the expressions of “esoteric” and “esotericism” have a wide range of meanings, however, they specifically apply to religious, mystical, and philosophical secret schools. in ancient greek world, i.e. before the hellenistic era, we come across some currents with esoteric tendencies. the various texts from this period show that the ancient greeks sought the source of the esoteric currents outside ...

The article examines Cate Tiernan’s ‘Wicca’ series. This series and the ‘Circle of Three’ books by Isobel Bird explore the experiences of teenage girls who embrace the pagan religion, Wicca. The texts reflect the growing interest in spirituality expressed by many young people and extend the literary representation of witchcraft. Tiernan produces stories of spiritual growth entwined with fantasy...

The contemporary Qur’anic studies have been marked by amazing development. Various methods and approaches to understand the Qur’an are offered scholars. One of prominent figures in this field is Nashr Hamid Abu Zayd. Nasr Zayd (1943–2010 M) a highly controversial thinker. He an Egyptian scholar who accused being apostate, because his theory qur’anic hermeneutic (the textual Qur’an). This reflec...

Can a cultural memory and identity constructed around traumatic events in the historical past, interpreted as the result of pollution of the sacred center, give a group an evolutionary advantage under the right conditions? This article assesses this question by examining three different waves of religious entrepreneurship that drove the evolution of the ancient Israelite religion between the la...

BACKGROUND Circumcision can be performed for a variety of techniques, including conventional dissection surgery or a Plastibell device, and has religious, ritual, or medical roots. In countries like Iran, circumcision is done purely on religious grounds. In this study, we outline 390 cases in our practice and describe the epidemiology, indications, surgical technique used, and the early complic...

Revels in madness will be a useful reference tool for students and scholars, especially for those looking for more obscure figures, like the German Romantic psychiatrists J C Reil, J C A Heinroth, and K W Ideler, whom Thiher describes in detail since few medical libraries have their books. In his introduction, Thiher indicates his distance from Foucault's "brilliant, influential ... but misguid...

This book is organized according to the major periods of Japanese history – ancient (up to 794), Heian (794–1185), medieval (1185–1600), early modern or Edo (1600–1867), and modern (1868–present). Each part begins with a brief historical overview, followed by short essays on major genres, texts, and authors. A number of the traditional genres – such as waka (classical Japanese poetry), kanshi (...

Then the first-order derivative of f(cj(Θ0; y)) with respect to cj(Θ0; y) is: − 1 n ∑n i=1 1 νj0 φ( cj(Θ0;y)−Wij(Θ0) νj0 ) < 0. Thus it ensures uniqueness of the root of f(cj(Θ0; y)) = 0 in the entire domain of cj(y). Note that, ĉj(Θ0; y) satisfied (S.1), hence f(ĉj(Θ0; y)) = 0. On the other hand, f(cj0(y)) → 0 (given the uniform law of large numbers). By the standard inverse function theorem, ...