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
Crime
(578 words)
[German Version]
I. The word crime appears in a wide range of contexts, both in technical (e.g. moral philosophy or history) and everyday usage; it is especially common in the usage of practical ethics. The term is defined more closely in the various fields of criminal law, both normative (criminal law dogmatics as the theory of positive criminal law, criminal policy) and empirical (criminology).
II. Normative criminal law commonly distinguishes between formal and material concepts of crime, although the exact boundary between them is a matter of deba…
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Religion Past and Present
Criminal Law
(3,505 words)
[German Version] I. Old Testament – II. History – III. German Criminal Law Today – IV. Penal Canon Law (Roman Catholic) – V. Islam
I. Old Testament Old Testament law (Law and legislation: II) emerged from three sources: (1) it reinforced mutual expectations based on norms of behavior by means of criminal ¶ laws supporting general prevention of criminal conduct; (2) it minimized violence by regulating conflicts through casuistic law (Law and jurisprudence: III) as the precursor of modern civil law, and (3) it regulated int…
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Religion Past and Present
Cripps, Arthur Shearly
(432 words)
[German Version] (Jun 10, 1869, Kent – Aug 1, 1952, Southern Rhodesia), Anglican priest, missionary and campaigner for African political and social rights in the settler-dominated society of colonial Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). An Anglo-Catholic (Anglo-Catholicism), 1901 Cripps was sent by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts to Mashonaland. Later he acquired over 7000 acres of land, where he built a church named Maronda Mashanu (“…
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Religion Past and Present
Crisis
(817 words)
[German Version] I. Ethics – II. Practical Theology
I. Ethics The Greek noun κρίσις/
krísis originally denoted the action derived from the verb κρίνειν/
krínein: (a) “sepa¶ ration, quarrel”; (b) “selection”; (c) “decision, judgment, verdict”; (d) “turning point (in a battle or disease)” (cf. also criticism, kairology). The adoption of the forensic sense in the LXX added a theological dimension to the term. In the NT,
krísis stands for the verdict of the judge, the court of judgment, and especially the eschatological Divine Judgment, the ultimate separ…
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Religion Past and Present
Crisis Cults
(350 words)
[German Version] Students of religion have accepted the ethnological term
crisis cult, introduced by La Barre in 1971, as a systematic hypernym for movements in non-Western societies which earlier 20th-century ethnology treated under such headings as apocalypticism, cargo cults, millenarianism/chiliasm, deliverance movements, revival movements (Revival/Revival movements), ghost dance, collective hysteria, nativism, peyote cult, prophetic revival movements, …
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Religion Past and Present
Crispin and Crispinian, Saints
(118 words)
[German Version] The feast of St. Crispin and St. Crispinian is observed on Oct 15. The veneration of their burial place is attested by a 6th-century church in Soissons, where (according to the legendary
Passio) they suffered martyrdom during the reign of Diocletian, after having made shoes for the poor without charge. In the 9th century, relics came to Osnabrück and they became that city's patron saints. Since the High Middle Ages, they have been venerated as the patron saints of shoemakers, tanners, and saddlers. Klaus Unterburger Bibliography Sources:
ActaSS Oct. XI, 1864, 495–540 Gre…
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Religion Past and Present
Cristiada, La
(293 words)
[German Version] (also known as the Cristero rebellion), an armed conflict (1926–1929) between the post-revolutionary Mexican government under Plutarco Elías Calles (1924–1928) and rebellious Catholics defending the freedom of the church against the state. They were called
Cristeros on account of their battle-cry “Viva ¶ Cristo Rey!” (“Long live Christ the King!”). The bishops announced a strike in respect of church services in protest against the laws enacted in 1926 that implemented the anti-ecclesiastical revolutionary …
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Religion Past and Present
Criteriology
(500 words)
[German Version] is the theory (the epitome of statements) of the necessary and sufficient conditions for the (given) presence of distinctions. We need a criteriology to carry out our praxis of distinction deliberately and responsibly – both for appropriate apprehension of distinctions already made (either through our own praxis or through processes for which we are not responsible), in other words, for our actions that construct symbols, and for our own appropri…
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Religion Past and Present
Critical Rationalism
(510 words)
[German Version] is a philosophy conceived by the Austrian philosopher K.R. Popper in the 1930s, initially as a theory of empirical epistemology, which was gradually expanded into an instrument of general rational problem solving. In it, Popper engaged critically with the epistemology (I) of I. Kant and with the Empiricism of the Vienna Circle. Characteristic for the critical-rational approach is the critique of the thesis that one can only speak of knowledge in the true sense if the object of knowledge in question is true with a cert…
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Religion Past and Present
Critical Theory
(1,635 words)
[German Version] I. Philosophy – II. Fundamental Theology – III. Practical Theology
I. Philosophy Critical theory is the designation for the philosophical program of the Frankfurt School, a group of philosophers and social scientists belonging to the Institut für Sozialforschung (Institute for Social Research) founded in 1923 in Frankfurt am Main. The term traces to an essay by M. Horkheimer,
Traditionelle und kritische Theorie (1937; ET: “Traditional and Critical Theory,” in:
idem, Critical Theory: Selected Essays, 1972) and was then adopted as the general c…
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Religion Past and Present
Criticism,
(467 words)
[German Version] from Greek κρίνειν/
krínein, “distinguish, decide, judge,” is methodical evaluation based on well-founded criteria. In everyday usage, the word is identified with negative assessment; in philosophical usage, however, it denotes the weighing of both positive and negative values and the discussion of validity claims. The ancient Greeks already distinguished epistemological, practical (political), and philological concepts of criticism (Pre-Socr…
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Religion Past and Present
Croatia
(900 words)
[German Version] The Republic of Croatia covers an area of 56,542 km2; in 2004 it had an estimated population of 4,500,000. The 2001 census reported an ethnic makeup of 89.6% Croats, 4.5% Serbs, 0.5% Muslims (Bosniaks), 0.4% Hungarians, 0.3% Slovenians, and 4.7% from other minorities. Its capital is Zagreb. Dalmatia was home to Jewish communities from the time of the Romans into the modern period; in the rest of Croatia, this continuity was interrupted from the 15th to the 18th century until new communities formed as a result of …
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Religion Past and Present
Croce, Benedetto
(297 words)
[German Version] (Feb 25, 1866, Pescasseroli – Nov 20, 1952, Naples). Along with Giovanni Gentile, Croce was a leading representative of Italian neo-idealism. He served as Minister of Education in 1920/1921 and 1925 wrote an anti-fascist manifesto; from 1943 to 1947 he was president of the reestablished Italian Liberal Party. Following G.W.F. Hegel, Croce developed a “philosophy of spirit” that understands itself as absolute historicism and asserts that what is r…
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Religion Past and Present
Crocius
(392 words)
[German Version]
1. Ludwig (Mar 29, 1586, Laasphe – Dec 7, 1655, Bremen). After studying at Herborn, Marburg, and Basel (Dr.theol. 1609), the Reformed theologian Ludwig Crocius became a pastor in Bremen and professor at the Gymnasium Illustre, of which he later became headmaster. With M. Martini and Heinrich Isselburg, he participated in the Synod of Dort as a delegate from the Bremen church. He was a prominent representative of the school of Bremen theologians fou…
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Religion Past and Present
Cromwell, Oliver
(577 words)
[German Version] (Apr 25, 1599, Huntingdon – Sep 3, 1658, London) was born into a relatively humble branch of a well-connected landholding family in Huntingdonshire and was elected MP for the county town in 1628. Following his defeat in a disputed election of a lecturer and preacher for the town Cromwell moved to nearby St. Ives, where he continued as a yeoman farmer during the 1630s. His career took off following the outbreak of the Civil Wars, when his military …
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Religion Past and Present
Cromwell, Thomas
(235 words)
[German Version] (1485?, Putney – Jul 28, 1540, London). Born into humble circumstances, after a turbulent youth Cromwell acquired enough legal knowledge (probably self-taught) to find employment as a solicitor. Around 1520 he came to work for Cardinal T. Wolsey; in 1523 he became a member of Parliament. After Wolsey's fall in 1529, he continued to pursue his own career. Made a member of the royal council by Henry VIII in 1531, he consolidated his position…
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Religion Past and Present
Crosby, Frances Jane
(193 words)
[German Version] (Fanny; Mar 24, 1820, Southeast, NY – Feb 12, 1915, Bridgeport, CT), hymnwriter. Crosby was the only child of John and Mercy Crosby. Blinded in infancy, Crosby moved to New York City in 1835 into the home for the blind, where her poetic and musical talents were nurtured. After completing her education, Crosby became a teacher at the institution. In 1858, she resigned. After publishing three books of poetry as well as lyrics for cantatas and secul…
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Religion Past and Present
Cross/Crucifixion
(4,480 words)
[German Version] I. The Cross in Non-Christian Religions – II. Crucifixion in Antiquity – III. The Crucifixion of Christ – IV. Church History – V. Dogmatic Theology – VI. The Cross in Modern Art
I. The Cross in Non-Christian Religions From prehistoric times to the present, various forms of the cross have appeared in many non-Christian cultures and religions, used both as a religious symbol and as an ornamental design (the boundaries are fluent). It is a primal human symbol. As such it is polysemous and has …
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Religion Past and Present
Cross, Exaltation of the
(359 words)
[German Version] (also Triumph of the Cross). The liturgical observance of the Exaltation of the Cross, still celebrated in the Orthodox Church and Roman Catholic Church on Sep 14, goes back to the veneration of the relics (II, 3) of the cross after the “finding ¶ of the true cross” (
inventio verae crucis) at Calvary in the 4th century. The
Itinerarium of the pilgrim Egeria (c. 384) describes an annual feast on Sep 14 in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre (Anastasis), commemorating the finding and exaltation of the cross at Golgotha. In the l…
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Religion Past and Present
Cross, Feasts of the
(266 words)
[German Version] Most of the feasts of the cross recall the (putative) finding of the historical cross of Jesus, which was first celebrated on Sep 14, 335, at the consecration of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. There is evidence for a rite of the Exaltation of the Cross (Cross, Exaltation of the) in Byzantium as early as the 7th century. This rite was borrowed by the West in the same century, probably following the recapture of the cross by Emperor Heracl…
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Religion Past and Present