Rodney Stark Bücher

Dieses Buch räumt mit der gängigen Sicht auf, die Kreuzzüge seien ein brutaler, imperialistischer, räuberischer Feldzug des christlichen Abendlandes gegen einen gebildeten, toleranten und friedlichen Islam gewesen, geführt, um sich zu bereichern und das Christentum zu verbreiten. Ein Krieg, der den berechtigten Hass der muslimischen Welt auf den Westen bis heute begründet. Mit Überblick und dennoch detailreich zeichnet Stark die Geschichte der Eroberung weiter Teile Europas, des Mittleren Ostens und Nordafrikas durch Mohammed und seine Erben nach. Er schildert die Behandlung der Juden und Christen in den besetzten Ländern und die Massaker an den Pilgern, die ins Heilige Land fuhren, um sich dort von ihren Sünden zu befreien. Er beschreibt die flehende Bitte Alexios' I. an den Graf von Flandern, Byzanz vor der Invasion der gerade zum Islam konvertierten Türken zu schützen, sowie den berühmten Aufruf Papst Urbans II. an die Ritter Europas, den Byzantinern zu helfen und den Weg ins Heilige Land für die christlichen Pilger wieder zu sichern. Er analysiert die blutigen Schlachten der Kreuzritter, ihre Siege und fatalen Niederlagen, die unterschiedlichen Strategien der Kriegsführung beider Seiten und die logistische Organisation dieser enormen Truppenbewegungen. Mit Gottes Krieger gibt uns einer der renommiertesten Religionssoziologen ein neues und realistischeres Bild der sieben großen Kreuzzüge und zeigt auf, was in den Jahren von 1095 bis 1291 in Europa und im Nahen Osten wirklich geschah.

Rodney Stark untersucht, wie der unbedeutende Kult der ersten Christen zur dominierenden Religion im Mittelmeerraum wurde. Er nutzt moderne Sozialwissenschaften und widerlegt gängige Ansichten über die Gläubigen. Besonders Juden und Frauen spielten eine zentrale Rolle. Stark verknüpft theologische und sozialwissenschaftliche Erklärungen für den Aufstieg des Christentums.

In The victory of reason, sociologist Stark advances the idea that Christianity and its related institutions are directly responsible for the most significant intellectual, political, scientific, and economic breakthroughs of the past millennium. In Stark's view, what has propelled the West is not the tension between secular and nonsecular society, nor the pitting of science and the humanities against religious belief. Christian theology, Stark asserts, is the very font of reason. While the world's other great belief systems emphasized mystery, obedience, or introspection, Christianity alone embraced logic and reason as the path toward enlightenment, freedom, and progress.--From publisher description

The book explores the remarkable rise of Christianity from its humble beginnings, focusing on the influential preaching of a Galilean carpenter. It examines the demographics of early followers, the spread of the faith, and the factors that contributed to its growth into the world's largest religion. Utilizing quantitative data and contemporary scholarship, Rodney Stark challenges established narratives about the early church's expansion, revealing new insights into its historical impact and the dynamics of belief and conversion.

In this page-turning, myth-busting history, acclaimed author Rodney Stark shows exactly why Western civilization triumphed over other cultures. Taking readers on a thrilling journey from ancient Greece to the present, Stark challenges much of the received wisdom about Western history, and debunks some absurd fabrications that have flourished in the past few decades.

This "fresh, blunt, and highly persuasive account of how the West was won—for Jesus" (Newsweek) is now available in paperback. Stark's provocative report challenges conventional wisdom and finds that Christianity's astounding dominance of the Western world arose from its offer of a better, more secure way of life. "Compelling reading" (Library Journal) that is sure to "generate spirited argument" (Publishers Weekly), this account of Christianity's remarkable growth within the Roman Empire is the subject of much fanfare. "Anyone who has puzzled over Christianity's rise to dominance...must read it." says Yale University's Wayne A. Meeks, for The Rise of Christianity makes a compelling case for startling conclusions. Combining his expertise in social science with historical evidence, and his insight into contemporary religion's appeal, Stark finds that early Christianity attracted the privileged rather than the poor, that most early converts were women or marginalized Jews—and ultimately "that Christianity was a success because it proved those who joined it with a more appealing, more assuring, happier, and perhaps longer life" (Andrew M. Greeley, University of Chicago).

Why do people join cults? Why do they leave? And how do they manage to stay in them, if that's what they've decided to do? What are cults, anyway? Moonies? Hare Krishnas? The Mormons? The Moral Majority? Manson? Rodney Stark, editor of Religious Genesis, Exodus, and Numbers, criticizes the media attention given to pseudo-experts on the cults. It seems odd, he says in his introduction, ôthat the media, usually so eager to reveal dirty secrets, fail to discover that some of their experts on religious movements are poorly regarded by others in the field, while most are held in no regard at all, since they have never participated in the field.ö His volume explores a broader range of issues and groups than is generally considered ôhotö by the press. Groups considered are-in addition to Rajneesh, the Unification Church and Hare Krishna, the Bo Peep UFO cult, the many faces of the ôhuman potentialö movement, the Moral Majority, Ian Paisley's Protestants in Northern Ireland, astrology and indigenous American groups such as the Mormons and Seventh Day Adventists. Instead of the tired ôbrainwashingö explanation of why people join fringe religious movements, this book provides clear-headed analyses of recruitment, disaffection and socialization in non-mainstream religious groups.

Rodney Stark's provocative new book argues that, whether we like it or not, people acting for the glory of God have formed our modern culture. Continuing his project of identifying the widespread consequences of monotheism, Stark shows that the Christian conception of God resulted--almost inevitably and for the same reasons--in the Protestant Reformation, the rise of modern science, the European witch-hunts, and the Western abolition of slavery. In the process, he explains why Christian and Islamic images of God yielded such different cultural results, leading Christians but not Muslims to foster science, burn "witches," and denounce slavery. With his usual clarity and skepticism toward the received wisdom, Stark finds the origins of these disparate phenomena within monotheistic religious organizations. Endemic in such organizations are pressures to maintain religious intensity, which lead to intense conflicts and schisms that have far-reaching social results. Along the way, Stark debunks many commonly accepted ideas. He interprets the sixteenth-century flowering of science not as a sudden revolution that burst religious barriers, but as the normal, gradual, and direct outgrowth of medieval theology. He also shows that the very ideas about God that sustained the rise of science led also to intense witch-hunting by otherwise clear-headed Europeans, including some celebrated scientists. This conception of God likewise yielded the Christian denunciation of slavery as an abomination--and some of the fiercest witch-hunters were devoted participants in successful abolitionist movements on both sides of the Atlantic. For the Glory of God is an engrossing narrative that accounts for the very different histories of the Christian and Muslim worlds. It fundamentally changes our understanding of religion's role in history and the forces behind much of what we point to as secular progress.

This edition offers research, statistics and stories that document-increased participation in religious groups in the US in the 21st century. New chapters chart the development of African American churches from the early 19th century and the ethnic religious communities of recent immigrants.