Doctor of Philosophy / Department of History / Marsha L. Frey / Donald J. Mrozek / Jesuits presented evidence in both French and Chinese to defend Christianity by citation of legal and historical precedents in favor of the "Teaching of the Lord of Heaven" (Catholicism) even after the Yongzheng Emperor's 1724 imperial edict proscribed the religion as a heterodox cult. The Jesuits' strategy is traceable to Matteo Ricci's early missionary approach of accommodation to Chinese culture, which aimed to prove grounds for a Confucian-Christian synthesis based upon complementary points between Christian theology and their interpretation of Yuanru (Original Literati Teaching). Their synthesis involved both written and oral rhetorical techniques that ranged from attempts to show compatibility between different religious values, to the manipulation of texts, and to outright deceit. Personal witness, observation, and interpretation played a key role in Jesuit group translation projects. French and Chinese apologetic texts composed to prove grounds for the repeal of the 1724 proscription edict contain these approaches. The Lettres edifantes et curieuses ecrite par des missionnaires jesuites (1702-1776) contain examples of this approach, as well as the Ruijianlu (1735-1737). Memorials in the Ruijianlu cited favorable legal precedents and imperial patronage rendered to Xiyangren (Men from the West). Jesuits presented their case for toleration of Christianity in the Ruijianlu in terms of Chinese notions of hospitality, diplomacy, and defense found in texts from as early as the Zhou dynasty. They cited an enduring Chinese defensive notion of "welcoming men from afar" (rouyuanren), but the court refused to return to this soft policy. The Qianlong Emperor rejected the Kangxi era policy of "welcoming men from afar" regarding established missions. In 1735 the imperial Board of Punishments re-enforced the proscription order against Christianity in military units and also ruled that baptism of abandoned infants by a Chinese convert constituted religious heterodoxy based on the Qing Code (Article 162). The twenty-one Jesuits (not expelled in 1724) remained in imperial service and at liberty to practice their religion among themselves. Officials pursued a severe policy of punishing any cult deemed heterodox according to statutes of the Code. Persecution of Christians increased throughout the eighteenth century, but abated during the reign of the Daoguang Emperor (1821-1851) when most anti-Christian edicts were rescinded and a subsequent imperial edict pardoned those Christians who practiced the faith for moral perfection.

The main theme is the differences in response among the churches to the Shinto Shrine Issue in Korea under Japanese colonialism. The central focus is an inquiry into the possible reasons why some religious groups, including the Catholic and Methodist Churches, should choose the way of compromise, while others, such as the Presbyterian Church, represented by individual missionaries and the Non-Shrine Worship Movement and the Mount Zion Sect, chose the way of radical challenge and withdrawal. It is proposed in this study to concentrate on three major churches - the Roman Catholic, the Methodist and the Presbyterian.This study offers, firstly, a detailed analysis of the content of the debate, the attitudes and actions of the three churches towards the shrine problem in their historical evolution since 1931; secondly, an attempt is made to explain the different positions of the three churches in terms of the sociology of religion and the sociology of missions. The sociological consequences of religious experience provide a general framework. The main assumption is that the difference in ideological elements is more important in religious institutions than has been usually thought. In explaining the differences of position in the three churches, the following eight factors are proposed: (1) Theological emphasis; (2) Church structure; (3) World view; (4) Mission policy; (5) Relationship to nationalism; (6) Relationship to non-Christian religions; (7) Early historical experience; and (8) Nationalities of missionaries.The thesis is divided into two parts: (1) Part I (Chapters One to Three) reviews the theoretical and methodological literature relevant to the study of the Shinto Shrine Issue. It also surveys the introduction of the two principal forms of Christianity (Roman Catholicism and Protestantism) in Korea, and examines modern Japan, State Shinto and Christianity.(2) Part II (Chapters Four and Five) comprises a detailed analysis of the positions of the three Christian churches towards the shrine problem, and a systematic comparison of the different responses of the three churches by employing the above-mentioned eight factors.Three key factors are proposed in respect of the denominational division in the matter of the Shinto shrine question: theological emphasis, mission policy and church structure. Attention is also drawn to the historical discontinuity in motivation between the Non-Shrine Worship Movement by the fundamentalists and the recent political struggle for justice by the liberals. The legacy of the ordeal of the Shinto shrine controversy in the 1930s remains as an obstacle to the reconciliation between ultra-conservative theology and liberal 'minjung' theology. It is therefore demonstrated in this thesis that the particular form of religious outlook is a relevant factor in its own right, which is not to be reduced to other variables. Thus for the purpose of this study, the tools of Weber seem to prove more effective than do those of Marx.

This research is an attempt to clarify the confusion and controversy concerning the content and meaning of Islamic economics. The objective of this dissertation is two fold. The primary objective is to attain a definition for the term "Islamic economic system" based on a thorough investigation of the origin and the evolution of Islamic economic thought. The second objective is to examine the extent to which early Islamic economic thought or its ideological concepts compares to the medieval economic thought of the West. / In order to identify what might be termed an "Islamic economy," this dissertation uses a Schumpeterian approach--that in order to understand the present, one needs to know the past. Apart from the importance of the Schumpeterian approach in economic analysis, the argument for pursuing the primary objective of this research is to recognize a neglected area in the field of economic thought. / The dissertation reveals a basic continuity of ideas on various economic subjects by Islamic scholars during the ascendancy of Islamic civilization. This provides the basis necessary to refute the thesis propounded by Meyer that the "Arabic, Turkish and Persian speaking East has experienced no continuity of economic ideas such as those which come from the Judeo-Christian West." The study further points to a certain unity of economic thought between the medieval West and the Muslim East. Both systems were primarily concerned with the quality of life, which in turn depended on the moral and ethical character of the individual. Both also traced their origins to Greek philosophy, in particular Neo-Platonism. / The study concludes with a discussion of the reasons for the divergence in economic growth observed in the Islamic East as compared to the Christian West in the period after the Renaissance. These reasons include a number of factors relating to socioeconomic and political institutions in the East, but do not arise from restrictions imposed by Islamic religious ideology. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 52-10, Section: A, page: 3666. / Major Professor: Philip Sorensen. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1991.

Traditional anthropological analyses of myth do not account adequately for historical processes of cultural syncretism and antisyncretism. This dissertation is an examination of a collection of myth texts written in Yucatec Maya during the Colonial period (c.1540 A.D.--1820 A.D.), particularly those present on pages forty-two through sixty-three of the Book of Chilam Balam of Chumayel. The research consists of a comparative examination of multiple redactions of individual myths, as well as analyses of the instances of reported speech and markers of evidentiality that occur in these myths. In contrast with traditional approaches, the methodology is grounded in a dialogical theory of language and culture. The application of such a methodology reveals the interconnectedness of indigenous responses to religious and linguistic (anti)syncretism with processes of identity formation in colonial Yucatan. New translations of these Maya myth texts in the Book of Chilam Balam are provided that take into account both the Prehispanic and European written and oral sources to which these myths were composed in rejoinder / acase@tulane.edu

This study concerns a network of progressive dissidents among Southern Baptists in the twentieth century. It explores their activities, understandings, and methods of relating to one another and to the broader southern and Baptist cultures of which they were a part 'A Genealogy of Dissent' developed along several pathways of influence, unfolding along the lines of a family tree, beginning with a remarkable, and today virtually unknown, figure named Walter Nathan Johnson. A pioneer racial integrationist who also challenged the corporate 'captivity' of Christianity in the United States, Johnson created a network of supporters and sympathizers from the 1920s through the '40s out of which came civil rights workers, labor organizers, advocates of women's rights--including ordination to the ministry--and proponents of disarmament and abolition of capital punishment, all within the ordinarily conservative group of Christian believers known as Southern Baptists Within this network arose a culture of protest against the usual southern and Baptist ways of behavior, and to a certain extent ways of belief, especially having to do with questions regarding the nature of a just society. While in many ways the people in this family of dissidents believed themselves to have been alienated from their traditions as southerners and as Baptists, for the most part they believed their protests to be a fulfillment, not a rejection, of the basic tenets of their beliefs as Southern Baptists For the most part, these dissidents avoided the usual pathways of institutional advancement in denominational life in the United States, preferring to place their efforts to influence life in the South on the individual and congregational level and in issue-oriented coalitions within and outside the ranks of Southern Baptists. Their most dramatic effects on the Southern Baptist denomination at large were inadvertent, serving to validate the cries of outrage over supposed liberalism in the Southern Baptist Convention raised by a resurgent fundamentalist party that mounted a successful takeover effort of the convention in the late 1970s and '80s / acase@tulane.edu

This historical analysis investigates the contributions of John Wesley's doctrine of entire sanctification, with its attendant emphasis on Christian perfection, to the value base of American professional social work. Major questions asked were: how catalytic was this doctrine in the drive for nineteenth-century social reform, especially in reforms headed by women; how specifically did it influence the founding and direction of early social work; what happened to these Wesleyan values as social reform moved from a spiritually-grounded movement into a secularized one; and what lessons are embedded in that history for current practice? Findings confirmed Wesleyan perfectionism's significant impact on social work's ethical foundation through America's Puritan-Enlightenment-Wesleyan synthesis; through the Benevolent Empire it spawned; and through the activities of its female adherents, notably the Methodist Diaconate. Tensions between these Wesleyan ideals and the positivistic utilitarian values that displaced them in social work's drive for professionalization remain today / acase@tulane.edu

One of the most controversial actions undertaken by the Catholic Church in the conversion of the Indians of the New World was the destruction of their pre-Hispanic religion through the extirpation of their objects of worship: clay, wooden and stone idols. In the case of Yucatan, the focus area for this study, the Institution that oversaw the arrest and punishment of the Yucatec Maya for idolatry was not the Holy Office of the Inquisition, but rather the little known and less studied institution of the episcopal court called the provisorato de indios. This dissertation examines the little known institution, its procedures and ministers and their impact on colonial Maya religion Using new sources of primary documentation the dissertation suggests a new trend in the conflict between the Catholic Church and the Maya in colonial Yucatan: specifically an increase in the intensity and an institutionalization of the extirpation of idolatry. The dissertation titled 'The Indian Inquisition and the Extirpation of Idolatry: The Process of Punishment in the Ecclesiastical Courts of the Provisorato de Indios in Yucatan, 1563--1821' analyzes the role played by this episcopal court in the 'spiritual conquest' of the Maya by examining its significance in two parts The first part examines the origin and procedures of the colonial episcopal court [Chapters 1--6]. A second part [Chapters 7--10] examines the impact that this institution had on local Maya religion and its central role in inter-ethnic conflict. This case study for colonial Yucatan offers a new approach to the study of colonial Indigenous religion and Spanish/Indian inter-ethnic relations in the New World. The importance of the public administration of ecclesiastical punishment as a form of didactic missionary theatre is emphasized. The dissertation's conclusions suggest that the punishment inherent in the extirpation of idolatry served as the Yucatec Maya's main means of contact with Christianity. In the face of the repressive measures of the ecclesiastical courts the colonial Maya chose either to resist or to engage in flight. This dissertation concludes that both of these options, previously discovered and studied by various authors, were the outcome of their interaction with the processes and ministers of this ecclesiastical court / acase@tulane.edu

As the XIXth Century began its last decade, several Spanish novelists of the 'Generacion del 68', displeased with the technical and ideological limitations imposed by the experimental method advocated by naturalism, introduced new ways of exploring human reality in its totality. While they still borrowed many of the techniques introduced by naturalism, these novelists searched for new ways to express those individual and social realities which lay beyond the realm of the senses and of deduction (reason). Influenced also by the growing spiritualism, characteristic of the fin de siecle mentality, these authors explored and interpreted in their novels the religious sentiment of their society. In particular they examined the question of faith, its interpretation and its concrete effects on the life of society This study examines eleven novels of Palacio Valdes, Pardo Bazan, Luis Coloma, Leopoldo Alas and Perez Galdos which, from 1890 to 1899, deal with faith and unbelief, either as the basic conflict, or as the ideology which permeates it. After an overview on faith in general, faith in the Judaeo-Christian tradition, its development in the Church and its philosophical and theological interpretations in the XIXth century, each of the novels is first presented and then its particular interpretation is compared to the theology and official pronouncements of the Catholic Church, from Vatican I and Pope Leo XIII The study illustrates that these Spanish novelists, genuinely preoccupied with the state of society, presented their views on faith according to their own orthodox and/or heterodox convictions. Each denounced abuses and suggested ways in which religious and non-religious faith can be an asset in the restoration of society's traditional values. Each offered a new vision to society at the threshold of the XXth Century / acase@tulane.edu

This is a study of heterodox ideas and behaviors, and of the society in which they were engendered Alumbrado is the name given to certain heretical groups of mystics who first appeared in sixteenth century Spain. These people generally believed that mental prayer was superior to vocal prayer; that external religious forms and practices, ie. rosaries, scapulars, images, fasting etc., were of no avail; that in quietistic prayer the soul could be taken over by God; and that in such a state one could become perfect and incapable of sin. Certain alumbrados, convinced that God acted within them, were notorious among their contemporaries for sins of the flesh. Carnal relationships were said to be the innocent sharing of divine love The geographical focus of this study will be New Spain, an area roughly coterminus with contemporary Mexico. Though attention will be given to old world origins, the focus of this study will be on Alumbrados in a colonial setting. The study is intended as a presentation and an explanation of Alumbrado beliefs and of their transformation over time. It will explore the influence of class, ethnicity, age, gender and occupation in the formation of these heterodox groups. It will look at the influence of key individuals, such as Gregorio Lopez, who was seen as a model for Alumbrado belief and praxis in New Spain Within the context of ecclesiastical history, this study will clarify the roles of religious and secular clergy, nuns, beatas and lay persons in the Alumbrado movement. It will also help to clarify real and perceived distinctions between these heterodox groups, Jews and Protestants. The place of the Alumbrados in the larger history of spirituality, mysticism, heresy, and esoteric societies will be duly noted. By viewing the relatively frequent violations of sexual norms by Alumbrados, this study will present a portrait of prevalent, mores in the colony, Finally, attention will be given to the political implications inherent in the Alumbrados' rejection of orthodoxy This study will, albeit indirectly, supplement and amplify the work already done in the field of Inquisition Studies and in the comparative studies of Humanist and Counter Reformation ideologies / acase@tulane.edu

Franciscan friars undertook the initial evangelization efforts in the city of Queretaro and were entrusted with the administration of parishes in conjunction with their monastery. Voluntary associations of laity, or cofradias, were established by the friars beginning in the late sixteenth century. The documentary evidence left by cofradias and lay Third Orders is used to examine the social and religious constructs of the Spanish, black, and native Mexican and Otomi populations Beginning in the last decades of the seventeenth century, these cofradias became a convenient means through which the secular clergy and other religious orders gained control over the administration of the laity, previously the exclusive domain of the Franciscans. By the middle of the eighteenth century, the strength of the secular clergy throughout New Spain was such that numerous parishes were 'secularized', or removed from the control of the friars and turned over to the secular clergy One of the most prominent features of the new secular parishes was the creation of the 'modern' cofradia, one which would standardize saint cults and eliminate what was perceived by church hierarchy as mere superstition. As a result of secularization in Queretaro in 1758, the laity was expected to shift cult devotion and financial support to the secular priests. In reality, however, cofradias at these new secular parishes were devoid of zeal and enthusiasm. Loyalties very clearly remained with the friars. New cofradias affiliated with Franciscans were formed to provide generous funds for works of mercy and for primary education In addition, a cult to the Virgin Mary, that of Nuestra Senora de Pueblito, became the single most important focus of religious devotion for all ethnic groups at the close of the colonial era. This cult embodied many aspects of Franciscan spirituality absent from the secular parishes and thus confirmed the survival of a Franciscan social and religious ethos at the close of the colonial period. Cofradia and Third Order documents, then, record the dynamic between the secular and the regular clergy and its effect on the history of the laity / acase@tulane.edu