Religion Dispatches
Netanyahu’s decision to declare two holy sites located in the Palestinian Territories and once shared by Jews, Christians, and Muslims “national heritage sites” triggers violence and conflict.
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What do you get when you add taqwa, or God-consciousness, to the punk suffix “-core”? Can something be Islamic without being religious? As journalists try to get a handle on this genre- and culture-bending mashup, RD associate editor Hussein Rashid gets right to the source.
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Two new books, one offering a vision of interfaith, universal religion, the other a model of a radically transformed Judaism, attempt to wrestle God into the everyday. Against the ascendancy of the so-called New Atheism, both writers argue for a God who transcends “god-management systems” and whose primary claim on us is through our own spiritual longing.
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Rioting continues in Malaysia this week as Muslims fight for the exclusive right to the word “Allah.” But is the name of God a name or a noun? And who stands to gain politically from this unrest?
Read MoreMy husband can run out to the door in his shorts and in what some people refer to tellingly as a “wife-beater” while I must be fully dressed, complete with appropriate underwear; it’s only partially based in religion.
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The so-called Christmas Bomber, a young Nigerian Muslim with a British education, was caught between wealthy westernized life and an inflexible religious ideal. His story summons a theory about how the radical narrative emerges, rises and dies
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Depends which of the 1.6 billion Muslims you ask. A new film seeks to give depth to Western perceptions of Islam. Too bad they didn’t make it to Asia.
Read MoreA letter to the editor and a response.
Read MoreTwo current cases involving religious (in this case Islamic) symbolism show the perilous relationship between religion and politics in civil society.
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If China becomes a new priority, an economic beacon and a political patron, what happens to the question of reconciling Islam and the West? Two new books offer groundbreaking approaches to this and other unexpected questions.
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