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.
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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
Malta, Knights of
(11 words)
[German Version] Knights of Malta/St. John's Hospitallers
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Religion Past and Present
Malta Report
(255 words)
[German Version] Contacts established during Vatican II led to the establishment of the 14-member Joint Lutheran/Roman Catholic Study Commission by the Secretariat for Christian Unity and the executive committee of the Lutheran World Federation. It met in five sessions: 1967 in Zürich, 1968 in Bastad (Sweden), 1969 in Nemi (Italy), 1970 in Cartigny (Geneva), and 1971 in San Anton (Malta). At the final session, a comprehensive final report was written, published in 1972 under the title
The Gospel and the Church (often called the Malta Report). The report formulates a “differ…
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Religion Past and Present
Malthus, Thomas Robert
(186 words)
[German Version] (Feb 13, 1766, Rookery, near Guildford – Dec 23, 1834, Bath, England). After studies at Cambridge, Malthus spent several years as a parish priest. In 1805 he was appointed professor of political economy at a college of the East India Company, where he taught until his death. He became ¶ famous through his “law of population,” according to which population tends to grow faster than the means of subsistence. The resulting threat of overpopulation would either be met by famine, war, etc., or avoided by sexual abstinence. These alter…
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Religion Past and Present
Maltzew, Alexis von
(178 words)
[German Version] (Aleksij Mal'cev, Mar 14, 1854, eparchy of Jaroslavl' – Apr 15/16, 1915, Kislovodsk), Russian theologian, son of an archpriest. In 1878 Maltzew completed his studies at St. Petersburg theological academy. He was ordained priest in 1882, and in 1886 became archpriest and chaplain at the Russian embassy in Berlin. He published a German-Slavonic edition of all important services of the Orthodox Church, with liturgical studies and confessional writings (e.g. in
Germania, 1898/99). In 1890 he founded the Brotherhood of St. Vladimir, which in 1895 set up …
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Religion Past and Present
Malvenda, Pedro de
(162 words)
[German Version] (c. 1505, Burgos, Spain – after 1561), important Catholic theologian of whose life little is known. In 1519 Malvenda began his studies in Paris, where in 1538 he earned a doctorate in theology. In 1540 he became chaplain at the imperial court in Spain. He took part in disputations on religion (Disputations, Religious: I) in Worms in 1541 and Regensburg in 1546, tried unsuccessfully in 1547 to win Philip of Hessen back to the Roman Church, and participated in the preparation of the…
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Religion Past and Present
Mammon
(283 words)
[German Version] is the Jewish Palestinian Aramaic term for wealth (III) and money (deriving from the Sem. root אמן/
ʾmn, it means “that upon which trust is placed”). Although in principle a neutral term, it gradually assumed the negative connotation of a dishonestly or sinfully acquired wealth. In Greek transcription, it is attested as μαμωνάς/
mamōnás in a Q-saying of the Synoptic Gospels, Matt 6:24, Luke 16:13: “No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. Yo…
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Religion Past and Present
Mampsis
(251 words)
[German Version] (Μάμψις, Isr. Mamshit, Arab. Kurnub) town in the Negev on the road from Beer-Sheva (Beer-Sheba) to Araba, mentioned in sources of the 2nd–6th centuries; excavated by Shimon Applebaum (1956), Avraham Negev (1965–1967, 1971–1972, 1990), and Talli Erickson-Gini (1993–1994). Founded by the Nabateans c. 70 ce as an open settlement, it survived till the time of Hadrian. Important for knowledge of Nabatean dwellings built of local limestone, since timber was lacking; even roofs and shelves were made of stone. Distinctive features …
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Religion Past and Present
Mamre
(369 words)
[German Version] (מַמְרֵא, genuine place name meaning something like “fat pasture”) stood in the middle of the hill country of Judah, about 3 km north of Hebron (Arab. name [until 15th cent. ce], Rāmat or Bēt al-Ḫalîl, “High Place/House of the Friend [of God]”). According to ancient tradition in Gen 18* a divine triad (from Hebron?) appeared here to the tent-dwelling peasant Abraham. When in the 6th century bce Abraham was made the mythic origin of the population of Judah, Mamre stood on the frontier between Judah and Idumaea (from 597/586 bce; Gen 13:18*; 16*). In the late 6th or ear…
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Religion Past and Present
Mana
(420 words)
[German Version] (in the history of religion). The Polynesian word has been known in Europe for more than a century. Similar expressions had been heard from Native American Indians (
manitu from the Algonquin,
wakanda from the Sioux [Lakota],
orenda from the Iroquois). The scholarly interpretation of this discovery (dynamism) states that “primitives” see themselves surrounded by impersonal powers which they set out to control with the help of magic. The original meaning of mana remains a mystery, since European thinking lacks an equi…
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Religion Past and Present
Management
(305 words)
[German Version] Management is the administration of sociotechnical systems on both the personal and task-oriented level with the aid of professional methods. With the growth of industry, the emergence of corporations as legal persons, and the resulting increased separation of ownership and business administration, the administration of (large) enterprises was entrusted increasingly to trained managers. In the years that followed, the task of these managers in large corporations with extensive division of labor was to ensure the coordination of corporate decisions. The term
ma…
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Religion Past and Present
Manasseh
(578 words)
[German Version] (מְנַשֶּׁה/
M enaššeh, “He who causes [the loss of a family member] to be forgotten”), the son and successor of Hezekiah; his reign as king of Judah is said to have lasted 55 years (c. 696–641 bce; Kingship [in Israel]). Like all kings of Judah since Ahaz, Manasseh was a vassal of Assyria (Israel: II, 1). Around 673 bce, Esarhaddon mentions him together with other western vassals as a supplier of construction materials (
TUAT I, 397), while Ashurbanipal lists him as a vassal around 667 (or 669) bce. According to Ashurbanipal, Manasseh (as well as other vassals) suppo…
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Religion Past and Present
Manasseh, Prayer of
(358 words)
[German Version] Manasseh, Prayer of, a penitential psalm classified among the Old Testament apocrypha (II). It probably represents a later continuation of the new tradition of 2 Chr 33, as against 2 Kgs 21, to the effect that the otherwise negatively portrayed king did penance during his Assyrian captivity and that his prayer is preserved in the “Chronicle of the Kings of Israel” (2 Chr 33:18). In spite of a number of parallels to the biblical text, the authenticity of the attribution remains unc…
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Religion Past and Present
Mandaeism
(1,638 words)
[German Version] I. Spread of Mandaeism – II. History of Research – III. Texts – IV. Cosmology – V. Religious Hierarchy and Ritual
I. Spread of Mandaeism Gnostic religion of the Mandaeans (lit. “knowing ones,” from Mandaean
mandaʿ, “knowledge”). Mandaeans in Iran and Iraq prefer their passport classification “Sabaean” (see “people of the book,” Qurʾān 2:62; 5:69; 22:17). Adepts, generally priests, are called Naṣoreans. 17th-century Christian missionaries named the Mandaeans “Christians of St. John,” because John the Baptist oc…
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Religion Past and Present
Maṇḍala
(331 words)
[German Version] (Sanskrit “circle”). Especially in the Tantric forms of Indian religion (Tantrism),
maṇḍala designates the arrangement of deities in a cosmos-palace. Traditional (Purāṇas) cosmology (ring-shaped continents surrounding a central mountain) persists in the concentric circles of the
maṇḍala. The subdivision into four quadrants represents the cardinal points; squares symbolize the palace, further square elements mark its gates, etc. The main deity resides in the center of the
maṇḍala, while other deities flank it in the peripheral segments. The Buddhist
maṇḍala …
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Religion Past and Present
Mande, Hendrik
(141 words)
[German Version] (c. 1360, Dordrecht – 1431, Sion Monastery, Beverwijk). First a clerk at the court of the counts of Holland, Mande was led by the preaching of G. Groote to the
devotio moderna . After a stay in Deventer and Zwolle he became, in 1395, a
redditus (unordained canon) at the monastery of Windesheim (Windesheim Congregation), where he worked as an illustrator and copyist. Mande often received visions, recorded by J. Busch in his
Chronicon Windeshemense. He was the author of mystical writings in Middle Dutch, in which he independently reworked the writings of …
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Religion Past and Present
Mandeville, Bernard de
(331 words)
[German Version] (1670, Dordrecht or Rotterdam – Jan 21, 1733, Hackney, near London). Mandeville took degrees first in philosophy and then in medicine in Leiden; for a short time he practiced medi-¶ cine in Rotterdam, specializing in ailments of the nerves and stomach. Later he lived in London as a physician and writer. In 1704 he renounced his title of nobility. In 1705 he published (anonymously) an allegorical poem,
The Grumbling Hive, or Knaves Turn'd Honest: a prosperous beehive (the English nation) is enjoying an economic and cultural heyday because all occupation…
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Religion Past and Present
Manegold of Lautenbach
(191 words)
[German Version] (clearly attested only between 1085 and 1103; possibly died Jan 24). Richard of Cluny (c. 1160) speaks of an itinerant teacher named Manegold who traveled about with his wife and daughters. This figure is probably identical with our Manegold, who was expelled in 1085 from Lautenbach in Alsace by supporters of Henry IV. He took refuge in the abbey of Rottenbuch and ultimately became provost of the abbey of Marbach in Alsace, which he founded in 1089. Mangegold composed two works in 1085. In his
Liber contra Wolfelmum, he represents the teachings of the pagan philosop…
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Religion Past and Present