Atheism Reference library
Thoralf KLEIN
Berkshire Encyclopedia of China
...the term, Confucianism, which came under fire for its association with the official cult of the state. Because these intellectuals formed the backbone of revolutionary movements and of the emerging political parties, atheism played an important role in the political transformation of China. Atheism during the Republican Period Chinese atheism was first and foremost directed against religion’s most “superstitious” form: folk, or popular, religion, which also includes certain elements of Buddhism and Daoism. The republican revolution of 1911–1912 witnessed...
Ritson, Joseph Quick reference
A Dictionary of English Folklore
...he saw as their slapdash and dishonest editorial methods. These attacks were so vehemently worded and so personally abusive that, despite often being right in point of fact, he made few friends and many enemies. Combined with his other personal peculiarities—vegetarianism and atheism included—Ritson's pedantry and obsessive behaviour meant that when he died after a brief spell of ‘madness’ he was not much mourned. In hindsight, there is no doubt that his public strictures on the likes of Pinkerton and Percy forced editors of the time and later to be more...
NAIRNE, Charles Murray (1808–1882) Reference library
Russell Pryba
Dictionary of Early American Philosophers
... Atheism and Pantheism in 1848 which was delivered as a lecture to the Young Men’s Association for Mutual Improvement in the City of Albany. In addition to his teaching he is perhaps best remembered for his introduction and notes to William Paley ’s Evidences of Christianity beginning with the edition of 1854 . He also published “Two Lectures of the Annual Psychology Course in Columbia College,” indicating how the traditional subject of “intellectual philosophy” was becoming known as “psychology” in eastern colleges in the 1860s. In Atheism and...
Madrasahs in Bukhara and Samarkand Reference library
The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Islamic World
...Samarkand, c. 1619–1636. Photograph by Joachim Gierlichs / Image Archive Das Bild des Orients, Berlin The importance of madrasahs in Bukhara and Samarkand as centers of Islamic learning greatly declined and many were closed in the twentieth century due to the Soviet policy of atheism and the ensuing secularism of the society between the 1920s and 1990s. Bibliography Abazov, Rafis . Palgrave Concise Historical Atlas of Central Asia . New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008. Bartold, Vasilii . Turkestan Down to the Mongol Invasion . New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal...
Communism Reference library
Jesudas M. Hedlund
The Oxford Encyclopaedia of South Asian Christianity
...to Global Capitalism: Drawn from Biblical History, Designed for Political Action , Heidelberg: International Books. Furet, F. (1999), The Passing of an Illusion: The Idea of Communism in the 20th Century , Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Kappen, S. (1983), Marxian Atheism , Bangalore: ATC. Marx, K. and F. Engels (n.d.), On Religion , Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House. Wielenga, B. (1984), Introduction to Marxism , Bangalore:...
Religious Practice, Contemporary Reference library
Jinghao ZHOU
Berkshire Encyclopedia of China
...constitution, the party takes Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought as its guide. Atheism is a central tenet of Marxism. Marxism holds that God is a mere fabrication, invented by people to soothe the misery of this world, a fabrication exploited by the ruling classes to oppress the working class. From the Marxist perspective, the abolition of religion and the abolition of the capitalist system go hand in hand. The party requires its members to profess Marxist atheism and to educate the masses in the Marxist perspective on religion. Chinese people...
HEDGE, Frederic Henry (1805–1890) Reference library
James A. Good
Dictionary of Early American Philosophers
...lecturing regularly at Alcott’s Concord School of Philosophy until 1887 , speaking on many important occasions, including a notable eulogy on the death of Emerson in 1882 , and receiving an honorary LLD degree from Harvard in 1876 . In his last philosophical monograph, Atheism in Philosophy ( 1884 ), Hedge argued that excessive philosophical speculation dangerously undermines belief in the existence of God. He died on 21 August 1890 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Although the more radical transcendentalists have overshadowed him, Hedge’s reputation...
Nasserism Reference library
The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Islamic World
...elected seats were reserved for farmers and workers from local councils up to the National Executive. Although the charter had obvious Marxist influences, it denied the class struggle and retained private ownership of property and land under stringent limits. It also repudiated atheism but generally ignored Islam without showing hostility toward it. The essence of the Nasserist creed was that without socialism to provide economic security and equality of opportunity, democracy would be a pure facade. See also Arab Nationalism ; Arab Socialism ; Egypt ; ...
Laiklik Reference library
The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Islamic World
...as “secularism.” A relevant Turkish term is laik , which means “secular.” Secular states have two main characteristics: 1) their legal and judicial processes are out of institutional religious control and 2) they constitutionally establish neither an official religion nor atheism. Secularization of the Turkish legal system began by the Ottoman Tanzimat Reforms of 1839 . The new Turkish Republic completed this process in the 1920s by adopting several European laws. In 1928 , a constitutional amendment removed the article which had established Islam as...
Qaddafi, Muammar al- (1942–) Reference library
Encyclopedia of Africa
...began to overhaul Libyan government and society. He charged many of the nation’s former leaders with treason, outlawed the politically influential Islamic Sanusi sect, and weakened tribal affiliations by reorganizing administrative structures. He denounced communism for its atheism, and promoted Muslim asceticism by banning liquor. In 1973 he instituted the so-called People’s Committees to enable citizens to directly control local and regional government. The General People’s Congress took over as the national representative body from the RCC, and Qaddafi...
CLARKE, James Freeman (1810–1888) Reference library
John R. Shook
Dictionary of Early American Philosophers
...points of Calvinism: the fatherhood of God, the brotherhood of man, the leadership of Jesus, salvation by character, and the progress of mankind forever. Bibliography Orthodoxy: Its Truths and Errors (Boston, 1866). Steps of Belief: or, Rational Christianity maintained against Atheism, Free Religion, and Romanism (Boston, 1870). Ten Great Religions , 2 vols. (Boston, 1871, 1883). Common-Sense in Religion (Boston, 1874). Essentials and Non-essentials in Religion (Boston, 1878). Memorial and Biographical Sketches (Boston, 1880). Self-Culture: Physical,...
DANA, James (1735–1812) Reference library
Adam Glover
Dictionary of Early American Philosophers
...Sins not chargeable on God, but on Themselves (New Haven, Conn., 1783). The African Slave Trade (New Haven, Conn., 1791). Repr. in Political Sermons of the American Founding Era , 1730–1805 , ed. Ellis Sandoz (Indianapolis, Indiana, 1991), vol. 2. The Folly of Practical Atheism (New Haven, Conn., 1794). The Character of Scoffers (Hartford, Conn., 1805). Sermons to Young People (New Haven, Conn., 1806). Other Relevant Works The Intent of Capital Punishment (New Haven, Conn., 1790). There is no Reason to be Ashamed of the Gospel (Hartford, Conn.,...
DWIGHT, Timothy (1752–1817) Reference library
Kyle Welty
Dictionary of Early American Philosophers
...argued that humanity could discern patterns from experience, which meant that Hume’s assertion that humanity could only connect cause and effect in a nominal manner was flawed. Moving from skepticism to outright atheism, Dwight argued that atheism necessarily entailed faith in hypotheses that resisted documentation. According to Dwight, “Atheism in all its forms is a specimen of the most absolute credulity” ( 1845 , vol. 1, 99). In Dwight’s assessment, atheists maintained their beliefs in spite of empirical evidence, not because of an abundance of proofs....
HOGE, Moses (1752–1820) Reference library
John R. Shook
Dictionary of Early American Philosophers
...5 July 1820 while attending a Presbyterian assembly in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Hoge was primarily a spiritual leader and preacher who represented the moderate Presbyterian Calvinism of Virginia during that era. He defended the Christian faith against Enlightenment deism and atheism, and seemed to be at the center of periodic evangelical revivals and minor “awakenings” in the region. Quick to announce signs of God’s grace or wrath, his commentaries on social and political issues of the day are revealing. In 1811 , seventy-two people died in a theater’s...
MESSER, Asa (1769–1836) Reference library
John R. Shook
Dictionary of Early American Philosophers
... Emmerich de Vattel ’s The Law of Nations ( 1811 edn), and Jean-Baptiste Say ’s A Treatise on Political Economy (trans. 1821 ) may also have been used. Messer took strong political stands favoring Federalism and enforcement of religion against the winds of deism and atheism, fearing threats to proper democracy. Among Christians, he was an example of religious toleration, who hated denominational bigotry and strife. But Messer was hiding his own unorthodox beliefs from public sight for a long time. While president, he was among the liberal Baptists...
CHEEVER, George Barrell (1807–1890) Reference library
Dorothy Rogers and Alexandra Perry
Dictionary of Early American Philosophers
...about it at his church entitled “The Curse of God Against Political Atheism.” He spoke of Brown as a man “driven to desperation” by a government that allowed slavery to flourish and a church that was essentially “sanctioning sin” ( 1859 , 22). While Cheever believed it was regrettable that a person would employ violence in an attempt to end slavery, the real root of the problem was America’s drift away from its divinely ordained role as an instrument of justice. The nation’s “political atheism” was at fault. It was in this same year that Cheever and his brother...
PEABODY, Elizabeth Palmer (1804–1894) Reference library
Monika Elbert
Dictionary of Early American Philosophers
...essays being “The Dorian Measure” and “Language” in the issue of Aesthetic Papers . Peabody continued to be fascinated by aesthetics, and she collected her earlier writings on the aesthetics of painter Washington Allston as well as other essays she had written about theology, atheism, and transcendentalism in a volume, Last Evening with Allston and Other Papers ( 1886 ). Peabody’s interests in pedagogy, as influenced by Kraitsir, Pestalozzi, and Froebel, culminated in Lectures in the Training Schools for Kindergartners ( 1886 ). In the 1840s Peabody...
Khalwatīyah Reference library
The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Islamic World
...1950s. The Khalwatīyah was a part of this process but did not assume a highly visible role in the Islamic resurgence of the late twentieth century. In the Balkans, some Khalwatīyah centers continued to be active, especially in Albania, where the order survived in the official atheism of the Communist era. See also Qādirīyah ; Shādhilīyah ; and Tijānīyah . Bibliography Bannert, E. “ La Khalwatiyya en Egypte, quelques aspects de la vie d ’une confrérie. ” MIDEO 8 (1964–1966): 1–74. Chih, Rachida . “ Cheminements et situation actuelle d ’un ordre mystique...
Kishk, ʿAbd al-Ḥamīd Reference library
The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Islamic World
...In these, he continued to criticize sharply any behavior that he regarded as a deviation from the norms of Islam. However, the regime was a little more tolerant of such criticisms, since it needed the support of the Islamic movement in the struggle against “communism and atheism.” Nevertheless, Shaykh Kishk , unlike Islamists such as Shaykh al-Shaʿrāwī , did not appear on state-run television or publish in the official printed media. In spite of the official media boycott, Kishk 's sermons were widely distributed on cassette tapes, as were, in the same...
HILDRETH, Richard (1807–1865) Reference library
Jon Rogers
Dictionary of Early American Philosophers
...of six written volumes, and while living in Guiana he wrote the first two of them, Theory of Morals ( 1844 ) and Theory of Politics ( 1853 ). The works were mostly well received, although harsh criticisms came from the church and religious academics who accused him of atheism for arguing that the essence of morality was to be found in “the constitution of man” rather than in the word of God. Hildreth returned to Boston after three years in Guiana and in 1844 he married Caroline Gould Negus , a portrait painter who came from a family of...
