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[German Version] I. History 1. The history of religious studies, or the science of religion (Ger. Religionswissenschaft) is a function of its definition or conception; it is thus somewhat ambiguous at ¶ times and is viewed in a variety of ways. Strictly speaking, religious studies did not acquire a more or less fixed framework of tasks and standard methods in Europe until the 20th century; this framework subsequently gained acceptance throughout the world, especially through the efforts of the International Association for the…

[German Version] (vicomte [viscount]; Sep 15, 1858, Strasbourg – Dec 1, 1916, Tamanrasset, Algeria). After a life of dissipation as an officer in the French army, Foucauld rediscovered his Catholic faith through an encounter with Islamic piety and tried to live that faith first among Trappist monks, then as a page among the Clarists. He later ministered among the Tuaregs in the Algerian Sahara and founded a lay community to which L. Massignon also belonged. Foucauld was an extremely multifaceted f…

[German Version] I. Religious Studies – II. Old Testament – III. Judaism – IV. New Testament – V. Church History – VI. Ethics – VII. Law I. Religious Studies As a solemn affirmation of a statement, an oath takes its religious quality from the underlying belief in the power of words to effect a blessing or curse (Blessing and curse). Therefore the early phenomenology of religion classed oaths with invective, curses, etc. as words of consecration: those who swear oaths identify themselves with their words and are “consecrated…

[German Version] I. History 1. The rites controversy is understood to refer to the controversy over whether Christians should be allowed to take part in particular state-ordered ceremonies in eastern Asia (China, India [see 2 below], and Japan; Asia : IV, 3) in the early modern period. This is linked to the question of theological terminology and church decrees. It was a question of how far the message of Christianity could be adapted to indigenous culture (Christianity, Expansion of : IV) and incult…

[German Version] I. History of Religions – II. Philosophy of Religion – III. Dogmatics I. History of Religions As a theological category, damnation belongs primarily in the context of the history of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The etymology of the term itself connotes a local and a judicial dimension: the punishment of expulsion to a real or imaginary place as an exclusion from …

[German Version] I. Religious Studies – II. Bible – III. Dogmatics – IV. Ethics I. Religious Studies While (re)conciliation as an instrument for reaching an amicable settlement in a lawsuit has echoes of the legal ¶ dimension of expiation, the meaning of expiation (appeasement, pacification) refers first of all to the (re)establishment of an undisturbed state or of a “sound” relationship. In contrast to atonement (Re…

[German Version] I. Religious Studies In comparison with expiation (I), reconciliation is defined more specifically; as a rule, its goal is to restore a personal relationship undermined by guilt or sin. In reconciliation we are dealing with a category rooted in ¶ the Judeo-Christian tradition that cannot be translated readily into other contexts. In comparison with Western Christianity, the understanding of reconciliation in Judaism displays several distinctive features. As in Christianity, the concept of reconciliation is complementar…

[German Version] I. Terminology Sin is a human breach of relationship with God. The term is emptied of content if it is used only for moral lapses. Only if a moral transgression in the mundane world is understood as a dimension of human alienation from God can it properly be called sin. The fundamental act of sin is unfaith (Unbelief ). In unfaith we close our eyes to the fact that we owe our existence to God and that he turns to us in love. We resist the idea that he determines our lives totally. T…

[German Version] I. Study of Religion – II. History – III. Sociology – IV. Practical Theology – V. Missiology I. Study of Religion The term modernization usually refers to mutually reinforcing structural changes in various social sectors: nation building and democratization in the political sector; industrialization and tertiarization (i.e. the development of services) in the economic sector; urbanization, educational expansion, and mobilization in the social sector; diversification and individualization in the c…

[German Version] I. Philosophy Natural law is the essence of the legal norms that claim to be binding on all human beings, independent of positive laws and conventions. The term goes back to the distinction between nature( phýsis) and law ( nómos; Law/Natural law), put forward by the Sophists of the 5th century bce in order to challenge the traditional positive laws. According to Antiphon, the precepts of such laws are arbitrary, whereas the precepts of nature, which articulate individual benefit, are necessary (DK, frgm. B 44). Plato presents a v…