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
Madruzzo, Christopher
(162 words)
[German Version] (Jul 5, 1512, Madruzzo near Cavedine – Jul 5, 1578, Tivoli) studied at Padua and Bologna, and after assuming several canonries (Trent, Augsburg, Salzburg, Brixen) was from 1539 bishop of Trent. In 1542, the year of his consecration and appointment as cardinal, he also assumed the administration of Brixen; he repeatedly sought other archbishoprics farther north in the empire. Madrutsch, a vassal of the emperor and close friend of the pope, tried, as a theologian tending towards ref…
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Religion Past and Present
Mafia
(525 words)
[German Version]
Mafia is a collective term of uncertain etymology (Arab.?) that referred initially to criminal groups in Sicily but has been applied more recently to comparable criminal secret societies elsewhere (“Russian Mafia,” “Chinese Mafia”). The self-designation
Cosa Nostra (“Our Affair”) was probably introduced in the recent past (Hess). The role of the mafioso is a by-product of Sicilian agrarian feudalism: mafiosi were originally estate managers (
gabellotti) who acted as agents (“power brokers”: Wolf) of the absent feudal lords, guaranteeing and enf…
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Religion Past and Present
Magdala
(202 words)
[German Version] Magdala (Gk Ταριχέαι/
Tarichéai or Μάγδαλα; Aram. מִגְדַּל־נוּנַיָּא/
migdal nûnayyāʾ; Arab. el-Mejdel) lies on the northwest coast of the Sea of Galilee; Strabo (XVI 2.45) already mentions it in the 1st century bce as a prosperous Jewish city. Mary Magdalene, a disciple of Jesus, came from Magdala (Mark 15:47; Luke 8:2; John 20:1). Fortified in the First Jewish Revolt (Jos.
Bell. II 606–609), Magdala was the site of a famous sea battle (
Bell. III 462–542). Excavations have revealed the remains of a small Hellenistic (cf. its Gk and Sem. names) city of…
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Religion Past and Present
Magdalenes
(176 words)
[German Version] Since the 12th century, individual convents were founded under the patronage of Mary Magdalene to accommodate converted prostitutes and save women in jeopardy. The order of the Penitent Sisters of Blessed Mary Magdalene (Poenitentes Sorores Beatae Mariae Magdalenae) traces back to the initiative of the Hildesheim canon Rudolph of Worms, who founded convents for these penitents throughout the empire, beginning in 1226. Affirmed by Gregory IX in 1227 and subject after 1232 to the Ru…
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Religion Past and Present
Magdeburg
(495 words)
[German Version] Magdeburg (population approx. 290,000) is the capital of Saxony-Anhalt. The Carolingian Diedenhofen capitulary (805) mentions “Magedeburg” on the Elbe, already an old frontier trading settlement; for a brief period under Otto I, it became the civil and religious center of the empire. In 937 Otto founded the Abbey of St. Maurice, the cornerstone for his planned archbishopric for the Slavs, with the suffragan bishoprics of Brandenburg, Havelberg, Meissen, Merseburg, and Zeitz taken …
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Religion Past and Present
Magdeburg, Joachim
(235 words)
[German Version] (1525, Gardelegen, Altmark – c. 1587) received his bachelor's degree from Wittenberg in 1546, then served as rector in Schöningen until 1547, when he was appointed pastor in Dannenberg. Having served from 1549 to 1551 in Salzwedel, he resigned voluntarily. He served as deacon in Hamburg (Sankt Petri) from 1552 to 1558; after being removed, he served as pastor in Oßmannstedt (Thuringia), where he was removed in 1562. In 1563 he resided in Eisleben. In 1564 he was appointed pastor i…
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Religion Past and Present
Maggid
(409 words)
[German Version] is the general Hebrew word for “speaker.” In religious terminology, it has two different meanings:
I. In the meaning of
preacher, maggid refers to one of the most important cultural institutions of modern Judaism (II; III). It refers to a religious elite that is second in authority to the official rabbinate (Rabbis: II, 2). Although large congregations always employed preachers in permanent positions, most maggidim wandered from one congregation to another, staying in each place for weeks or months. …
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Religion Past and Present
Magic
(9,806 words)
[German Version] I. Religious Studies – II. Antiquity – III. Bible – IV. Church History – V. Practical Theology – VI. Philosophy of Religion – VII. Judaism – VIII. Islam
I. Religious Studies No definition of magic has as yet found general acceptance. Approaches that go back to the late 19th century (E.B. Tylor, J.G. Frazer) view magic as a primitive cognitive system, the lowest rung on an evolutionary ladder (Evolution) that progresses with religion and science (cf. also Myth/Mythology: I). Magic in this view is charact…
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Religion Past and Present
Magical Books/Grimoires
(1,088 words)
[German Version] Magical books, also known as grimoires, are magical texts that contain instructions for procedures by virtue of which control over occult powers can be attained. The scope of the Hellenistic magical papyri (1st–4th cents. ce) extends from small fragments with simple magical formulas to longer texts. Coptic elements have occasionally infused the Greek texts. Magical papyri are late syncretistic witnesses to the magical traditions of the Egyptian temple. Around a quarter contain divinatory formularies (Divination); …
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Religion Past and Present
Magical Papyri
(467 words)
[German Version] is the prevalent name given to a collection of Greco-Egyptian magical texts (
PGrM; Magic: II, 2) edited by Karl Preisendanz at the suggestion of Albrecht Dieterich (vol. I, 1928; vol. II, 1931; vol. III, destroyed in 1943 as a result of the war). Steadily augmented by new finds, these inscriptions, symbols, and drawings on metal foil, ostraca, and intaglios as well as on papyrus, developed into a ramified specialist field of the history of ancient religion. Currently, the phenomena described as magic are undergoing a fundamentally new assessment. The
PGrM represent a …
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Religion Past and Present
Magi, The
(584 words)
[German Version] According to Matt 2:1–12, μάγοι/
mágoi from the East came to the place of Jesus' birth in order to pay homage to the newborn king of the Jews. They appear to represent members of the Median-Persian caste of priests, whom the ancient world believed to be endowed with particular astronomical/astrological and prophetic skills. The account is reminiscent of a Midrash and makes use of elements borrowed from the Balaam tradition (Num 24). Pagan belief in Jesus as the Messiah pre-dated Israel's belief. From the three gifts of gold, incense, and myrrh, Origen (
Hom. Gen. 14.3) alr…
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Religion Past and Present
Magnes, Judah Leon
(175 words)
[German Version] (Aug 5, 1877, San Francisco – Oct 27,1948, New York), Rabbi, one of the founders of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. Magnes was ordained as a rabbi in 1900 at the Hebrew Union College. In 1902 he gained a doctorate at Heidelberg. In 1904 Magnes was Reformed rabbi of the Temple Israel in Brooklyn and in 1906 of the Temple Emanu-El in New York. Disappointments with Reform Judaism led him to Conservative Judaism. In 1910 he assumed the office of rabbi of Bʾnai Jeshurun. After Worl…
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Religion Past and Present
Magnificat
(1,126 words)
[German Version] I. New Testament – II. Liturgy and Church Music
I. New Testament The
Magnificat is Mary's song of praise (Luke 1:46–55), which takes its name from the first word of the Latin translation (
magnificat, “she praises”) and consists of two strophes: vv. 47–50 report, in the first person, God's acting on Mary; vv. 51–55 are more general and praise God's mighty deeds on Israel's behalf. In terms of genre, it is an individual song of praise or a hymn that stands in the tradition of the Old Testament Psalms and is inspi…
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Religion Past and Present
Mahābhārata
(486 words)
[German Version] The
Mahābhārata is one of the two most important Sanskrit epics of Hinduism (the other being the
Rāmāyaṇa ). It comprises some 100,000 metrically arranged verses, each of 32 syllables. The longest work of its kind in the world, the epic is roughly eight times the length of the
Odyssey and
Iliad put together. Presumably based on a substantially shorter core, it swelled to its present length in a process that took several centuries, from the 4th century bce to the 5th century ce. While the literature preceding the
Mahābhārata – mainly the Vedas and their ancillary texts…
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Religion Past and Present
Mahāvīra
(502 words)
[German Version] I. History of Religion – II. Art History
I. History of Religion Mahāvīra (“Great Hero”) is the honorific epithet by which Vardhamāna, the founder of the Jain community, is commonly known. The Jains consider him to be the last in a series of 24 “ford-makers” (
tīrthaṅkara) who appear in different ages in order to proclaim and revive the true doctrine of salvation, namely Jainism. Mahāvīra actually placed himself in the tradition of Pārśva, who lived roughly two and a half centuries earlier and was venerated as the 23rd Tīrth…
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Religion Past and Present
Mahāyāna
(961 words)
[German Version] (Sanskrit) literally means “great vehicle” (equivalents in other languages are
dasheng in Chinese,
daijō in Japanese,
taesuˇng in Korean,
theg-pa chen-po ¶ in Tibetan). The “great vehicle” is, alongside the Hīnayāna, the “small vehicle” or the Śrāvakayāna, the “vehicle of those who listen,” the second major school within Buddhism, which represents contemporary Buddhism in East Asia (People's Republic of China, Korea, Japan), Central Asia (Mongolia, Tibet) and, in part, Southeast Asia (Vietnam). Mahāyān…
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Religion Past and Present
Mahler, Gustav
(353 words)
[German Version] (Jul 7, 1860, Kaliště, Bohemia – May 18, 1911, Vienna), Austrian composer and director. Mahler thought of his symphonies as music of experience, as sonic autobiography and an expression of his worldview. He dealt with central existential questions and based his symphonies on “internal” programs, which he initially shared and later concealed. Many annotations in his autograph scores show that his symphonies must be interpreted as music in which personal, religious, literary, and philosophical elements find expression. Mahler was a highly critical, religious…
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Religion Past and Present
Mahling, Friedrich
(186 words)
[German Version] (Feb 14, 1865, Frankfurt am Main – May 18, 1933, Berlin), Protestant theologian. Mahling studied in Marburg and elsewhere from 1883 to 1886 under W. Herrmann; in 1891 he became a pastor in Geinsheim in Hesse; in 1892 he became director of Hamburg City Mission; from 1904 he was a pastor in Frankfurt am Main. The focus of his activity was on Inland Mission, for whose founder J.H. Wichern he acted as publicist and editor. In 1908 the Kiel faculty of theology granted him an honorary d…
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Religion Past and Present