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
Inner Asia
(3,811 words)
[German Version] I. Pre-Islamic Period – II. Islam
I. Pre-Islamic Period
1. Geopolitical ambiguity, conception, and definition The concept of “Inner Asia” is both historically and geographically unclear. It is usually understood to mean the territories between Iran in the west and the Chinese border in the east (China), while giving way to the Siberian taiga in the north and abutting to the Himalayas in the south. It includes areas in the modern states of Afghanistan, Pakistan, northern India, northeastern Ira…
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Religion Past and Present
Inner Emigration
(317 words)
[German Version] The origin of the term is disputed. Some point to L. Uhland's
Auswanderung in die Ver-¶ gangenheit [Emigration into the past] (1848), some to the author Frank Thiess (1890–1977), who claimed the term, which quickly became prominent after 1933, as his own. Inner emigration and its synonyms such as “emigration inward” or “spiritual exile” refer to the non-political habitus of artists and authors such as J. Klepper, R. Schneider, and W. Bergengruen under the conditions of the National Socialist dict…
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Religion Past and Present
Inner Person
(1,567 words)
[German Version] I. Concept – II. Antiquity – III. New Testament – IV. Early Church – V. Systematic Theology
I. Concept The notion of a “real person” residing within the outer human being is widely attested in ancient literature and became part of a comprehensive system of metaphors by the time of Hellenism at the latest. However, this notion is conveyed through very different terms, corresponding also to conceptions of rather differing nature. The single English concept “inner person,” which cannot adequately …
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Religion Past and Present
Innitzer, Theodor
(213 words)
[German Version] (Dec 25, 1875, Neugeschrei, northern Bohemia [today Nové Zvolání, Czech Republic] – Oct 9, 1955, Vienna), archbishop of Vienna from Oct 30, 1932 onwards and cardinal from Mar 13, 1933. Under his chairmanship (Austrian Bishops' Conference), the clergy were recalled from active politics in November 1933. The bishops whom Innitzer had ordered to Vienna made a declaration of loyalty on Mar 18 which had great propagandistic value for the popular referendum on Apr 10, 1938. Innitzer's e…
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Religion Past and Present
Innocent III, Pope
(606 words)
[German Version] (papacy Feb 22, 1198 – Jul 16, 1216) (Lothar of Segi, b. 1160 or 61 at Gavignano, near Segni, in Latium). The papacy of Innocent III marked the high point of pontifical power in the Middle Ages. After studying theology at Paris and canon law at Bologna, in 1190 he was appointed cardinal deacon of St. Sergius and St. Bacchus. His cardinalate attracted little attention; during it he wrote
De miseria humanae conditionis, De missarum misteriis, and
De quadripartite specie nuptiarum, works of ascetical theology that later came to be widely read. His other works in…
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Religion Past and Present
Innocent I, Pope (Saint)
(242 words)
[German Version] (papacy Dec 21, 402 – Mar 12, 417; feast day July 28). According to Jerome
Ep. 130.60, Innocent became bishop of Rome as the son of his predecessor Anastasius I (399–402); he aspired to a primatial status (
caput et apex episcopatus: Ep. 37.1; right to appoint all bishops:
Ep. 25.21) that clearly went beyond canon 3 of the Council of Constantinople (IV, 1) in ¶ 381 and claimed authority for Rome in doctrinal questions. In the West, against the background of contemporary political and military troubles, he partially attained his goal, resolving t…
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Religion Past and Present
Innocent IV, Pope
(302 words)
[German Version] (papacy Jun 25, 1243 – Dec 7, 1254) (Sinibaldo Fieschi, b. 1180/1190 at Lavagna, near Genoa). After studying and teaching law at Bologna, Sinibaldo served as auditor of the Curia, cardinal and vice chancellor of the Roman Church, rector of the March of Ancona, and legate of Gregory IX. During the conflict between empire and papacy, which also divided the College of Cardinals, the see of Rome stood vacant for 18 months (See, Vacant). Finally Sinibaldo was elected at Agnani as a com…
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Religion Past and Present
Innocent (Veniaminov), Saint
(180 words)
[German Version] (Aug 26, 1797, Anginskoye, near Irkutsk – Mar 31, 1879, Moscow). Born Ivan Popov, he was orphaned at an early age. At the seminary in Irkutsk, his patron Bishop Veniamin (Benjamin) of Irkutsk gave him the new patronymic Veniaminov. In 1840, when he was made a monk, his baptismal name was replaced by
Innocent. In the same year, Innocent – who had been ordained to the priesthood in 1821 and had been working as a missionary in the Aleutians and Alaska since 1824 – was made bishop of Kamchatka. He took up residence as archbishop in 1852…
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Religion Past and Present
Innocent VI, Pope
(294 words)
[German Version] (papacy 1352 – Sep 12, 1362) (Étienne Aubert; b. 1282 or 1295 in Les-Monts-de-Beyssac, Limousin). He began his career as professor of civil law at Toulouse and as bishop of Noyon and Clermon; in 1342 he was made a cardinal. From the conclave of 1352 there survives the earliest capitulation signed by the cardinal electors stipulating their rights. After his election, Innocent withdrew his signature. He was a frugal administrator who shrank the papal household and promoted reform of…
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Religion Past and Present
Innocent V, Pope
(115 words)
[German Version] (papacy Jan 21 – Jun 22, 1276) (Pierre de Tarentaise, b. c. 1224, Champigny, Savoy). After studying and teaching theology at Paris, the Dominican was appointed archbishop of Lyon by Gregory X in 1272 and made cardinal in 1273. He was focused on initiating a crusade, in support of which he arranged a
rapprochement with Byzantium and settled conflicts in Italy by confirming Charles I of Anjou as senator of Rome and imperial vicar of Tuscany while deferring the coronation of Rudolf of Habsburg. Innocent wrote a commentary on the
Sentences and several exegetical works. He …
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Religion Past and Present
Innocent XI, Pope
(374 words)
[German Version] (papacy Sep 21, 1676 – Aug 12, 1689) (Benedetto Odescalchi, b. May 19, 1611, in Como). Odescalchi, made cardinal in 1645, served as legate in Ferrara from 1646 to 1650 and as bishop of Novara from 1650 to 1656. He was renowned for his exemplary lifestyle and concern for the poor. After a two-month conclave, he was unanimously elected pope in 1676, after the resistance of France, who had opposed him in 1670, was overcome. Within the church, he sought a middle way in the controversy…
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Religion Past and Present
Innovation, Religious
(347 words)
[German Version] In everyday usage, the term
innovation, from the Latin verb
novare (“renew”), generally has positive connotations. When used in religious studies, it denotes the result of a qualitative change of or within a religious system. Its generality limits its usefulness in theoretical contexts; if it is to have analytic substance, not only must the content of an innovation be examined but also the constitutive factors and forces leading to the change in question. Innovation can take place, for exam…
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Religion Past and Present
Innsbruck, University
(338 words)
[German Version] The territorial order of 1526 stipulated the creation of a Hohe Schule (High School) in Tyrol. In 1562, the provincial of the Upper German Jesuit province, P. Canisius, opened a Gymnasium (grammar school) in Innsbruck. In 1669, the year of the university's foundation, Leopold I authorized an additional charge of twelve
kreuzer on every sold cartload of Hall salt
pro fundo alhiesiger Universitet, which initially consisted of four faculties (philosophy, theology, law, medicine). The university opened its doors in 1673 and was granted an imperi…
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Religion Past and Present
Inquisition
(2,005 words)
[German Version] I. Terminology – II. Historical Development and Aspects of Canon Law – III. Latin America, Asia, Africa
I. Terminology In the broader sense, “inquisition,” from Lat.
inquirere, “to seek out, research, investigate,” refers to the official (
ex officio) investigation of the facts, particularly in relation to criminal circumstances. Both in the ecclesiastical and the civil judiciary, the so-called “trial by inquisition” appeared alongside the customary “trial by accusation,” which had been the sole method, in the cour…
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Religion Past and Present
Insignia
(429 words)
[German Version] Symbols of rule (following Schramm) or insignia (Lat.
signa;
insignia) are objects that denote persons of superior status. In a narrower sense, they are the emblems of the supreme civil and spiritual dignitaries. As a rule, symbols of rule or insignia are worn on the body (regalia): crown, helmet, miter, tiara; sword, lance (Liturgical implements), scepter, globe, ring; clothing ¶ (e.g. coronation mantle, liturgical vestments [Vestments, Liturgical]) and jewelry (e.g. Pectoral cross); the throne marks the point from which dominion is exerc…
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Religion Past and Present
Inspiration Communities
(256 words)
[German Version] are communities which arose out of radical Pietism and still exist today. As early as around 1690, ecstatic, visionary and prophetic phenomena became manifest in the Pietist movement. After the appearance of ecstatic prophets from the Camisards, who came to Germany via England and the Netherlands, German prophets and prophetesses as well started to appear as “mediums”; in 1714, they sparked an enthusiastic “inspirational awakening,” primarily among the radical Pietists, which was …
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Religion Past and Present
Inspiration/Theopneusty
(4,151 words)
[German Version] I. Religious Studies – II. New Testament – III. History – IV. Fundamental Theology – V. Dogmatics
I. Religious Studies
1. Terminology The terms
inspiration (from Lat.
inspiratio, “insufflation”) and
theopneusty come from the NT. Prophecy comes through the Holy Spirit (2 Pet 1:21); in 2 Tim 3:16, the adjective ϑεόπνευστος/
theópneustos) ¶ describes Scripture as being “inspired by God.” In many religions, we encounter the idea that communications enter the human sphere through the mediation of other entities. Plato (
Phaidr. 265) was already systematizing m…
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Religion Past and Present
Institution
(1,609 words)
[German Version] I. Religious Studies – II. Social Sciences – III. Theology
I. Religious Studies If an institution is understood as a set of norms that regulate action in a precise manner, then, from the perspective of religious studies, a differentiation can be made between institutions that regulate religious action and normative standards that regulate non-religious action but are religiously justified. However, it always needs to be taken into consideration that this distinction is made by the external …
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Religion Past and Present
Institutional Chaplaincy
(289 words)
[German Version] In church and state church law, the institutional chaplaincy is a classic example of a
res mixta, including pastoral care in state and local hospitals, penal institutions, homes for old and disabled people, orphanages and care homes, and in a wider sense pastoral care for the armed forces and police, including border police. In constitutional law, all these institutions are based on the fundamental right of freedom of religion in German law (Basic Law, art 4 §§ 1 and 2) and the institutional guar…
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Religion Past and Present
Institutional Congregation
(182 words)
[German Version] The church of Jesus Christ does not take form in the local area only. In addition to the territoriall – defined local church congregation, special forms such as personal and institutional congregations have developed. While in personal congregations members are exempted from the local church organization because of particular personal characteristics, institutional congregations stand in a particular legally regulated relationship to an institution and a circle of persons for whom…
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Religion Past and Present
Institution, Church
(226 words)
[German Version] On the one hand, the concept of the church institution is employed generally, especially in the 19th and early 20th centuries, to explain the nature of the church and is contrasted to or combined with the collegialistic understanding (the church as ¶ a community of saints and an institution of salvation, F.J. Stahl). In the specific sense, on the other hand, the concept refers to certain organizations and institutions within the responsibility of the church. According to the definition under administrative law, an institu…
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Religion Past and Present
Institutum Beatae Mariae Virginis
(339 words)
[German Version] (Mary Ward Sisters; since 2004: Congregatio Jesu), one of the most important female teaching orders of the Catholic Church. The “Institute of the Blessed Virgin Mary” was founded by the Englishwoman Mary Ward (1585–1645) in 1609/10 in the Spanish Netherlands during the persecution of Catholics in England in order to care for and educate English girls living there. It was patterned after the model of the Jesuits. The founder, in favor of her youth work, dispensed with both the stri…
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Religion Past and Present
Institutum Judaicum
(368 words)
[German Version] With its roots in Protestant Jewish missions, the first Institutum Judaicum, founded in 1728 by J.H. Callenberg in Halle, was devoted to the training of missionaries and the distribution of Christian literature in Yiddish and Hebrew. It existed until 1792. In 1883, H.L. Strack founded the Institutum Judaicum Berolinense in Berlin which placed its emphasis on missions, scholarly engagement with Jewish sources and the battle against Antisemitism. After Strack's death, the Institutum…
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Religion Past and Present
Instructio
(179 words)
[German Version] An
instructio in the meaning of
CIC/1983 c. 34 serves the interpretation and application of laws for the use of those who are responsible for their execution. Bearers of the
potestas executiva (e.g. the Vicar General, but also the diocesan bishop [no separation of powers in Catholic church law!]) are competent to issue an
instructio. It is subordinate to the laws. Consequently, its validity ends through derogation or with the expiration of the underlying law. It can neither alter nor invalidate a law. More recent instructions by the Roman
dikasteria (e.g. “instruction…
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Religion Past and Present
Instruction Courses, Apologetic
(265 words)
[German Version] These courses trace back to the initiative of the Apologetische Centrale (Apologetic Center) founded in Berlin-Spandau in 1921 by the Centralausschuß für die Innere Mission (Central Committee for Inland Mission; Carl Gunther Schweitzer, H. Schreiner) with its method of a “new apologetics” influenced primarily by K. Heim. This method proceeds from familiarization with and objective portrayal of the opposing position in order “to understand [it] better than it understands itself” (F…
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Religion Past and Present
Insurance
(428 words)
[German Version] One can protect oneself against the risks of life through personal provision or by acquiring private insurance. Given freedom of choice the individual will decide for the insurance if the costs of covering a certain risk are less than bearing the costs directly. In private insurance, premiums are determined on the basis of risks assessment on the principle of actuarial equivalence. Indemnification payments are based on premium payments, which, in turn, are assessed in terms of the…
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Religion Past and Present
Integralism, Brazilian
(127 words)
[German Version] Integralism was a fascist movement in Brazil, founded in 1932 by Plinio Salgado “for God, fatherland and family” (one million “greenshirts”). Its doctrine denied religious preferences or aversions. Salgado's deputy, Gustavo Barroso, however, was a radical anti-Semite. Integralism mostly sympathized with Catholicism (H.P. Câmara). Consequently, Lutheran circles (H.G. Dohms) raised objections, also against the nationalism that would render the Lutheran
Volkskirche (people's church) impossible. The Estado Novo outlawed integralism (1937), and…
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Religion Past and Present
Integration
(411 words)
[German Version] refers to the process of constituting or preserving a whole and is employed in the humanities primarily as a sociological and educational-psychological category. Consequently, in the field of theology, integration is a term with primary relevance for practical theology.
Conceptually, in particular the third of the meanings of the Latin adjective
integer (1. sound, incorrupt, 2. new, 3. whole) has come to dominate the current notion of integration, while the Latin substantive,
integratio, primarily connoted “renovation.” The modern concept of integrati…
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Religion Past and Present
Integration Theory
(400 words)
[German Version] With reflection on forced social differentiation, the question of the forces of social integration also arose in the course of the 19th century. H. Spencer in his sociology was the first to view differentiation and integration as mutually complementary processes. The search for answers quickly led to religion. Already the French counter-revolutionaries J.M. de Maistre and L.G.A. Bonald considered religion the guarantor of social order. W.R. Smith attributed a socio-integrative fun…
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Religion Past and Present
Intellect
(1,610 words)
[German Version] I. Philosophy – II. Philosophy of Religion – III. Fundamental Theology – IV. Dogmatics – V. Ethics
I. Philosophy In the traditional doctrine of cognition (Epistemology), the intellect is primarily viewed as an intuitive capacity (Gk νοῦς/
nous, Lat.
intellectus), partly in demarcation from reason as a discursive capacity. The intellect enables a person to attain direct insight into last principles or simple facts, so that the process of cognition is brought to a close logically and rationally (Arist.
Eth. Nic. 1143af.). This dimension of grasping the truth…
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Religion Past and Present
Intellectual Intuition
(6 words)
[German Version] Vision/Intuition
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Religion Past and Present
Intelligence
(1,095 words)
[German Version] I. Definition – II. History of Research – III. Stanford-Binet Intelligence Test and Spearman's g-Factor – IV. Critical Assessment
I. Definition Ever since its introduction, the concept of intelligence has been the subject of heated controversy. Accordingly intelligence has been defined in a wide variety of ways ranging from Cyril Burt's definition of intelligence as an innate, general, cognitive ability to such positivist but rather unhelpful definitions as “whatever it is that our tests measure.”…
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Religion Past and Present
Intelligence, Artifical
(7 words)
[German Version] Artifical Intelligence
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Religion Past and Present
Intelligent Design Theory
(498 words)
[German Version] The fundamental idea animating intelligent design theory (IDT) is that events, objects, and structures in the world can exhibit features that reliably signal the effects of intelligence. Special sciences as diverse as animal learning and behavior (Behavioral research), forensics, archeology, cryptography, and the search for extraterrestrial intelligence thus all fall within IDT. IDT becomes controversial when methods developed in these special sciences for sifting the effects of i…
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Religion Past and Present
Intention/Intentionality
(1,594 words)
[German Version] I. Philosophy – II. Ethics
I. Philosophy In the context of action theory,
intention/
intentionality (from Lat.
intentio) usually denotes an aim or purpose.
Intentionality is understood both in the sense of the will that initiates actions and in the sense of the motive or motivation that guides both volition and action. In other philosophical contexts, the prevailing understanding of intentionality goes back to the turn of the 20th century in the work of E. Husserl, who drew in turn on his teacher F. Brentano. In his major work
Psychologie vom empirischen Standpunkt, vo…
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Religion Past and Present
Intention, Pope's
(270 words)
[German Version] In conjunction with the church's prayer, especially in the celebration of the Eucharist, particular concerns are brought before God in intercessory remembrance, supported by offerings for the worship service and the poor. It has long been customary to mention the givers and their intentions in the liturgy. The prayer formula “according to the pope's intention” (Indulgence) and the mass stipend, a gift of money given a priest outside the celebration of mass with the request that a …
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Religion Past and Present
Interaction
(1,248 words)
[German Version] I. Philosophy of Religion – II. Ethics – III. Practical Theology
I. Philosophy of Religion To begin the interpretation of society and religion with the notion of interaction means to assume a basis of action. Fundamental forms of interaction are, for example, cooperation, exchange, conflict and competition, or, according to F.D.E. Schleiermacher, identical and individual symbolization and organization. Problems of interaction occur when the rules of interaction are questionable. A monadic the…
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Religion Past and Present
Intercession
(1,408 words)
[German Version] I. Basics – II. History – III. Systematic Theology
I. Basics Liturgical or congregational intercession (Prayer) is one of the primary duties of the church and the congregation (Worship). Such intercession lives on even when the powerful forget themselves and the helpless are forgotten. It transcends all (pious) wishes. With short texts of its own, the congregation takes part in ektenia and litany. The topical nature of intercession is augmented by the concretion, which dispenses with the …
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Religion Past and Present
Inter-Church Aid
(422 words)
[German Version] Archbishop N. Söderblom of Uppsala's (1866–1931) personal initiatives since 1914 among refugees and victims of war in Europe and the Near East indicated a great need, but it was realized that a proper organization was needed to channel resources more effectively. In 1922, consequently, the European Central Office for Inter-Church Aid under the leadership of A. Keller was created in Geneva. Similarly, the ¶ deficiencies of the existing initiatives in view of the humanitarian crises became apparent in 1942 in the Geneva office of the World Counc…
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Religion Past and Present
Intercommunion
(1,110 words)
[German Version] I. History – II. Ecclesiology
I. History Intercommunion refers to forms of fellowship in the Eucharist or the Lord's Supper, to communion between churches or ecclesial communities. In the full sense, it ¶ encompasses pulpit and altar fellowship (that is, also intercelebration); such a fellowship exists since 1973 between the churches affiliated on the basis of the Leuenberg Concord, and already since 1931 between Anglicans and Old Catholics. Limited forms of intercommunion are the general opening of celebration…
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Religion Past and Present
Intercultural Theology
(1,083 words)
[German Version] The term “intercultural theology” does not yet refer to a clearly circumscribed subdiscipline of theology nor to a specific method. Its respective meaning is defined by the research interests of those who employ it. Nonetheless, a paradigm shift is taking place here at the margins of the traditional canon of disciplines that will influence the entire discipline of theology. Important impulses originate in the disciplines of the history of religions or religious studies, missiology…
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Religion Past and Present
Interdenominational Foreign Mission Association
(192 words)
[German Version] (IFMA). Founded in 1917 for the purpose of “strengthening the effectiveness and outreach of faith missions,” the IFMA is a fellowship of theologically conservative North American mission societies without denominational affiliation. The seven charter members included South Africa General Mission, the China Inland Mission, the Central America Mission, the Africa Inland Mission, the Sudan Interior Mission, the Inland South America Missionary Union, and the Women's Missionary Union o…
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Religion Past and Present
Interdict
(226 words)
[German Version] is one of the three ecclesial censures (Censorship) along with excommunication and suspension. It is only imposed on individuals, and no longer on places or regions and groups. The interdict automatically prohibits any service in the mass and other worship services, the administration and reception of the sacraments, and the administration of the sacramentalia. After the imposition or determination of the interdict, the one interdicted must be prohibited from any ministry in worship or else the worship must be suspended (
CIC 1983 c. 1332 in conjunction with c…
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Religion Past and Present
Interest
(3,846 words)
[German Version] I. Concept – II. Legal Aspects – III. Economics – IV. Non-Christian Antiquity – V. Bible – VI. Christianity – VII. Judaism – VIII. Islam
I. Concept Interest is payment in exchange for a right of use or exploitation, typically on a temporary basis and always agreed for a fixed period of time. Money later gained increasing importance as an object of lending and now occupies a dominant position, although other items or rights remain possible as objects of lending, as for example rent. In economics (see III below), this mutual commitment between the conferral…
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Religion Past and Present
Interim Ethics
(403 words)
[German Version] If there are objective or subjective reasons to regard a life-orienting certainty concerning the nature (essence), origin and destiny of the world and humanity and the rules of action derived from it as valid for only a limited time, one speaks of an interim ¶ ethics. More properly, it should be referred to as an interim
ethos or an interim morality. Examples include (a) the ethos of Jesus and (b) the “provisional morality” of R. Descartes (
Discours de la méthode, 1637; ET:
Discourse on Method, 1960).
a. A. Schweitzer first described Jesus' ethos as an “interim eth…
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Religion Past and Present
Interiority
(684 words)
[German Version]
I The term interiority or inwardness (Ger.
Innerlichkeit) was used by F.G. Klopstock and J.W. v. Goethe, but it was only in G.W.F. Hegel that it gained the interpretive configuration that subsequently became definitive: first, and in the widest sense, the term refers to the subjectivity or the immediate being-within-one's self of the spirit (III). Wherever there is spirit, there is interiority, and vice versa, for interiority
is nothing other than the spirit's “returning into itself” (
Philosophie der Geschichte, 340). Second, thus defined the term serves as…
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Religion Past and Present
International Association for Liberal Christianity and Religious Freedom
(158 words)
[German Version] In the wake of the initiatives set in motion by the Boston Unitarian Charles William Wendte, the international organization of religious liberals was founded on May 25, 1900 as the International Council of Unitarian and other Liberal Religious Thinkers and Workers on the occasion of the celebrations accompanying the 75th anniversary of the American Unitarian Association and the British and Foreign Unitarian Association. From 1910 to 1937, the Council or, from 1932, the “Internatio…
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Religion Past and Present
International Association for Mission Studies
(197 words)
[German Version] The IAMS is an international, interconfessional and interdisciplinary forum for the scholarly study of biblical, theological, and practical questions relating to Christian mission. It was formally established in 1972. Regular conferences have since been held in all five continents and now at four-yearly intervals. The 12th conference took place in Balatonfüred (Hungary) in August 2008. The membership stands at 541 individual, 7 corporate, and 17 associate members. The proceedings …
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Religion Past and Present
International Baptist Theological Seminary
(269 words)
[German Version] The Southern Baptist Foreign Mission Board (FMB; Southern Baptist Convention [SBC]) founded the school in 1948 to provide leadership training. The FMB bought a villa in Zürich-Rüschlikon and opened the Baptist Theological Seminary in 1949. It offered a four-year Bachelor of Divinity (B.D.) course but other programs were available. All its presidents, beginning with Norwegian-born Josef Nordenhaug (1903–1969), were Southern Baptists, while the FMB chose the trustees, many of whom w…
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Religion Past and Present
International Church of the Foursquare Gospel
(14 words)
[German Version] Church of the Foursquare Gospel
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Religion Past and Present
International Council of Christian Churches
(270 words)
[German Version] The International Council of Christian Churches (ICCC) ¶ was founded in Amsterdam in 1948 with Carl McIntyre as president, shortly before the first assembly of the World Council of Churches (WCC). Fundamentalist churches established the ICCC as an alternative to the WCC. Membership is open to so-called “Bible-believing churches,” who are committed to what the ICCC describes as the “20th century reformation” and who are not members of the WCC. Article 2 of the ICCC constitution commits the…
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Religion Past and Present
Internationales Institut für Missionswissenschaftliche Forschungen (IIMF)
(223 words)
[German Version] Internationales Institut für Missionswissenschaftliche Forschungen (IIMF), association of Catholic scholars and friends for the promotion of missiology and research on intercultural relations and developments. The establishment of the IIMF traces back to a suggestion by Matthias Erzberger, a delegate to the Reichstag, and the proposal of Prince Alois of Löwenstein at the Berlin conference of the Missionsausschuss des Zentralkomitees der Katholikenversammlungen Deutschlands [Missio…
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Religion Past and Present
International Fellowship for Research in Hymnology
(155 words)
[German Version] (Internationale Arbeitsgemeinschaft für Hymnologie, IAH). The IAH promotes and studies church singing (Singing: III). Church song, open forms of singing and the hymnal are the subjects of international, ecumenical, and interdisciplinary (theology, musicology, linguistics and literature, bibliography, folklore) scholarly study, primarily at conferences and through the promotion of hymnological projects (Hymnology) – often in cooperation with academic institutions – and also in rela…
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Religion Past and Present
International Fellowship of Evangelical Students
(242 words)
[German Version] (IFES). The IFES is an interdenominational evangelical fellowship uniting national networks of university Christian Unions. It emerged out of the formalization of links between Norwegian (Norges Kristelige Studentlag) and British (Intervarsity Christian Fellowship, IVF) evangelical university missions. Robert Wilder (formally Student Volunteer Movement for Foreign Mission, SVM), H.W. Guinness, and Douglas Johnson (IVF) and Ole Hallesby (Norges Kristelige Studentlag Skoleungdomslag…
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Religion Past and Present
International Law
(3,761 words)
[German Version] I. Conception – II. Greco-Roman Antiquity – III. Ancient Near East and Israel – IV. Church History – V. Fundamental Theology – VI. Ethics – VII. Church in International Law – VIII. Islam
I. Conception
1. Legal conception International law is the quintessence of the legal norms that regulate sovereign relations between the international legal subjects. International legal subjects are primarily states, traditionally also the Apostolic See, the international organizations created by the states on a contractual b…
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Religion Past and Present
International Missionary Council (IMC)
(302 words)
[German Version] The World Missionary Conference at Edinburgh (Edinburgh Conference) developed a “Continuation Committee” with J.R. Mott as chairman and J.H. Oldham as secretary. In 1921 this became the IMC under their leadership. It held its first meeting at Lake Mohonk, New York, and aimed to increase cooperation among missionary societies. A.L. Warnshuis and W. Paton became representatives of the IMC in its New York and London offices. The IMC mounted a major international conference in Jerusal…
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Religion Past and Present
International Organizations
(432 words)
[German Version] Political science distinguishes between international governmental organizations (IGOs) and international non-governmental organizations (INGOs). An IGO is a cooperating association which has been formalized in a multilateral treaty under international law by at least three states whose jointly fixed normative standards have internally led to a definition and balancing of expected mutual reactions; at the same time, the IGO functions externally by interacting with the member state…
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Religion Past and Present
Internet
(574 words)
[German Version] The internet (“Interconnected Networks”) is a combination of local, national, and international computer networks administered according to a decentralized principle. It is, among other things, the result of the efforts by the United States American Department of Defense (1958–1969) to develop a disruption-resistant computer network that would automatically redirect data transmissions (ARPAnet) in the event of the destruction of one or more computers. The internet ¶ supports the following important individual media or services: E-mail (“Electron…
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Religion Past and Present
Interpretation
(328 words)
[German Version] Interpretation, from Lat.
interpretatio, “analysis,” “translation,” generally refers to the elucidation of works and texts. F. Nietzsche elevated the term's prominence in philosophy. In analogy to human behavior toward the world, he understood vitality in general as interpretation. Interpretation is the attempt “to become lord over something” (
Kritische Studienausgabe, vol. XII, 314); it is the selective and harmonizing mastery of an infinitely manifold reality. Only through interpretation, and that means, from relative perspec…
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Religion Past and Present
Interpretation of Knowledge (NHC XI, 1; Interpr)
(284 words)
[German Version]
Interpr (or the
Interpretation of Knowledge) is a partly very fragmentary Christian-Gnostic text which is only preserved in Coptic translation. Some scholars attribute the text to Valentinianism, although it probably cannot be associated with any known religious movement. It can be classified as a homily of mostly ecclesiological and christological content. Its unknown author is the representative of a particular historical reception of the canonical Gospels and Pauline Epistles known to him, but also of Colossians and Ephesians.
Interpr points to a persecu…
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Religion Past and Present
Interpretatio Romana/Graeca
(422 words)
[German Version]
1. Latin
interpretari means, similar to Gk ἑρμηνεύω/
hermeneúō, “to interpretet, to translate, to make understandable.”
Interpres (translator, mediator, exegete) and
interpretatio are technical terms of exegesis in jurisprudence, literature, and religion.
Interpretatio Romana/Graeca are not used technically in classical antiquity;
interpretatio Graeca is a modern expression coined in analogy to Tacitus's singular statement (
Germania 43) that two Germanic deities are to be identified with Castor and Pollux “according to Roman interpre…
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Religion Past and Present
Interreligious
(364 words)
[German Version] The adjective “interreligious” has acquired increased significance since the 1960s. With the emergence of multicultural societies (Multiculturalism) and of global mobility, the points of contact between the religions have multiplied and given rise to a theological and socio-scientific reflection on their mutual relationships, but also to numerous practical initiatives. “Interreligious” stands here for the entire spectrum of relationships between the religions, i.e. on the politica…
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Religion Past and Present
Interuniversity Institute for Missiological and Ecumenical Research (IIMO)
(297 words)
[German Version] Interuniversity Institute for Missiological and Ecumenical Research (IIMO), Utrecht. The IIMO was founded in Utrecht on Jun 23, 1969, by both secular and Christian universities, as well as Roman Catholic and Protestant missionary and ecumenical bodies in the Netherlands. Two departments were established: the missiological department in Leiden with Evert Jansen Schoonhoven as its first director and the ecumenical department in Utrecht with Alexander J. Bronkhorst as its first direc…
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Religion Past and Present
Intervarsity Christian Fellowship
(274 words)
[German Version] (IVF) is a worldwide evangelical Christian student movement, which emerged out of the British biblicist reaction to the ecumenical Student Christian movement. Formed in 1928 by three evangelical leaders, H.W. Guinness, Douglas Johnson, and Hugh Gough, and influenced by medical and faith missions, the Cambridge Inter-Collegiate Christian Union (CICCU), the Plymouth Brethren, and the Keswick Movement, the IVF formalized existing inter-university evangelical union links, which had be…
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Religion Past and Present
Intolerance
(8 words)
[German Version] Tolerance and Intolerance, Rigorism
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Religion Past and Present
Intonation
(81 words)
[German Version] (Lat.
intonatio, Ital.
intonazione).
1. Setting the pitch by the celebrant and/or cantor, for instance, for the
Gloria or
Credo.
2. Introductory notes for liturgical recitatives, for example, psalm notes.
3. Maintaining the pitch in song or other music.
4. An improvised or composed introductory piece to liturgical song by the organ or other instruments.
5. Tonal fine tuning in organ-building. William T. Flynn Bibliography M. Reimann,
MGG 1 VI, 1957, 1365–1370 B. Sydow-Saak, “Intonatio-Intonation/intonare-intonieren,”
HMT III, 1984.
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Religion Past and Present
Intoxication
(413 words)
[German Version] In religious studies, intoxication is often understood as the state that is induced through the intake of euphoric substances. This is misleading because in an unfavorable setting or basic psycho- mental disposition of the consumer, it is not euphoria but states of anxiety (Anxiety and Fear) and depression that are induced. For this reason, it is preferable, in the history of religion and culture, to define intoxication as a state of enhanced emotionality induced by psychoactive d…
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Religion Past and Present
Intrinsic
(113 words)
[German Version] In the epistemology of theology, the terms intrinsic and extrinsic refer to the relationship between fundamental theological reflection and the contents of the Christian faith. This relationship is described as intrinsic when the contents of faith are the subject of fundamental theological argumentation. K. Rahner, in particular, criticized fundamental theological extrinsicism. In the doctrine of grace, the terms intrinsic and extrinsic describe the relationship between nature and…
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Religion Past and Present
Introit
(386 words)
[German Version] I. Liturgy – II. Music
I. Liturgy The introit was the first song of the mass, sung during the entrance of the celebrant. It is first attested by the
Ordo Romanus Primus and must therefore have been introduced before the end of the 7th century. It comprised an antiphon and a complete psalm when it accompanied a papal procession from the
secretarium (sacristy near the entrance). The introit acquired its “Gregorian” form after 750 in France (approx. 150 authentic songs). It still lends its name to Sundays (
Laetare, Quasimodo Geniti et al.).
II. Music The text and music appe…
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Religion Past and Present
Intuition
(740 words)
[German Version] I. Philosophy – II. Systematic Theology
I. Philosophy Intuition is a term used in epistemology and refers to a special, successful cognitive act. Accordingly, and following the typology of G. Ryle, “intuition” is thus a (cognitive) success word, but it also designates a special cognitive faculty. In many contexts, a performative quality is reserved for the intuitive act, as expressed by the characteristic feature that was probably first noted in Epicurean circles: its instantaneousness (ἀϑρόα/
athróa). Inasmuch as this instantaneousness is understood i…
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Religion Past and Present
Inuit
(619 words)
[German Version] (or Eskimo in the recent past) are an Arctic people who are represented both in Asia (the Chuckchee Peninsula) and in America (the coasts of Alaska, Canada, and Greenland). Their diffusion on two continents possibly offers an explanation for their relatively late entrance to North America c. 3000 bce. The Inuit language, which stands quite isolated, is divided into two dialects: Yupik is spoken in south Alaska and Siberia, whereas Inupik is spoken from Alaska to eastern Greenland. The area covered by the Inuit languages covers …
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Religion Past and Present
Investiture
(372 words)
[German Version] denotes, through the image of “outfitting” (property rights; Lat.
vestitura, investitura), the formal conveyance to the transferee of property, an office with its appertunances, and later, a fiefdom. The positive, soon substantivized concept of investiture may have developed in the 8th century from the metaphor, mediated through the church, of legal return (
revestire). Apparently, investiture encompassed all common law forms of actual or symbolic/representative transfer of property before witnesses (
manus vestitura by means, for example, of a straw …
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Religion Past and Present
Investiture Controversy
(1,009 words)
[German Version] The term
Investiture Controversy usually denotes the ecclesio-political conflict between the popes and kings at the end of the 11th century and the beginning of the 12th century. Since the Carolingian period, it had been customary for bishops to be appointed and also invested in office by kings. During the Gregorian Reform of the 11th century, this practice had come under fire, especially since the attack on simoniacs published in 1058 by the cardinal bishop Humbert of Silva Candida …
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Religion Past and Present
Invisible Church
(7 words)
[German Version] Visible/Invisible Church
Source:
Religion Past and Present