Religious Trends Research Articles

Religious change in Orthodox-majority Eastern Europe: from Nation-State to Global-Market

This article mobilises an analytical framework developed by the author in a series of solo and joint publications according to which religion has shifted from a Nation-State to a Global-Market regime, which it applies to the case of Eastern European Orthodox majority countries, including Russia, in modern times. Bringing together a large amount of research in a synthetic objective, it first examines how religion in Eastern Europe was nationalised and statised from the end of the eighteenth to the twentieth century. It looks at the particularities of the communist experience, and shows how it is best understood as a form of radicalisation of National-Statist trends. It then shows how neoliberal reforms have integrated these countries in wider global flows. The remainder of the article looks at different trends from the perspective of marketisation: the coextensive rise of Orthodoxy affiliation and nationalism, the qualitative changes within Orthodoxy, as well as the parallel developments of New Age derived spirituality and Pentecostalism, the two ideal-typical religious forms in the Global-Market regime, and by linking them to specific experiences of globalisation and social determinants. The conclusion argues that the rise of nationalism and authoritarianism as well as the religious trends that are developing today are the consequences of neoliberal reforms, the penetration of consumerism as a dominant ethos, and thus generalised marketisation.

Maimonides’s Rationalization of the Incest Taboo, Its Reception in Thirteenth-Century Kabbalah, and Their Affinity to Aquinas

AbstractThis article discusses Maimonides’s rationale for the incest taboo and traces its reception in Christian and kabbalistic traditions in the thirteenth century. Tracing the reception of Maimonides’s view enables recognition of the resemblance between Maimonides and Aquinas, the ambivalent stance toward Maimonides’s explanation expressed by Nahmanides, and the incorporation of Maimonides’s reasoning in one of the most systematic and enigmatic works of kabbalistic rationalization of the commandments, the Castilian Kabbalist Joseph of Hamadan’s The Book of the Rationales of the Negative Commandments. R. Joseph’s acceptance of Maimonidean principles and his integration of them in the theurgic Kabbalah reveal a conflict in the heart of its system and teach us about an important aspect of the theory of sexuality in Kabbalah. The inquiry offered here examines the inter-relations between divergent medieval religious trends in constructing the role of sexuality. Instead of the common presentation of Kabbalah as diverging from the ascetic positions of Jewish philosophy and Christianity, this analysis will elucidate Kabbalah’s continuity with them.

PROSPECTS AND PROBLEMS IN GIRLS SPORTS PARTICIPATION AT UNIVERSITY LEVEL IN KHYBER PAKHTUNKHWA, PAKISTAN

Purpose: Main objectives of this review paper were to examine the existing position regarding the religious perspectives in connection with female participation in sports, opportunities, and barriers affecting their entry into sporting activities. The focus of this article was to investigate the viewpoint of the female regarding the religious and socio-cultural factors influencing women’s participation in sports.
 Methodology: A self-made questionnaire consisting of twenty-four different items encircling religious and socio-cultural factors affecting women's participation in sports was used for the collection of data. Population for this study comprised of conveniently available 236 border girls students of Gomal University Dera Ismail Khan.
 Main Findings: Findings of the study has revealed that, in addition to dominant religious trend and sociocultural environment, lack of facilities, law and order situation, and transportation issues in reaching the facility, dress code, misconception of the masses in perspectives of the female participation in sports and financial problems were the main barriers in the way of female participation in sports.
 Implications: It is recommended that parents, teachers, religious leaders, experts in the field of health and sociology, and different sources of social media should play their role in clarifying the situation in paving the way for the female folk to bring positive change in the situation.

The Impact of Covid-19 On State-Religion Relations: A Study On Israel And Iran

Regulations, measures and restrictions implemented by state authorities on public events and mass gatherings due to fear, anxiety, and panic caused by COVID-19 pandemic have made religious field more open to state intervention since the global pandemic started and religious practices underwent radical changes. Governments’ public health measures concerning the places of mass worship and religious gatherings to stop the spread of the pandemic and the reactions of religious groups against their orders and imposed restrictions emerged as a new dimension of the debates on state-religion and state-individual relations. In this regard, the main purpose of the study is to discuss the new global religious trends that emerged with the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic, which reshapes state-religion relations through the regulations and measure for containing the virus, in light of the experiences in different regions and religious traditions, and to analyze the relationship between the religion and the state in the Middle East, specifically the cases of Israel and Iran as religious character is dominant and orthodox religious groups play a significant role within the social and political structure in both countries.

A Reflection on Nominal Christians in Contemporary England

This article attends to the religious landscape in contemporary England, particularly those who display some Christian beliefs and practices loosely, while their church attendance is slight, occasional or non-existent. In Western society and churches, they are predominantly characterised as “nominal Christians.” From a missiological perspective, I examine the adequacy of this characterisation, drawing upon my empirical findings of non-diasporic Korean missionaries’ engagement with the phenomenon of interest. Firstly, I show how nominalism is addressed in the two major sociological approaches that attempt to characterise the religious trend in the contemporary Western culture, namely, secularization theories and de-institutionalization theories. Secondly, I present empirical findings of Korean missionaries’ reflection on nominalism in the light of such a sociological debate. Finally, I examine the missiological implication of their reflection for nominalism in reference to the concept of missio Dei. I argue that Korean missionaries’ accounts disclose what I call “religious nominals” who have some valid elements of Christian faith in an increasingly deinstitutionalized ecclesial context. They represent a distinctive religious constituency among whom God carries out the redemptive work of Christ, the manner of which is as yet to be explored. This disclosure invites us to review our understanding of nominalism with a serious theological exploration of such a redemptive intervention of God. This exploration also invites further reflection on our current discourse of missional church in this particular theological context.

Emerging Religious Trends through the Ages

All religious movement have become a social movement in the country. These movements play a major role in monarchy to democracy. Religion had major impacts on the community. These permeate into the literature and shows its reflection in the community. Religions get progressed and travels parallel through the literature and its transformation. Similarly, the purpose of the religious literature has been changed through times. Doctrines, rites of worship, existence of tradition are seen common in all religions. But some religious literatures have sung to inimical of other religions. It is necessary to look comparatively from Sangam literature period that how the religious literature have undergone change and how purpose and course of cult are written in the texts. Religions such as Jainism, Buddhism, vaishnavism, saivam, Christianity and Islam are also explored. Finally, it is possible to find out that in each period religious beliefs and hatreds have travelled into the literature along with the worships and divinity.it is also possible to learn about generality, philosophy and charitable works done by individuals through the religion. It is established that the gods were sung from ancient to modern genres and earlier religious conflict did not have major impact on contemporary literature.

CONNECTION BETWEEN DANCE PLASTICS AND RELIGION

The article examines the connection between dance plastics and religion, their influence and manifestation in people's lives. The authors of the article investigate the synthesis of interpretation of folk dance and religious trends, in the context of dance as a way of manifesting and expressing feelings through plastic, as well as its use in physiotherapy and psychotherapy. 
 Plastic therapy, as a new form of healing, originating from the time of the existence of mankind, has gained great popularity today.
 Revealing the inner potential of a person, working out at a deep spiritual and psycho-emotional level of various blocks of diseases and traumas accumulated during life, in our opinion, is healed through dance plastics. It is generally known that healing with fire, air, water, earth originates from ancient beliefs such as paganism, Tengrism, Zoroastrianism, Buddhism, Vedas and others.
 Despite the fact that the interweaving of dance plastics and breathing exercises allows for therapy, integrates new possibilities and techniques in medical practice, the authors of the article consider its application only in the field of non-traditional use techniques, which has gained great popularity in our time.
 Dance therapy, being one of the topics of the evoked discourse among professionals and representatives of alternative medicine, mental therapy determined the relevance of this study. Expanding the concept of "plastic therapy", the authors turn to the analysis of each term, reflecting the method of deductive research. The definition of "plastic therapy" means the presence of a plastic and semantic expression of feelings. In this case, the body is an instrument and acts as a conductor of feelings, and movements and plastic play the role of a "meditative" means through which spiritual and physical healing is achieved. Dance, as a form of sacred art, continues to develop, and finds application in new forms and manifestations.
 The results of the study provide an opportunity to apply the concept of "plastic therapy" in the theory of choreographic art, as a form of creating an interpretation of dance synthesis and psychotherapy.

Transformations of contemporary terrorism in view of legal, economic and sociocultural issues

The paper presents an analysis of network terrorism in its retrospective and within the practices of contemporary transformations. The risks of expansion of terrorist movements into the territory of particular states with their subsequent legitimization have been identified with regard to social consciousness, law and economy. Within the network structure of the contemporary international terrorism, which formed continuous mutations, the so-called «terrorist clusters» have taken shape, with the Middle Eastern, the North African and others among them. Centrally-managed terrorist organizations of the past were succeeded by transnational structures within the framework of a consolidated ideological, political and religious trend of conducting terrorist attacks in any part of the world. Namely, the segmented, polycentric, ideologically integrated network is currently the most prevalent and dangerous model of international terrorism while the networking principle of organization of terrorist activity remains the most effective in asymmetric confrontation with the adversaries. The transformation of terrorism in the 21st century is presented within 3 perspectives of the social being - law, economy and morals. For instance, an approach to legal treatment of manifestations of terrorism has changed dramatically. In the international law there has occurred a definitive extrapolation of the notion of crime against humanity, mainstreamed by the Nuremberg trials, to terrorist activities. Regardless of under which guise and for which purposes these crimes are being committed, they have acquired an explicit denomination as an absolute evil that implies no justification or extenuating circumstances. This standpoint is expressed in numerous international documents including the United Nations Security Council resolutions and international conventions, not to mention various national-level documents. At the same time, the severity of counterterrorism laws and international legal norms adopted by different states is often disrupted due to their inconsistency that complicates considerably the counter-terrorist activity at all levels. The sociocultural aspect of the transformation of terrorism is being investigated in the context of the confrontation between two world views - the western and the eastern (Islamic). For radical adherents of the Radicalization is occurring in hybrid living environments that include the elements of both online and offline human experience. This antagonism is currently transforming from its mentality from into the instrumental form increasingly acquiring an artificial, hybrid nature. Studies of «mutations» of terrorism with regard to economic issues have focused upon such factors of the neoliberal globalization as social injustice, urbanization and revival of colonial traditions. In recent decades the world has faced a new threat: use of counter-terrorism to justify transnational interventions into underdeveloped and unstable countries. In this way, there occurs a process of disguising the novel practices of colonization which in fact constitute the state terrorism. The scope and the forms of state terrorism vary from political and economic pressure upon the weakest of state entities to explicit use of armed violence. Within the legal environment it has become common to employ the practices of countries charging members its own population with terrorism as a tool for destabilizing the undesirable political movements as well as escalating sectarian and ethnic confrontations for the purpose of economic gains. The authors have investigated the novel trends in the financing of terrorism, particularly within the context of challenges of the post-pandemic world and have substantiated a complex approach to combating this evil suggesting its foundation to consist not in the force counteraction as is presently common, but in solving moral, socio-economic and legal contradictions within societies which may potentially become hotbeds of the terrorist threat.

Religious complexity: theorizing multiple religious trends

ABSTRACT This article contributes to the debate on secularization and the return of religion by using the social science complexity frame of reference. A trend in many Western countries is the decline in individual religiosity, increase in ‘nones’, growth of non-Christian religions, changes in religion itself, and the visibility of religion in the public sphere. Many sociologists of religion have analyzed the situation by discrediting the theory of secularization and adopting the newer theories of the spiritual turn, desecularization, and post-secularity, while others have maintained that secularization theory is still valid. The complexity frame of reference offers a toolkit that can be useful in resolving this theoretical dilemma. This article contributes to the theorizing of multiple religious trends at various analytical levels. It criticizes the current approaches before it introduces the concept of religious complexity. Finally, it explores the implications of religious complexity for analyses of multiple and varied religious trends.

СТАРООБРЯДЧЕСКИЕ ОБЫЧАИ «НЕЗАМИРЩЕНИЯ» ВО ВРЕМЯ РАСПРОСТРАНЕНИЯ НОВОЙ ВИРУСНОЙ ИНФЕКЦИИ КОВИД-19 (ПО МАТЕРИАЛАМ НОВОСИБИРСКОЙ ОБЛАСТИ)

The article analyzes the customs of overcoming “desecration” (self-isolation from the modern world), actualizing among the Siberian Old Believers of different religious trends (accepting and not accepting the priesthood) during the spread of the new viral infection COVID-19. These interviews show that the Novosibirsk Old Believers have a firm conviction about the sinfulness of the “world” and its inhabitants as the root cause of the spread of the dangerous epidemic, but there is a difference in views between supporters of different directions, as well as on the acceptability of vaccination. Social upheavals throughout the history of mankind were accompanied by many concomitant factors, one of which was an appeal to the patterns included in the ethnocultural memory of peoples. At the beginning of the 21st century, the ideas and customs of the Old Believers were updated, which helped them to survive earlier during periods of epidemics (for example, the plague of 1771). As in the 18th - 19th centuries this is the observance of the tradition of eating exclusively from “their own dishes”, minimizing communication with the worldly (atheists, infidels, etc...

Globalization, Secularization and Collective Identities

The diverse and paradoxical nature of globalization processes has given rise to new social constellations that shape transnational, national and local spaces. The historicity of identities, their past and present conditions, the changes they went through, the ways they influence the feeling of full membership in a community and the differentiation derived from cultural diversity and pluralism underscore the need for revisiting theoretical explorations. This paper addresses past and present social, cultural and religious processes in an era of transformations derived from the complexity of today’s interconnected world and on the light of historical encounters. The need for revising the singularity of social and cultural trajectories and the religious trends gravitating in society is approached through snapshots of a twofold historical encounter: between Modernity and Latin America, and between Judaism and Modernity. Both express entrenched dilemmas of the binaries periphery-center and universal-particular. While one of them raised the issue of the dominant program of Modernity as a Western project, the other was entailed in the assumptions of one hegemonic religious constellation.

The Rise of the Nones across the United States, 1973 to 2018: State-Level Trends of Religious Affiliation and Participation in the General Social Survey

Although there has been a fast rise in the share of Americans reporting no religion, it is unclear whether this trend has affected different parts of the country equally. Against this backdrop, we apply dynamic multilevel regression and poststratification (Dynamic MRP) to General Social Survey data over the period 1973 to 2018 to estimate state-level religious trends. We validate our estimates against external benchmarks, finding that they perform well in terms of predictive accuracy. Substantively, we find steeper increases in the share of religious nones in states that had more nones to begin with. Moreover, whereas state-level increases in the share of religious nones are strongly linked to declines in occasional church attendance and moderate religious identification, the associations with trends in regular attendance and strong identification are much weaker. States have thus not only diverged in their share of religious nones but also experienced different degrees of religious polarization.

Religious Trend in Contemporary Indonesia: Conservatism Domination on Social Media

Religion is predicted to dissipate from social significance through the processes of development or economic modernization. Classical secularization theory forecasted religion in the modern era will face some circumstances such as 1) the decline of personal faith, religious beliefs and practices; and (2) the retreat of religion from public space (Cassanova: 1994, 2010). However, the supporters of secularization and modernization theories failed to notice that religion did not disappear from the public sphere. The opposite occurs in Southeast Asia. Economic development program and modernization could work hand-in-hand with religion in the region (Feener and Fountain: 2018).In the context of Indonesia, the issue of religion has gone through ups and downs. The story of Indonesia’s revival of Islam had been begun when the country experienced anti-communist campaigns of 1965-66 (McVey: 2006). Since then, the government obliged all of its societies to profess one of Indonesia’s recognized religions: Islam, Catholicism, Protestantism, Buddhism, and Hinduism (now Confucianism has been added to the list) (Qurtuby: 2013). The pressure for all citizens to embrace one particular recognized religion resulted in great conversion from local religions/faiths—Hindu, Buddha, abangan, etc.—to Islam (Hefner: 1987a, 1987b, 1989; cf. Beatty: 1999). It then witnesses rapid growth of the grassroots Islam and the spread of Islamization (Houben: 2003).

Tibetan “Barbarians” in China’s Borderlands: Changing Perspectives According to the Geographical Records in the Siku Quanshu

China has always considered herself to be the center of the world. Those regions and populations which were not included in the Chinese territory under direct supervision of the imperial court were, depending on their distance from the court, perceived as being in a tighter or looser tributary relation to China. Tibet and its territorial relation to China is one such example and the historical sovereignty or suzerainty of China over Tibet is an omnipresent issue even in the current Sino-Tibetan context.
 China expresses territorial claims over Tibet originating from the Yuan or even the Tang dynasty, while the Tibetan side argues that Tibet was an independent state until the middle of the twentieth century. There is evidence to support both claims. However, it is difficult to judge historical territorial claims from our contemporary viewpoint and current understanding of the functions and integrity of the state and its borders.
 Undoubtedly, China and Tibet, as neighboring entities, experienced intense cultural, political, and religious interaction, and depending on the given political situation they would seek alliances or, more frequently, clash as enemies. An inquiry into the geographical records of the Qing dynasty collection of valuable sources, the Complete Library of the Four Treasuries (Siku quanshu), and particularly into the Qing historiographical record, the Da Qing yitong zhi, and its revised version the Jiaqing chongxiu yitong zhi, indicates that relations between China and Tibet were much more complex than presented by the two political parties nowadays, as they dependednot only on the military strength of the two parties, but also on prevailing economic needs or dominant religious trends.

RATIONALE DISCOURSE OF RELIGION AND KNOWLEDGE: PREVENTION OF RELIGIOUS EXTREMISM

This article discusses the problems of prevention and prevention of religious extremism and terrorism as well as the solution. At the present stage, religious extremism has become one of the most dangerous and difficult to predict phenomena. After the collapse of the communist ideology, a rapid rise of all religious trends began on the territory of Kazakhstan.In our time, modern society is undergoing a transformation of the value system due to the modernization of social life. The processes of globalization in the economic, political, cultural spheres, drawing the population of countries into migration flows of different nature and level, lead to the complication of the structural ties of specific societies and the entire community as a whole.

Түрік қағанаты тұсындағы діни ағымдар: буддалық ілім мен шамандық сенімдерден туған жыл қайыру, жеті қазына ұғымдарының халық әдебиетіндегі көрінісі

The author in his article examines the history of the emergence of some concepts that have entered the tradition of the people, which have passed into the folklore of the Turkic peoples on the basis of the religions of neighboring peoples. He also sought to comprehensively analyze the manifestations of religious beliefs and beliefs that were preserved in the memory of the people during the period of the Turkic Kaganate. At the same time, studying the mythical concept and ancient beliefs, the traditions of ancient tribes, like the yellow Uyghurs, heirs from that era, I want to determine the efforts of the ways of the onset of religious beliefs that have survived in modern Kazakh folklore. The goal of the Turkic Khanate is to describe the traditions of the Turkic written tradition on the basis of traces of stone, letter and the spread of religious movements in these eras. Plots and reflections of common religious trends and in folk literature are also based on the article.

The Black Madonna: A Theoretical Framework for the African Origins of Other World Religious Beliefs

This review summarizes existing scholarship in order to theorize how Abrahamic religions and Hinduism were influenced by African beliefs, in order to illuminate the contributions that African beliefs have had on other world religions. The review begins with a brief historical overview of the origins of indigenous ideologies, followed by a review of classical theories of religion and a summary of contemporary religious trends, with particular attention on African beliefs. The Black Madonna, with origins in Africa, is a prominent example of how African beliefs have been integrated into other faiths in ways that are often obscured from view. The Black Madonna is compared with the characteristics and symbolism of the traditional fair-skinned Virgin Mary. It is estimated that there are hundreds of depictions of the Black Madonna, yet her identity as truly black is generally minimized. This review contributes a theoretical rationale for the lack of recognition and acceptance of the Madonna as black, contextualizing this within a feminist theoretical viewpoint and analyzing the connection to African folklore and traditional religious beliefs. The theoretical framework articulated in this paper contributes an elucidation of the ways that indigenous African religions have affected other world religions. Acknowledging this influence challenges the simplistic notion of reified distinctions between Western and non-Western religions.

The Hyphen Cannot Hold

This article presents an innovative sociological framework to discuss recent social, ideological, and religious trends within the Religious-Zionist sector in Israel. The article challenges the prevalent conceptualization of Religious-Zionism as a sui generis ideology. Contrary to researchers who emphasize the synthesis of religion and Zionism in the Religious-Zionist ideology, the author argues that the Religious-Zionist identity is based primarily on social connections (kinship, geographical, institutional) between the members of the group. The author uses this approach to make sense of recent Religious-Zionist trends: post-Zionism, the ‘religious-lite’, Orthodox feminism, and neo-liberalism.

The Emergence and Development of Persianate Sufism: Khorasan, Ninth to Twelfth Centuries

Abstract This paper examines the emergence of Sufism and its differentiation from other religious trends in early Islamic Khorasan and Transoxania and traces the influence of Buddhism and Manichæism on the development of Sufism. The corresponding professionalization of the Sufi sheikhs in this formative process went hand in hand with the elaboration of Sufi mystical theory. The theoretical elaboration of Sufism consisted in the development of a theory of divine love culminating in the masterpieces of Farid al-Din ʿAttār on the eve of the Mongol invasion. The paper highlights the strong connection between Sufism and fotovvat (urban brotherhoods) during the emergence of Sufism in Khorasan and its gradual weakening that resulted from the increasing professionalization of Sufism and the formation of a distinct Persianate Sufi identity. The appropriation and transformation of royal symbolism in the Sufi texts is then analyzed in the last section.

Religious trends before the impact of globalization and Vietnam's religious policy

The study of the impact of globalization on religion and the changes in Vietnam's policies in recent years is a difficult and difficult task to determine accurately. However, the results that this article brings will partly shed light on the religious trends in Vietnam before the impact of globalization and the changes in religious policy of the Vietnamese state today. This study focuses on clarifying religious life in Vietnam; the impact of globalization on religious life in its people; it highlights common trends in religious life, as well as secularization, modernization of religion, diversification of religious activities, new forms of religion, and the characteristics of new religious phenomena. The study also focused on analyzing Vietnam's religious policies; the advantages and limitations of these policies. It can be seen that the change of religious life in Vietnam in the period of renewal is mainly due to the impact of change in the economic, cultural and social life of the renewal of economic development, in the context of globalization, market expansion, and the international integration of Vietnam. Furthermore, it is a consequence of the restoration and increasing need for religious-spiritual life after years of repression by war. Hence, the need for theoretical and practical research on religious trends and policies, to help improve the policies of the Communist Party and the State on religion, guaranteeing democracy and equality in religious activities in Vietnam.