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
Calvary
(787 words)
[German Version] I. Name – II. Art and Liturgy – III. Roman Catholic Congregations
I. Name The Greek interpretation of the Aramaic Golgotha as Κρανίου Τόπος/
Kraniou Topos, “Skull Place” (Matt 27:33; Mark 15:22; John 19:17; cf. Luke 23:32), is rendered almost uniformly in the Latin versions (Old Latin, Vulgate) as c
alvariae locus. The Latin form gave rise to “Calvary” and similar terms in other European languages. It is based on the Latin noun
calvaria, “cranium, skull,” which makes its first appearance in the middle of the 1st century ce in medical works (Aurelius Cornelius Celsus,…
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Religion Past and Present
Calvinism
(1,241 words)
[German Version] I. Term – II. The Establishment of Orthodoxy – III. The Revision of Orthodoxy
I. Term The word Calvinism was coined in the 16th century by Lutherans who feared the intrusion of Calvin's ideas, especially on the Eucharist (III, 1.b), into Germany. In time, it acquired several meanings: It may refer to the theological system of Calvin himself or to the theology of his pupils from the 16th century to the present; the adjective “Calvinist” is often used interchangeably…
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Religion Past and Present
Calvin, John
(10,728 words)
[German Version] (Jean Cauvin, Jul 10, 1509, Noyon – May 27, 1564, Geneva) I. Life and Work – II. Theology – III. Impact
I. Life and Work
1. Development as a Reformer
a. Childhood and youth. Calvin's biography until his first stay in Geneva is only partially known (autobiographical foreword to the
Commentarius in librum Psalmorum, Geneva 1557). His father, Gérard Cauvin, was a notary in the service of the cathedral chapter of Noyon. In 1521, Calvin received the tonsure and the income from a benefice
sine cura to provide for his education. Probably in 1523, during an outbr…
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Religion Past and Present
Calvisius, Seth
(223 words)
[German Version] (Feb 21, 1556, Gorsleben, Thüringen – Nov 24, 1615, Leipzig) attended school in Frankenhausen (1569) and Magdeburg (1572), where he may have been a student of Gallus Dressler. He attended the Universities of Helmstedt (1579) and Leipzig (1580). In 1581, he became cantor at the University Church in Leipzig; in 1582, cantor and Hebrew teacher in the Princes' School in Pforta; in 1594, Thomas cantor in Leipzig. The significance of this office is due…
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Religion Past and Present
Camaldolese
(470 words)
[German Version] The Camaldolese are an offshoot of Benedictine monasticism, combining eremitic and cenobitic styles of life. They wear a white habit; nuns also a black veil. The order originated c. 1000 from the monastic reforms of Romuald of Ravenna (c. 952–1027), put into place at Fonte Avellana (c. 1000; Peter Damian) and Camaldoli (between 1023 and 1026). The constitutions, written between 1045 and 1057 by Peter Damian, followed between 1080 and 1085 …
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Religion Past and Present
Câmara, Hélder Pessoa
(289 words)
[German Version] (Feb 7, 1909, Fortaleza – Aug 27, 1999, Recife, Brazil) was ordained priest in 1931; for a short time he was an adherent of the Brazilian Integralistic action (Integralism). From 1936 he served in the Education Department of Guanabara State. In 1952 he became auxiliary bishop of ¶ Rio de Janeiro. In 1964, at the beginning of the military dictatorship, he became archbishop of Olinda and Recife; he retired in 1985. In Rio he was already developing social programs for the slums. In 1952 he founded the Conferência Nac…
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Religion Past and Present
Cambodia
(579 words)
[German Version] The population of Cambodia is 12 million, with a growth rate of 2.5%. Theravada Buddhists (Hĩnayãna) comprise 90% of the population, Muslims2%, Christians 1.5%, adherents of Chinese popular religion and tribal religions 1.5% each, Caodaiists (Caodaism) and Bahā'i 1% each. Of the population, 90% are Khmer, 5% Vietnamese, 1% Chinese, and 2.5% Malay. Catholic missionary work began in 1555 with the arrival of the Dominicans Gaspar da Cruz (died 1570) and Sylvester Azevedo (died 1576) from Malacca (Melaka). Around 1770 P. Levasseu…
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Religion Past and Present
Cambridge Platonists
(395 words)
[German Version] The Cambridge Platonists were a group of independent philosophical theologians influenced by the ideas of Platonism and Neoplatonism, who sought to develop a theology that would eschew both Puritan Calvinism and Laudian (W. Laud) Anglo-Catholicism. Reason was for them “the spirit in man,” which serves as “the cradle of the Lord.” They were unanimous in their conviction that ¶ God acts in harmony with the eternal reason of things, in their rejection of all notions of an absolute, sovereign divine will, and finally in their trust in …
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Religion Past and Present
Cambridge Ritualists
(332 words)
[German Version] The “Cambridge Ritual Anthropologists” or “Ritualists” consisted of four classicists, three of them from Cambridge – Jane Ellen Harrison (1850–1928), Arthur Bernard Cook (1868–1952), and Francis Macdonald Cornford (1874–1943) – as well as Gilbert Murray (1866–1957) from Oxford. The period of their activity lay between 1890 and 1920, when they jointly developed a daring irrationalist interpretation of Greek religion, and especially of Greek drama,…
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Religion Past and Present
Cambridge University
(762 words)
[German Version] The founding of Cambridge University probably goes back to members of Oxford University who left Oxford in reaction to the closing of schools in 1209 that resulted from disputes between the city and the university. Although instruction resumed in Oxford in 1214, a few scholars remained in Cambridge. Proximity to the episcopal see of Ely favored the establishment of a permanent institution, and Cambridge and Oxford remained the only English univer…
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Religion Past and Present
Camerarius, Joachim
(181 words)
[German Version] (Apr 12, 1500, Bamberg – Apr 17, 1574, Leipzig) began studies in Leipzig in 1512, in Erfurt in 1518 (M.A. 1521), and in Wittenberg in 1521, where he enjoyed a close friendship with Melanchthon. He became professor of rhetoric in 1522, although he often spent long periods in Bamberg and traveling, in 1524 with Melanchthon to Bretten and as Luther's emissary to Erasmus in Basel. In 1525 he became professor of Greek in Wittenberg, in 1526 rector in …
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Religion Past and Present
Cameron, John
(283 words)
[German Version] (1579, Glasgow – Nov 27, 1625, Montauban) went to France around 1600 and was initially active as a teacher in the vicinity of Humaniora. After studying in Paris, Geneva, and Heidelberg, he became pastor in Bordeaux in 1608, professor of theology at the Protestant academy in Saumur in 1618 and in Montauban in 1624. In the disputes with the Arminians, Cameron defended the Calvinist doctrine of predestination, but modified it by emphasizing …
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Religion Past and Present
Cameroon
(618 words)
[German Version] The name “Cameroon” derives from the Portuguese name of the Wouri River estuary in Douala: Rio dos Camarões, “River of Prawns.” In 1884 the German colonial administration extended the name to the entire land, whose boundaries were fixed in 1910/1911. Cameroon covers an area of 475,441 km2. It comprises rainy and semi-arid tropical regions, including one of the wettest regions of the world around Mount Cameroon, an active volcano (4095 m.). Cameroon is a potpourri of 120 ethnic groups speaking 236 differen…
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Religion Past and Present
Camillians
(208 words)
[German Version] (
Clerici regulares ministrantes infirmis, MI;
Ordo Sancti Camilli, OSC). The Camillians are the only clerical order of the Catholic Church devoted entirely to charitable service. The order was founded in Rome in 1582 by Camillo de Lellis (1550–1614) to renew the ministry of service to the sick (fourth vow: to serve the sick, regardless of mortal danger – hence grave losses during epidemics of the plague and cholera). After the demise of the Order of Servants o…
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Religion Past and Present
Camisards
(559 words)
[German Version] The Camisards were Protestants in southern France who, after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1686 (Huguenots), secretly formed armed bands in the Cévennes region, the “desert,” to fight for the freedom and rights of their suppressed church in the face of harsh persecution. The term “Camisard” probably derives from the
camisia (“shirt”) worn over their clothing during night raids, which were therefore called
camisades. The movement, which at times appeared fanatical, survived until 1711; especially when its followers were being pu…
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Religion Past and Present
Campanella, Tommaso
(456 words)
[German Version] (Sep 5, 1568, Stilo, Calabria – May 1, 1639, Paris) attempted to reconcile the Renaissance philosophy of nature with a radical reform of science and society. Born in a small village in southern Italy, he entered the Dominican order as a young man. Campanella read medical works and books on natural science, works of Plato and of Neoplatonism, but the great encounter of his youth was with Bernardino Telesio's natural philosophy. Accor…
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Religion Past and Present
Campanus, Johannes
(159 words)
[German Version] (c. 1500, Maaseik – after 1574). After studying at Cologne and a stay in the duchy of Jülich, Campanus came to Wittenberg c. 1527/1528. His exclusion from the debate at the Colloquy of Marburg (Disputations, Religious: I) marked the beginning of his conflict with the Wittenberg Reformers, which was intensified in 1530 when he disputed the divinity of the Holy Spirit. He soon returned to Jülich, where a warrant for his arrest (at first not executed) was issued in 1532. His
Göttlicher und Heiliger Schrift … Restitution (1532) expounded his anti-trinitarian th…
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Religion Past and Present
Campbell, Alexander
(294 words)
[German Version] (Sep 12, 1788, Near Ballymena, Ireland – Mar 4, 1866, Bethany, WV) was one of the founders of the 19th-century American Restoration Movement that gave birth to the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), the Christian Church/Churches of Christ (Independent), and the Churches of Christ. While studying at the University of Glasgow, Campbell had stood under the influence of the primitivist teachings of J. and R. Haldane. He arrived in Virginia in 1808 and found that his…
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Religion Past and Present
Campbell, Donald T.
(243 words)
[German Version] (Nov 20, 1916, Grass Lake, MI – May 5, 1996, Bethlehem, PA) was professor of psychology at Northwestern University (1953–1979), Syracuse University (1979–1982), and Lehigh University (1982–1996); he was president of the American Psychological Association in 1975/1976. He won international recognition for his work in social and experimental psychology, especially in the fields of methodology and the philosophy of the social sciences. He made funda…
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Religion Past and Present
Campbell, John McLeod
(178 words)
[German Version] (May 4, 1800, Kilninver – Feb 7, 1872, Roseneath, Scotland). The son of an Argyll¶ shire clerical family, Campbell was educated at the universities of Glasgow and Edinburgh. In 1821 he obtained a license to preach and was presented to the parish of Rhu in 1825, where he sought to nurture a well-founded and properly orientated piety among his congregation. Initial difficulties were diagnosed by him as the result of a legalistic attitude stemming from Reformed theology …
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Religion Past and Present