VARIA

Nemti and Gold: Religious Violence and the Semantics of Punishment in an Ancient Egyptian Tale

The article discusses the motif of bodily mutilation in connection with the punishment in an ancient Egyptian tale, in the story of the ferryman Nemti. This narrative is compared with similar Egyptian plots about the loss of body parts and their replacement/transformation into gold. Based on the works of Vladimir Propp, the author builds a model of the event which triggers the development of action in the fairy tale and in the myth.

Alvin Plantinga and Thomas Aquinas on the Possibility of Natural Knowledge of God

Traditionally Aquinas is considered as the leading representative of the position that natural theology is the king road to the knowledge of God by means of human reason alone. Nevertheless, Alvin Plantinga cites him along with John Calvin among the two main predecessors of his famous idea of sensus divinitatis. According to this idea, human reason can have natural knowledge of God via special cognitive mechasnism, which is closer to the functioning of human perception, than to the proofs along the line of traditional theologia naturalis.

Russian Diplomat in the Vilayet of Islamic Holy Sites in the Beginning of the Twentieth Century

This article endeavors to detect the goals, main tracks and priorities of the Russian diplomacy in a vilayet of the Ottoman Empire — Hejaz, which hosted major Islamic sanctuaries. Religion and politics were tightly interwoven in Russia’s diplomatic activities there. Our analysis is made at the micro level, through the official correspondence of a Russian diplomat, Michail Nikolsky, who in the early 20th century served as a secretary of the Russian Imperial Consulate in Jeddah, Hejaz.

Śabarimala: Ayyappa’s Virginity, Gender Equality and Conflicts of Religious Rights in Today’s India

The article analyzes one of the most controversial clashes over religion in India, namely the conflict around the worship of god Ayyappa in the Śabarimala temple in Kerala. The practice of preventing fertile women from entering the temple has been established and entrenched here, fertility being formally defined as the age between ten and fifty.

The Problem of Theological Languages in “The Big Trilogy” by Fr. Sergius Bulgakov

Since Christian theology, in order to formulate the articles of faith, inevitably uses the categorical apparatus of historically established philosophical traditions, the problem of theological languages is objectively present. This problem is primarily connected with the revealing of a correct correlation between those languages, which is required for maintaining the unity of the Holy Tradition.

“Returning the Stolen Latin Souls”: The Policy of Polonization of Orthodoxy in the Interwar Poland

The policy of the Polish government towards the Eastern Orthodoxy in the northeastern regions was turning tougher on the eve of the Second World War. Polish officials feared that the USSR would meddle in Polish domestic affairs using the Orthodox Church, and therefore they tightened control over the Church and the flock. The government wanted to tie the Orthodox community closer to the Polish nation.

The Meaning of Symbols in Emerson’s Stand against the Lord’s Supper

The paper investigates the controversy over the Lord’s Supper between Ralph Waldo Emerson and the Second Church of Boston. We studied the text of Emerson’s sermon against the Lord’s Supper ascertaining possible theological divisions among the church members on the issues of Christ’s true nature and authority, as well as the meaning of bread and wine of the Communion. We reveal how the pastor foreshadowed the assumed reactions of his listeners while working on the text of his sermon.

Ignatius of Loyola's Religious Method in His Spiritual Diary

The purpose of this article is to explain Ignatius of Loyola’s method of spiritual cognition. The analysis demonstrates that Ignatius’ method can be understood as a specific way of thinking when the thoughts of a person are recognized as authored not by the person himself but by God. This explanation is based upon Ignatius’ “Spiritual Exercises” but also upon the texts by Ludolph of Saxony and Joannes de Caulibus. The text that serves as an example of using the method of spiritual cognition is Ignatius’ own “Spiritual Diary”.

The Text of the Scripture and Religious Identity: The Septu- agint in Orthodox Christianity

In polemics of Orthodox theologians with Jews, Protestants and Catholics, the Septuagint has often been regarded as the hallmark of Orthodoxy. The article demonstrates that the picture is much more complicated: throughout the history of the Orthodox tradition violent polemics against allegedly corrupted Hebrew or Latin Bibles existed side by side with quoting the Hebrew readings by the early Byzantine Fathers or correcting the Church Slavonic Bible against the Vulgate. Homiletic reasons were much more important than purely textual matters.

The Dialectics of Secularization in Russia: An Appraisal of V. Zenkovsky’s History of Russian Philosophy

There is an ongoing debate regarding the dialectics of secularization in the West. One of the key works in the field is Charles Taylor’s A Secular Age, exploring the role of metaphysics in the development of Western secularism. Yet the process of secularization in the Russian context largely remains beyond the scope of the current scholarly discussions. Dealing with the dialectics of secularization in the history of Russian philosophy, the author draws a parallel between Charles Taylor’s fundamental work and Vasily Zenkovsky’s History of Russian Philosophy.

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