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[German Version] This Ādi Granth is the holy scripture of the Sikhs (Sikhism), also called Gurū-Granth. The standard version (see below) is titled Ādi Srī Gurū Granth Sāhibjī, "The guru in first position in the form of the book." He was appointed by the 10th and final guru, Gobind Singh (period of office: 1675-1708), to continue the human succession of gurus since its founder, Nānak (1469-1539) and as the ultima…

[German Version] I. Terminology – II. Religious Studies – III. Church History – IV. Buddhism – V. India I. Terminology Monasticism is a collective term for an alternative way of life, always religiously motivated, that includes asceticism but is also characterized by a more or less radical withdrawal from society (the “world”) as well as from the monastics' own community of faith. The term monk commonly used in Christianity (from secular Gk μοναχός/ monachós, “solitary,” Lat. monachus, borrowed by way of a hypothetical 8th-century monichus* into Old High German [ munih] and othe…

[German Version] I. The Concept – II. Religious Studies – III. History – IV. Philosophy of Religion – V. Practical Theology – VI. Islamic Mysticism – VII. Hindu Mysticism – VIII. Taoist Mysticism I. The Concept The concept of mysticism is closely linked to the development of the history of religion in Europe and the term must not be taken and applied uncritically as a general term for a phenomenologically determined group of phenomena in other religions (see also II, 3 below). Attempts at definition are either phenomenolog…

[German Version] I. Bible and Ancient Judaism 1. Old Testament a. General. In biblical studies, poetry (Gk ποίησις/ poíēsis) in contrast to prose generally comprises stanzaic texts in language employing patterns of rhythm and sound, whose structure and style are determined by both linguistic (sound patters, rhyme, clause sequences, etc.) and nonlinguistic factors (so-called constraints: music, ¶ extent, parallel structure, setting, etc.). We do not know the ancient Hebrew poetic terminology, although poetry constitutes a significant portion of Old …

[German Version] (born in the first half of the 15th cent.?) was a poet-saint from northern India. He was born into an Islamized lower Hindu caste of weavers in which the Tantric tradition (Tantrism) of the Nāthyogīs was cultivated. His activities are linked with Benares and Magahar (near Gorakhpur). Kabīr is considered the most significant poet of the Sant- Bhakti. A monistic ontology and the emphasis on human mortality and their being in need of mercy justified his claim of egalitarian access to…

[German Version] I. Religious Studies 1. Beginnings. Sikhism was brought into being at the turn of the 16th century by Guru Nānak in the Punjab (Pakistan/northern India). At that time the community called itself Nānak-panth (“path of Nānak”) or gurmat (“teaching of the guru”). As the community grew more complex, subgroups with various names emerged. Within the North Indian bhakti of the Sants, Sikhism represents a regional variant, which nevertheless is aware of its ties to both the Sant tradition and in part also the Sufi tradition (Islam: II, 5) of th…