Religion Past and Present

[German Version] (Oct 12, 1872, Down Ampney, Gloucestershire – Aug 26, 1958, London), British composer and director. Vaughan Williams taught composition at the Royal College of Music in London and Cambridge University. He had studied with Hubert Parry, Charles Wood, and Charles Villiers Stanford and briefly with Max Bruch and Maurice Ravel. He composed symphonies, choral music, hymns, and music for the stage, theater, film, and radio. He was influenced by English folksongs and Tudor (English Renaissance) polyphony. He was the musical editor of the influential English Hymnal (1906)…

[German Version] (Nov 17, 1903, Paris – Sep 10, 1971, Jerusalem), entered the Dominican order in 1929, and became professor of history and archaeology (1934) and director of the École Biblique et Archéologique Française in Jerusalem (1945–1965). He edited the Revue Biblique from 1938 to 1953. From 1933, he turned first to orientalist, then to exegetical and archaeological questions. Special mention should be made of his co-editorship of the Jerusalem Bible, his work Les institutions de l’Ancien Testament (2 vols., 1958–1960; ET: Ancient Israel: Its Life and Institutions, 1961), an…

[German Version] (Apr 21, 1651, Sancoale, India – Jan 16, 1711, Kandy, Sri Lanka), Christian Brahmin, Goan priest and Oratorian. The spectacular resurgence of Catholicism in Ceylon (Sri Lanka) at the end of the ¶ 17th century is associated with Vaz. Catholicism had practically vanished from the island with the end of Portuguese colonial rule in 1658. Despite strict restrictions by the new Dutch authorities, Vaz made it to Ceylon in 1687. Disguised as a beggar, he initially visited the north (Mannar, Jaffna), then the west (Negomb…

[German Version] According to Indian tradition, the Upaniṣads generally define Vedānta, the “end” or “ultimate goal” of the Veda. Vedānta is associated specifically with philosophical and religious schools that deal with the interpretation of the Upaniṣads ( uttara mīmāṃsā). The central issue of Vedānta is to comprehend Brahman as the causative principle of the world and to develop a method for final deliverance from the cycle of existence (Saṃsāra). All schools of Vedānta accept the Brahmasūtra (2nd/3rd cent. ce; Sūtra) as the primary authoritative text for these purpos…

[German Version] Vedas, sometime referred to collectively as the Veda, are the sacred texts of Hinduism. The Brahmanic tradition (Brahman, Vedic and Brahmanic religion) distinguishes two types of sacred texts: śruti, “revelation,” literally “hearing,” and smṛti, literally “remembering.” Only the Vedas are śruti, “revelation”; the authority of smṛti drives from śruti (at least in theory). Collectively the Vedas constitute a literature, Vedic literature, whose internal structure may be described roughly as follows. Most commonl…

[German Version] (Jul 3, 1876, Westerenger, Westphalia – Apr 26, 1972, Okahandja, Namibia), from 1903 a missionary in German Southwest Africa, working on behalf of the United Evangelical Mission (Vereinigte Evangelische [Rheinische] Mission). Initially he looked after victims of the German colonial wars from 1904 to 1908 (Namibia) among the Herero and nama people, providing critical comment. After 1911 he found his primary missionary life’s work in training teachers and evangelists, which he ¶ placed on a solid academic footing with ethnographic, linguistic, and historical studies (honorary doctorates from Tübingen in 1925 and Stellenbosch in 1948); he concluded his missionary work as president of the Rheinische Mission in German Southwest Africa (1937–1947). Critics, especially Africans, attacked his senatorial representation of Namibian “natives” in the South African parliament (1950–1958), his use of creation theology to defend apartheid, and the belated development of an indigenous A…

[German Version] I. Veda: Origin, Content, Revelation The Veda dates b…

[German Version] (1498, Segovia – Sep 13/21, 1549, Salamanca), a Franciscan. He studied at the University of Salamanca, where he became a professor, following the teachings of J. Duns Scotus and Bonaventura. At the Council of Trent, he participated in discussions of the canon of Scripture, the Vulgate, and the doctrine of justification. …

[German Version] Dietary laws, Eating/Drinking

[German Version] …

[German Version] (late 15th cent., Biberach, near Heilbronn – April 1539, Halle), OP. After receiving his Dr.theol. in 1513, he served as prior of the Dominican house in Heidelberg from 1515, and from 1532 as provost of the Neues Stift in Halle. In 1539 he was appointed suffragan bishop of Halberstadt. Vehe’s most important work, Assertio sacrorum quorundam axiomatum (1535), treated all the current topics of debate between Catholics and the Reformers. He also published the first German Catholic hymnal (I, 2), Ein New Gesangbüchlin Geystlicher Lieder (1537, 21567). …

[German Version] (Jul 20, 1635, Ulm – Feb 23, 1706, Ulm). After studying in Straßburg (Strasbourg) and the Saxon universities, he was appointed preacher at the Ulm Minster in 1662 and professor of theology at the Ulm Gymnasium in 1663. In 1664 he received his Dr.theol. in Straßburg with a disputation against chiliasm under J.K. Dannhauer. In 1671 he was appoi…

[German Version] Woman: VII (Islam)

[German Version] (full name: Diego Rodríguez de Silva y Velázquez; Jun 6, 1599, Seville – Aug 7, 1660, Madrid). After studying in Seville with the painter and theoretician Francisco Pacheco, Velázquez went to Madrid, where he worked at the court of Philip IV after 1623. There he met P.P. Rubens in 1628/1629; the meeting probably inspired his travel to Italy, where he lived from 1629 to 1631 and again from 1649 to 1651. Through his exposure to Italian art (esp. Titian’s) and the painting of Rubens’…

[German Version] (Jan 5, 1881, Lelić, Serbia – Mar 18, 1956, South Canaan, PA), bishop of Žiča (1919–1921, 1936–1956) and Ochrid (1921–1936). Velimirovich studied and earned his Dr.theol. (1906–1910) in Switzerland and Oxford. During World War I he had close contacts with Anglicans such as the archbishop of Canterbury Randall Thomas Davidson and G. Bell. After 1941 the German occupation kept him under house arrest and sent him to Dachau concentration camp in 1944; at the end of the war he was forc…

[German Version] (Jan Gerritsz Versteghe; c. 1520, Stroe, Gelderland – 1570 Steeg, near Bacherach). As a priest in Garderen (from 1544), Veluanus was arrested in 1550 for preaching the Reformation. In 1553 he succeeded in escaping to the Rhineland, where he became pastor in Palatine Steeg in 1554/1555; in 1561 he was appointed superintendent for Bacharach and Kaub. In his popular works, including Der Leken Wechwyser (“Guide for the Laity,” 1554) and his Kurzer Wegweiser (publ. anonymously 1564), he encouraged an undogmatic Christianity based on the Bible; he combined a basically Reformed position with influences from various Protestant sources as well ¶ as humanism. In his writing he disputed sympathetically with Anabaptist and Spiritualist (Spiritualism) views. Hellmut Zschoch Bibliography Works: BRN 4, 1906, ed. F. Pijper, 81–490 On Veluanus: W. Hollweg, “Johannes Anastasius Veluanus,” MEKGR 16, 1967, 200–237 (bibl.) E. Mülhaupt, Rheinische Kirchengeschichte, 1970, 180–183.

[German Version] (Gechauf; c. 1490, Nuremberg – 1551, Nuremberg). He is first mentioned in 1519 as a priest responsible for early mass in Kornburg, near Nuremberg, after a humanistic education, probably in Italy. From 1522 until the end of his life, he worked as a cleric in Nuremberg (Nürnberg); after 1534 he also headed the municipal school system. A member of the circle of Nuremberg humanists, he was also known as an editor (the first pr. ed. of the works of Archimedes) and translator of classic…

[German Version] (Matisse-Chapel, 1947–1951). As a favorite to Sister Jacques-Marie, his former nurse, the renowned painter, H. Matisse, agreed to advise upon the construction plans for a new chapel. The elderly artist recognized the rare opportunity of a complete environment dedicated to his art. He seized the moment, becoming architectural planner, interior designer, and artist as well as the creator of liturgical objects and vestments. He crafted a space filled with mystical light and joyful co…

[German Version] I. Religious Studies Veneration of gods in the form of man-made images (I) is part of the development of human ideas about God. The nature of such images varies widely, from natural objects with little or no human work involved (rocks, posts, trees) to professionally produced works of “art.” For the structure of the idea of God reflected in images, the crucial question is whether they “merely” facilitate epiphany rituals or whether the gods regularly manifest themselves in the images through ritual guarantee, i.e. are made prese…

[German Version] (912,050 km2) is situated in the northeast of South America. In the north, it is bordered by the Caribbean; in the south by Colombia, Brazil and Guyana (Guyanas, America, see map). Its population is approx. 25.01 million (2004); 90% are urban; 67% mestizos and mulattos, 20% white, 10% black, and 3% indigenous (approx. 150,000 are Native American Indians). The capital is Caracas. The name of Venezuela (little Venice) appears for the first time in 1500 and probably refers to the houses on stilts that the natives lived in on the coast. At that time it…