Religious rivalry and persecution have bedeviled so many societies that confessional difference often seems an unavoidable source of conflict. Sacred Boundaries challenges this assumption by examining relations between the Catholic majority and Protestant minority in seventeenth-century France as a case study of two religious groups constructing confessional difference and coexistence

In this thought-provoking interdisciplinary work, Shaun Marmon describes how eunuchs, as a category of people who embodied ambiguity, both defined and mediated critical thresholds of moral and physical space in the household, in the palace and in the tomb of pre-modern Islamic society. The author's central focus is on the sacred society of eunuchs who guarded the tomb of the Prophet Muhammad in Medina for over six centuries and whose last representatives still perform many of their time honored rituals to this day. Through Marmon's account, the "sacred" eunuchs of Medina become historical guides into uncharted dimensions of Islamic ritual, political symbolism, social order, gender and time.

This volume brings together a series of innovative studies on Roman, Byzantine, and Islamic Palestine, Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls, and ancient synagogues in honor of renowned archaeologist Jodi Magness.

Making use of techniques from literary analysis, social history and anthropology, she brings together a wide array of sources ranging from literary works, historical chronicles, biographies, pilgrimage diaries, travelers' accounts, and previously unexamined archival material.

Lying on the border between eastern and western Christendom, Orthodox Karelia preserved its unique religious culture into the 19th and 20th centuries, when it was described and recorded by Finnish and Karelian folklore collectors. This colorful array of ritulas and beliefs involving nature spirits, saints, the dead, and pilgrimage to monasteries represented a unigue fusion of official Church ritual and doctrine and pre-Christian ethnic folk belief. This book undertakes a fascinating exploration into many aspects of Orthodox Karelian ritual life: beliefs in supernatural forces, folk models of illness, body concepts, divination, holy icons, the role of the ritual specialist and healer, the divide between nature and culture, images of forest, the cult of the dead, and the popular image of monasteries and holy hermits. It will appeal to anyone interested in popular religion, the cognitive study of religion, ritual studies, medical anthropology, and the folk traditions and symbolism of the Balto-Finnic peoples.

In this 2005 book, leading historians examine sanctity and sacred space in Europe during and after the religious upheavals of the early modern period.

Simple Soulful Sacred is a guidebook for the modern woman who seeks clarity and guidance on how to live the life of her dreams, on her own terms. It's for the women of our time-the mothers, teachers, healers, light workers, dreamers, creators, leaders-who are ready to find their voice, speak their truth and own their power, whilst living life with less hustle and more flow. For modern women wanting more for their lives, it's the now age definition of having it all. Women are rising; ready to step out of the cloak of masculine traits that keep them striving for a version of success that is not their own. Ready to stop hiding their light and playing the comparison game. And ready to fully embody their feminine power. Because while the feminine may have been disowned and devalued for centuries, we are so done with that story now. But it's still a paradox. Because within this very rising, women are longing to step out of the noise and chaos, to live more simply. They want time and space for what's most important to them; and the comfort, consciousness and connection that often gets lost in the busyness and distractions of daily life. This book is the bridge women have been seeking. Written with the time-poor reader in mind, this book includes 200 short-form chapters, the perfect length for dipping into while commuting; during a lunch break or at the end of the day. The perfect gift, or self-gift, for women of all ages.