Spiritual State Research Articles

An Instrument for Measuring Morale of Military Personnel in the Malaysian Army

While there is a myriad of factors contributing to accomplishing a mission, one that has been consistently emphasized by military strategists over the years would be the soldiers’ morale. Morale is an intangible and abstract factor. It needs to be translated and verified empirically through systematic and objective observation in order for it to be properly managed. Unfortunately, no valid and reliable instrument for measuring morale has been established. This paper aims to expound the process of developing an instrument for measuring the morale of soldiers in Malaysian Army. Through a literature search, six dimensions of morale were identified and the first draft of the instrument was crafted. Next, two focus group discussions were conducted in which senior military officers from various departments were engaged as subject matter expert and improvements were made on the instrument based on feedback received. The first meeting reviewed the instrument’s construct and content validity and the second, with the help of an English Language instructor, focused on the constructs as well as the clarity of the language used. The final instrument incorporated the following six dimensions; 1) Team’s task and objective to be accomplished (5 items), 2) Mental/Psychological state (8 items), 3) Selflessness (5 items), 4) Affective state (8 items), 5) Team cohesion (10 items) and 6) Individual’s spiritual state (6 items). The instrument was tested on 100 soldiers who were randomly selected from the 5th Battalion Border Regiment of Bukit Kayu Hitam. Analysis of the reliability of the instrument shows that the Cronbach’s Alpha values range from 0.80 to 0.98, suggesting an excellent reliability. This instrument would be used in the next phase of the research to evaluate the extent of morale in Malaysian Army.

Improved HFACS on Human Factors of Construction Accidents: A China Perspective

Human errors are one of the major contributors of accidents. In order to improve the safety performance, human errors have to be addressed. Human Factors Analysis and Classification System (HFACS) has been developed as an analytical framework for the investigation of the role of human errors in aviation accidents. However, the HFACS framework did not reveal the relationships describing the effect among diverse factors at different levels. Similarly, its interior structure was not exposed. As a result, it is difficult to identify critical paths and key factors. Therefore, an improved Human Factors Analysis and Classification System in the construction industry (I-HFACS) was developed in this study. An analytical I-HFACS mechanism was designed to interpret how activities and decisions made by upper management lead to operator errors and subsequent accidents. Critical paths were highlighted. Similarly, key human factors were identified, that is, “regulatory factors,” “organizational process,” “supervisory violations,” “adverse spiritual state,” “skill underutilization,” “skill-based errors,” and “violations.” Findings provided useful references for the construction industry to improve the safety performance.

Cultural–Psychological Origins of the First Avant-garde: The Tiredness from Culture

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Implementation of Repentance: The Basic Changes in Drug Addicts

Repentance is to return to God by executing what is commanded and abandoning what is forbidden. Repentance is a fundamental method in the process of cleansing the heart in the teachings of Islam to establish the relationship between the Creator and His creation. This article attempts to highlight the value of repentance as the fundamental method of causing a real change in a person’s life. The method of analysis is derived from information from various reading materials, for example articles. The study found that the role of repentance is actually in helping a Muslim to achieve a maqasid syariah. This ideally leads to the preservation of the spiritual state after repentance and is not merely a positive indicator followed by a back-slide to the previous spiritual state before repentance.

The Spiritual States (Ahwal) in the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam

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MANIFESTATION OF THE CRISIS OF SPIRITUALITY IN THE EVERYDAY INFORMATION SOCIETY

Problem setting. The man as a historical and cultural phenomenon repeatedly changed and was different in different cultures. Today, under the influence of the progress of science is scrapping the data invariants. Itself spirituality as the most important value of a person, requires a new understanding. In today's society, the crisis of spirituality is manifested in all socio-cultural sphere.Recent research and publications analysis shows that to study the nature of spirituality in the society lies at the intersection of the planes subject to many branches of science. To Russian philosophy peculiar is the study of various aspects of the content of the specifics of expression and functioning in the context of the culture of intellectual production, in the activities of society as a whole and of the individual. However, today, spirituality is perceived and studied as a phenomenon solely a positive orientation that does not correspond to modern realities.Paper objective. The purpose of this article is to attempt an initial understanding of the crisis dimensions of spirituality in the society.Paper main body. In modern society, are becoming more widespread erroneous assessment of such practices, ascribed to them a creative, positive and even curative potential and interpret altered States of consciousness and perception as the source of qualitatively new about the soul and reality to further personal growth. Sensing on the faith of such an evaluation, the person recklessly rushes in spiritual quest for the sake of ephemeral attainments, without hesitation, leaving the normal everyday life, she wished that these spiritual state became the personal experiences of everyone and believes in the possibility of transformation of the consciousness of all people in General. It is noted that in the formation of modern society, a return to a spirituality of everyday life is a few dangerous; this process is associated with the ability to change mental and mental structures, as it allows the juxtaposition of experiences, ideals, principles and values of culture and civilization, which can lead to the abandonment of fundamental moral values. All this undermines the life world of a person deprived of his usual support and meaning, people lose life goals and the ability to preserve their identity in such conditions.The very consciousness of human existence in philosophy is determined spumonte human and reality. Such an interpretation makes spirituality historically changeable formation, which again and again is determined by the boundary between the categories of the mental and spiritual. Spirituality is a factor in the structuring of different levels of subjectivity. It is intermittent, but not a normative category, is not a once and for all prescribed list of samples to be pursued identity for the sake of achieving spirituality, its volatility predetermined by the fact that the singing is a dimension that sets it depends on valuable orientations of the person. Each person carries out a search on their field of spirituality, as its worked out her way, and the result of this search depends on the image of the internal universe of a particular person or historical eras as a whole.Conclusions of the research. For structures of the society is characterized by the presence of stable forms of perception inherent in the representatives of the community. Information technology becomes the Foundation on which make up the world of modern network person. The most important indicator of the effectiveness of picture of the world her unconscious expression in everyday life. The surrounding reality is perceived through the information filter, resulting in a changed perception of reality.

GESTURE AS THE FIRST METAPHOR OF NON-VERBAL COMMUNICATION

Non-verbal speech is a kind of metaphorical colouring of verbal language as it can give the language rich emotional substance as well as to pass the information that word function is not able to give. The metaphor is reflected not only in language but also in thinking and acting. The determination of gesture as the first metaphor is actual in the process of studying the non-verbal language meaning and role in culture, communication and self-knowledge. The metaphor predestination expressed via the gesture or body language consists in transition the hidden internal content of information. Gesture as the first metaphor equivalent creates the effect of maximum presence. Such gestures can be called ontological that means transferring the sense and meaning of event and entitled to be brightly emotionally coloured that makes them universal and clear for any language culture representative. Equivalent gestures are the reflection of that first natural language first people talked before the verbal language barrier appeared. The metaphorical gesture as the most important element of somatic language becomes the important factor in the process of communication allowing to understand the inner spiritual world of communicator. Gesture basis as the first metaphor is the archaic conscience. Gesture as the conscience of the first metaphor allows to discover the psychological and biological elements of anthropology. The body language was the natural language of communication. Imitating the nature and many natural phenomena the human being was understood by all his tribe members. Codified gesticulation as the prototype of metaphorical somatic language is imprinted in painting where artist by means of portrayed gestures transferred not only the human being spiritual state but also the spirit of the age. The gesture metaphoric is inherent in national culture. Knowing the national character it is not difficult to recognize the ethnical origin of communicator via gesture communication. The national metaphoric of gesture language is attributed to historic and cultural processes which determine the worldview and communication style. However in case of body and gesture language expression in national character their culture conditionality and dissimilarity should be pointed out. The gesture basic purpose in communication is the manifestation and presentation of human being inner world and spiritual condition. One of gesture functions as the first metaphor is its symbolism. The gesture language semiology is present in different spheres of communicative process: from the professional gestures symbols up to domestic ceremonial esthetics. Gestures-symbols are divided into universal for all the cultures and specific ones which are understood only by certain subculture as the language of hidden information. Gesture as the first metaphor serves to universalization of non-verbal communication and encourages the communication enriching and gives it colouring, emotionality and the unity of perception of transmitted information.

Carnets de l'incarnation: Textes choisis 2002–2015 by Nancy Huston

Reviewed by: Carnets de l'incarnation: Textes choisis 2002–2015 by Nancy Huston Polly Galis Nancy Huston, Carnets de l'incarnation: Textes choisis 2002–2015. Arles: Actes Sud, 2016. Huston's corpus is commonly characterised by its transnational and multi-generic format, and Carnets de l'incarnation is no exception. Huston draws inspiration from multiple contexts including a research trip to Israel, a gallery in Beijing, a New York book-club, and the Parisian Hebdo polemic surrounding the 2015 terrorist attacks. She also incorporates both public pieces (newspaper articles, critical prefaces, conference proceedings) and personal fragments (diary entries, poetry, and prose), playing with narrative style and shifting from the comic to the tragic. Huston pays homage to a wide spectrum of philosophers, artists, and writers, including Diane Arbus, Anaïs Nin, Nelly Arcan, Kate Chopin, Simone de Beauvoir, as well as Annie Leclerc and Romain Gary, on whom she has written extensively in two eponymous publications. As with her previous amalgamated textes choisis, Désirs et Réalités (1995) and Âmes et corps (2004), Huston brings together a decade's worth of foundational essays centred on an overarching theme: in the case of Carnets de l'incarnation, a gendered mind-body dichotomy. Huston begins by acknowledging problems experienced primarily by women: prostitution and pornography; the Madonna-whore complex; and the reduction of women's identity to their bodily form (be they de- or hyper-sexualised). Huston then addresses male-orientated issues, [End Page 141] namely, men's coercion into violent and dominant social positions, and their implication in paedophilia, crime, and war. Huston situates these analyses at the intersection of biological determinism and social constructionism. On the one hand, Huston claims men have a naturally higher libido than women, and that women are predetermined to solicit the male gaze. On the other, Huston considers instincts to be dangerously distorted by social phenomena such as the sex industry, which exploits men's sexual drives and women's bodies to finance a neo-liberal market. Huston thus highlights the hypocrisy of our contemporary epoch which both denies sexual difference and profits from it. Where women are encouraged to define themselves according to their bodies, moreover, men are paradoxically taught to deny theirs. Huston insists that we should not overlook but learn from sexual difference, to harness its positive potential instead. What could be interpreted as a contradiction thus constitutes an invitation to overcome binaries. The same is true for other dualisms in this collection, as with love-intellect, nihilism-idealism, corporeality-spirituality. As Huston confirms in her introduction, she seeks not coherence but polyphony, and invites us to embrace our material corporeality—men and women alike—to access a mode of spirituality fitting for our modern times. How this spiritual state is to be achieved in practical terms, however, is left unanswered, and the book ends with a fictional tale of disempowerment: the narrator espies an approaching army and is unable to forfend its advance. In true Huston style, this collection refuses neat categorisation and simple solutions. If any conclusive messages do stand out, it is that we can problematize cultural, racial, and gender divides by imagining the position of the Other, and that we must re-evaluate the causes and consequences of gendered bodily experience before it is too late. [End Page 142] Polly Galis University of Leeds Copyright © 2018 L'Esprit Créateur

Mulla Sadra by Ibrahim Kalin

Reviewed by: Mulla Sadra by Ibrahim Kalin Edward Moad (bio) Mulla Sadra. By Ibrahim Kalin. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014. Pp. 192. Paperback $24. isbn: 978-0-19-945117-3. This introduction to the life and thought of Muhammad ibn Ibrahim ibn Yahya Qawami al-Shirazi (Sadr al-Din al Shirazi, or Mulla Sadra), is part of the Makers of Islamic Civilization series, conceived by the Oxford Centre for Islamic studies, edited by Farhan Nizami, and published by Oxford University Press. The self-described aim of the series is to provide a set of introductory texts on outstanding figures in the history of Islamic civilization. This volume represents an important contribution to the literature on a neglected period of Islamic philosophy, by a scholar who is emerging as one of the most important contemporary Muslim thinkers. Ibrahim Kalin states his own aims in the book in terms of its four main chapters. The first is to give a brief account of Mulla Sadra's life and influence. The second is to describe the cultural and intellectual context in which his thought developed. The third is to introduce Sadra's main intellectual contribution: his doctrine of the primacy of existence. The fourth provides an overview of Sadra's thought and assesses the extent to which it succeeded (or not) in arriving at a coherent synthesis." (p. 9) Kalin thoroughly accomplishes the first two of these objectives. He does a great job of putting Mulla Sadra in historical context, including the preceding rise of the Safavid dynasty with Shah Ismaʿil's conversion of the Safawiyya Sufi order from Sunnism to Twelve-Imam Shiʿism in 1501. Sadra emerges a generation later, as a major intellectual at the beginning of Shi'a ascendency in Iran. Kalin provides a clear and readable account of the intellectual climate of the time, including the akhbari-usuli controversy and the emergence of a new Shʿia oriented Sufism. He shows how the work of Sadra emerged out of a bubbling cauldron of diverse ideas, including the peripatetic philosophy of Al-Farabi and Ibn Sina, the ishraqi school of Suhrawardi, the Sufi metaphysics of Ibn ʿArabi, and the various schools of Shiʿʿa and Sunni kalam. He is also generous in describing Sadra's influence on future thinkers. Unfortunately, Kalin is not as successful with his fourth objective, of providing a critical assessment of the success of Sadra's overall project; and the reason for this seems to be that the way he approached the third objective, of introducing the 'primacy of existence' doctrine, upon which the success of [End Page 1] Sadra's project turns, was not such as to make a critical assessment possible. That need not necessarily detract from the book, because there is some reason to believe that the doctrine itself is simply not accessible to critical assessment, at least of any sort that can be accomplished in a book. As Kalin puts it: For Sadra, one of the goals of philosophy is to equip us with the proper epistemic tools and cognitive means to 'see' the self-evident (badihi) reality of existence. This, however, cannot be achieved by mental or rational analysis alone because demonstrative and rational analyses give us only a mental picture of existence, not its reality. (p. 82) But there is some ambiguity on this point, which first appears in Kalin's account of Sadra's view of the relation between ʿirfan, and burhan. On the one hand, he says that "gnosis is not without cognitive content, and a true sage can explain his vision by using ordinary rational arguments." (p. 47). On the other, he quotes Sadra as saying "the knowledge of what is tasted and the knowledge of spiritual states cannot be captured in the garment of letters and words." (p. 49). The latter position lends itself to Wittgenstein's famous dictum, "that of which we cannot speak we must pass over in silence." But the former characterization of Sadra's position, and the fact that he did have a lot to write on the primacy of existence, whets the appetite for a satisfying burhani treatment of the topic; one that, as Kalin puts it, "ensures that...

A New World, a New Approach to Answering His Critics: George Whitefield in the American Colonies, 1740–45

ABSTRACT George Whitefield intentionally stirred up controversy to generate publicity. During his first American preaching tour, he accomplished this by claiming that the New England clergy were in a defunct spiritual state. When he returned in 1744, he encountered the most organized onslaught of criticism he had or would ever face. But even more curious is the rapidity with which Whitefield's American critics stayed their pens after 1745, which can largely be attributed to Whitefield's recognition that the American context demanded a more moderate approach than the one he deployed in Britain, where he usually fanned the flames of controversy when answering his critics.

Novo srednjovekovlje u filozofiji istorije Nikolaja Berđajeva

The author discussed the philosophy of history of Nikolai Berdyaev on the basis of appropriate literature. His understanding of the meaning of history and the new Middle Age is based on philosophy of freedom. History without freedom is void of any meaning. A man realizes his freedom only in the community with the Holy Trinity. The arrival of Christ was the victory of freedom over the kingdom of necessity of a sinful nature. The pagan concept of destiny was expelled from the vocabulary of a free man. In the history of mankind, as a common spiritual basis of the Renaissance and Reformation, Berdyaev sees humanism. In the analysis of the internal nature of humanism, Berdyaev recognizes the man's rebellion against God. He follows the unity of man and god through the Renaissance, whose end extends beyond its temporal boundaries in futurism and cubism of the twentieth century. The philosopher of freedom points out that humanism, paradoxically, turned completely against mankind. In order to illustrate this idea, in the history of art, science, and philosophy, he finds examples of the disappearance of man. Berdyaev compared the spiritual state of mankind of the ninety twenties to the epoch of the Roman emperor Diocletian, when the mass exile of the Christians began. According to many signs, European society should enter a new historical era similar to the 7th, 8th, and 9th centuries, in the pre-Medieval period. The author believes that the feudalization of Europe, with the weakening of the role of the state and transnational companies in political life, is only formal, insufficient that it can be concluded that we are getting closer to the new Middle Age, because a man through his wanting to be the measure of all things, has diminished himself as a thing.

Європейська культурна самосвідомість зламу ХІХ‒ХХ ст.: зміна парадигми

The article analyzes the phenomenon of cultural fracture (shift, breakdown), which reflects the nature of transformational processes in the culture of the end of the XIX — early XX century and focuses on the mechanisms of transmission of the cultural and historical experience of mankind. The dynamic character of changes in the European cultural consciousness on the verge of the XIX and XX centuries, the transition from the classical model of cultural interpretation to the non-classical and post-classical, the role of everyday life in the "inalienable" states of culture has been researched. The connection between criticism of culture and correlation between scientific and art world views of the end of the XIX and the beginning of the XX century has been revealed. The consequences of a total cultural fracture in the human consciousness of European culture in the projections of cultural-traumatic discourse are revealed through the conceptual topography of the XX century culture. The culture of everyday life, which arises in the XIX century as a culture of comfort, has become the cause of a collision between alternative spiritual states of culture, which also caused a situation of fracture. The fracture of culture reveal the inner essence of culture and in the conditions of the anthropological crisis form a new dynamic model of the worldview that includes the past and the future at the same time. If in the classical version of the philosophy of culture the crisis is perceived as a source of eschatological sentiment, then in the non-classical one it acquires signs of an existential crisis, which outlines a new type of "split" cultural consciousness. The sharp change in ideological orientations concentrates the attention of researchers on transitional states of culture, which has a huge evaluetive potential, as the need for their inclusion in the dynamism and the logic of cultural development (O. Losev, N. Mankovskaya, G. Knabe, and others). Actualization in the mental field of modern culture of new meanings and metaphorical concepts - "labyrinth", "rhizome", "fold", "crossroads" is the consequence of the continuation of permanent transition, the state of search in situation of uncertainty. The situation of the XX — beginning of the XXI century is not a fracture, because it is rather a deepening of the tendencies that were laid in the late XIX - XX centuries. Of course, fundamentally new phenomena arise, a new topography of culture is formed, in connection with the advent of information technologies appear new types of identity, which acquires signs of "drifting", cultural-traumatic discourse is formed. However, these processes can rather be defined not as a radical "revaluation of values", but as a "dispersal" of new values acquired during the XX century, "improvement" of new formats of the culture of everyday life, the problems of which arise in the XIX century.

Paradoks wdzięku. O teatrze marionetek Heinricha von Kleista

The article is an attempt of interpreting On the Marionette Theatre by H. v. Kleist. Kleist as a writer uses the principle of paradox and coincidence in his work. The claim that a marionette possesses more grace than a man is, according to the author of this text, also a paradox consciously applied by Kleist. It mostly concerns the phenomenon of human grace, which is a manifestation of the spiritual state of a person. The author also draws attention to the reception of Kant’s philosophy and Schiller’s aesthetics, out of which Kleist drew radical conclusions.

Spiritual struggles and compassion: the positive side of moral concerns

ABSTRACTA large body of research has focused on the negative consequences associated with spiritual struggles, with little consideration to the potential positive aspects of these experiences. To fill this void in literature, we investigated the relationship between spiritual struggles and state compassion using film methodology. The results of this study show that the moral concerns component of spiritual struggles is the only one that predicted feelings of compassion, and this relation was not explained by other individual differences factors. The results demonstrated that one facet of spiritual struggles can predict positive outcomes, such as compassion.

EXPLORING PHILOSOPHY OF ART IN INDIAN APPROACH

Art is one of the cultural activities of man through which he reaches his ideas, values, feelings, aspirations and reactions to life. The generic purpose of art is to provide aesthetic experience and enjoyment to the recipient. Art give outlet to the artist himself to reveal and express his innermost aspirations, feelings, sentiments and also the impressions of life. Aesthetics, the branch of philosophy devoted to conceptual and theoretical enquiry into art. Philosophy of Indian art is concerned with the nature of art and the concepts in terms of which individual work of art interpreted and evaluated. It deals with most of the general principles of aesthetic cognition of the world through any human activity. The human concern for art and beauty had been expressed at the very beginning of philosophy both in the East and West and it continues to the present. In India, philosophy of art is designated as saundaryasastra, which is evolved with an emphasis on inducing special spiritual or philosophical states in the audience or with representing them symbolically. It deals with most of the general principles of aesthetic cognition of the world through any human activity. The human concern for art and beauty had been expressed at the very beginning. The rich tradition of Indian aesthetics can be traced back to the second century BC with Bharata’s Natyasastra, the foundation text on Saundaryasastra. Indian aesthetics is evolved with an emphasis on inducing special spiritual or philosophical states in the audience.

Living the myth: Revisiting Okigbo’s art and commitment

This is a study of the nature and sources of the persona’s quest in Christopher Okigbo’s poetry. The protagonist in Okigbo’s writing explores the fluid borders between aesthetic and spiritual states, with language and social action as instruments of the self’s aspiration towards spiritual and aesthetic fulfillment. Although Okigbo’s narration is presented in the form of dramatic ritual, the distance or severance of the material from the poet’s own spiritual history is not total, for the historical content eventually intrudes into the writing and reestablishes the authentic autobiography of the poetic self. The historical context, the 1960s, is an age of transition. Okigbo’s characterisation of his persona as an actor in a state of personal transition reflects the poet’s sensitive immersion in the spirit of his times and establishes Okigbo the poet as perhaps its ideal representative. One of the issues raised in this study is that in spite of the protagonist’s recurrent return to the point of passage, there is a relentless drive towards death seen ambiguously as the ultimate goal and state of perfection as well as the perfect form of transition. The central question explored in this study is the roles of poetic diction, the tense politics of the 1960s and the poet’s own intense temperament in determining his peculiar choice of resolution to the dilemma at the centre of his poetry.

Doctor Faustusand the Art of Dying Badly

<i>Doctor Faustus</i>and the Art of Dying Badly

Association of spiritual well-being pre- and post-radiotherapy for prostate cancer with health-related quality of life and psychological state.

214 Background: Cancer survivors often experience psychological stress, with impact on quality of life (QOL) and mortality. Religious/spiritual identity and well-being (WB) can also significantly relate to QOL among individuals with cancer. The specific aim of the current study investigates correlates of spiritual (WB), QOL, and psychological state before and after radiotherapy for prostate cancer (PC). We hypothesized that 1) positive correlations between pre-treatment spiritual WB and health-related QOL will be seen both time points and that 2) negative correlations between spiritual WB and depression and anxiety will be seen at both points. Methods: The PHQ-9 and GAD-7 assessed depression and anxiety, respectively. The FACT-P assessed physical, social, emotional, and functional WB. The FACIT-Sp-Ex assessed spiritual WB. Our sample ( N= 65) had mean age of 68 (range 52-81) and education of 16 years (range 10-20). Most participants (82%) identified as European-American. Associations were assessed by Pearson’s correlation coefficients. Results: Pre-treatment spiritual WB positively correlated with social, emotional, and functional well-being (all p &lt; .001). Spiritual and physical WB were not significantly related. Spiritual WB negatively correlated with depression and anxiety (both p &lt; .001). Among a smaller subsample ( N = 39) with pre-, mid-, and post-treatment assessment, spiritual WB significantly increased over time, p &lt; .001. Post-treatment spiritual WB again correlated with social, emotional, and functional WB (all p &lt; .001) and did not correlate with physical WB. Spiritual WB was again negatively correlated with anxiety ( p &lt; 0.05), but it was no longer associated with depression. Conclusions: Assessing and addressing spiritual WB can be helpful in itself, as well as in better understanding QOL and psychological state. Future directions include more fine-grained assessment of pre- and post-treatment spiritual WB in order to better understand which aspects of religious/spiritual identity relate more or less closely to post-treatment QOL for different stages of PC.

Psychometric properties of the Chinese version of Spiritual Index of Well-Being in elderly Taiwanese

BackgroundSpiritual well-being has become an increasingly important issue for the elderly people. The 12-item Spirituality Index of Well-Being (SIWB) is a well-validated instrument for assessing a patient’s current spiritual state. However, the psychometric properties of the SIWB in the Chinese elderly populations are not known. Therefore, this study translated the SIWB into Chinese and evaluated its psychometric properties.MethodsThe English version of the SIWB was first translated into Chinese based on the Brislin’s translation model. The psychometric properties of the translated version of the SIWB (SIWB-C) was evaluated in 416 elderly Taiwanese recruited using a purposive sampling procedure from a medical center, a long-term care institution, and a community health center. Convergent validity was accessed using Pearson’s correlation coefficients of the SIWB-C, the EQ-5D-3 L health-related quality of life scale, and the Geriatric Depression Scale-5 (GDS-5). Exploratory factor analysis with Varimax rotation was performed to determine the construct validity. Confirmatory factor analysis was conducted for verification of the quality of the factor structures and demonstrating the convergent validity of the SIWB-C. An internal consistency test based on the Cronbach’s alpha coefficient and a stability test based on the Guttman split-half coefficient were also performed. Test-retest reliability was evaluated with intraclass correlation coefficient.ResultsExploratory factor analysis confirmed the original two-dimensional structure of the scale. Confirmatory factor analysis indicated a well-fitting model and a fine convergent validity of the SIWB-C. The Cronbach’s alpha coefficient and the Guttman split-half coefficient for the SIWB-C were 0.94 and 0.84, respectively. The correlations between the SIWB-C with EQ-5D-3 L and GDS-5 were 0.22 (p < 0.01) and 0.45 (p < 0.05), respectively. The intraclass correlation coefficient of the SIWB-C over a test-retest interval of two weeks was 0.989.ConclusionsThe SIWB-C was found to be a potential useful measure of subjective spiritual well-being in elderly Taiwanese. Its application in assessing the spiritual well-being in Mandarin-speaking elderly population warrants further investigation.

Letters III (1756–1765) (The Works of John Wesley volume 27)

This volume has been long awaited by students of Wesley's life and character, for his letters are more revealing than the deceptive journal. The late Frank Baker edited the first two volumes of letters in this Bicentennial Edition (BE) as long ago as 1980–2. The new editor is Professor of Church History at Southern Methodist University and a veteran Wesley scholar. For the period they cover so far, the BE edition is clearly superior to Telford's 1931 ‘Standard’ edition. It has the meticulous text for which the standard was set by Baker, exact sources for the letters and, where needed, corrected identities of recipients. Baker's volumes had welcome selections from Wesley's correspondents. From now on these will no longer be in the printed volumes but available online in full. The present volume adds a number of letters not in Telford: nothing dramatic, but welcome for fresh details. One letter, to Sarah Ryan on 12 November 1761, in Telford is dropped in this edition without explanation. A full index is necessarily postponed until the letter volumes are complete, but there is a complete list of Wesley's correspondence and a new index of people mentioned in the letters. The overall introduction remains Frank Baker's in the first letter volume and one wonders whether it might be useful to have a brief introduction to each volume, sketching the main issues covered and some mention of the wider background (in this volume, invasion worries during the Seven Years' War). We learn of these matters here largely through scattered comments in the footnotes.Many of Wesley's correspondents were women to whom he wrote more freely than anyone but his brother, occasionally mentioning his spiritual state. In the case of Sarah Ryan this had a disastrous effect, for one of the features of this volume is the breakdown of Wesley's marriage. It is difficult to judge this sad affair fairly, since most of the evidence comes from Wesley's letters to his wife (hers he burnt). He complains that she read his correspondence, rifled his belongings, and rendered his domestic life a miserable imprisonment. To add insult to injury from her point of view, his letters to Ryan were markedly more intimate than his to her, for their businesslike tone was hardly softened by addressing her as ‘my dear love’.One recurring theme was that Methodism was separating from the Church of England, and indeed some preachers started to administer the Lord's Supper. A few were expelled for paying a dubious Greek bishop to ordain them. Letters to the evangelical Samuel Walker of Truro showed Wesley resisting his desire to reduce the preachers in his parish to ‘readers’ under his control. Wesley also continued to oversee societies and preachers in the evangelical Henry Venn's Huddersfield parish. Wesley ceased about this time to hope for a ‘union’ with the evangelical clergy but this was impossible because of his disapproval of their Calvinism and theirs of his perfectionism and violations of church order.Much of Wesley's correspondence shows him in the role of pastor, not much discussed by his biographers except for a chapter in Martin Schmidt's ‘theological biography’. A long correspondence with Samuel Furly saw him through from college to early curacies. Wesley was no respecter of persons. It is noticeable that he addressed aristocrats politely but firmly for the good of their souls. Much of the correspondence, especially to women, concerns Wesley's controversial perfection doctrine. He defined it as received in a moment yet with growth before and after; as cleansing from conscious sin yet subject to ‘infirmities’. He probed them with questions on their experience and it was his fascination and optimism about the gift which made him hesitate far too long (so his brother and others thought) when faced with the perfectionist excesses of Maxfield and Bell in the early 1760s.Charles, mysteriously, is absent from the correspondence between December 1756 and early 1760. The first extant letter from John begins, ‘Where you are I know not.’ Is this a similar situation to that in 1753, when John complained that Charles travelled on impulse and did not coordinate with his brother? But Charles seems to have ceased to itinerate altogether after 1756, despite periodic attempts to stir him up.These letters are a major source for Wesley's life and opinions, shaped by controversy and experience. It is good to see more of them again and one must wish Professor Campbell well in the preparation of further volumes.