Religion Past and Present
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Subject: Religious Studies
Edited by: Hans Dieter Betz, Don S. Browning†, Bernd Janowski and Eberhard Jüngel
Religion Past and Present (RPP) Online is the online version of the updated English translation of the 4th edition of the definitive encyclopedia of religion worldwide: the peerless Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart (RGG). This great resource, now at last available in English and Online, Religion Past and Present Online continues the tradition of deep knowledge and authority relied upon by generations of scholars in religious, theological, and biblical studies. Including the latest developments in research, Religion Past and Present Online encompasses a vast range of subjects connected with religion.
Subscriptions: see brill.com
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Religion Past and Present (RPP) Online is the online version of the updated English translation of the 4th edition of the definitive encyclopedia of religion worldwide: the peerless Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart (RGG). This great resource, now at last available in English and Online, Religion Past and Present Online continues the tradition of deep knowledge and authority relied upon by generations of scholars in religious, theological, and biblical studies. Including the latest developments in research, Religion Past and Present Online encompasses a vast range of subjects connected with religion.
Subscriptions: see brill.com
Darśana
(99 words)
[German Version] In Hinduism,
darśana (Sanskrit, neut., literally “vision, sight”) designates: (a) the mutual beholding of believer and divinity in worship (Pūjā), and (b) a philosophical system, especially the six “orthodox” schools of Vaiśeṣika, Nyāya, Sāṃkhya, Yoga, Mīmāṃsā and Vedānta. In Buddhism, the term denotes either a rational insight or the meditative vision of a celestial Buddha or Bodhisattva. Axel Michaels Bibliography E. Frauwallner,
Geschichte der indischen Philosophie, vol. I, 1953; vol. II, 1956; ET:
History of Indian Philosophy, 1973 D. Eck,
Darśan: Seeing …
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Religion Past and Present
Darwin, Charles Robert
(592 words)
[German Version] (Feb 12, 1809, Shrewsbury, England – Apr 19, 1882, Downe, Kent, England) is known as the author of
The Origin of Species (1859), the book which popularized the theory of biological evolution and introduced the evolutionary mechanism of natural selection. Darwin developed the evolution theory following studies of biogeography as a naturalist on the survey-vessel H.M.S. Beagle (1831–1836). Con…
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Religion Past and Present
Darwinism
(1,874 words)
[German Version] I. Science – II. Philosophy of Religion – III. Systematic Theology – IV. Ethics
I. Science Although Darwinism may be thought of as referring to the version of evolutionary theory originating from C.R. Darwin (Desmond & Moore), it is in reality, however, difficult to agree on any more precise definition. Darwin's own works on evolution involved several different mechanisms for br…
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Religion Past and Present
Dasein
(652 words)
[German Version] I. Dasein – II. Dasein Analysis
I. Dasein
1. General The German term
Dasein refers to the reality of things (Lat.
existentia, which C. Wolff translated into German as
Dasein, lit. “being there”) in contradistinction to their essence (Ger.
Sosein, “being so”) and to the actuality of facts (i.e. that such-and-such is the case). In early Greek philosophy and also in Plato,
Dasein does not receive much attention as an independent topic, there being more interest in determining the what and the how of things. Although Aristotle inquires concerning
Dasein in his
Posterior An…
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Religion Past and Present
Data Protection
(1,878 words)
[German Version] I. Data Protection – a Fundamental Right – II. Limitations of Data Protection – III. Data Protection and Information Technology – IV. The General Data Protection Law – V. Church and Data Protection – VI. Area-Specific Data Protection – VII. Future Prospects
I. Data Protection – a Fundamental Right The misleading term data protection arose at the beginning of the 1960s when business and government first began using computers on a large scale to process bulk transactio…
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Religion Past and Present
Dathenus, Petrus
(274 words)
[German Version] (1531/1532, Cassel near Hazebrouck, Flanders (now France) – Mar 17, 1588, Elbląg [Elbing], Poland) joined the Reformation as a young Carmelite monk (Ypres) and fled to England in 1550. In 1555, he became the leader of the Dutch exile community in Frankfurt am Main. After the eucharistic controversy between Calvin and J. Westphal, Dathenus and some 60 families took refuge in the monastery of ¶ Frankenthal. He moved to the Netherlands in 1566, but fled once again to the Electoral Palatinate (Kurpfalz) in 1567 …
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Religion Past and Present
Daubanton, François Elbertus
(199 words)
[German Version] (Feb 5, 1853, Amsterdam – Dec 6, 1920, Utrecht) served as a minister in the Netherlands (1878–1903), and subsequently as professor of biblical theology, practical theology, and the history of mission at Utrecht University. His most important study,
Prolegomena van protestantsche zendingswetenschap (“Prolegomena of Protestant Missiology,” 1911), was the first history of mission studies and the first formal study of missiology; it deals wit…
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Religion Past and Present
Daub, Carl
(248 words)
[German Version] (Mar 20, 1765, Kassel – Nov 22, 1836, Heidelberg). From a poor background, Daub began his studies of philology, philosophy, history, and theology in Marburg in 1786. He passed the theological exam in Marburg in 1789, became
Stipendiatenmajor (tutor for scholarship students), and
Privatdozent in 1790. In 1794, he became professor of philosophy in the Hohe Landesschule Hanau. On Nov 13, 1795, he was appointed second professor – of dogmatics a…
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Religion Past and Present
Daube, David
(299 words)
[German Version] (Feb 8, 1909, Freiburg – Feb 24, 1999, Berkeley, CA), scholar of Roman, biblical, and Jewish law, biblical Interpreter. Born in an orthodox Jewish family, Daube studied in Freiburg and Göttingen. In the face of the Nazi oppression of Jews (Holocaust), he emigrated to England in 1933: Daube received his doctorate in Cambridge in 1936 and his M.A. in Oxford in 1955. He …
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Religion Past and Present
Daut, Johann Maximilian
(158 words)
[German Version] (died after 1736), radical Pietist. A cobbler's apprentice, he was expelled from his home city, Frankfurt am Main, in 1709, because of his polemics against the church and authority, led an irregular life as a wandering prophet (Wittgenstein region, Leiden and Altona). In view of the impending judgment of God, he called “false and unrepentant C…
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Religion Past and Present
David
(3,786 words)
[German Version] I. Bible – II. Christianity – III. Judaism – IV. Islam
I. Bible
1. Old Testament From the biblical perspective, David, whose name means “darling, beloved,” is the embodiment of the ideal ruler. He governed in the early 10th century bce, allegedly for 40 years, of which seven and a half were in Hebron, the rest in Jerusalem (2 Sam 5:4f.). Although he is the king of whom the Bible has most to tell (Kingship in Israel), he remains a …
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Religion Past and Present
David, Christian
(189 words)
[German Version] (bapt. Feb 17, 1692, Senftleben – Feb 3, 1751, Herrnhut), a carpenter, as a Catholic stimulated by secret Protestants and Jews, he studied the Bible and converted to Protestantism in Berlin in 1715. Awakened in 1717 under the influence of pastor Melchior Scheffer in Görlitz, he requested land from N.L. v. Zinzendorf for Moravian immigrants and built the first house at Herrnhut in 1722 (Bohemian and Moravian Brethren: II). David was the prototype of a Moravian emissary whose
Beschreibung und Zuverlässige ¶ Nachricht von Hernnhut (“Description …
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Religion Past and Present
Dávid, Ferenc
(159 words)
[German Version] (actually Hertel), (c. 1510, Klausenburg – Nov 15, 1579, Déva), studied 1546–1559 in Wittenberg and Frankfurt an der Oder, in 1551 became teacher in Bistritz, in 1552 the first Protestant pastor in Petersdorf (north Transylvania), in 1555 school director in Klausenburg, in 1556 superintendent of the Hungarian Evangelical-Lutheran Church. Initi…
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Religion Past and Present
David IV of Georgia
(185 words)
[German Version] (1089–1125; born 1073). Also known as David the Builder, he occupies a special place among the kings of the Georgian “Golden Age” in the period of the defense against the Seljuqs. As the son of George II, he is numbered the second, third, or better, fourth to bear the name among Georgian kings. From 1107 to 1118, he conquered provinces previou…
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Religion Past and Present
David, Johann Nepomuk
(151 words)
[German Version] (Nov 30, 1895, Elferding, Austria – Dec 22, 1977, Stuttgart). Together with E. Pepping and H. Distler, David is one of the most innovative 20th-century composers of church music. After composition studies in Vienna, David spent ten years as an organist and school teacher in Wels. From 1934 to 1945 he taught in Leipzig. After three postwar year…
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Religion Past and Present
David of Augsburg
(287 words)
[German Version] (c. 1205, Augsburg – 1272, Augsburg), OFM, novice master and religious author. As a popular preacher he was the
socius (not
magister) of Berthold of Regensburg, whom he accompanied in 1246 as papal visitor of the abbeys of Ober- and Niedermünster. The often claimed activity as inquisitor is unlikely since authorship of the Waldensian tractate
De inquisitione is no longer attributed to David. In addition to minor Latin tractates and an exposition of the rule of the Ordo Fratrum Minorum, he authored the mirror for novices,
De compositione, which, as a comprehensive in…
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Religion Past and Present
David of Dinant
(138 words)
[German Version] (died 1206/1210) probably received the Master of Arts in Paris, and supposedly spent time at the court of Innocent III. He excerpted and translated Aristotle's works of natural philosophy from Greek, discovered his
De problematibus, and developed, under neoplatonic influence, a pantheistic philosophy in which he identified God with the primary material and mind. He defended the worldview of Pythagoras ag…
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Religion Past and Present
David of Ethiopia
(226 words)
[German Version] (Eth. Dāwit) I (II according to Ethiopian enumeration – after the biblical David, or the epithet “the second David”) was the throne name of Qosṭanṭinos (Constantine); he was an Ethiopian king who reigned from 1382 until 1413. Through evangelization in Goğğām, he extended the Christian realm southward. Campaigns agai…
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Religion Past and Present
Davidson, Donald
(512 words)
[German Version] (Mar 6, 1917, Springfield, MA – Aug 30, 2003, Berkeley, CA), American philosopher. After studies at Harvard in the 1930s and 1940s under both A.N. Whitehead and later W. v. O. Quine (service with the US Navy 1942–1945), Davidson held positions at Queen's College (NY), Stanford, Princeton, Rockefeller, Chicago and fi…
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Religion Past and Present
Davies, Robertson
(151 words)
[German Version] (Aug 28, 1913, Thamesville, Ontario – Feb 12, 1995, Orangeville, Ontario), Canada's leading 20th-century novelist. In his works Davies regularly employed religious symbols, disputes, traditions, and hagiography. After working in the theater and as an editor of the
Examiner, published in Peterborough, ¶ Ontario, he became Master of Massey College, University of Toronto, in 1963, where he served until retirement. Davies's novels included three trilogies: …
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Religion Past and Present