Tēwodros as Reformer and Modernizer

1969 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 457-469 ◽  
Author(s):  
Donald Crummey
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Special Reference ◽  
Turning Point ◽  
Early Years ◽  
Religious Values ◽  
The Reformation ◽  
Foreign Influence ◽  
Close Relationship ◽  
Major Turning Point ◽  
Modern Era

This paper discusses the place of the Emperor Tewodros (1855–1868) in Ethiopian history and suggests that due to his policy of modernization, and to his ambition to transform Ethiopian society along modern lines, he is to be seen as the opener of the modern era. It is suggested, as well, that this concept of modernization and transformation may be applicable to other pre-colonial African rulers. Special reference is made to missionary sources. Catholic material from the Lazarist Mission is used to clarify and elaborate the reforming intentions of the early years of the reign; while, for the later years, they reveal modern dimensions to Tēwodros's foreign policy. Protestant material from the Chrischona Mission throws new light on the Emperor's personality, and elaborates his attempts at introducing foreign influence with a modernizing intention. It is also shown how the Protestant missionaries established a close relationship with the Emperor, which partially rested upon certain shared religious values. This led the missionaries to interpret his reforming ambitions primarily in terms of the Reformation princes of Europe. Finally, it is suggested that the Protestant missionary material has an important contribution to make in determining a major turning point in Tēwodros's career; a point from which his career began to decline, and the reforming intentions were increasingly neglected.

Explaining Brexit North and South of the Border

2017 ◽  
Vol 26 (4) ◽  
pp. 391-410 ◽  
Author(s):  
David McCrone
Keyword(s):  
Turning Point ◽  
Social Values ◽  
Demographic Characteristics ◽  
Social Surveys ◽  
Clear Cut ◽  
Major Turning Point ◽  
Scottish Independence ◽  
North And South ◽  
Scottish Politics ◽  
Game Changer

The Brexit referendum in 2016 was a major turning-point in British and Scottish politics, reflected in a majority for Leave in England, but for Remain in Scotland. This article uses the British and Scottish Social Surveys for 2016 to explain Scottish-English differences, and finds that there were broad similarities in terms of social and demographic characteristics, and in terms of social values (‘authoritarians’ voting for Leave). Being ‘English’, however, was much more significant than being ‘Scottish’ in accounting for Brexit vote. The association between Brexit vote and constitutional preferences, notably voting intention in a future Scottish Independence Referendum, is far less clear-cut. Brexit promises to be a political game-changer, but in ways which are complex and unpredictable.

The Swiss and their Neighbours, 1460-1560

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tom Scott
Keyword(s):  
Fifteenth Century ◽  
Turning Point ◽  
Buffer Zone ◽  
The Political ◽  
Territorial Expansion ◽  
The Reformation ◽  
Political Principle ◽  
Mutual Obligation ◽  
The Common ◽  
Common Identity

Renewed interest in Swiss history has sought to overcome the old stereotypes of peasant liberty and republican exceptionalism. The heroic age of the Confederation in the fifteenth century is now seen as a turning point as the Swiss polity achieved a measure of institutional consolidation and stability, and began to mark out clear frontiers. This book questions both assumptions. It argues that the administration of the common lordships by the cantons collectively gave rise to as much discord as cooperation, and remained a pragmatic device not a political principle. It argues that the Swiss War of 1499 was an avoidable catastrophe, from which developed a modus vivendi between the Swiss and the Empire as the Rhine became a buffer zone, not a boundary. It then investigates the background to Bern’s conquest of the Vaud in 1536, under the guise of relieving Geneva from beleaguerment, to suggest that Bern’s actions were driven not by predeterminate territorial expansion but by the need to halt French designs upon Geneva and Savoy. The geopolitical balance of the Confederation was fundamentally altered by Bern’s acquisition of the Vaud and adjacent lands. Nevertheless, the political fabric of the Confederation, which had been tested to the brink during the Reformation, proved itself flexible enough to absorb such a major reorientation, not least because what held the Confederation together was not so much institutions as a sense of common identity and mutual obligation forged during the Burgundian Wars of the 1470s.

Erasmus the Theologian

2016 ◽  
Vol 96 (4) ◽  
pp. 498-515
Author(s):  
Greta Grace Kroeker
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Early Years ◽  
The Reformation

Erasmus of Rotterdam developed from a classical humanist to a Christian humanist theologian in the first two decades of the sixteenth century. In the early years of the Reformation, his theological work responded to the theological debates of the age. Although many contemporaries dismissed him as a theologian, he developed a mature theology of grace before his death in 1536 that evidenced his efforts to create space for theological compromise between Protestants and Catholics and prevent the permanent fissure of western Christianity.

The Cycle of Agathias: New Identifications Scrutinised

1969 ◽  
Vol 89 ◽  
pp. 87-96 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. C. McCail
Keyword(s):  
Recent Article ◽  
Early Years ◽  
Political Life ◽  
The Political ◽  
Historical Sources ◽  
Close Relationship ◽  
The Subject ◽  
State Of Affairs ◽  
Dead Man ◽  
Published Account

The Cycle of sixth-century epigrams edited by Agathias Scholasticus is the subject of a recent article by Mr and Mrs A. Cameron (JHS lxxxvi [1966] 6 ff.), who argue cogently that it was published in the early years of Justin II, and not the later years of Justinian, as has hitherto been supposed. Ca. also suggest identifications for many of the poets and imperial officials who figure in the Cycle. They do not, however, exhaust all the identifications that can be made, and some of those suggested by them require amplification or correction. Furthermore, Ca.'s view of the dating of the Cycle leads them, it seems to me, to underestimate its Justinianic character. The following observations are offered without prejudice to the merit of Ca.'s article as a whole.Among the Cyclic poets, only Julian the ex-Prefect of the East stands in close relationship to the political life of the age. His involvement in the Nika insurrection of 532 is attested by historical sources and, as Ca. claim (13), by two epigrams of the Anthology. The latter, however, contain difficulties passed over by Ca. In the first place, of the two epigrams on the cenotaph of Hypatius, only AP vii 591 is certainly from Julian's pen; vii 592 is unattributed in the Palatine MS., a fact which Ca. omit to mention. (It is absent from the Planudean MS.) The state of affairs in P is no accident, vii 591, though eulogising the dead man and alluding openly to the casting of his corpse into the sea, is moderate in tone, and would have caused no more offence to Justinian than Procopius's published account of the affair.

Anglo-american policy in Greece (1946-50)

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Spero Simeon Zachary Paravantes
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Foreign Policy ◽  
American Foreign Policy ◽  
The United States ◽  
Early Years ◽  
United States Government ◽  
Anglo American ◽  
Dramatic Shift ◽  
Current Financial Crisis ◽  
Post War

While trying to understand and explain the origins and dynamics of Anglo-American foreign policy in the pre and early years of the Cold War, the role thatperception played in the design and implementation of foreign policy became acentral focus. From this point came the realization of a general lack of emphasisand research into the ways in which the British government managed to convincethe United States government to assume support for worldwide British strategicobjectives. How this support was achieved is the central theme of this dissertation.This work attempts to provide a new analysis of the role that the British played in the dramatic shift in American foreign policy from 1946 to 1950. Toachieve this shift (which also included support of British strategic interests in theEastern Mediterranean) this dissertation argues that the British used Greece, first asa way to draw the United States further into European affairs, and then as a way toanchor the United States in Europe, achieving a guarantee of security of theEastern Mediterranean and of Western Europe.To support these hypotheses, this work uses mainly the British andAmerican documents relating to Greece from 1946 to 1950 in an attempt to clearlyexplain how these nations made and implemented policy towards Greece duringthis crucial period in history. In so doing it also tries to explain how Americanforeign policy in general changed from its pre-war focus on non-intervention, to the American foreign policy to which the world has become accustomed since 1950. To answer these questions, I, like the occupying (and later intervening)powers did, must use Greece as an example. In this, I hope that I may be forgivensince unlike them, I intend not to make of it one. My objectives for doing so lie notin justifying policy, but rather in explaining it. This study would appear to havespecial relevance now, not only for the current financial crisis which has placedGreece once again in world headlines, but also for the legacy of the Second WorldWar and the post-war strife the country experienced which is still playing out todaywith examples like the Distomo massacre, German war reparations and on-goingsocial, academic and political strife over the legacy of the Greek Civil War.

The Hoare-Laval Plan: A Study in International Polities

1962 ◽  
Vol 24 (3) ◽  
pp. 342-364
Author(s):  
Henderson B. Braddick
Keyword(s):  
Great Britain ◽  
Interwar Period ◽  
Turning Point ◽  
African Country ◽  
International Politics ◽  
Foreign Minister ◽  
State Department ◽  
The State ◽  
International Crisis ◽  
Major Turning Point

The agreement between British Foreign Minister Sir Samuel Hoare and Pierre Laval, French Premier and Foreign Minister, in early December, 1935, was a major turning point in European international politics during the interwar period. It placed a premium on Fascist aggression in Ethiopia by proposing that Italy be given actual or de facto control over huge slices of the African country. Several volumes of memoirs published in the last few years throw new light on some aspects of the proposal itself and on the politics of Great Britain, Italy, and France toward the Italo-Ethiopian conflict, policies which at the height of the international crisis produced the Hoare-Laval Plan. In addition, the State Department documents, published and unpublished, are a mine of information on these matters.

scholarly journals Os ritos tridentinos na construção do absolutismo : a importância de Luís XIV

2021 ◽  
pp. 207-240
Author(s):  
Eduardo Gonçalves Almeida
Keyword(s):  
European Society ◽  
Political Power ◽  
Ancien Regime ◽  
Louis Xiv ◽  
Close Relationship ◽  
French Case ◽  
Pertinent Question ◽  
Ancien Régime ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Modern Era

The influence of the Tridentine rites in sustaining the Absolutism of the Catholic States of the Ancien Regime is a pertinent question, despite the fact that thisform of government has already been abundantly discussed. The existing analyzes on Absolutism did not look directly at the prism that we propose to the reader with this work. Centered on the French case of Louis XIV, we will try to better understand the close relationship between the Throne and the Altar in Europe under the Ancien Regime, and how this osmosis strengthened and ensured until the liberal revolutions the domination of European society by these two institutions. We will do this through a particular prism: that of religious, Catholic, post-Tridentine rites, and those of Louis XIV's “Court Society”. Since times immemorial, humanity has used symbols to express different realities and ways to legitimize the exercise of power. From the Pharaoh gods, through the Augustus of Antiquity, we know that religion was absolutely fundamental and indispensable and articulated and legitimized forms of political power. The study of the relationship between ecclesiastical rites and those of a monarchy in times of affirmation of Absolutism, in the final centuries of the Modern Era, emerges as necessary in this context. Therefore, this paper seeks to answer the following question: what role did Catholic rites play in the construction of the maximum icon of European Absolutism?

scholarly journals Trump, Russia, and China: The First 100 Days

2017 ◽  
pp. 116-122
Author(s):  
M. Share
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Turning Point ◽  
Transition Period ◽  
American Foreign Policy ◽  
The United States ◽  
Donald Trump ◽  
Key Indicator ◽  
The World ◽  
The Future

On April 30 the United States and the World marked the 100th day in office of Donald Trump as President of the United States. The first 100 days are considered as a key indicator of the fortunes for a new President’s program. This article briefly reviews the 2016 campaign and election, the 11 week transition period, his first 100 days, a brief examination of both American-Russian relations and Sino-American relations, and lastly, what the future bodes for each under a Trump Presidency. The 100 Day period has been chaotic, shifting, and at times incoherent. He has made 180 degree shifts toward many major issues, including Russia and China, which has only confused numerous world leaders, including Presidents Putin and Xi. There has been a definite disconnection between what Trump says about Russia, and what his advisors and cabinet officials say. So far Trump has conducted a highly personalized and transactional foreign policy. All is up for negotiation at this a huge turning point in American foreign policy, the greatest one since 1945. Given all the world’s instabilities today, a rapprochement between the United States and Russia is a truly worthwhile objective, and should be strongly pursued.

scholarly journals The Phenomenon of Sabbatarianism: Nature, Types, and Brief History

2019 ◽  
pp. 44-54
Author(s):  
Tatiana I. Khizhaya ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Old Testament ◽  
Religious Studies ◽  
Orthodox Jews ◽  
Religious Movement ◽  
Early Church ◽  
Religious Movements ◽  
Radical Reformation ◽  
The Reformation ◽  
History Of ◽  
Modern Era

The article focuses on the analysis of Sabbatarianism, i.e. on clarifying the meaning of the term, identifying various kinds of this phenomenon, as well as researching its history. The topicality of the work stems from both uncertainty of the definitions of the concept under consideration and the lack of works in Russian religious studies that deal with the problem of Sabbatarianism. During the study the author comes to the conclusion that the term “Sabbatarianism” is polysemantic. First, it implies special attention to the fourth commandment of the Decalogue in the Christian tradition, in which, since the period of the early Church, there were different practices of observing the first and/or the seventh day of the week in the East and West of the Christian world. Second, we call Sabbatarian specific religious movements that emerged in Europe during the Modern Era and had genetic connection with the Reformation. The author divides them into Christian (Protestant) and Judaizing, noting the challenge and even the failure of differentiating between both in some cases. The first type is subdivided, in turn, into the First-day Sabbatarians, who did not constitute a particular religious movement, and the Seventh-day ones, who made up separate Protestant denominations. The secon type includes sects that are guided to varying degrees by the Old Testament texts. The study of the Judaizers’ history reveals that their genesis is correlated to the Radical Reformation. They arose among the Anabaptists, Unitarians and Puritans, forming an ultraradical stream in the religious scene of the Modern Era. At the same time, these movements were often millenarian. The most vivid model of Judaizing Sabbatarianism was the phenomenon of Transylvanian Sabbath keepers, who evolved from the Protestant Anti-Trinitarians to the Orthodox Jews. The paper is the first attempt at a special research on the phenomenon of Sabbatarianism in Russian religious studies. Its results are significant for understanding the history of the Reformation, various religious trends within the latter (especially radical), as well as the relationship between Christianity and Judaism.

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