REL 1220: World Religions

University of Toledo
Summer 2014 Sections: 912 and 911 ( 5/12/2014 - 6/20/2014 )
Instructor: Dr. Ovamir Anjum Ovamir.anjum@utoledo.edu
Ph: 419-530-4598 (office and voice-mail)
Email is the best way to contact me. I will not be in my office regularly during the summer, but your
voice messages will reach me immediately by email. If you wish to talk to me over the phone, please
email me and leave a number and time to reach and give me a 2-day period to call back. If it is urgent,
send me an email with urgent in the subject line and provide a good way to reach you in the body of
the email.
The premise of this course is that in the modern world there has been a resurgence of religion. This has
occurred against the predictions that as premodern worldviews met with urbanization, secularization,
the modern scientific worldview, colonialism, and finally, the postmodern collapse of all metanarratives,
religions will lose significance and eventually disappear. Instead, today we meet religious and cultural
diversity constantlyat our workplaces, in our neighborhoods, and in our schools. This course focuses,
in part, on the clash of traditional religions with modern scientific and secular society because that is
paramount to understanding interactions between religions and cultures in the world today. To
understand the new, or postmodern, era just emerging, we must have some understanding of the
premodern period in each religious tradition, including its responses to and changes brought about by
modernization.
After the first week, we will spend the next four of our total six intense weeks covering four of the
worlds major religious traditions: Judaism and Christianity, Islam, and Buddhism. During the last week,
we will cover the impact of modernity and globalization on the worlds religions, and get ready for the
final exam.
Getting Started
1. Make sure you have access to Blackboard, that you are comfortable using it, and your
utoledo.edu email is functional.
2. Once on Blackboard: check the [Start Here] tab. Here (this document) you will find all the
important information for the course. Print it out, but also double check the webpage
frequently in case there is an update.
3. Get the textbook. Study the right topic/chapter for the weekly quiz. See the Schedule given
below.
4. Do not forget to use study aids under [Course Documents]. Use flash cards to help
remember important vocabulary and Review Quizzes to check yourself.
5. Contact me for any questions.

Textbook
World Religions Today by Esposito et al. Oxford University Press. Fourth Edition.
Schedule

Week (Tuesdays) and Theme Chapter # (WRT, Fourth Ed.)
Wk 1. 5/12
Introduction (ch. 1)
1
Wk 2. 5/19
Judaism (ch. 3)
3
Wk 3. 5/26
Christianity (ch. 4)
4
Wk 4. 6/2
Islam (ch. 5)
5
Wk 5. 6/9
Buddhism
7
Wk 6. 6/16
Prepare for the exam.

Final Exam 6/20
Quizzes

Every week you will have time to study the materials (one chapter every week) between Monday and
Friday. Quizzes will be made available between Friday morning 8 am and Sunday end of the Day,
11:59pm.
Grading
Five weekly quizzes 50%
Final Exam 50%

A 94 and above
A- 90 93
B+ 87 89
B 84 86
B- 80 83
C+ 77 79
C 74 76
C- 70 73
D+ 67 69
D 64 66
D- 60 63
F 0 59
KEY THEMES AND TERMS
Judaism (ch. 3)
Judaism is the oldest of the existing Abrahamic traditions, and even though its
numbers do not match those of Islam or Christianity in todays world, its
significance does. We will consider the unity and diversity of Judaism, with
particular focus on examining both the secular and religious forms of Judaism in
relation to modernity and postmodern trends. The monotheism of both Christianity
and Islam has its roots in Judaism, but while Christianity teaches the concept of
original sin, that concept does not exist in either Islam or Judaism. In the case of
Judaism, the ideal of life is living in harmony with the will of God, and God gave
Jews a gift to tip the balance between good and evil in favor of good. The gift was
the dual Torah, the sacred oral and written teachings that established the covenant
with Israel, making them a holy people. For premodern Rabbinic Judaism, to choose
to walk in the way of God was to follow his 613 commandments. But within the
diversity of modern Judaism, the one path has opened onto many paths.

Judaism
bar mitzvah: boy's ritual, at age 13, that moves him into full membership of the
religious community and adulthood
bat mitzvah: extension of bar mitzvah ritual to females by the Conservative and
Reform Jewish communities
circumcision: ritual called Bris or Brit milah required for every male at 8 days old,
when the child is circumcised and named
covenant: a mutual agreement between two parties that is both an expression of
mutual love and care and a legal agreement on the model of a marriage contract
Diaspora: Jews who were dispersed in the Roman Empire
dual Torah: the sacred oral and written teachings that established the covenant
with Israel
gentile: a non-Jewish person
halakhah: the premodern Talmudic tradition; Jewish law
Hasidism: a movement marked by piety, great devotion, and expression of great
joy in response to God's presence, which is found everywhere in creation
Holocaust: literally means "burnt sacrifice"; long-standing Christian anti-Judaism,
the rise of secularism, and scientific-bureaucratic forms of social control all
contributed to Hitler's attempt during World War II to rid the world of Jews
Israel: "wrestler with God"; Jacob renamed by God
Kabbalah: Jewish mysticism, emerged in the late medieval period; defining work is
the Zohar, Book of Splendor
kosher: rules for dining
Marranos: in Spain in the late 1400s, 13,000 Jews, most of whom had been
forcibly baptized as Christians, were condemned as MarranosJews masquerading
as Christians while practicing their Judaism in secret
Mishnah: the writings that form the core of the Talmud, primarily written by
students of Hillel
Rabbinic: the Judaism of the dual Torah under the leadership of the rabbis
Sephardic Jews: the first wave of Jewish immigrants to the United States, starting
in 1654, were the Sephardic Jews, of Spanish or Portuguese extraction, seeking
religious freedom
Shema: Judaism's creed that states, "Hear O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is
one"
synagogue: house of study and prayer
Talmud: insights of the oral tradition written down, from second to fifth centuries,
initiated by the Pharisees; emergence of Rabbinic Judaism
Tanak: Jewish Bible that came into existence at end of first century; called the Old
Testament by Christians
temple: center of Jewish life until its destruction in 70 CE
Tzaddik: Hasidic term for a righteous man
Zionism: form of nationalism that returns Israel to Jews exclusively

Christianity (ch. 4)
The challenge of this chapter for students is twofold: to understand both the unity
and diversity among people who call themselves Christians, and to understand the
unique relation that exists between the history of Christianity, now the world's
largest religion, and the emergence of modernity.
Christians believe that there is one God who rules over history and is the maker of
all things. The highest goal of life is to act in harmony with the will of God. While
Judaism, Islam, and Christianity all believe in one God, a unique belief of Christians
is that the one God is three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Distinguishing
Christianity from Judaism and Islam again is the belief that God revealed himself
uniquely and fully only in the person of Jesus of Nazareth.
Life's problem is "sin," or the failure to live in harmony with the will of God.
Christianity defines sin and how to overcome it a little differently than Judaism and
Islam. For Christians, the good will of all humans is corrupted by Adam and Eve's
original sin of disobeying the will of God. The only way to overcome sin and death
and reestablish harmony with the will of God is through spiritually dying and rising
with Jesus Christ, whom God sent into the world for this very purpose.

Augustinianism: the view that the task of Christianity is to transform every
society into a Christian society composed of two branches: church and state
Catholic: one who believes that the way to know God is by faith and reason,
scripture and tradition, and guidance from papal authority
Christ: the anointed one, or messiah
Constantinianism: Constantine was the first monarch to legally permit
Christianity; he created a model in which the church is ruled by the state, through
the Christian emperor, as the form Christian civilization should take
deism: belief that God made a perfect machine when he made the world and it
runs on its own without further assistance from God; God does not actively guide or
influence events in the world
evangelical: form of pietist Christianity that emphasizes the centrality of the "born
again" experience of spiritual transformation rather than dogma as the key to
Christian authenticity and union among Christians in all their diversity
fundamentalist: rejects modernism and believes in inerrancy of the Bible
Gospel: stories of the life of Jesus found in the New Testament, traditionally
believed to be written by apostles and disciples of Jesus, but in fact written over
two to three generations, with each Gospel beginning from shared oral traditions
grace: the undeserved gift of God's acceptance of the sinner given through faith for
Protestants. For Catholics it is an undeserved gift that transforms the sinner and
enables the sinner to cooperate in God's work of spiritual renewal of the individual
heresy: a teaching that does not follow prescribed dogma
homoousios: from the Council of Nicaea, "same as," that is, the Word through
which all things were created was the same as God; Used to describe the one nature
shared by the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
justification by faith: Luther's teaching that knowledge of God can be obtained
only through faith and scripture, untouched by reason, became the central doctrine
of the Protestant Reformation
Kingdom of God: according to Christian canon, Jesus inaugurates the Kingdom of
God, which is completed at the Second Coming when all injustice is overcome and
suffering and death will be no more
original sin: the will to do good in all human beings was corrupted by Adam and
Eve when they disobeyed God's will
Pentecostal: form of Christianity that focuses on personal conversion and the
ecstatic experience of "speaking in tongues" as the signs of God's gift of grace in
the Spirit
Protestant: one who believes that the way to know God is through faith and study
of scripture, and no mediator such as the Catholic Church hierarchy is needed
Protestant ethic: a demand that one live simply and work hard, based on
teachings of John Calvin
sacraments: in Catholicism, seven sacraments are believed to be outward and
visible signs of God's inward, invisible grace; can only be administered by ordained
clergy. Protestantism reduced the number to two: baptism and communion
Second Coming: when Christ will return to raise the dead and judge the heavens
and earth
Son of God: to explain the uniqueness of Jesus, and after debate at the Council of
Nicaea in 325 and the Council of Chalcedon in 451, it was decided that in the one
person of Jesus there were two natures, divine and human, united yet distinct
syncretistic: some beliefs and practices of a religion are Christianized versions of
indigenous pre-Christian religious elements
Trinity: God is one God in three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; through the
trinity God is not all things (pantheism) but is in all things (panentheism)
two natures, one person: the Council of Chalcedon decided that in the person of
Jesus the two natures of divinity and humanity were united yet completely distinct

Islam (ch. 5)
Muslims today are found in fifty-seven predominantly Muslim countries extending
from North Africa to Southeast Asia, and Islam is the world's second largest
religion. While the vast majorityabout 80 percentof the world's 1.5 billion
Muslims live in Asian and African societies, Islam in recent years has become an
increasingly visible presence in the West.
Islam belongs to the family of monotheistic religions, along with Judaism and
Christianity. And while all three traditions trace their religious roots back to
Abraham, Judaism and Christianity claim descent from Abraham's son Isaac and
Islam through Abraham's son Ismail. The word "islam" means "to surrender" or "to
submit." A Muslim, therefore, is one who submits himself or herself to follow and
actualize God's will in history, both as an individual and as a member of the
transnational Muslim community (ummah), whose mission is to spread and
institutionalize an Islamic Order. Muslims believe God has given the earth as a trust
to humankind, and as God's representatives on earth, Muslims have a divine
mandate to spread God's rule on earth and create a socially just society.
The Quran is believed to be the fulfillment, correction, and completion of the earlier
revelations given to Moses and Jesus. Thus, rather than being the newest of the
three monotheistic faiths, Islam defines itself as being the oldest. Historically, Islam
has significantly formed and informed politics and civilization, hence the common
occurrence of Islamic empires and states.


Allah: Arabic word for God
caliph: a successor to Muhammad who served as political and military head of the
community
dar al-Islam: a vast land or region of Islam
dhimmi: one of three choices given to conquered non-Muslims was to become
"protected people," or dhimmi, by paying a special tax
fatwa: official legal opinions or interpretations of Islamic law
fiqh: literally, "understanding"; Muslim jurisprudence, or the human interpretation
of God's divinely revealed law, sharia
hadith: tradition, narrative stories about what Muhammad said and did that make
up the Sunnah
hajj: fifth pillar of Islam, the pilgrimage to Mecca that every Muslim who is
physically and financially able is expected to make at least once
hijab: the headscarf worn by many Muslim women
hijrah: Muhammad's emigration from Mecca to Medina in 622
hudud: Quranically prescribed crimes and punishments
ibadat: the division (one of two) of Islamic law that concerns a Muslim's duties to
God, consisting of obligatory practices
ijma: consensus about an issue from the majority of religious scholars who
represented religious authority
ijtihad: a reinterpretation of Islamic law to meet the needs of the modern world,
promoted by Islamic modernist reformers
imam: one who leads the prayer and is paid to look after the mosque, generally at
larger mosques
Islam: literally means "submission" or "surrender"
jihad: means to "struggle" or to "strive"; generally means the obligation of all
Muslims to fulfill God's will, as well as armed struggle to defend oneself,
community, or religion when under attack
khutba: sermon that is a special feature of Friday prayer
Mahdi: divinely guided one; an eschatological figure who Muslims believe will usher
in an era of justice and true belief just prior to the end of time
majlis al-shura: a consultative assembly of senior members to select leaders and
governments
masjid: literally means "place of prostration," another term for mosque
minbar: pulpit that the Friday sermon is preached from
mosque: or, masjid"place of prostration"
muamalat: the division (one of two) of Islamic law that concerns a Muslim's duties
to others, including regulations governing public life
muezzin: the chosen person who calls the faithful to prayer five times daily from
the mosque's minaret
mufti: an Islamic legal expert
mujaddid: literally, a "renewer" of Islam; may be a caliph, saint, teacher, scholar,
or another influential person; one who practices tajdid
Muslim: one who bears witness that "There is no God but the God and Muhammad
is the messenger of God"
People of the Book: Jews and Christians, as people who shared the same God as
Muslims, were automatically entitled to receive protective status (dhimmi) when
their territory was conquered by Muslims
qiyas: analogical reasoning, the third source of Islamic law
Quran: the Islamic book of scripture, as revealed to Muhammad over a period of
twenty-two years; considered to be the very word of God; the primary material
source of Islamic law
Ramadan: the ninth month of Islam's lunar calendar; the month-long fast is the
fourth pillar of Islam
salat: prayer or worship five times a day, the second pillar of Islam
shahadah: "to witness or declare"; first pillar of Islam, confession of faith, "There
is no God but the God and Muhammad is the messenger of God," allows one to
become a Muslim
sharia: Islamic law
shaykh: a teacher in the Sufi tradition, whose authority is based on direct personal
religious experience
Shiah: followers of Ali, fourth caliph and Muhammad's cousin and son-in-law; this
major branch of Islam was a minority from its beginning and operated from a
worldview based on suffering, oppression, and being victims of injustice; believes
that the imam or leader must be a direct descendant of Muhammad's family and is
a religiopolitical leader
shura: a traditional Islamic concept of consultation
Sufi: one who practices Islamic mysticism, a major religious movement within
Sunni and Shii Islam
Sufism: Islamic mysticism; began as a reform movement to counter a trend of the
Umayyad caliphs to live lavishly
Sunnah: the second source of Islamic law, the example of Muhammad, what he
said and did, who serves as a living model for Muslims to follow
Sunni: the majority branch of Islam, 85 percent today, believes that the caliph is
the selected or elected successor of Muhammad, not as prophet but as political and
military leader
surah: Muslim scripture consisting of 114 chapters (surahs) of 6,000 verses,
arranged by length, not chronology
tajdid: the Arabic word for "renewal"; in Islamic context, refers to the revival of
Islam in order to purify and reform society
tariqah: the interior path or way of Sufi mysticism
tawhid: the oneness or unity of God, monotheism
ulama: "learned ones," religious scholars
ummah: Muslim community
wali: Sufi saints, who are said to have had the power to bilocate, cure the sick,
multiply food, and read minds
zakat: almsgiving, the third pillar of Islam

Buddhism (ch. 7)
Buddhism is the oldest of the world's missionary religions and, from its founding,
has been extraordinarily accommodating of other religious beliefs and varying
community situations, even teaching that there are many different paths to reach
nirvana and there are multiple interpretations of the truth the Buddha revealed. Its
central institution has been the sangha, and a dynamic of exchange between the
sangha and society was largely responsible for the rise and spread of Buddhism.

Ambedkar: Dr. Bhimrao Ambedkar is the founder of a social reform movement in
Maharashtra, in which Mahar caste groups, relegated to the bottom of the caste
system, convert to Buddhism en masse, rejecting Hinduism and its
institutionalization of social inequality
anatman: "no-atman" or "nonself"; rejection of Hindu concept of atman, or an
essential, unchanging interior entity at the center of a person
arhat: an enlightened disciple of the Buddha
bhikkhuni: Buddhist nuns
Bodh Gaya: temple built at the site where the Buddha was enlightened under the
bodhi tree
Buddha: one who has "awakened," ended karmic bondage, and will not be reborn
Buddha-nature school: a Mahayana school that said if nirvana and samsara
cannot be separated, then nirvana must interpenetrate all reality; therefore, all
beings have a portion of nirvana and so possess the latent potential for its
realization
caitya: a stupa or any Buddhist shrine
dana: the first stage in punya, a merit-making donation, "dana" means "self-less
giving" to diminish desire
Dharma: the teachings of the Buddha
Eightfold Path: consists of eight ways of thinking and acting that can be
categorized as morality, meditation, and wisdom
"engaged Buddhism": a movement started by Thich Nhat Hanh that asserts that
when faced with the inevitable suffering in the world, Buddhists must take action
and engage their society
enlightenment: the elimination of ignorance, which completely clears the mind to
see reality as it truly is
Four Good Deeds: a doctrinal statement that provides guidance for how to live,
aimed at the laity
Four Noble Truths: a diagnosis of the human condition and a prescription for
liberation, which involves following the Eightfold Path
Gelug-pa: also known as the Yellow Hats, is the youngest of the Tibetan schools,
but the largest and the most important, and is headed by the Dalai Lama
Madhyamaka: deconstructive philosophically based school of thought founded by
Nagarjuna
Mahayana: name given to the Great Vehicle division when the sangha aligned
under two main divisions after the death of the Buddha
mantra: a short text or sound chain, known for its spiritual powers, and meant to
be chanted
nirvana: the final state of liberation
Pali Canon: the only complete version of the Buddha's teachings, recited and
corrected at the Fifth Buddhist Council in 1871
pap: "demerit"
prajna: insight or wisdomthe full development of prajna is essential to salvation
"Protestant Buddhism": modern reformation of Buddhist tradition begun in
colonial Ceylon
punya: the merit system for measuring spiritual advancement
Pure Land: a form of Mahayana Buddhism founded in India but spreading more
widely to China and then Japan; it promoted deferring enlightenment seeking from
the human state until rebirth in a heaven; must rely on "other power" of celestial
Buddhas to reach nirvana
sangha: Buddhist monastic community
shramana: a person who pursues ascetic practices in seeking enlightenment
stupa: relic mound shrines, eight of which contain ashes of the Buddha
Theravada: name given to the elder traditionalists, or Sthaviravadins, when the
sangha aligned under two main divisions after the death of the Buddha
Three Marks of Existence: suffering, impermanence, and nonself
Three Refuges: a recitation used to mark conversion to Buddhism, to affirm one's
devotion, or to start Buddhist rituals; the Buddha, the Dharma, and the sangha
Thunderbolt Vehicle: a branch of Mahayana Buddhism, also called tantra;
emphasized realizing salvation fast and in this lifetime
Zen: formed as Ch'an in China; reaching nirvana is an individual effort; stresses
meditation as the means