Jewish Millenarianism: A Comparison of Medieval Communities

1980 ◽  
Vol 22 (3) ◽  
pp. 394-415 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen Sharot

Sociologists and anthropologists who have studied millennial movements in a comparative perspective have almost completely ignored the movements among Jews in the Diaspora. Historians have studied particular Jewish messianic outbursts and have also provided general surveys of Jewish millennial expectations and ‘false’ messiahs, but none have offered a systematic analysis of possible social causes and few have made any comparison with non-Jewish millennial movements. Gershom Scholem, the author of Sabbatai Sevi, by far the most outstanding work on Jewish messianism, puts the weight of explanation on the immanent development of ideas in Judaism and tends to discountenance possible social causes.

2013 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 137-150
Author(s):  
Fabio Massimo Parenti

The complexity of China's state-society relations is often underestimated, or completely neglected, by Western commentators, journalists, politicians and, at times, academics. There especially seems to be a lack of theoretical ideas and systematic analysis in geographical studies. The overall outcome of said underestimation is the proliferation of misinterpretations on the meaning-sense of evolving relational configurations between power, people and places in China. Hence the Western ability (institutions and common people) to understand and judge, as objectively as possible, ongoing socio-economic and political trends in China, its hybrid experimental path and general development trajectory, is concretely invalidated. Starting from this standpoint and drawing from different sources, this paper first suggests that the changing characteristics of the current Chinese multi-scalar politico-socio-economic processes cannot be simply reduced to “capitalism.” Secondly, to get a better understanding of China in a comparative perspective — by analyzing the country's direction of development and governance — I summarize some instructive traits of state-society relations, arguing that the nature and significance of these differ, when they are not quite the reverse, from the prevailing (mis) interpretations by Western agents. I specifically refer to the need to (re)interpret two points from a comparative standpoint: a) the state's popular legitimacy and socio-economic dynamism, and b) the variegated modes of conflict resolution and financial governance.


Author(s):  
F.J. Sjostrand

In the 1940's and 1950's electron microscopy conferences were attended with everybody interested in learning about the latest technical developments for one very obvious reason. There was the electron microscope with its outstanding performance but nobody could make very much use of it because we were lacking proper techniques to prepare biological specimens. The development of the thin sectioning technique with its perfectioning in 1952 changed the situation and systematic analysis of the structure of cells could now be pursued. Since then electron microscopists have in general become satisfied with the level of resolution at which cellular structures can be analyzed when applying this technique. There has been little interest in trying to push the limit of resolution closer to that determined by the resolving power of the electron microscope.


2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (2) ◽  
pp. 23-38
Author(s):  
Daniel Hummel

A small but growing area of public administration scholarship appreciates the influence of religious values on various aspects of government. This appreciation parallels a growing interest in comparative public administration and indigenized forms of government which recognizes the role of culture in different approaches to government. This article is at the crossroads of these two trends while also considering a very salient region, the Islamic world. The Islamic world is uniquely religious, which makes this discussion even more relevant, as the nations that represent them strive towards legitimacy and stability. The history and core values of Islam need to be considered as they pertain to systems of government that are widely accepted by the people. In essence, this is being done in many countries across the Islamic world, providing fertile grounds for public administration research from a comparative perspective. This paper explores these possibilities for future research on this topic.


2015 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 33-48 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mathews Mathew ◽  
Debbie Soon

Debates in Singapore about immigration and naturalisation policy have escalated substantially since 2008 when the government allowed an unprecedentedly large number of immigrants into the country. This essay will discuss immigration and naturalisation policy in Singapore and the tensions that have been evoked, and how these policies are a key tool in regulating the optimal composition and size of the population for the state’s imperatives. It will demonstrate that although the state has, as part of its broader economic and manpower planning policy to import labour for economic objectives, it seeks to retain only skilled labour with an exclusive form of citizenship.  Even as the Singapore state has made its form of citizenship even more exclusive by reducing the benefits that non-citizens receive, its programmes for naturalising those who make the cut to become citizens which include the recently created Singapore Citizenship Journey (SCJ) is by no means burdensome from a comparative perspective. This paper examines policy discourse and the key symbols and narratives provided at naturalisation events and demonstrates how these are used to evoke the sense of the ideal citizen among new Singaporeans. 


The topic of Legitimate and Illegitimate Violence in Islamic Thought (LIVIT) calls for an interdisciplinary, comparative and historical approach. This has been the underlying methodological assumption within the project which bore this name. Amongst the products of that three-year project is a series of collected studies by established and emerging scholars in the field, examining how Muslim thinkers have conceptualised violence and categorised (morally and legally) acts of violence. In this opening chapter, István Kristó-Nagy first explores how violence in Islamic thought can be set against a wider consideration of violence in human history. It is this comparative perspective which contextualises not only this volume, but also the two subsequent volumes in the LIVIT series. In the second half of this chapter, Robert Gleave explains how this volume is structured, addressing the different approaches used by the contributors, and examines the different ways in which violence can be categorised.


Asian Survey ◽  
1987 ◽  
Vol 27 (5) ◽  
pp. 535-551
Author(s):  
George J. Viksnins ◽  
Michael T. Skully

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