Women without hijab to be prosecuted ‘without mercy’: Iran’s judiciary chief

Mallika Soni As more and more women continue to defy Iran’s compulsory dress code, the country’s judiciary chief threatened to prosecute women who appear in public without hijab “without mercy”, news agency Reuters reported quoting Iranian media. Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei said, “Unveiling is tantamount to enmity with (our) values. Those “who commit such anomalous acts… Read More Women without hijab to be prosecuted ‘without mercy’: Iran’s judiciary chief

1st April 2023 Dilip

Monks and militias in Myanmar

Amara Thiha and Marte Nilsen The political implications of ultra-nationalist Buddhist monks and ideologies in Myanmar received much attention in the years before the 2021 military takeover. As Myanmar has turned more violent since the coup, ultra-nationalist monks have been radicalised further. What role are these monks playing in the political landscape of Myanmar today?… Read More Monks and militias in Myanmar

18th March 202318th March 2023 Dilip

At the Kremlin in 1943

Stalin presented Orthodox leaders with a proposal: the Soviet state that had destroyed their Church would bring it back In September 1943, as the tide of the Second World War was turning in the Soviet Union’s favour, the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin called a meeting at the Kremlin. Alongside the foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov and… Read More At the Kremlin in 1943

15th March 202315th March 2023 Dilip

Mezquita and Hagia Sophia: two sacred symbols and the culture wars that belie their complex history

World heritage monuments in Córdoba and Istanbul stand at the centre of a reductionist bid to rewrite the past In these two remarkable buildings at opposite ends of Europe, in their stones and slates and marble and gold, in their pillars and arches and windows and mosaics, can be glimpsed the complexities of European history,… Read More Mezquita and Hagia Sophia: two sacred symbols and the culture wars that belie their complex history

5th March 20235th March 2023 Dilip

Three Versions of Judas: Jorge Luis Borges

There seemed a certainty in degradation: T. E. Lawrence, Seven Pillars of Wisdom In Asia Minor or in Alexandria, in the second century of our faith (when Basilides was announcing that the cosmos was a rash and malevolent improvisation engineered by defective angels), Nils Runeberg might have directed, with a singular intellectual passion, one of the… Read More Three Versions of Judas: Jorge Luis Borges

5th March 20234th March 2023 Dilip

The Center Cannot Hold

A kaleidoscopic journey through a divided country…The river of bile on which Sharlet fights to stay afloat courses from one end of the country to the other. By Elizabeth D. Samet The Undertow: Scenes from a Slow Civil War by Jeff Sharlet Jeff Sharlet’s new book, The Undertow, plunged me into a vertiginous fever-dream. It induced a physiological response… Read More The Center Cannot Hold

3rd March 20233rd March 2023 Dilip

Alarm grows in Iran over reports that hundreds of schoolgirls were poisoned

Concern is growing in Iran after reports emerged that hundreds of schoolgirls had been poisoned across the country in recent months. On Wednesday, Iran’s semi-official Mehr News reported that Shahriar Heydari, a member of Parliament, cited an unnamed “reliable source” in saying that “nearly 900 students” from across the country had been poisoned so far. The first… Read More Alarm grows in Iran over reports that hundreds of schoolgirls were poisoned

2nd March 2023 Dilip

The Original Sin of Economics

By Lynn Parramore / Institute for New Economic Thinking When you think of original sin and the fall of Adam and Eve, an economics class probably isn’t the first thing that comes to mind. After all, economics is a secular discipline. Or is it? Maybe not entirely, considering that the earliest economic thinkers had religion very… Read More The Original Sin of Economics

20th February 202320th February 2023 Dilip

Afghanistan: single women and widows are struggling to find their next meal under Taliban restrictions

Jamila*, a widow living in Herat, lost her husband in a suicide attack about eight years ago. She has an 18-year-old daughter who is blind and a 20-year-old son who lost both legs in a mine blast. Jamila used to be a housemaid and bake bread for people in their homes. With this income she… Read More Afghanistan: single women and widows are struggling to find their next meal under Taliban restrictions

9th February 2023 Dilip

Iran’s Khamenei admits to holding “Tens of Thousands” of Prisoners of Conscience

It was the first time that the Iranian authorities have admitted to holding tens of thousands of political prisoners. Some 500 persons were shot dead by government security forces in the course of last fall’s demonstrations, and most of those detained were simply protesting peacefully, which should not have been the basis for an arrest… Read More Iran’s Khamenei admits to holding “Tens of Thousands” of Prisoners of Conscience

7th February 20237th February 2023 Dilip

After the truth-shower

Philosophy, history, literature, current affairs, and other stuff. Posted by Dilip Simeon

Tag: religion