent from medical networks, but highly dependent on Ahlus Sunnah movements. With a high number of offline and online followers, it demonstrates the potential of their status as religious influencers on COVID-19 based on Ahlus Sunnah viewpoints in Indonesia.

Why Using Religious Arguments in the Euthanasia Discussion is Problematic


 
 
 
 In discussions about assisted dying (euthanasia, assisted suicide), those who argue ‘against’ legalisation often reason from a religious angle, whereas those ‘in favour’ adopt a secular stance. The Dutch experience is more nuanced: here, euthanasia advocacy largely originated from protestant religious believers. In this contribution, I criticise the use of religious arguments favouring any specific position. Religion may provide a heuristic context to explore norms relevant in the discussion, and religion may help us formulate our personal stance. But when it comes to societal debates (often focusing on whether or not to legalise euthanasia), we should concentrate on legal, societal, empirical, and ethical arguments that are understandable to all.
 
 
 

„Sąsiedzi Europy i europejscy sąsiedzi ”? Polityka rozszerzenia UE i Europejska Polityka Sąsiedztwa w debatach Sejmu 2004-2014

“Europe’s neighbours and European neighbours”? EU enlargement and European Neighbourhood Policy in Sejm’s debates 2004-2014 Main aim of this article is an analysis of discursive legitimising practices of selected EU policies. The study focuses on the Sejm’s debates in which the issue of EU Enlargement and European Neighbourhood Policy with special focus on Eastern Partnership (since 2008) were discussed between 2004 and 2014. The analysis answers the question which aspects of these policies are the most controversial today and why. How political actors perceive the future of the policies? Typical arguments used in debates concentrate on security, economic costs and benefits and the impact on the European integration. However in presented study special attention is paid to cultural, religious and identitarian arguments used by political actors.

Clerical associations in Qatar and the United Arab Emirates: soft power competition in Islamic politics

Abstract In the wake of the 2011 Arab uprisings, the wealthy Gulf states of Qatar and the United Arab Emirates began hosting and establishing associations of influential Islamic scholars. These clerical associations, the Doha-based International Union for Muslim Scholars (IUMS) and the Abu Dhabi-based Muslim Council of Elders (MCE) and associated peace initiatives, have afforded a platform for more credibly entering into religious and political debates, for cultivating new networks of influence among Muslim publics, and engaging non-Islamic countries and organizations. Drawing upon interviews and primary resources, this study investigates this exercise in religious statecraft, comparing the discourse and policy interventions of these associations, and analysing their improbable challenge to the predominant religious terms set by the traditional heavyweight in the Gulf, Saudi Arabia. It finds that the effectiveness, or resonance, of these religious soft power projects depends upon credibility—their alignment with national religious traditions and policy directions—and positioning—the targeting of particular audiences and stakeholders. It concludes that the UAE holds certain advantages over Qatar in its soft power positioning in the current nationalist moment, as states gain ground over transnational Islamic movements and relations with powers such as India, Russia, China and Israel—all hostile to independent Islamic movements—gain in importance. Policy-makers acknowledging the surprising hard power projection of these small states through military interventions and economic leverage may benefit from this study of their new religious soft power influence.

Ancestral Monuments, Iconoclasm, and Memorial Culture in the Sixteenth-Century Low Countries

This contribution assesses the impact of the Protestant Reformation and iconoclasm on the memorial culture of tombs, epitaphs, and rituals in the Low Countries (c. 1520-1585), and analyses the consequences these events had on ancestral remembrance. Demonstrating how Protestant critiques and iconoclastic attacks fundamentally endangered the archival function of churches, it argues that this imminent threat to memory provoked a heightened awareness of the ancestral past in the later sixteenth century. Most significantly, it shows that this precarious situation led to the genesis of a new type of commemorative manuscript, the épitaphier, in which heraldic, genealogical, and other information on various types of memorial monuments in churches was recorded. In tracing the production and dissemination of these épitaphiers, the article casts new light on the pan-European heraldic and ‘genealogical craze’ in this period: while English scholars have emphasized social dynamics as explanation, this essay puts forward the religious debates as a hitherto neglected factor, and demonstrates how the two interlocked.

The story of Nana Sita and the Group Areas Act

Nana Sita (1898–1969) is best known for being the secretary of the Transvaal Indian Congress and for his leadership in the passive resistance movement for which he was incarcerated three times. This article focusses specifically on three more times he was sentenced to hard labour for refusing to submit to the Group Areas Act and to leave his (business and) house at 382 Van Der Hoff Street in Hercules, Pretoria. The main sources for telling the story of Nana Sita’s resistance are interviews with his 93-year-old daughter, a chapter written on him by E.S. Reddy and other unpublished material placed at the author’s disposal by Maniben Sita herself. The focus of the article will be on the religious arguments against the Group Areas Act put forward by Nana Sita himself in his defense during his final trial in 1967.Contribution: Historical thought and source interpretation are not limited to historic texts but include social memory in the endeavour of faith seeking understanding. People of faith in South Africa can only come to grips with reality by engaging with the stories of the past, like that of Nana Sita.

The Reception of Spinoza’s Theological-Political Treatise in the Islamic Republic of Iran

In the form of a case study and based upon novel material about the reception of Spinoza’s Theological–Political Treatise (TTP) in Iran, this paper studies issues with the interactions among political, theological and philosophical ideas in the reception of Spinoza’s TTP. The paper starts with the first Iranian encounters with Spinoza’s philosophy in the Qajar era in the nineteenth century and then focuses on the reception of the TTP in the period after the 1979 Islamic Revolution. The first translation of the TTP was prepared in the 1990s by Muḥsin Jahāngīrī, but he withheld the manuscript from being published. I discuss the arguments that led him to withhold the publication of his translation; in this context, it will be important to consider the tumultuous religious and political debates, and broader questions as to the legitimacy of political power will also prove relevant. The first doctoral dissertation in Persian about the TTP will be described, followed by a description of a digital translation of the twentieth chapter of the TTP, which was published after the 2009 election protests. The article ends with discussing translator Ali Ferdowsi’s motivation to produce the first complete Persian translation of the TTP, published in Tehran in 2017. In conclusion, it will be discussed to which extent the theocratic political context in the country caused interest in the TTP.

Skrifgebruik en Skrifgesag in die postmodernistiese konteks

Scripture use and Scriptural authority in the postmodernist context. This article focused on the burning issue of the authority of Scripture and the way that it is currently used in the Christian and theological community. The research was necessitated by the gap between academic epistemology and the use of the Bible in religious activity. The research illustrated how a different understanding of the authority and interpretation of the Bible caused a clear division in church and society, particularly in the Reformed churches. The aim of the research was to illustrate the current abuse of the Bible in religious debate to legitimise pre-conceived convictions on theological and ethical issues. It was found that, even within the Reformed tradition, the opposing use of Scripture has caused diversity in the church community; thereby causing a serious break in the unity of the church. During the research process, it became clear that a radical new approach to Scriptural interpretation opposed the traditional Reformed understanding of the application of the Bible as per the three main confessions of the Reformed faith. What influenced such a radical new way of Scriptural authority? It was found that an analysis of philosophical systems, leading to the postmodern era, clearly prepared the way for an approach to search for the so-called true meaning of the text behind the text. This new approach was juxtaposed against the Reformed use of Scripture in the immanent text of the Bible and application thereof in the Reformed confession.Contribution: All over the world and also in South Africa, the church community seems to be drawn into a battle for survival. Many church members have lost their faith, abandoned the church membership or moved on to other religions, mainly due to the way Scripture is currently viewed and applied. Unless the confusion in the understanding of the Bible is cleared, the process will deteriorate rapidly. In particular, the theological training of ministers and pastors needs careful consideration. Some academics have denounced their faith in the existence of God in favour of a post-theistic conviction. Students are taught that the Bible is not the Word of God, but human words about God. Such convictions have caused great confusion in church communities. It is envisioned that this research, published in a scientific journal, will underline the urgent need for the church, in general, and the Reformed faith, in particular, not to ignore the seriousness of the matter.

How do people perceive the relationship between science and religion? The roles of epistemic and ontological cognition

SummaryAlthough the relationship between religion and science has long been the subject of discussion, investigations into the how and why of people's science‐religion perspectives are rare. This study examined how epistemic and ontological cognition predict agreement with four science‐religion perspectives: conflict, independence, dialogue, and integration. Participants (N = 3911) were Finnish, Danish, and Dutch adults who had answered an online study. Most people held views that were not well captured by the commonly used four categories. When more specific perspectives were examined, differences were found especially in supernatural beliefs, over‐mentalizing, and justifications for religious arguments and scientific knowledge. Thinking styles and epistemic sophistication played only a minor role. The results suggest that non‐scientists evaluate the relationship between religion and science more based on their ontological beliefs than their epistemic reflection.

IS THE SEMITIC CHARACTER OF HAGAR AN EXAMPLE OF A SURROGATE MOTHER? A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF SEMITIC RELIGIONS AND SCIENCE

Purpose of the study: This paper explores the religious perspective on marriage, captive girls, and the status of slave girls and their children in Semitic religions, examining the legitimacy of concubine's children compared to surrogate mothers. Methodology: The scientific techniques of in vitro fertilization (IVF) will be examined to elucidate both gestational and traditional surrogacy methods. Main Findings: The findings suggest that while Semitic religions validate the status of concubines' children as legitimate heirs, the comparison between concubines and surrogate mothers is limited due to religious debates over the legitimacy of surrogacy and the technological advancements involved, highlighting distinct roles and dynamics within religious frameworks. Applications of the study: The application of this research could provide insights into the historical and religious perspectives on surrogate motherhood, informing discussions on the intersection of religion, culture, and reproductive technologies. Novelty/Originality of the study: The novelty of this research lies in its interdisciplinary exploration, comparing the portrayal of Hagar within Semitic religions to contemporary perspectives on surrogate motherhood, bridging religious studies and scientific inquiry.

An Assessment of Race & Decolonization Debates: Wider Socio-Cultural Implications in a Multi-Ethnic Western Society.

Race and religious study decolonization debates have traced the problems to colonialism. To resolve these problems, colonial legacies must be examined in an ethical light to enable solutions. This article is an assessment of these debates and what they offer to racial equality and the decolonization of religious studies curriculum.