Religious Elites Research Articles

К вопросу о роли Спасо-Каменного монастыря в карательной политике Российского государства (XVI–XVII вв.)

The purpose of the article is to reveal causes and features of punitive practice of the Spaso-Kamenny Monastery in the pre-imperial period when there was a rapid separation of the state and church jurisdiction in various spheres of society. The article tries to define the most significant events which determined the inclusion of this monastery in the punitive policy of the state. Another task of the research is to determine the peculiarities of the exile to the Spaso-Kamenny Monastery at the early stage of its development. Due to its special geographical location, initially it was used for punitive purposes rarely and rather selectively. The complexity of the research work can be explained by the limited availability of the sources related for the period under consideration, which did not allow us to recreate a complete picture of the functioning of the prison premises and the everyday life of prisoners. It was possible to create a more detailed picture only by turning to the documents of the era of the regular state of Peter the Great. Therefore, the accent in the research was made first of all on generalization and analysis of the most striking and at the same time insufficiently studied facts of exile to the Spaso-Kamenny Monastery of various well-known persons, including Metropolitan Zosimus, Metropolitan Varlaam, Archbishop Arsenii, and Archimandrite Ivan Neronov, who played an important role in the history both of the church and of the state. The author analyzes the causes and conditions of exile in the context of the events of that time. The conclusion is made that the content of punitive functions of the Spaso-Kamenny Monastery was constantly changing. The basis for these changes was the desire of the grand-princely power to see the monastery as a supporter of the spread of its own influence. A peculiarity of the first stage in the punitive activity of the Spaso-Kamenny Monastery was the fact that representatives of the religious elite were exiled there. It was explained by special natural conditions and geopolitical location of the island monastery. Later this trend continued, but the contingent of exiles significantly expanded.

Religious Support for Civil Resistance Movements: When and How Does It Contribute to Regime Change?

There is substantial research on the influence of elite defections on civil resistance campaign outcomes. Yet most studies focus on defections among security forces, political leaders, and economic elites. In this article, the author examines religious elite defections. Analyzing 99 civil resistance struggles, the author explores whether religious leaders’ support is associated with regime change in authoritarian contexts. The author also uses qualitative comparative analysis to determine the conditions and pathways that lead to a successful outcome. The author illustrates these pathways with four cases (Ukraine’s orange revolution, Mali’s uprising against General Traoré, the Philippine People Power movement, and Malawi’s struggle against President Banda). The results indicate that religious elite defections are not necessary for civil resistance success. However, religious support can contribute critical resources to movements, create a positive flank effect, facilitate security force defections, provide space for resistance in conditions of indiscriminate repression, and activate international networks that can pressure a regime.

Sosiologi Spiritualitas & Kesalehan Sosial

Spirituality and a new religious awakening, are seen by religious elites as a stage of religious directness in carrying out religious traditions and rituals. New civilizations can instead be a threat to conventional religious traditions and rituals. Without the willingness of religious elites to criticize and re-interpret conventional ritual traditions and patterns, the functions of the world's major religions could fade. The world's major religions are increasingly alienated from the objective world and awareness of the lives of the people and their people. It seems that there will be a new form of religion or a new religion that is completely different from the tradition of religious rituals that have been carried out by the major religions of the world. While the religious elite is still attached to classical religious interpretations. But on the other hand, the emergence of modern society, encouraging the argument of secularization is part of modernization. The values underlying socio-political and economic relations also appear to be beginning to enter an irregular stage, when viewed conventionally, the spiritulitas of global civilization, rather than lies in the format of values, traditional systems and structures or modern rationality. New civilizations in social systems and Science and Technology (SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY) began to be directed at a more intuitive spirituality stage. Then came the act of social piety that proved impartiality over the duafa wal mustad'afin, workers and the poor who were oppressed by the economic system. The emergence of the term left theology only wants to explain about righteousness and belief based on the ability to perform acts of liberation of the proletariat. This action is not only done after the reality of the proletariat appears, but creates a social and economic system that has impartiality towards the proletariat.

Politicisation of Religion in Pakistan: A Case Study on Ministry of Religious Affairs (MORA)

Pakistan was created in the name of religion (Islam) as an independent country in 1947 on the basis of Two Nation Theory wherein the Muslims of Indian subcontinent could live, preach and profess their religion freely from the dominance of Hindus. After independence the state elites did not make any tangible programmes which could establish the country as an Islamic state. However, the state elites established religious ministry after 27 years of the establishment of Pakistan. The ministry was not established to implement or enforce religious programmes for Pakistan. Contrary it was established to control religious elites and their institutions which could be used for political gain. This paper is designed to illustrate the historical aspect of role of religion in Pakistan. The paper further will analyse how state elites used religion for political gains by politicising religion in Pakistan.

Religious Elite Cues, Internal Division, and the Impact of Pope Francis' Laudato Si'

AbstractWhat impact do cues from religious elites have on followers, particularly when religious communities are internally divided? Could religious elites promote internal consensus, or would their cues stoke further internal polarization? This article utilizes the release of Pope Francis's encyclical on the environment, Laudato Si', to explore these questions. A unique survey experiment, conducted on a nationally representative sample of Catholic voters in the United States in late 2015, tests the impact of Francis' message relative to a similar message from unidentified environmental elites. In keeping with other studies of Laudato's impact in the United States, findings reveal real, but nuanced, effects from Francis' environmental cue. The Francis cue did impact conservatives and high religiosity Catholics, but these effects were not distinct from those on other Catholics in the sample, suggesting limitations in promoting consensus. Instead, responses to a Francis cue varied sharply depending on pre-existing views of Francis' leadership.

Arab Scholarship on Turkey's Regional Role before and after the Rise of the AKP

This article examines scholarship from the Arab world on Turkish foreign policy since the early 1980s to show shifts in Arab perceptions of Turkey. Prior to 2002, Arab scholars were focused on the competition between Turkey's secular and religious elites, with largely negative views of the country's policies in the Middle East. With the rise of the Justice and Development Party (AKP), Arab scholars began to look more positively toward Turkey, as it sought to play a new role in the Middle East. With the Arab uprisings from 2011 onward, the Arab literature on Turkey began to vary, reflecting the developments in Turkey's relationships with scholars' respective countries.

The Making of the Medieval Middle East: Religion, Society, and Simple Believers

The Making of the Medieval Middle East: Religion, Society, and Simple Believers

Who are American evangelical Protestants and why do they matter forUSclimate policy?

AbstractWhite evangelical Protestants are the most skeptical major religious group in the United States regarding climate change. While their position of political influence in the Republican coalition is widely recognised, the full range of effects of this position on evangelicals' climate opinions is not. To move research on evangelicals from the margins of climate change opinion research, we review and integrate the interdisciplinary literature on US evangelicals, climate change, and politics. In assessing this literature, we identify three areas in need of further research. First, there is a critical need for more research on the climate attitudes of evangelicals of color, who comprise a growing share of the evangelical tradition in the US. Second, highlighting the Christian Right's active engagement in the climate debate, we identify a need for more experimental work examining how cues from religious elites may shape evangelicals' opinions. Finally, we suggest that to better harness insights across disciplines, researchers must become more explicitly aware of how different disciplines conceptualize temporality. Attending to temporal scale suggests that a new approach is needed to test how dominion beliefs, which are widely thought to be an important theological driver of climate skepticism, operate. We also suggest that two factors that appear to play a weak or limited role in driving climate skepticism over the short term (anti‐science attitudes and evangelical religiosity) may in fact play a significant role in driving skepticism over the medium term.This article is categorized under:Perceptions, Behavior, and Communication of Climate Change > Perceptions of Climate ChangeTrans‐Disciplinary Perspectives > Humanities and the Creative Arts

Colonial state and indigenous Islamic learning: a case study of Calcutta Madrasa

ABSTRACT The Calcutta madrasa was one of the many institutions which witnessed recurrent attempts at reform in Muslim societies during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Since the eleventh century, when madrasas first emerged as the principal institution of higher Islamic learning, it has undergone many changes, adapting in varying degrees to local cultures and changing times. Given the centrality of the Calcutta madrasa in the preservation and production of knowledge as well as in the formation of the religious elite, the madrasa was crucial to the construction of religious authority. This paper attempts to arrive at a deeper understanding of the origin and nature of the Calcutta madrasa. The first half explores the impact of British educational policies and conceptions of knowledge on the very “traditionalists” attempt to protect Islamic knowledge and learning from its feared extinction under colonial rule. The madrasa institution established by and during colonial rule emerges as a more complex entity that absorbed both colonialist and traditionalist conceptions, which continued to be renegotiated even after the madrasas, had been firmly established. This aspect will be discussed in the second part of this paper.

From Idolatry to Religions: the Missionary Discourses on Hinduism and Buddhism and the Invention of Monotheistic Confucianism, 1550-1700

Abstract The emergence of a European discourse to distinguish, analyze, and historicize various non-Biblical religious traditions within Asia involved a significant amplification of the concept of idolatry. The Jesuit experience of Japanese Buddhism in the second half of the sixteenth century posed a particular challenge, because of its overt atheism. The patristic models of Christian apologetics, based on distinguishing elite monotheism from popular religion in ancient paganism, had been useful in India, but in Japan had to be replaced by a system where the elite cultivated an atheistic form of esoteric monism. When focusing their dialectical firepower upon the doctrines of double truth and non-theistic monism, the Jesuits, led by Alessandro Valignano, were in fact responding to the doctrinal distinctiveness of East Asian Buddhism, notably the emphasis on provisional teachings, on the one hand, and Buddha-nature, on the other. When in China Ricci decided to classify the Confucian literati as civil philosophers rather than as a religious elite, he also transferred Valignano’s critique of Buddhist pantheism to specifically Neo-Confucian doctrines, distinct from the supposed monotheism of the original Confucians.

Introduction: Early Catholic Orientalism and the Missionary Discovery of Asian Religions

Abstract New encounters in America, Africa, and Asia facilitated the “discovery” of non-Biblical religious traditions that were distinct from the ancient paganism known to Christian humanists and antiquarians from classical sources and patristic literature. Although Hinduism, Buddhism, and Confucianism did not exist as concepts in the early modern period, the three articles in this special issue illustrate the learning process by which a number of influential and pioneering Catholic missionaries came to distinguish these various traditions from each other. We argue that they did not simply “invent” new religions arbitrarily: instead, on the basis of the very broad categories of true religion and idolatry, they engaged in some close interaction and “dialogue”—albeit usually polemical—with local religious elites and their writings, including Eastern Christians. In addition, in the case of the Jesuits in particular, we note that these various engagements were often connected events that influenced each other in important ways, from India to Japan, from Japan to China, and from all these to Tibet.

Agents of altruism: the Great Irish Famine and Italian civil society (1847)

ABSTRACT This article analyses the participation of individuals, networks and international organizations in transnational fundraising aimed at providing humanitarian relief aid. Focusing on fundraising campaigns organized in the Italian states in favour of Ireland in 1847, when the Great Famine scourged its population the most, the article highlights the agency of the fundraisers in setting in motion an economy of altruism that transcended groups’ boundaries and state borders. The activism and networking of a few well-established individuals in Rome were pivotal in mobilizing the lay and religious elites at a local level. In January and February 1847, the elites of the Italian capitals collected copious sums within private events and initiatives directed at their peers, while the Christian faiths present in Rome organized the first alms collections. This wave of altruism succeeded in setting humanitarian relief for Ireland as one of the goals of the global Catholic Church. In March, Pope Pius IX issued the Encyclical Praedecessores Nostros, appealing for Catholics to donate in favour of Ireland, and thereby generating much local fundraising, mainly in the Italian states and Southern Europe, until the early months of 1848. The Catholic clergy served the cause, raising money locally and taking charge of its delivery to Ireland, with partial coordination from Rome. Although implementing a transnational fundraising campaign involved obstacles of a political, logistical and financial nature, the alms collection raised in the Catholic churches aggregated many small donations over a considerable time span, providing more than double the amount raised in the lay initiatives organized by the elites of the Italian states. The article, based on unedited archival sources from the Italian, Vatican and Irish archives, shows how the charitable fundraisers overcame the obstacles imposed by state politics, international conflicts and transaction costs over the transnational circulation of ideas, initiatives and capitals.

Does Sharia By-Laws Damage Interfaith Harmony? The Case of Sharia By-Laws Implementation in Pamekasan, Madura

Since the beginning of the Reformation Era in 1998, Indonesia has been transforming itself into a more liberal polity than that of in the New Order Era. This political circumstance is characterized by the freedom of opinion and the decentralization of power. During this Reformation Era, many local regulations have been enacted. One of which was sharia by-laws or local regulation based on Islamic norms in some largely Muslim populated regions. This situation has triggered concerns about the impacts of sharia by-laws over the inter-religious harmony among a very diverse society of Indonesia. This study aims to evaluate the sharia by-laws implementation in Pamekasan, Madura, and analyze its implication for inter-religious harmony. By using a qualitative approach and phenomenological descriptive analysis, it reveals that there has not been found negative impacts on the implementation of sharia by-laws since its enactment in 2001 until today. The internal and external potentials of Pamekasan residents, arguably, have become the determinant factor in keeping the by-laws in line with inter-religious harmony. These potentials include cultural-deeply rooted social capitals such as friendliness, politeness, mutual respect, and helping others. Besides, dialogue among religious elites, which is facilitated either by local government or civilian organizations, is frequently conducted and this helps to create a conducive atmosphere for all despite the existence of sharia by-laws in Pamekasan, Madura.Keywords: sharia by-laws, interfaith harmony, social capitals.

#No2Sectarianism: Experimental Approaches to Reducing Sectarian Hate Speech Online

We use an experiment across the Arab Twittersphere and a nationally representative survey experiment in Lebanon to evaluate what types of counter-speech interventions are most effective in reducing sectarian hate speech online. We explore whether and to what extent messages priming common national identity or common religious identity, with and without elite endorsements, decrease the use of hostile anti-outgroup language. We find that elite-endorsed messages that prime common religious identity are the most consistently effective in reducing the spread of sectarian hate speech. Our results provide suggestive evidence that religious elites may play an important role as social referents—alerting individuals to social norms of acceptable behavior. By randomly assigning counter-speech treatments to actual producers of online hate speech and experimentally evaluating the effectiveness of these messages on a representative sample of citizens that might be incidentally exposed to such language, this work offers insights for researchers and policymakers on avenues for combating harmful rhetoric on and offline.

Contesting Religious Authority in Ghana: Perspectives of Literary Works of Aminu Bamba

This paper examines the literary works of Aminu Bamba as a perspective of his contributions to Islamic reform and counter to religious unorthodoxy propagated by some religious elites in the Tijaniyya movement in Ghana. It pays particular attention to his interpretations of issues that pertain to theology, jurisprudence, and conflict resolution competences. Whereas this paper takes into cognizance the fact that aspects of his ideas on Islamic theology and jurisprudence were not original as they are well reflected in the mainstream traditional Islamic scholarship, the paper analyses the uniqueness of his ideas that center on eradicating religious unorthodoxy within the Tijaniyya. The article argues that Bamba’s reform ideas considerably depart from the Sufi-Salafi polemic that the debate on Islamic reform always characterize in Ghana.

Agama dan Politik: Konstelasi Pemikiran antara Kelompok Kultural dan Struktural pada Kalangan Kiai Pesantren di Madura

In many social science studies, Madurese people are not only known for having traditionalist religious culture, they are also known for their heterogeneous religious typologies. This study specifically examines the constellation of religious thought between the two contemporary Islamism movements in Madura, namely the Madura Ulama Alliance (AUMA) and Gesper. Both AUMA and Gesper both were born from pesantren circles, and were driven directly by the religious elite of pesantran, Kiai and lora (read: Gus in Java) pesantren. Based on the composition of its management, Gesper consists of elite boarding schools, both Kiai and lora, the majority of which are active in managing large organizations, Nahdhatul Ulama (NU). On the other hand, AUMA is mostly inhabited by Nahdhatul Ulama (NU) non-structural elites, but culturally has emotional ties with NU traditions. Therefore, although both were born and developed from a pesantren environment, in some cases AUMA and Gesper have differences, especially in terms of thinking. The condition is at the same time an explanation of why AUMA and Gesper are often involved in the struggle of religious thought in the dynamics and diversity discourse in Madura. One of them is the debate about the correct use of the term Nusantara Islam, and the latest is the dispute about whether or not to elect and appoint leaders from non-Muslims.

RELIGIOUS ISSUES DURING PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION OF INDONESIA IN 2019

The election of a president and vice president is a fundamental way to fill thevacuum of power . However, in the 2019 presidential election , a striking phenomenon with the involvement of religion in the political contest, so that there are many pros and cons if it does not suitable withthe desire of each religious elite in the 2019 presidential election. T he involvement of religion in the presidential election raises questions such as , first, how religion was involved in the presidential election process; Second, how religious discourse takes place in legitimating a particular process in the presidential election; and Third, how does religious involvement in the presidential election bring consequences to the life of society as a whole . The method used in this paper is a qualitative method. T he qualitative method is often referred as the generic qualitative method which is to find out several indications of the 2019 presidential election with the involvement of religion as a marker of identity. While the primary data source obtained from various online media in the form of writing, or in the form of direct coverage, and analysis of the author's using descriptive analysis. During presidential election, the religious elite consider emotion al feeling as a priority so that they come out of the core problem. So that religion in the presidential election is only an instrument of political interests and can not be avoided again through movements that ultimately lead to pros and cons among fellow religious elites. Thus the professionali sm of religion will be difficult to create because it is caused by religious elites who legitimize religion into the practical politic s.

RELIGIOUS ISSUES IN THE 2019 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION OF INDONESIA

The election of a president and vice president is a fundamental way to fill thevacuum of power . However, in the 2019 presidential election , a striking phenomenon with the involvement of religion in the political contest, so that there are many pros and cons if it does not suitable withthe desire of each religious elite in the 2019 presidential election. T he involvement of religion in the presidential election raises questions such as , first, how religion was involved in the presidential election process; Second, how religious discourse takes place in legitimating a particular process in the presidential election; and Third, how does religious involvement in the presidential election bring consequences to the life of society as a whole . The method used in this paper is a qualitative method. T he qualitative method is often referred as the generic qualitative method which is to find out several indications of the 2019 presidential election with the involvement of religion as a marker of identity. While the primary data source obtained from various online media in the form of writing, or in the form of direct coverage, and analysis of the author's using descriptive analysis. During presidential election, the religious elite consider emotion al feeling as a priority so that they come out of the core problem. So that religion in the presidential election is only an instrument of political interests and can not be avoided again through movements that ultimately lead to pros and cons among fellow religious elites. Thus the professionali sm of religion will be difficult to create because it is caused by religious elites who legitimize religion into the practical politic s.

NIGERIA AND THE CHALLENGES OF NATIONAL UNITY

The task of unifying the various ethnic, religious, political and socio-economic groupings in Nigeria has remained a daunting national challenge more than hundred years after amalgamation in 1914. This is particularly puzzling considering that all government regimes since independence in 1960 have made national unity their important agenda. Concomitant programmes, policies and mantras including institutionalization of the federal character principle, the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC), unity schools, national symbols, National Orientation Agency (NOA), and mantras such as “the unity of the nation is not negotiable”, among others, have been adopted to facilitate national unity in Nigeria. Yet the gap between the various groupings seems wider as the nation is still plagued with ethnic rivalry, religious intolerance, political exclusion, quest for self-determination, power sharing and violent agitations, to mention a few. This paper explored the challenges of national unity in Nigeria after one hundred years of existence. Employing the Choice theory, documentary data sources and qualitative data analysis, the paper contends that the challenges to national unity in Nigeria appear to persist because of the manipulations of political, ethnic and religious elites due to pecuniary gains and enduring rivalry over the control of state power. The result showed that unity remains a scarce commodity in Nigeria because of the manner elites conceived and implement policies to reinforce primordial loyalties. As a result, government policies and projects are narrowly conceived and implemented to favour selected groups and communities. This heightens disagreements and controversies among the diverse peoples and communities, threatening the nation’s existence and development.

EPIGRAPHY OF THE XII–XVIII CENTURIES FROM THE AGUL VILLAGE OF RICHA (NEW DATA)

In the abundance of epigraphic monuments and their historical and cultural significance, the ancient Aghul village of Richa stands out among other mountain villages and auls of Dagestan. The aim of this paper is to present the results of the study of Arabic inscriptions found in the village of Richa. More than twenty previously unknown inscriptions in various genres of epigraphy – construction, ownership and vital records, epitaphs and religious texts – have been for the first time introduced into modern linguistics. Notable among them are the most ancient monuments of Arabic Kufic writings, paleographically dated the XI-XII centuries, which testifies to the early popularization of Islam in Richa. In addition, the authors propose a new way of reading some of the Richa inscriptions that are already known to science. The presence of Kufic inscriptions on the walls of three mosques in Richa, as well as Naskh inscriptions dated 1242 on the walls of another mosque, suggest that mosques had existed in Richa even before the Mongols came here in 1239. Researchers have revealed the oldest dated epitaph in Richa (1300–01) in which the term alim (scholar) was used for the first time in the epigraphy of Dagestan. New valuable data have been obtained on the history of construction and reconstruction of Muslim places of worship, mausoleums, sanctuaries, and public buildings. Names of many local craftsmen, carvers and calligraphers have become known. The inscriptions contain valuable information on representatives of the medieval religious elites and Sufi figures. The rich social and professional terminology used in the newly identified Richa inscriptions is also of interest: sultan, shaykh, pir, murid, alim, qadi, ustad (usta), qatib, nakir, sahib, gulam, kavha. Translations of the texts are accompanied by scientific comments.