bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Initiation and the Druid Secret Language: The Three Calls to Cormac Understood as a Druidic Initiation
Authors: Myers Brendan
Published: March 2015

Celtic society was a stratified, hierarchical society that by no means bore all of the egalitarian and democratic features that Neopagan Celts often ascribe to it.
Shamanistic Elements in Zoroastrianism: The Pagan Past and Modern Reaction
Authors: Daryaee Touraj
Published: March 2015

The parameters of the Shamanistic tradition has been fully outlined in the work of Eliade, where the Zoroastrian traditions has been given its due attention. One should begin by stating that the word Shaman itself appears to be connected with the Zoroastrian tradition, where its origin is assigned to eastern Iran/Central Asia.
Claiming Sacred Ground: Pilgrims and Politics at Glastonbury and Sedona
Authors: Harvey Graham
Published: March 2015

Claiming Sacred Ground: Pilgrims and Politics at Glastonbury and Sedona

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Wiccan Warrior: Walking a Spritual Path in a Sometimes Hostile World
Authors: Pangaryk Phoenix
Published: March 2015

Wiccan Warrior: Walking a Spritual Path in a Sometimes Hostile World by Kerr Cuhulain Llewellyn, 2000 1 56718 252 6
The Rotting Goddess: the Origin of the Witch in Classical Antiquity
Authors: Ezzy Doug
Published: March 2015

The Rotting Goddess: the Origin of the Witch in Classical Antiquity by Jacob Rabinowitz Automedia: New Yo r k
Urth’s Well: A Proposed Northern Cosmology
Authors: Kramer-Rolls Dana
Published: March 2015

Service to the community is a hallmark of historical shamanism, in contrast to closed or private circles (such as most Wiccan circles) where psychic practice is primarily kept 'in house'.
Religion, Violence, and Radical Environmentalism
Authors: Taylor Bron
Published: March 2015

the martial symbolism and apocalyptic worldviews found within radical environmental subcultures has not and probably will not yield widespread or proliferating terrorist violence.
The First Seven Trumps of the Major Arcana (and the Fool) as Patterns for Pagan Leadership: Past, Present and Future
Authors: Muntean Fritz
Published: March 2015

Covert leaders often insist on some version of the consensus method of decision making knowing (often intuitively) that consensus functions as a more or less subtle method of intimidation.
Effeminate Love
Authors: Yohalem John
Published: March 2015

In renouncing the aristocratic ideals of male behavior that were still in favor, if only as ideals, in Handel’s day, we have lost the traditional sense of what properly constitutes manhood …
KEEPERS OF THE FLAME: INTERVIEWS WITH ELDERS OF TRADITIONAL WITCHCRAFT IN AMERICA
Authors: Martin Stephanie
Published: March 2015

KEEPERS OF THE FLAME: INTERVIEWS WITH ELDERS

OF TRADITIONAL WITCHCRAFT IN AMERICA by Morganna Davies & Aradia Lynch
Book Review: A VOICE IN THE FOREST: CONVERSATIONS WITH ALEX SANDERS
Authors: Clifton Chas S
Published: March 2015

Although it is written for a narrowly defined audience, A Voice in the Forest should interest anyone concerned with issues of mediumship and the establishment of what are sometimes called

magical “contacts” within revived Witchcraft.
The Myth of Matriarchal Prehistory by Cynthia Elle
Authors: Hayden Brian
Published: March 2015

The Myth of Matriarchal Prehistory by Cynthia Eller Boston: Beacon Press, 2000 276 pp + illus. US$26.00
Patient Counting: What Old Records Tell about the Battle for Souls in England and the English Witch Hanging
Authors: Slater Kate
Published: March 2015

How important is it for us to know the history of the beliefs and customs we weave into Neopaganism? You may be a lore maven or an experience maven or maybe both if you can find the time and energy. For lore mavens here are a couple of plums.
Book Review: THE EARLY GREEK CONCEPT OF THE SOUL by Jan Bremmer
Authors: Arkenberg Jerome S
Published: March 2015

While at first glance this study may not seem germane to modern Hellenic polytheists, those particularly interested in reconstructing this ancient religion should find it of particular interest, as Bremmer notes that the ancient Hellenes viewed both the soul (psyche) and human psychological makeup entirely differently than we, here in the West, do today.
Excavating Sites of Production: Margaret Murray's Theory of Religion in Context
Authors: Detrixhe Pam A.
Published: March 2015

Even though many scholars and practitioners of Wicca recognise English archaeologist and historian Margaret Murray's influence in significantly shaping the Wiccan myth of origins, the implications of her scholarly method and colonial contexts have received little attention.
The Myth of Historical Narrative: Margaret Murray's The God of the Witches
Authors: Ramsey Nancy
Published: March 2015

An important area of contention that arises when the scholars of today approach the religions of Witchcraft and Paganism concerns the origins of modern Witchcraft and whether any historical continuity exists between contemporary Pagans and the ancient pagan religions of Europe.
Book Review: The Witch in History, Diane Purkiss, Routledge, 1996
Authors: Hutton Ronald
Published: March 2015

The dust jacket of this book defines Diane Purkiss as a Lecturer in English; within its pages she prefers to describe herself as a feminist literary critic. It is a potent combination, and has resulted in a thoroughly individual and important book. Its preoccupation is with the manner in which images of English witches have been formed and manipulated during two distinct periods of history, that of Elizabeth and the early Stuarts, and the late twentieth century.
Notes from the Underground
Authors: Editors The
Published: March 2015

This fourth issue of The Pomegranate is both a landmark and a watershed. We are proud to have made it through a full year of publication, even though it took us a year and a half to do it, but we're more than aware that nearly everyone who supported our fledgling publication by subscribing did so for the first four issues, and now virtually all of those original subscriptions must be renewed.
The Magician of Shakespeare's The Tempest
Authors: Carew Maggie
Published: March 2015

The older and more experienced I become, the more I admire William Shakespeare. I have seen countless productions of his plays, and read them over and over. I think about him and his characters often, quote him in daily speech, and continually find new insights in his work.
The Sacred Marriage: Hierogamy in Grand Opera
Authors: Yohalem John
Published: March 2015

Perhaps the original drama is the drama of mating. Tension arises from the question of whether nature, against all odds, is going to permit reproduction to occur, life to go on. Considering the preposterous odds, the fecundity of life may be the strangest thing about this planet - yet it is also the most ordinary.
A Yellow Dress at Chilly Brauron: The Taming of Wild Girls
Authors: Slater Kate
Published: March 2015

Two years ago, I set out to write a historical novel about the Eleusinian Mysteries. On the way to Eleusis I turned in the opposite direction, following another ancient pilgrimage, to the marshy shores of Brauron, and the childhood of women, where the story begins.
Masks in Magical Meetings
Authors: NightMare M Macha
Published: March 2015

The Covenant of the Goddess (CoG), a national organization of Witches and covens, holds MerryMeet, its annual Grand Council and festival, in late August each year. Preceding MerryMeet, the Leadership Institute is a day-long workshop or series of workshops for members to continue their magical education and to share their knowledge and expertise. The Northern California

Local Council of CoG (NCLC-CoG) and Reclaiming Collective sponsored MerryMeet and its concomitant Leadership Institute in 1996.
Book Review: Margot Adler's Heretic's Heart
Authors: Clifton Chas S
Published: March 2015

Margot Adler's story is set in the middle of that over-summarised decade, the 1960s. One advantage to reading it is to get past the image of antiwar protests, burning inner-city neighbourhoods, and LSD and to hear two people's stories: hers and that of the American soldier who became her pen pal, confidant and lover.
Notes from the Underground
Authors: Editors The
Published: March 2015

As ever, we eager minions have done our very best to bring you the finest writing in the Neopagan community today. Our headline article contains an update on the latest research being done on the Great Witch Hunt of the 14th-17th centuries.
The Interface of Archaeology and Mythology: A Philosophical Evaluation of the Gimbutas Paradigm
Authors: Keller Mara
Published: March 2015

I n her corpus of twenty books and over 300 articles, Marija Gimbutas makes a comprehensive study of empirical archaeological data that serves as the basis for her challenging new theory of the cultural roots of Western civilization.
Asherah: Goddess of the Israelites
Authors: Muntean Fritz
Published: March 2015

Is it possible that the God of Israel, in the popular religion of tribal and monarchical times, had a consort? The Israelite religion unequivocally represents itself as a strict monotheism that began with Yahweh’s original revelation to Abraham, although many scholars date the origin of Hebrew monotheism a few centuries later, during the days of the great prophets (Raphael Patai, The Hebrew Goddess, 1967: 20)
Book Reviews: Two Roads to Magical Herbalism
Authors: Clifton Chas S
Published: March 2015

Writers of nonfiction often say that their books are made up of other books. That statement acknowledges the necessity of research. When it comes to herbalism, however, an unfortunate tendency at least three centuries old leads writers to take the saying too literally. Too many Pagan writers just recycle older published material without ever getting their hands dirty in the herb garden — or at least they convey that impression.
The Pomegranate READERS’ FORUM
Authors: Editors The
Published: March 2015

We are pleased to be able to resume publication of our Readers’ Forum. Please contribute so that we may continue to present this valuable venue for the exchange of ideas. Letters may be edited to conserve space or to avoid repetition. Deletions are indicated by ellipses (…) and the full text will always be made available upon request. Writers of published letters will have their subscriptions extended by one or two issues.
The Pomegranate READERS’ FORUM
Authors: Editors The
Published: March 2015

Please contribute to our Readers’ Forum so that we may continue to present this valuable venue for the exchange of ideas.

Letters may be edited to conserve space or to avoid repetition.

Writers of published letters will have their subscriptions extended

by one or two issues.
Savitri Devi and the National Socialist Religion of Nature
Authors: Kaplan Jeffrey
Published: March 2015

This paper argues however, that nature religiosity can have its dark side, for National Socialism too was a religion of nature which was built upon the rock of selected streams of nineteenth century German romantic and occult philosophy.
The Pomegranate: Readers' Forum
Authors: Editors The
Published: March 2015

Please contribute to our Readers’ Forum so that we may continue to present this valuable venue for the exchange of ideas. Letters may be edited to conserve space or to avoid repetition. Writers of published letters will have their subscriptions extended by one or two issues
Four New Books about Goddesses
Authors: Long Asphodel
Published: March 2015

The first three of these reviews originally appeared in Wood and Water, a feminist influenced Goddess-centered pagan magazine from England which has been appearing for over twenty years. The review of Concept of the Goddess first appeared in the Spring 1997 issue, that of The Faces of the Goddess in the Spring 1998 issue, and of Ancient Goddesses in the Winter Solstice 1998 issue.
Methods of Compassion or Pretension? Conducting Anthropological Fieldwork in Modern Magical Communities
Authors: Salomonsen Jone
Published: March 2015

The community I came to study was the Reclaiming Collective of San Francisco, a well-known feminist Witchcraft community founded in 1979 by Starhawk and her coven sisters .
Another View of the Witch Hunts
Authors: Dashu Max
Published: March 2015

The history of witch persecution begins with repression by

feudal rulers, with a strong patriarchal impetus already

visible. It may have very old Indo-European roots.
Myth, History and Pagan Origins
Authors: Greer John Michael
Published: March 2015

The myths of a culture or a subculture have tremendous power to shape human experience - one reason why such stories are treated with a good deal of suspicion in postmodernist circles.
Aradia and the Revival of Modern Witchcraft
Authors: Clifton Chas S.
Published: March 2015

Writing the history of religion often means simply writing a history of text, of holy books. Yet Neopagan Witchcraft, or Wicca, has no defined holy books; the nearest approximation, the Book of Shadows, is more "a concept than an object". Wicca is a religion without scripture - and proud of it.
We Weren't Going to Publish Interviews, But
Authors: Editors The
Published: March 2015

The Pom interviews a notorious pagan editor, John Yohalem of Enchanté: The Journal for the Urbane Pagan, which is available from him at P.O. Box 735, NY NY 10014, and has just published its twenty-second issue, "Rituals of Theatre/Theatre of Ritual" with articles on ancient Egyptian ritual theatre, the Vendetta motif in ritual and theatre, the Passion Play Project in New York, Antero Alli in California, and of course an episode of All My Avatars: The Pagan Soap Opera.
What We Don't Know About the Ancient Celts
Authors: Fairgrove Rowan
Published: March 2015

When one says that one wants to study and, perhaps, reconstruct the religion of the ancient Celts, it is well to be clear about whom one speaks. 'Celtic' describes a language group which, over time, has divided into two strains - P-Celtic, spoken in Wales, Cornwall and Brittany and Q-Celtic, spoken in Ireland, Scotland and the Isle of Man. One must also be clear about the possible tools for such study that are available. As so many things Celtic comes in threes, so do our sources - archaeology, classical commentaries and the vernacular traditions of the Celtic countries.
Margaret St. Clair, Forgotten Foremother of Pagan Science Fiction
Authors: Clifton Chas S
Published: March 2015

The importance of science fiction and fantasy writing in the Pagan community is undeniable. Most often told is the story of how Robert Heinlein's 1961 novel Stranger in a Strange Land helped spawn the Church of All Worlds.
The extreme metal ‘connoisseur’
Authors: Allett Nicola
Published: March 2015

This article draws on the author's research with extreme metal fans to consider the construction of extreme metal community in the UK, in the light of controversies and set against a wider culture that is increasingly celebrating the extreme. It considers a discursive strategy by fans to define extreme metal against a mainstream and legitimate their taste by adopting a system of values and distinctions that position themselves as ‘connoisseurs’. The author demonstrates that her respondents’ consumption of extremity contrasts with their presentation of selves as connoisseurs of ‘high’ art who value knowledge, virtuosity, distance and expert judgement. Such an emphasis upon connoisseur values and ‘high culture’ characteristics place extreme metal music as art, removing allegations of profanity and distancing extreme metal music and community from the ‘low’ culture of the popular mainstream.
Suicide solutions?
Authors: Brown Andy
Published: March 2015

This article offers a comparative analysis of press mediated morality scares, concerned with the influence of types of heavy metal music on incidences of teen suicide, in two different periods. On the basis of this comparison, I argue that the campaign against heavy metal, in the 1983–87 period in the United States, is an example of a successful moral panic; whereas the attempt to generate a similar scare about the emo sub-genre, in the UK in 2008, is an example of a failed one. So why did one succeed and the other not? Debating Critcher’s ‘make-over’ of the moral panic model and its critics, I suggest the answer lies in a number of factors, some of which support the model, others undermine it. First, while sensationalist press coverage on behalf of ‘parents’ characterized both panics, in the UK this lacked endorsement by elite/professional bodies, so societal ‘solutions’ were never clearly posed. Second, the enhanced role of niche/subcultural media in contesting the emo panic. Third, the ability of emo fans to ‘speak back’ to their demonizers, exemplified by the march on the Daily Mail, which was widely reported. Finally, to the extent that emo is a middle-class defined subculture, with a pronounced female profile, it is not viewed as a threat to societal norms as that of the working-class, male-defined fandom of 1980s heavy metal.
The Hermeneutics of Problematic Gender Verses in the Qur'an
Authors: Kassam Zayn
Published: March 2015

Muslim women scholars and activists such as Amina Wadud and Asma Barlas argue that the Qur’an evinces gender equity. They do so by suggesting that verses in the Qur’an that are often viewed to be problematic from a feminist perspective need to be re-examined through different hermeneutical lenses than those traditionally employed by interpreters of the Qur’an. This article examines some of the verses in question, explores the hermeneutical approaches suggested by these women scholars, and poses some questions about the prospects for a distinctively Islamic feminist scriptural interpretation.
Interview with Adele Horne, Director of 'The Tailenders' (2006)
Authors: Castelli Elizabeth
Published: March 2015

The Tailenders is a feature-length documentary written and directed by Los Angeles-based independent filmmaker Adele Horne. The film introduces viewers to Global Recordings Network (GRN), an evangelical Christian missionary organization devoted to translating Bible stories into all of the languages of the world. Focusing on oral transmission by working with native speakers of indigenous languages, GRN makes recordings of the stories and distributes them in low-tech formats using “hand-crank” technologies. The film emphasizes the linkages between Christian missionary groups and processes of capitalist globalization, between Protestant values and the technologies of modernity.
“It’s all by someone else!”
Authors: Coffman Christopher K.
Published: March 2015

James Merrill’s The Changing Light at Sandover is the outstanding visionary long poem of late twentieth-century American literature. Despite its somewhat unusual mode of composition and the rather eccentric heavenly pantheon with which Merrill claims to have communicated, Sandover is presented as the transmission of an authentic prophetic message and the narrative of the manner in which that message was received. One of the more intriguing aspects of the text is its self-reflexive nature. A substantial amount of the poem’s dialogue and a number of narrative manipulations interrogate the technologies of the poem’s composition and the relation of Merrill’s medium and method to his task as the author of a sacred text in a skeptical age. These internal tests ultimately confirm his efforts by celebrating the most basic element of any author’s craft—language—as not only the medium for the message but also the mechanism of humankind’s redemption.
Of Theory, Aesthetics, and Politics
Authors: Anderson Lisa Marie
Published: March 2015

This essay examines the messianic desire that impacted the cultural products of German-speaking Europe so strongly during the 1910s and 1920s. It then problematizes that desire by arguing that a famous 1930s debate, ostensibly about the political aesthetic of those previous decades, actually had as its central nerve the configurations of the messianic seen there. In juxtaposing two fundamentally disparate ways of the thinking the messianic (in contemporary theory as well as in the art and literature of a distinct period), I aim to interrogate the dialectical and aporetic structures inherent in messianism, as well as the consequences of secular co-optations of Jewish and Christian models.
The Taste to Come
Authors: Brower Virgil W.
Published: March 2015

This article exploits a core defect in the phenomenology of sensation and self. Although phenomenology has made great strides in redeeming the body from cognitive solipsisms that often follow short-sighted readings of Descartes and Kant, it has not grappled with the specific kind of corporeal self-reflexivity that emerges in the oral sense of taste with the thoroughness it deserves. This path is illuminated by the works of Martin Luther, Jean-Luc Marion, and Jacques Derrida as they attempt to think through the specific phenomena accessible through the lips, tongue, and mouth. Their attempts are, in turn, supplemented with detours through Walter Benjamin, Hélène Cixous, and Friedrich Nietzsche. The paper draws attention to the German distinction between Geschmack and Kosten as well as the role taste may play in relation to faith, the call to love, justice, and messianism. The messiah of love and justice will have been that one who proclaims: taste the flesh.
"Write the Text Letter-by-Letter in the Heart"
Authors: DeNapoli Antoinette Elizabeth
Published: March 2015

The performance of the Rāmāyan, a popular, medieval Hindi text composed by the Indian poet/saint Tulsidas, constitutes an important genre in the “rhetoric of renunciation” for female Hindu ascetics (sādhus) in Rajasthan. It is used by them, along with the singing of devotional songs (bhajans) and the telling of religious stories (kahānī), as integral to their daily practice of asceticism. This essay examines the performance and textual strategies by which non- and semi-literate female sādhus create themselves as “scriptural”—how they perform a relationship with the literate textual tradition of the Tulsi Rāmāyan—and thus engender female religious authority in the male-dominated institution of renunciation, in which men are often considered by Indian society as “the” experts in sacred texts. For these female sādhus, Rāmāyan performance functions as a rhetorical strategy with which they construct their tradition of devotional asceticism as a non-orthodox and vernacular alternative to the dominant (and orthodox) Sanskritic textual model of Brahmanical asceticism. The sādhus’ identification of Rāmāyan expressive traditions with Tulsidas’ written text contributes a new perspective on the concept of scripture, and their textual practices provide an alternative model of scripturality to current analytical models which equate it with individuals’ engagement with the written sacred text.
Casting the Sacred Reading the Self
Authors: Love Velma
Published: March 2015

"Casting the Sacred" examines the material culture and storied environment associated with African American engagements with the unwritten scriptures of the Yoruba Ifa tradition of West African origin, and offers a compelling case for expanding conventional notions of scriptures. This essay builds on the work of historians of religion who take a relational approach to the study of scriptures, placing the focus on the people and their engagement with sacred texts as cultural practice and system of meaning-making. Showcasing the diviner as the chief orchestrator of the storied environment, this work draws attention to the set of personal scriptures derived form Oracular utterances. It also notes the physicality of bodies, shells, divining chains, palm nuts, floor mats, and notebooks, all of which are significant aspects of "reading," a means of accessing and engaging a form of sacred knowledge which clients incorporate into their lives.
The Guru and His Queer Disciple
Authors: Vrajaprana Pravrajika
Published: March 2015

Christopher Isherwood’s engagement with Vedanta falls outside the frame of conventional readings, confronting the assumption that religion and homosexuality are mutually exclusive. Isherwood was a committed follower of Vedanta’s nondualistic philosophy (advaita), which provided a nonjudgmental basis for his spiritual aspirations. This approach was crucial for Isherwood since his acceptance of a spiritual ideal and practice was critically dependent upon how his homosexuality was accepted. Pivotal in Isherwood’s life was his relationship with Swami Prabhavananda, whose influence was as profound as that of E.M. Forster. Isherwood produced a considerable output of religious writings in his career, yet he has been neglected as a religious writer. This paper interrogates colonialist condescension towards Isherwood as a “Hindu,” typically opposing Western “reason” against Hindu “superstition.” The paper concludes by suggesting that Isherwood’s interpretation of Ramakrishna was not based upon a homosexualist hermeneutic, but rather one based on the freedom found in Guru Bhakti.
Images and Reflections of the Spiritual Self in Christopher Isherwood’s Narratives
Authors: Faraone Mario
Published: March 2015

Throughout his life, Christopher Isherwood explored his sense of himself through a range of different genres of writing: autobiography, letters and journals, and fiction. The polysemic image of the mirror plays a major role in the structuring of his novels and other writings. Through the figure of the mirror, the writer signals many nearly imperceptible yet significant changes over time. This article explores this image in a range of Isherwood’s writings, and argues that, through its deployment, the artist very often questions himself about the dichotomy between appearance and reality. The presence of the mirror in the early writings assumes modalities which are distinct from those belonging to the conversion period to Vedanta, the Hindu-oriented philosophy and religion.
Scriptures, Myths, and Power: The Bible at Work
Authors: Mack Burton
Published: March 2015

Concluding thoughts of Burton Mack's extended conversation with Vincent Wimbush and Institute for Signifying Scripture, Claremont Graduate University. The conversation revolves around the cultural function of the Bible as Christian myth in American society, and the African-American domestication of the Bible as their Scripture. The essay explores the differences between the Bible as myth in the dominant Euro-American tradition, and the Bible as Scripture in African-American experience. Drawing upon the work of Henry Louis Gates, Jr., the concept of "signifying" describes a remarkable linguistic style characteristic of African-American mentality and culture.
Scriptures, Myths, and Power: The Bible at Work
Authors: Mack Burton
Published: March 2015

The introduction to Burton Mack's extended conversation with Vincent Wimbush and Institute for Signifying Scripture, Claremont Graduate University. The conversation revolves around the cultural function of the Bible as Christian myth in American society, and the African-American domestication of the Bible as their Scripture. The essay explores the differences between the Bible as myth in the dominant Euro-American tradition, and the Bible as Scripture in African-American experience. Drawing upon the work of Henry Louis Gates, Jr., the concept of "signifying" describes a remarkable linguistic style characteristic of African-American mentality and culture.
Scriptures, Myths, and Power: The Bible at Work - Chapter Three
Authors: Mack Burton
Published: March 2015

Part 3 of Burton Mack's extended conversation with Vincent Wimbush and Institute for Signifying Scripture, Claremont Graduate University. The conversation revolves around the cultural function of the Bible as Christian myth in American society, and the African-American domestication of the Bible as their Scripture. The essay explores the differences between the Bible as myth in the dominant Euro-American tradition, and the Bible as Scripture in African-American experience. Drawing upon the work of Henry Louis Gates, Jr., the concept of "signifying" describes a remarkable linguistic style characteristic of African-American mentality and culture.
Missionaries in a Globalized World
Authors: Giménez Béliveau Verónica
Published: March 2015

This article examines contemporary orthodox or traditionalist communities that have emerged within the heart of Argentinean Catholicism. The discussion aims to contribute to current debates concerning global religious citizenships in relation to orthodox or traditionalist Catholic communities. Vigorously promoted by Pope John Paul II and now Benedict XVI, such conservative communities have exceeded the nation-state boundaries in which they have arisen and, using global resources from diverse international networks within the Roman Catholic church, they work hard to expand still further throughout the globe. Conservative Catholic communities, which ground their activities in the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965), have found in Argentina conditions particularly favorable for growth. While Argentinean Catholics who participate in such groups are still a clear minority, they currently enjoy a visibility in the public sphere and recognized space within the Catholic church. As they justify their expansion, the communities redefine both the goal and the appropriate territories for missionization. The construction of Catholic community draws on perceptions of a memory of Christianity that go beyond national loyalties, generating for participants new worldviews and forms of sociability within the frame of a “renewed” Catholicism.
The Passion of Guatemala
Authors: O'Neill Kevin Lewis
Published: March 2015

This article examines the Roman Catholic concepts, rhetoric, and images that have helped shape histories of progress in postwar Guatemala. The specific interest here is in the Roman Catholic Church’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission report and the progress narratives that this report helps to perpetuate. Titled Never Again (1998), the report documents Guatemala’s genocidal civil war by paralleling Guatemala’s passion to Christ’s passion. And while much of this article contributes to an ever-growing critique of progress narratives, of modernity itself, most compelling for this reflection are the spatial politics that appear as the Church’s progressive history proves increasingly uninformed (at best) and irrelevant (at worst).
It Is What It Is (Or Is It?)
Authors: Kinnard Jacob
Published: March 2015

Books are a common motif in the art of medieval Indian Buddhism. The questions addressed in this article are: What are these Buddhist images of books? What are they images of? Or, more to the point, are they images of anything at all? This article suggests that such images are like sculptural snapshots. These are not images not to be worshipped—although the main goddesses or bodhisattvas presented in the images were certainly objects of veneration—but they are images of worship. As such, they may be evidence of this worship, but they may also be rhetorical or polemical statements about the importance of the book in the Buddhist communities that produced them.
A Birthday Party for a Sacred Text
Authors: Waghorne Joanne Punzo
Published: March 2015

For over a decade, various Hindu organizations in Singapore have joined to celebrate an extraordinary series of events, called the Gita Jayanti. The term jayanti literally means "victory" or "victorious" but more usually indicates celebration of the birthday of a holy figure or a deity. Put simply, this is a birthday celebration for the Gita, a compact text that increasingly functions in the Hindu diaspora much like the Bible—a portable compendium of teachings, a deeply poetic source of individual comfort, a text to be memorized, chanted, studied. I know of no other Hindu text with such a birthday, nor had any of the people whom I interviewed about it encountered this celebration outside of Singapore. As part of the celebrations, the Gita undergoes a ritual that parallels the consecration of a deity for use in a temple. In this case the Gita takes on the body of Krishna who is understood to have spoken these holy words many centuries ago. In this sense the Bhagavad Gita, here treated as the Holy Book of contemporary Hinduism, is an iconic body of Krishna just as the bronze murti is also an iconic body—the ultimate iconicity.
The Pride and Prejudice of the Western World
Authors: Solibakke Karl Ivan
Published: March 2015

The article examines controversies arising from the perception of the instruments of cultural memory and the logic of their transmissibility. On the one hand we have a carefully selected, temporally and geographically orchestrated body of texts, the Great Books, which are an enduring testament to the authority of Western intellectual artifacts. On the other hand, Jacques Derrida’s Archive Fever locates a furtive transformation of collective memory in the informal practices exemplified by oral narrative and public discourse. Not only do both models rely on archives as a functional instrument of collective identity, but they also value them as institutions circumscribing social and cultural conventions. However, when synchronizing the traces embedded in oral discourse and written documents, the repositories are frequently subject to manipulation by interpretive communities. Recognizing the processes underlying archives and artifacts is essential to comprehending how canons and canonic practices impact Western cultural memory.
Images to be Read and Words to be Seen
Authors: Brown Michelle P.
Published: March 2015

How did the codex take on iconic status? This article surveys the history of the early medieval book, especially the transmission of religious texts in the codex format, in order to understand how the material form of the book itself came to take on religious significance.
“Winged Words”
Authors: Graham William A.
Published: March 2015

We consider first some difficulties of facilely differentiating “religious” from “cultural” phenomena, and similarly “scriptures” from (“religious” or “cultural”) “classics.” Texts in the latter three categories can be identified by their “iconic” status within a given tradition or context, but only on the basis of their social function, not by their form or content. We then consider how it may be possible to study “scriptural” texts constructively in shared discourse with scholars of differing religious backgrounds. Such a common discourse would be facilitated by a heuristic model of scripture as a text extending functionally in two directions, towards the human through interpretation and towards an Absolute or Transcendent ontologically (allowing it to participate in or mediate something of the Absolute to contingent human beings). Finally, we consider whether this model is applicable to “classics” as well as “scriptures” and conclude that on balance it is not. The model thus confirms one of the differences between classics and scriptures.
Biblical Literacy and the English King James Liberal Bible
Authors: Crossley James
Published: March 2015

Using the 400th anniversary of the King James Bible as a test case, this article illustrates some of the important ways in which the Bible is understood and consumed and how it has continued to survive in an age of neoliberalism and postmodernity. It is clear that instant recognition of the Bible-as-artefact, multiple repackaging and pithy biblical phrases, combined with a popular nationalism, provide distinctive strands of this understanding and survival. It is also clear that the KJV is seen as a key part of a proud English cultural heritage and tied in with traditions of democracy and tolerance, despite having next to nothing to do with either. Anything potentially problematic for Western liberal discourse (e.g. calling outsiders “dogs,” smashing babies heads against rocks, Hades-fire for the rich, killing heretics, using the Bible to convert and colonize, etc.) is effectively removed, or even encouraged to be removed, from such discussions of the KJV and the Bible in the public arena. In other words, this is a decaffeinated Bible that has been colonized by, and has adapted to, Western liberal capitalism.
Biblical Literacy and Two Classical Sociologists
Authors: Chalcraft David
Published: March 2015

This article explores aspects of the biblical literacy of two classical sociologists, Max Weber (1864–1920) and William Dubois (1868–1963) and after discussing two examples in some depth and drawing comparisons, briefly reflects on what kinds of biblical literacy is required of contemporary readers of Weber and Dubois, if they are to make sense of their sociology given the continuing legacy of the Bible in their work. The examples of their use of biblical ideas, themes and figures are taken from Weber’s lectures, “Politics as a Vocation and Science as a Vocation,” and from Dubois’ The Souls of Black Folk. It is argued that whilst Weber uses biblical quotation to share with his audience a situation with some sociological analogy to their own case, Dubois utilises the continuing authority of the Bible amongst his White and Black audiences to affect social change and to provide an identity and purpose for Black folk post emancipation in the American South.
The iTunization of pop
Authors: Fung Anthony Y.H.
Published: March 2015

This article explores the cultural consequences of music on iPhone, iPad and iPod, a context in which youth today use the same digital and online iTunes platform to download, play, store and organize music. iTunes, coupled with smartphones (either iPhones or Android phones) and the availability of other social network sites (e.g. Facebook, YouTube) constitute a set of ready-made tools for young people to connect themselves with music, which serves as a common interest for networking under the context of a new internet culture. In other words, former massmediated music choices are being replaced by the selective choices of peers, who can now use the available platforms and new music technologies to locate their own musical tastes. Based on systematic in-depth interviews and analysis of lists of songs provided by interviewees, the article argues for a process of iTunization—a term describing the cultural phenomenon in which youth of the same cohort store and share much the same music resources, with these resources being quite stable over time.
Changing Modalities in the Globalization of Islamic Saint Veneration and Mysticism
Authors: Frishkopf Michael
Published: March 2015

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Development of the Islamic Understanding of Sanctity
Authors: McGregor Richard
Published: March 2015

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New Christian Social Activism
Authors: Victor Henry
Published: March 2015

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Mahavidyas at Kamarupa
Authors: Dold Patricia
Published: March 2015

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Body of the Gurus
Authors: Singh Nikky-Guninder Kaur
Published: March 2015

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Problem of Colonialism in the Western Historiography of Christian Missions
Authors: Samson Jane
Published: March 2015

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Where the Divine Meets the Created
Authors: Fraser Jessica
Published: March 2015

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Liberation Theology Down on the Farm
Authors: Moreland Claudia , Terrar Toby
Published: March 2015

The central concern of this article is family values taught in the religion of southern working-class people in the antebellum United States. It uses a representative South Carolina family and focuses on the values in three different contexts: religion, family and labor. In living out their lives, working people encountered both success and failure. Their history is compared with the present-day family value discussion, as conducted by scholars such as James Dobson.
Contemporary Pagan Ritual and Cyberspace
Authors: Bittarello Maria Beatrice
Published: March 2015

The paper attempts a theoretical re-appraisal of contemporary Pagan ritual by posing the following question: do Pagan rituals online contradict this new religion’s stress on embodiment or, rather, do such rituals compel us to reconsider and re-evaluate the category of ritual itself? The author examines first the main features of contemporary Pagan ritual offline and online, as they emerge from ethnographic work and from scholarly interpretations, then, based also on a re-evaluation of the relationship between actuality and virtuality in certain works on computer mediated communication, highlights the existence of a close relationship between the creation of symbolic meaning and ritual in contemporary Paganism.
Birds Hill Park, the Dakota Eagle Sundance, and the Sweatlodge: Establishing a Sacred Site in a Provincial Park
Authors: Ruml Mark
Published: March 2015

Little scholarly analysis has been made of the processes involved in returning

Indigenous sacred locales to contemporary religious usage. In this paper, a historical and descriptive sketch is provided of the institutional and personal

systems in place in the recovery of a Dakota sundance site in Birds Hill Provincial Park. After several meetings with various officials from the Manitoba Department of Conservation the White Buffalo Spiritual Society was given permission to hold a sundance ceremony at Birds Hill Provincial Park, located approximately twenty kilometers north of the City of Winnipeg,

Manitoba, Canada. From 2000 until 2007 an annual sundance and regular sweatlodge ceremonies were held at a site in the Park selected by members of the White Buffalo Spiritual Society in consultation with Conservation officials. This article outlines significant events in the process of establishing and maintaining a sacred space in a Provincial Park, introduces

the reader to the Dakota Eagle sundance, and notes the reasons why the sundance and sweatlodge ceremonies are viewed as important for the individual and community well-being.
Etty Hillesum: Love Calls for Spiritual Discernment
Authors: Pleshoyano Alexandra Ileana
Published: March 2015

Etty Hillesum, a young Jewish woman living in Amsterdam, died on

November 30th 1943 in Auschwitz when she was twenty-nine years old, leaving behind a diary (eleven exercise books) and seventy-eight letters which have drawn responses across the world in the form of books, reviews, articles, documentaries, plays and visual art. By adding this essay to the body of literature on Hillesum’s writings, I hope to change the process of recuperation so that her texts may be read differently. What I hope to contribute

is a pluralist and universal’s perspective on the comprehension of love in Hillesum’s writings. This subject has not as yet been given enough thought and attention. And yet, when one tries to understand Hillesum’s spiritual path it is mandatory to interpret what she understood by the so common word of “love.” Hillesum’s writings do indeed articulate a remarkable

experience of God in times when many just abandoned a faith that seemed so useless.
Faith in the Public Square, by Rowan Williams
Authors: Mihevc Joe
Published: March 2015

Faith in the Public Square, by Rowan Williams. Bloomsbury, 2012. 344pp., $21.63. ISBN–13: 9781408187609.
Skanda and His Fathers in the Aranyakaparvan
Authors: Mann Richard D
Published: March 2015

By the Gupta era, Siva and Uma have emerged as the recognized parents of Skanda, but an examination of the descriptions of the deity’s birth from the Mahabharata presents a much more complex view of his parentage. This essay examines one of the early narratives of the deity’s birth from the Mahabharata where the young god has several fathers and mothers. Through an examination of the paternal relationships Skanda has in the Aranyakaparvan of the Mahabharata I argue one can observe the methods employed by epic redactors in writing non-Vedic gods into the emerging Hindu pantheon. Each paternal relationship demonstrates particular concerns the epic redactors faced with the inclusion of a non-Vedic deity into the text, concerns that are addressed through establishing paternal relationships between the young god and his fathers in this account, Agni and Siva.
Evidence of High Gene Flow Between Samples of Horseweed (Conyza canadensis) and Hairy Fleabane (Conyza bonariensis) as Revealed by Isozyme Polymorphisms
Authors: Soares Alaim Anderson Fernandes , Fregonezi Angela Maria Dalla Torre , Bassi Denis , Mangolin Claudete Aparecida , de Oliviera Collet Sandra Aparecida , de Oliveira Junior Rubem Silvério , de Fátima Pires da Silva Machado Maria
Published: March 2015

Native polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis was used to identify polymorphisms in α- and β-esterases loci and electrophoresis in starch gel to identify polymorphism in malate dehydrogenase (MDH; EC 1.1.1.37) and acid phosphatase (ACP; EC 3.1.3.2) isozymes loci in leaf tissues from samples of horseweed and hairy fleabane populations to determine genetic diversity and population structure. Similar or differential genetic divergence between the two species may guide specific use of herbicides. For samples of plants with high genetic similarity it is possible to adopt similar mechanisms and processes for their control. The proportion of polymorphic loci was 57.14, 50.0, and 53.6%, in samples of horseweed and hairy fleabane, for EST, MDH, and ACP isozymes, respectively. A comparison of the diversity parameters in the two species showed that the number of alleles is similar in the horseweed and hairy fleabane plants. The estimated heterozygosity in horseweed and hairy fleabane was also very close. A relatively low level of population differentiation was detected between horseweed and hairy fleabane (FST= 0.0199), which suggests a substantial genetic exchange among the two species. Accordingly, estimate of gene flow was high (Nm = 12.3172) for the alleles of the lociEst,Mdh, andAcp. The Nei's identity (I) values also was high (I = 0.9561) indicating very high similarity between the twoConyzaspecies. AMOVA showed higher genetic variation within (95%) than among (5%) the two samples. The low genetic structure and high value of genetic identity was an important indication that alleles are exchanged between horseweed and hairy fleabane populations, and provides additional evidence of occurrence of outcrossing between populations or dispersion of samples of one for other site.
Evaluation of POST-Harvest Herbicide Applications for Seed Prevention of Glyphosate-Resistant Palmer amaranth (Amaranthus palmeri)
Authors: Crow Whitney D. , Steckel Lawrence E. , Hayes Robert M. , Mueller Thomas C.
Published: March 2015

Recent increases in the prevalence of glyphosate-resistant (GR) Palmer amaranth mandate that new control strategies be developed to optimize weed control and crop performance. A field study was conducted in 2012 and 2013 in Jackson, TN, and in 2013 in Knoxville, TN, to evaluate POST weed management programs applied after harvest (POST-harvest) for prevention of seed production from GR Palmer amaranth and to evaluate herbicide carryover to winter wheat. Treatments were applied POST-harvest to corn stubble, with three applications followed by a PRE herbicide applied at wheat planting. Paraquat alone or mixed withS-metolachlor controlled 91% of existing Palmer amaranth 14 d after treatment but did not control regrowth. Paraquat tank-mixed with a residual herbicide of metribuzin, pyroxasulfone, saflufenacil, flumioxazin, pyroxasulfone plus flumioxazin, or pyroxasulfone plus fluthiacet improved control of regrowth or new emergence compared with paraquat alone. All residual herbicide treatments provided similar GR Palmer amaranth control. Through implementation of POST-harvest herbicide applications, the addition of 1,200 seed m−2or approximately 12 million seed ha−1to the soil seedbank was prevented. Overall, the addition of a residual herbicide provided only 4 to 7% more GR Palmer amaranth control than paraquat alone. Wheat injury was evident (< 10%) in 2012 from the PRE applications, but not in 2013. Wheat grain yield was not adversely affected by any herbicide application.