Includes bibliographical references. / Nineteen eighty-five was the year in which the first halal-certified non-meat product appeared in South African stores. The certifying authority was the Muslim Judicial Council of Cape Town and the product was Flora-margarine. The certification of a non-meat product signaled a major shift in halal in South Africa. It represented the development of a halal consciousness that extended beyond the realm of purely meat products and into the unseen, intangible, expert-controlled world of food technology. Other developments also contributed to the growing halal industry in South Africa. The end of apartheid resulted in freedom of movement for the previously disadvantaged Muslim community. The newfound freedom resulted in increased demand for halal consumption in places previously restricted or considered unwelcoming. Changes in lifestyle resulted in an increase in dual income households and overall standards of living amongst middle class Muslims. These changes contributed to an increase in demand for packaged food, dining out and the cost effective, one-stop shopping that mass retailers offered. Muslims began to spend more time on vacation, at shopping malls and at restaurants. This change in consumption behavior resulted in a demand for halal products. This demand precipitated into requests for

The 21st century has brought new concerns to the fore within South Africa's democracy. Sexuality and the freedom to express one's sexual identity are currently at the forefront of academic writing and investigation in the social sciences in Africa. In following this interdisciplinary line of research, this thesis explores some of the ways that religious ideologies influence women's agency in relation to their sexuality and identity. In particular, I examine how dominant religious and cultural norms framed by patriarchal and heteronormative ideals are negotiated by black lesbian Zulu women. My research is focused on the lives of two Zulu women, lesbian activist photographer Zanele Muholi and lesbian sangoma Nkunzi Zandile Nkabinde, who inhabit very different social realities from one another. Both these women are redefining the paths of women's sexuality in their specific contexts, while taking somewhat different approaches to this task. I argue that religion has a very powerful impact on the way that these women approach their sexuality and sexual choices, whether directly or indirectly, with a hybridity of Zulu tradition and Christianity influencing their lives in various ways. Muholi and Nkabinde are directly affected by religious ideologies through the way that they have to reconcile their sexuality with their religion and culture; and indirectly through the way that certain heteronormative religious ideologies have influenced the political and social structures within South Africa. Religious ideologies that divide humanity into the essentialist complimentary categories of masculine and feminine pose a problem for people who straddle both these spheres. By not fitting neatly into any of these categories, black lesbians are often viewed or depicted as not fitting into the social structure, particularly within and around urban townships, giving reason for their oppression and marginalisation.

Bibliography: p. 171-181. / This study is done from the periphery and designs a socio-literary model for the socio-political interpretation of the seven prophetic messages in the Apocalypse of St. John. The main function of the model is to highlight the author of Revelation's socio-political position in relation to the groups in society and the church, as well as John's socio-political aims. The secondary functions are to accentuate the groups involved within Revelation's context, their social characteristics, as well as their socio-political position in relation to one another and John's position towards them. The model attempts to show how John involves religion in the political arena as a means to influence his readers' construction of social reality. It further aims to contribute in our search into the socio-historical context and social function of Revelation. The design of the model is an endeavor to participate in the methodological debate regarding future research on Revelation. The model designed is the product of a synthesis of various socio-literary models. This study's contribution to the synthesis model is four fold. Firstly, the synthesis model is made applicable to the Apocalypse of John. Secondly, it adds to the synthesis model a primary rhetorical dimension and argues that Revelation is a piece of primary rhetoric. In primary rhetoric the rhetoric determines the literary techniques and constructions employed by the author of a text. On the basis of the work done by Collins (1979:104), this model attempts to specify the literary function of Revelation in more detail than was done before. Thirdly, this model builds on the work of Carney (1975:xvii,309)) and Elliott (1986:18f), and emphasizes the advantages of using the broadest possible socio-historical background. Fourthly, it strives to provide a scientific paradigm for studying the text from the perspective of the oppressed.

Bibliography: leaves 236-249. / This thesis is a study of the nature, construction, and operation of human world view systems. Using a comparative dialogue with Mahatma Gandhi, Leo Tolstoy, and Religious Studies I aim to develop a definition of world view that explores the pivotal world view universals of identity, orientation and belonging and how these combine and interact in world view systems. I also explore various possibilities of how a sense of identity arises within human awareness and how this in turn structures individuals' understanding of their vocations and modes of active engagement with the world. I hypothesise that this process of identity and world view formation occurs in two paradigmatically different ways which structure the totality of individuals thinking, feeling and acting in the world, whether they are psychologically integrated, and whether their socio-political interactions tend toward violence or nonviolence. Using the theoretical resources of the comparative study of mysticism and religious experience, I set out to define the precise analytical contours of my two paradigms of human awareness and world view. It is in fact the study of mysticism that enables one to more clearly understand what is simultaneously the most crucial and yet neglected facet of human psychology and existence - love. I therefore not only attempt to analyse the construction and operation of world view universals in Gandhi's world view, but also to reinterpret the pivotal Gandhian notions of unity, love, truth and nonviolence as they converge in a personal inner experience of faith. Theoretical resources which I develop, applied to case studies of Gandhi and Tolstoy, are combined to enable general reflections about the nature of conceptual functioning by means of conceptual models or maps, as well as the existential basis of personal empowerment in contexts of violence and death. This thesis confirms the importance of securing a sense of identity, orientation, and belonging - the tension between part and whole - in any world view system, but lays greater stress on the crucial psychological and existential need to overcome a sense of separation, which is a pivotal factor in distinguishing two broad possibilities of human awareness and action as well as two paradigms of world view. The possibility of overcoming the sense of separateness, I suggest, is perhaps the central existential factor determining whether human social interactions are basically violent or nonviolent. It is within the basically nonviolent paradigm of world view, identity and action that one can locate and so better understand Gandhi's religious world view at both its individual and corporate levels.

Bibliography: pages 157-161. / Many New Testament scholars have recently come to understand aspects of Christology in terms of the rabbinic legal concept of agency. Whereas Rengstorf attempted to understand apostleship in terms of the rabbinic agency concept (1964, first published 1933), works such as those of Borgen (1983, first published 1968), and Buehner (1977) attempt to explain the Johannine Jesus in such terms, following on Eduard "Zum religionsgeschichtlichen Hintergrund der "Sendungsformel" Gal .4:4f; Roem.8:3f; John 3:16f; I John 4:9", published in the Zeitschrift fuer die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft in 1966. The aim of this dissertation is to locate the roots of the concept of Divine Agency at the heart of the Hebrew tradition, rather than in later rabbinic abstractions, and to examine the development of the tradition from ancient times to the period contemporary with Jesus of Nazareth. Two figures, in works reflecting some of the diversity of Intertestamental Judaism and dating from the first decade of the Christian Church, have been selected for assessment as Divine Agents. These are the "Son of Man" in the Similitudes of Enoch and the "Logos" in the writings of Philo of Alexandria. While the rabbinic and other legal abstractions are not a valid ideal model for understanding Divine Agency, they are nevertheless useful in that they articulate concepts more concisely than is the case elsewhere. A brief treatment of the legal material is therefore included. This is followed by a survey of the development of the Hebrew religious tradition, with particular attention to the concept of the Divine Council assembled round the Throne of God. It is in the context of this tradition that messianic and other ideal figures emerged, and therefore in this context that the origins of the Divine Agency Concept are sought. The Agency idea is found to be well-attested in the Hebrew tradition, particularly during the post-Exilic period.

Bibliography: leaves 116-123. / The twentieth century has marked a huge interest in the renewal of Christian worship. It was essentially sparked off by the Liturgical Movement early in the twentieth century. The second Vatican Council also devoted much time and effort to discussions on the renewal of worship. The changing times parallel to the often stereotypical and stagnant worship forms have generated an exodus of many young people out of many church denominations, but particularly in the Reformed tradition.

Bibliography: leaves 104-111. / This research focuses on the role of Ancient Egypt during antiquity. It attempts to demonstrate a rereading of Egypt through the lens of an African, in relation to the views held by traditional scholarship. It also provides its readers with an alternative way of looking at how Egypt and the Near Eastern countries influenced each other. Secondly, this research provides evidence, which suggests that the founders of ancient Egyptian civilization relates closer to their African heritage than their Asian, or even its European neighbours. This research also provides evidence, which suggest that most world-renowned Greek scholars studied under the feet of the Egyptian priest-scholars. The role of the 'Wisdon of the Egyptians' is discussed in comparison to other forms of wisdom, including Greek philosophy. Thirdly, this research provides us with new tools with which we can interpret sacred literature through the lens of an African. These tools play a significant role in the development of an African approach. Throughout this research, African scholars are searching for an African discourse, which aims at providing an alternative approach to the Western or European discourse. This perspective is vey helpful in redefining the role of ancient Egypt throughout the ancient world.

Bibliography: leaves 70-76. / Through a literature study into the historic-philosophical roots of what John de Gruchy calls the privatisation of piety, the origins of this privatised faith to Enlightenment thinking and the individualism and secularism that came along with it are traced. Indications are found that, especially during the later phases of apartheid, the value-free mentality that accompanies modernism the breeding ground for a status quo religion. What Willie Jonker calls the Second Enlightenment, along with the influence of the Second World War, were further precipitated in the information of apartheid policy.

Since 1996, Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) has waged a campaign of terror in Uganda and neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), which has resulted in a number of fatalities and continues to threaten the security of the region. From its inception, the objective of the ADF has been to overthrow the Ugandan government and establish an Islamic state governed by a Salafi interpretation of Islam. This study seeks to document the history of the ADF and to locate its position within contemporary Salafi debates. It does so by answering the following questions: (1) what do we know about the ADF? (2) How did the ADF emerge in Uganda? (3) Is the ADF Jihadi-Salafi movement or local political movement in disguise? This study utilises interviews, as well as archival and ethnographic approaches to research. Findings suggest that the ADF is a Jihadi-Salafi militant movement, which was originally established under the name Salafi Jihad Council (SaJiCo). However, the initial failure to stand alone and the Busitema defeat forced them to join other non-Muslim rebel groups to form the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF). In addition, this study confirmed that, persuasive rhetoric of ADF leader, Jamilu Mukulu in addition to a long history of economic, social and political marginalisation of Muslims in Uganda by colonial and post-colonial governments, played a significant role in the creation and recruitment strategies for the Movement.

This study explores South African Muslim women's experiences of motherhood; particularly the ways in which Muslim women themselves construct and enact their maternal roles in relation to their social realities and faith tradition. Using an Islamic feminist analytical framework, I employed the concepts of experience as an epistemological site, the particularity of mothering experiences, and gender scripts within Islamic perspectives to render visible the layered and nuanced realities of Muslim mothers which reflect their lived experiences. The study found that the participants experienced tension between the discursive idealisation of motherhood in the Islamic tradition and the challenges of their lived experiences as mothers, in that the former creates unattainable and at times disempowering expectations on mothers based on dominant constructions of gender norms and femininity. This finding corroborates and is reflective of the main themes in feminist literature on Motherhood in Islam. However, the study also found that participants actively engaged in mothering/parenting around themes less widely reflected in the above literature. These included the intricacies and complexities of mothering Muslim children within a context of contemporary social norms, such as digital technology consumption and sexual diversity. This finding highlights a chasm which exists between Islamic traditional constructions of motherhood and contemporary challenges to Muslim family life. The study shows that in response to these challenges, these South African Muslim mothers are generating innovative, creative responses to fulfilling their mothering roles and determining their maternal subjective values whilst doing so. The study concludes that there is a dire need for the inclusion of Muslim women's participation in developing knowledge that will support Muslim mothers in navigating the highly challenging terrain of raising Muslim children.