Reformation

500th Anniversary of the Reformation: Ecumenism as Church and Public Phenomenon in Today’s Germany

The 500th anniversary of the Reformation in 2017 was held in Ger‑ many for the first time as an ecumenical event. Within its framework, a number of important official church documents about rethinking the history of the Reformation were adopted, common worship services held, and a large number of projects implemented at the region‑ al, national and international levels.

Islam and Partial Modernization: “There Was No Liberation from Medieval Elements”

If his interview Taufik Ibrahim argues that the main problem for Muslims is that the traditional, medieval understanding of religion has not yet been overcome. This traditional understanding is connected with the loss of the initial creative impulse of early Islam, with the so-called closure of the gate of ijtihad. Both the fundamentalists and the reformist typically reference the early Islamic period. But the question is, why do they do so?

Round-table: "What Is Happening in the Islamic World? An Attempt at a Conceptualization"

The roundtable addressed the question of research methodologies for those trends now observable in the Islamic world, as well as conceptual approaches for understanding current developments there. Such frameworks as Islamic reformation, a neo-modern age, and the search for a political Islamic identity were proposed. Participants did not agree about the relationship between Islamic fundamentalism and modernity. Some of them considered fundamentalism as potentially a modernist movement, and others saw it only as antimodernist and archaic.

Islamic Reformation: The Heuristic Value of the Approach