Is this thread, beginning with Julie post, not off-topic?

This is the list for the academic study of magic.

Nick



-----Original Message-----
From: Society for The Academic Study of Magic
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of James John Bell
Sent: 22 September 2012 00:33
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [ACADEMIC-STUDY-MAGIC] Religious Teachings

Julie,

A religion and politics question, those are always fun.

There are folks on this list with more knowledge in this arena than myself,
though I do work in the field of constructing political narratives and
religious narratives are unavoidable so here is my answer regarding the
"trend of the moment" - I'm curious if others feel the same at all, which is
why I'm postulating this takeaway on current religious events.

What's going on in North Africa is bigger than the response to a film, and a
response to US foreign policy, there is for lack of a better word a
"reformation" that has begun sweeping the Islamic world. The movements call
themselves reform versus schism, but it is definitely underway, and many of
the leaders have been hunted down and killed -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberal_movements_within_Islam

Islam took off around 6-700AD, so it's reaching that volatile 14-1500 year
mark. Sociologists have tracked world religions and theologians have
suggested that what Islam is experiencing is similar to what Christianity
went through in the 1500's - a period of violent reformation. The Muslim
faith has not yet had such a massive reformation period until now.

By comparison, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf Kingdoms would be similar to the
Roman Catholic, Anglican, and Eastern Orthodox fundamentalist Christian
Kingdoms of the 16th century - those Kings who recognized the supreme
authority of the Vatican and the Pope. Every other Christian revolted and
became the 33,000 estimated denominational offshoots of Protestantism.

North Africa, via Egypt, under control of the Muslim Brotherhood now, is the
extension of such supreme fundamentalist religious authority. Look to the
bloody wars in Europe that were fought between the Catholic Kings and
Protestant German Princes in the 1500's for a potential look at what is
about to go down, or has been going down, across the Middle East among the
Arab Princes and their Kingdoms as they take sides in the wars of this
Muslim reformation.

Mecca in Saudi Arabia is to Islam what Rome is to all Catholics and what
Jerusalem in Israel is to all Jews - those are the strategic centers for the
three major offshoots of western belief systems (If the major Protestant
offshoots had a center it might be Germany, but for example the Mormons
don't even consider themselves protestants technically and thus their
religious center is Salt Lake City). I'm using the broad definition that
Protestants are any Christian belief systems that do not recognize the
authority of the Pope and the Vatican and emerged after around 1500. Thus
the Coptics who splintered from the Catholics in the 5th century fall into
another category.

Anyway this is definitely one reason the US stands with fundamentalist Saudi
Arabia, it's a center of religious power for the entire region, just like
America's other good buddy Israel and Jerusalem and it being the center of
Jewish authority in the entire region.

Again, I understand there are huge complexities at work here that create all
sort of exceptions to what I'm putting out as a trend here, but this is one
attempt at a lens - to use past religious history - that I have found to
interpret recent global events and trends through.

James

On 9/21/12 2:58 PM, "Julie S Maclure" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> I came across this link:
>
> http://www.victoria.ac.nz/sacr/about/overview-intros/religious-studies
>
> What do you think ?
> How does religious beliefs differ from country to country, and what
influences
> the trend of the moment ?