Blackwell Reference Online

Extract

This New Dictionary of Religions has grown out of the Penguin Dictionary of Religions , first published in 1984. It has, however, undergone such substantial change and expansion that it is properly called A New Dictionary. The original list of twenty-nine contributors has grown to sixty-five (from twelve countries around the globe). Completely new sections have been added, notably on Afro-Caribbean religious movements, modern North American developments, traditional religions in Latin America and Japanese New Religious Movements. An important additional theme is religions in migration (e.g. Hinduism in the Caribbean, in Africa, Britain and America, Islam in Europe, America and elsewhere, and various Sikh groups) and entries on groups found mainly in their respective diaspora such as Deobandi, Barelvi. Some major subjects have undergone large-scale change (especially Hinduism, Buddhism, and Eastern and early Christianity), others have been completely rewritten (Study of Religion, Jains, New Religious Movements in the West, Gnostics, Manichaeans, Mandaeans). Entirely new subjects have been introduced (Ahl-i Haqq, Implicit Religion, Yezidism, Zoroastrian Pseudepigrapha). Most entries have been updated in content and bibliography in order to take account of recent advances in scholarship and modern developments within the religions (for example in the New Religious Movements). ... log in or subscribe to read full text