Annotation. This study of the social circumstances of Japanese intellectuals in the last quarter of the eighteenth century is based on biographical data concerning 173 individuals. It deals with the image of intellectual life of that period in current scholarship, and with the self-image and ethos of scholars, authors, poets and artists. That self-image and ethos, however, often clash with the realities of their everyday lives. This prosopographical investigation offers a new look at intellectual life on a basic level. The current image of intellectual life in the Tokugawa period is one of dissatisfaction and withdrawal, whereas the image that results from this study is one of dynamism and interaction. For more (Dutch-language) titles on Japan, please visit: "http://www.aup.nl/do.php?a=show_visitor_booklist&b=series&series=21">www.aup.nl/japan This title can be previewed in Google Books - http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN9789087280017.

The Reverend Professor Dorothy A. Lee FAHA is well-known as a New Testament scholar not only in Australia but around the world. An Anglican priest, her ministry, particularly as a preacher and retreat director, is highly regarded and highly sought after, not only in her home city of Melbourne, but in many parts of the country. This Festschrift volume honors her contributions and ministry on the occasion of her seventieth birthday. An interdisciplinary collection of twenty-one essays, it offers two biographical contributions, several essays on New Testament themes, essays on women, feminism, and the church, and cross-disciplinary essays focused on the biblical text. Contributors to the volume come from Australian theological education centers and Australian churches.

Includes some separate vols. for special sessions.

The importance of baptism within Christian history, theology, and practice is of the first order. Rooted in Christian Scripture, baptism is initiation into Jesus Christ and the sacramental beginning of engagement with the church, the body of Christ. In recent decades, the relationship between baptismal theology and ecclesiology has changed. Rather than focusing solely on the implications of baptism for individuals, the center of theological conversation has moved increasingly to the nature of baptism as formative of the church. One of the pioneers in exploring this theological issue in the United States has been the Rev. Dr. Louis Weil, who, from the time he helped author the 1979 Book of Common Prayer, has advocated for an approach called "baptismal ecclesiology." In a number of essays since the 1980s, Dr. Weil has encouraged an increasingly ecumenical conversation around this particular approach to ecclesiology. This ecumenical collection of essays by a distinguished and international group of sixteen scholars continues the conversation on liturgy and ecclesiology begun by Fr. Weil.

Embark on a captivating journey with "Lavengro: The Scholar, the Gypsy, the Priest." Penned by George Borrow, this novel intertwines the worlds of scholars, Romanies, and the clergy, offering readers a rich tapestry of English life and culture. Set against the backdrop of England, this work is a testament to Borrow's literary prowess and his keen insights into society's diverse facets.

This autobiography traces Francis X. Clooney's intellectual and spiritual journey from middle-class American Catholicism to a lifelong study of Hinduism. It explains how he came to fashion comparative theology as a way of learning interreligiously that is boldly intellectual and deeply personal and practical, lived out in intersections of his roles as theologian and scholar of Hinduism, as professor and Catholic priest, and over the tumultuous decades from the 1960s until now, in his role as Parkman Professor of Divinity, Harvard University. Clooney sheds fresh and realistic light on the idea and ideal of scholar-practitioner, since his wide learning, Christian and Hindu, is grounded in his Catholic and Jesuit commitments, as well as in a commensurate learning with respect to several Hindu traditions that are most accessible to scholars willing to learn empathetically and in a participatory manner. What Clooney has learnt and written must be understood in terms of a love of Christ deeply informed by a Hindu instinct for loving God without reserve. A fundamental spiritual disposition - intuitions of God present everywhere - has energized his work over his long career, love giving direction and body to his professional academic work.

Bruce Lincoln is one of the most prominent advocates within religious studies for an uncompromisingly critical approach to the phenomenon of religion—historians of religions, he believes, should resist the preferred narratives and self-understanding of religions themselves, especially when their stories are endowed with sacred origins and authority. In Gods and Demons, Priests and Scholars, Lincoln assembles a collection of essays that both illustrates and reveals the benefits of his methodology, making a case for a critical religious studies that starts with skepticism but is neither cynical nor crude. The book begins with Lincoln’s “Theses on Method” and ends with “The (Un)discipline of Religious Studies,” in which he unsparingly considers the failings of uncritical and nonhistorical approaches to the study of religions. In between, Lincoln presents new examinations of problems in ancient religions and relates these cases to larger comparative themes. While bringing to light important features of the formation of pantheons and the constructions of demons, chaos, and the dead, Lincoln demonstrates that historians of religions should take religious things—inspired scriptures, sacred centers, salvific rites, communities graced by divine favor—as the theories of interested humans that shape perception, community, and experiences. As he shows, it is for their terrestrial influence, and not their sacred origins, that religious phenomena merit consideration by the historian. Tackling many questions central to religious study, Gods and Demons, Priests and Scholars will be a touchstone for the history of religions in the twenty-first century.