‘aaah of things, the’, 187–189
Aboriginal beliefs, 11, 196, 199
culture, 198
sacred sites, 2, 11, 192
resolving disputes over, 191–204
sense of the sacred, 44, 47
traditional religious practices, 2
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Heritage Protection Act, 1984, 11, 191, 192, 193
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, 2
Aboriginal Australians, 45, 47, 72
‘ruthless policy of extermination’, 46
Aboriginal Land Rights, 46, 86
Abraham, 53, 61, 80
Abrahamic faiths, 51
Absolute Good, 188
acculturation
judicial, 143
religious, 142, 143
Adam and Eve, 52, 53, 61
advertising, 103, 104
aesthesis, 102
aesthetics, 102
Age of Reason, 184
Ahadith, 56
Aikenhead, Thomas, 31, 32–34, 36, 38
al-Aqsa Intifada, 18, 20, 21, 24
al-Ghazali, 61
Alice Springs dam, 192, 194, 197–199
Allah, 53, 122
Allcard v Skinner, 136, 140
Alliance of Christian Churches of Japan, 156
Amax Iron Ore Corporation, 86
An Account of the Rise and Progress of Mahometanism, 33
Anglican church, 114
Anglo-Catholic theology, 115
anthropologists, 200
role of, 197
anti-Muslim feelings, 20, 21, 25
anti-Semitism, 82, 84
in Australia, 17–30
anti-Zionism, 23
Arabian Revolution, 60, 61
arationality, 101, 103, 105
Art, 104
atheism,
‘evidential’, 10, 169
‘of suspicion’, 10
Australia,
‘a new Britannia in another world’, 45
a secular society, 2
Australian Constitution, 183 , 203
Australian Federation of Islamic Councils, 25
Australian identity, 44
Australian Land Rights (Northern Territory) Act, 86
Australian League of Rights, the, 19
Australian National Action, 21
Australian National Dialogue of Christians, Muslims and Jews, 25, 26, 28
Australian National Socialist Movement, 21
Australian Partnership of Ethnic and Religious Organisations, 25
Begin, Menachem, 84
Ben-Gurion, David, 84
BHP, 192, 200
Bidah, 59
bin Laden, Osama, 27
‘blackfella country’, 201–202
blasphemous libel, 35
blasphemy, 1, 2, 3, 7, 11, 17, 110, 115, 116
abolishing the offence of, 31
as an attack on civil order
as an offence to God, 5, 31–41
as an offence to the believer, 5, 32, 34–38, 116
attitudes towards, 124–125, 127
definitions of, 179
last recorded execution for, 34
laws of, 4, 31, 32, 43
intention of, 36, 43
modern expressions of, 119–132
understanding of, 4–6, 34, 39
Blasphemy Report (1994), 116
Bonhoeffer, Dietrich, 10, 175
Boobera Lagoon, 192, 193, 194, 200–201, 202
bourgeois society, 100
Buddhism, 2,
Butler, Eric, 19
Calvinist iconoclasm, 112
capitalism, sacralisation of, 104
capitalist secularism, 99
Carpentaria Land Council, 201, 202
category error, 179, 181
Catholic Church, 71, 91
Catholic immanentism, 112
Catholicism, 6, 143
European, 7
in Japan, 10
parallels with Tibetan Buddhist practices, 93
Celtic ‘I AM’ poems, 182
Central Land Council, 191
Century Mine project, 192, 201
Christ Before Caiaphas, 32
Christian pogroms against Jews, 111
Christian political influence in Japan, 148
Christian relics, 91
Christians for Defence of the Constitution, 153
Christianity, 4, 51, 101
Western European, 109
Christians, Japanese, 10, 147–165
self-expression, 163
Church of Scientology, 134
Citizens’ Electoral Councils, The, 21
clash of civilisations, 17, 27
clash within civilisations, 17, 27
closure of signification, 100
Coalition of the Willing, 104
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, 174
Collected Speeches on Religion, 185
collective identity, 68
commodity aesthetics, 104
commodity relationship, 99, 103
community standards, 9, 10
Confession of Responsibility During World War Two, 154
consciousness, altered states of, 65, 74
consumerism, 104
Coronation Hill dispute, 197, 198
Court, Sir Charles, 86
‘cult of the individual’, 68
‘cult of the state’, 68
cultural diversity, 25
cultural relativism, 11
cyberculture, 99
Dalai Lama, 95
Defence of Religious Freedom Day, 152
desacralisation of politics, 114
de Tocqueville, 70
democracy, 8, 180
discrimination, 32, 194
divine order of existence, 52
dogmatism, 10–11
domination
inexplicit, 9
structures of, 100
‘Dreaming, the’, 198
Dreaming tracks, 197, 200
Durkheim, Emile, 66
and the sacred in the social sciences, 66–77
ecclesiastical courts, 111
‘effervescence’, 67, 71–72
Enlightenment thinkers, 184
Epicureanism, 110
epistemic closure, 10, 174
equitable doctrine of unconscionable dealings, 137
equitable undue influence, 134, 136, 137, 138
ethics, the sacred and sacrilege as, 179–190
ethnic cleansing, 6, 109
European bourgeoisie, 102
Evatt, Elizabeth, 196
Executive Council of Australian Jewry, 19, 25
exploitation of religious faith, 138
Extension of Charitable Purpose Act 2004, 143
faith
distinguished from idolatry, 174
as manifestation of psychological disease, 171
faithfulness
to Christianity, 174
to truth, 174
Family Provision Act, 1982, 9
family provision legislation, 139, 140, 142
‘Final Solution’, 84
fitra, 52, 53, 61
‘flaw in the nation-building process’, 43, 45
Forrest River Massacres, 87
Forty Days at Musa Dagh, 83
free speech, 2, 32
freedom of speech, 4
functional specialisation, 120
Gay News, 4, 31, 35, 38
Geneva Convention, 36
genocide, 21, 79, 81
Armenian, 79–80, 82–83
German Empire 113
Gibson, Mel, 32
Giotto, 32
Golden Temple, Amritsar, 181
Gott, John William, 35
gift-giving, 135
relevance in a multicultural society, 133
gifts,
inter vivos, 133, 134
legal restraints upon, 133, 134, 140–142
motivated by religious faith, 133, 134, 139, 141
negotiating the sacred in law, 135
testamentary, 9, 10, 133–139
globalisation, 99
God
existence of, 186
place of in civil and political matters, 33
understandings of, 39
‘Goodness and Kindness’ program, 26
Gordon-Cumming, Constance, 46
Grueber, Father John, 93
Gulf War (1990–91), 17, 18
Hanson, Pauline, 19
Hansonism, 19
Hare Krishna community, 136
Hashem Aghajari affair, 122
Haug, Wolfgang Fritz, 100, 101
heresy, 7, 110, 111, 115
Heritage Bookshop, 20
Himmler, Heinrich, 79
Hindmarsh Bridge case, 11, 191, 198
Hiromachi, Kozaki, 156
Hitler, 21, 47, 80
Holocaust, the, 6, 23, 80, 81, 84, 85
denial, 19, 20,
denialism, 82–86
holocaust, 80
House of Lords Select Committee on Religious Offences, 31
holy, the, 186
‘human Being-ness’, 181–190
human bones,
as art objects, 92, 95
trafficking in, 92
in Western art history, 94
Human Development Index, 127
humanism, sacralisation of, 58
Hume, David, 10, 169–171
Huntington, Samuel, 17, 27
Ibn Khaldoun, 55
idolatry, 170, 176
ijtihad, 56, 61
Imperial Rescript on Education, 157
In the Will of Thomas Walsh, 138
incommensurable, comparing the, 194–195
indigenous religions, 11
individualism, 104
Indonesia, 129
injustice, 46
institutional differentiation, 120
instrumentalism, 175
intolerance, 9, 76
Iran, 128, 129
Iron Knob, mining at, 199–200
Irving, David, 85
Irving v Lipstadt & Penguin Books, 85–86
Islam, 3
and humanity, 54, 60
and natural law, 61
dissent within, 6
Golden Age, 60
in the development of Western thought, 60, 61
paradox of, 51–62
Islamic community in Australia, 17
Israeli-Palestinian conflict, 21, 23, 27
James, William, 43
Japan
Allied Occupation, 147
Christian political influence in, 148, 161
confrontational approach, 148, 162
church-state confrontation, background to, 155–163
freedom of religion, 149
ineffectiveness of Christian voice in, 147
negotiating religious identity in, 147–165
post-war legal system, 149–151
‘protest litigation’, 150
reconstruction period, 163
removal of prohibition of Christianity, 155
war guilt, 149, 154, 161
Jesus, 53, 91
Jewish community, 3
in Australia, 24
Jewish institutions, attacks on, 18, 19
Jihad, 26
Judaism, 3, 51
Judeo-Christian tradition, 9, 142, 181
Judeocide, 80
juridical morality, 71
juridical power, 110
justice, 180
Kant, 102
Kanzô, Uchimura, 157, 159
Kirkup, James, 31, 35, 36
knowledge
Aboriginal notion of, 198
Western notion of, 198
Kristallnacht, 17
kufr, 122
Laqueur, Walter, 21, 22, 24
law, desacralising of, 113–115
Lectures on the Religion of the Semites, 67
L’Hôpital, Chancellor Michel de, 112
liberalism, 67
‘Living in Harmony’ projects, 25
Locke, John, 36, 114
love, faculty for, 188
Lovemarks, 103
Luhmann, Niklas, 120, 126, 128
Mabo case, the, 11
‘Made from Human Bones’, 93
Marco Polo, 93
marriage,
gay, 9
sanctity of, 9
materialism, 99
metaphysics and morality, 184
mind/body duality, 100
modern society, central feature of, 120
modernity, 33, 48, 54
challenges of, 51–62
conditions of, 119, 120, 122, 126, 130
the normative content of, 70
relationship with religion, 3, 8, 126, 130
and religiosity, 127
Mohanty, J.N., 186, 188
morality
regulatory role of, 121
universal, 181
Moses, 53, 182
Mossad, 20, 21
mourning customs/paraphernalia, 92
Muhammed, the Prophet, 52, 53, 60, 122, 123
multiculturalism, 3, 5, 8, 33, 43
Australian, 11, 12
multicultural societies, 43
negotiating the sacred in, 1–13
Muslim Anti-Semitism: A Clear and Present Danger, 22
Muslim community/society, 3, 17, 55
in Australia, 24, 123
secular intellectuals, 57
secular model in Turkey, 57
mystical experiences, 74
mysticism, 99
Nakaya Case, 152
Nasr Hamed Abu Zeid affair, 122
nation-building process,
National Viewers’ and Listeners’ Association, 35
Native Title legislation, 11
‘nature mysticism’, 74
Nazi Germany, 21, 79, 84
Nefesh ha’ Hayyim, 39
negotiating the sacred, 104, 191
in law, 133–145
in a multicultural society, 43–50
the role of the state, 11
negotiation in a pluralistic society, 12
New Advent Catholic Encyclopaedia, 71, 72
New South Wales Council of Christians and Jews, 25
New South Wales Law Reform Commission, 116
New South Wales Jewish Board of Deputies, 17
Nietzsche, 10, 169, 170
critique of religion/Christianity, 171–172
Christian response to, 173–175
No Logo, 103
Noonkanbah Station, 86
Northern Territory Government, 191, 192, 197
‘obdurate believers’, 9, 141, 142
objective standards, 140–143
offence, 2
One Land, One Law, One Culture, 47
One Land, One Law, One People, 47
One Nation, 19
Oslo Accords, 18
Pakistan, 129
blasphemy in, 123
Christians, 123
Islamisation in, 122
Oxford University Press in, 123
Pauline Hanson’s One Nation, 20
Peace of Westphalia, 113
Pell, Bishop George, 4, 35
People’s Republic of China, The, 95
Peres, Shimon, 83
performance and the profane, 120
pharisaical moralism, 172
‘pharisaism’, 170–172
philosophers and language, 184
Pietists, 114
piety, 185
‘Piss Christ’, 4, 35
‘plastination’, 95–96
pragmatism, 67
prayer, 10
probate undue influence, 134, 137, 138
property, 69
proprietary or pecuniary interests, 194
Protestant church, 111
Protestant Ethic, 99
Protestantism, 6
Professional Ethics and Civic Morals, 68, 70
Qadr, 51
Qur’an, 53, 56, 60
Racial and Religious Tolerance Act, 2001, 40
Rainbow Serpent, 200
Ramadan, Tariq, 57
Ramseyer, Robert, 151
rapporteur, role of, 196–197
rationality, 100
Rawls, John, 180, 187
religio, 104
religion
and blasphemy, overview, 121–123
and society, 68
as cultural right, 2
as deep grammar of society, 69
as institution, 102
as social solidarity, 67
coexistence with capitalism, 104
Durkheim’s definition of, 67
freedom of, 3, 8, 9
in the private sphere, 6
in the public sphere, 6
inextricable link with nature, 52
language of, 184
philosophy of, 169
place in society, 1, 126
privatisation of, 115, 116, 120, 126
spiritualising of, 113–115
religious
cleansing, 109
communities, 116
conflicts, 1
criminality, 111
dialogue, 17–30
discrimination, 134
fundamentalists, 6, 10, 17, 170, 174
language, functions of, 73–74
peace, 115
pluralism, 4
role of institutions in society, 120
truth, 8
vilification, 32, 39
zealots, 17
religiosity
and blasphemous attitudes, 126, 128
and blasphemy in Muslim societies, 129
authentic, 186
in Malaysia, 127, 128
modern expressions of, 119–132
Religious Bodies Bill, 159–160
Religious Peace of Augsburg, 113
Renfrewshire witches, 34
‘resurrection men’, 92
‘right relations’, 5, 48
Roche, Jack, 18, 19
Romanticism, 103
‘rumour of angels’, 69
Rushdie, Salman, 4, 31, 122
sacralisation, 58
sacralising the profane, 79–88
sacrality, 188
sacramental violence, 112
sacred, the, 2
Art embodied as, 103
as a quality, 65
bourgeois, 99–105
Catholic definition of, 71
constructions of, 11
‘dynamic boundedness’ of , 100
ethics, not metaphysics, 179–190
exclusive province of religion, 183
existence of, 11
four characteristics of, 65
in the social sciences, 66–67
modern, 102
nature of, 1, 8
place of in public lives, 3
political constructions of, 6
-profane distinction, 66, 70, 71–73, 110, 112, 115
profaning the, 79–88
realm of, 10
subjectivity of, 188
taboos around, 70, 71, 74
the universal, 187
uses of the term, 73–76
sense of, 47
source of ethics, 70
stretching the, 65–77
sacredness and significance, 193
sacrilege, 1, 3, 11, 17, 115
and blasphemy, 79
and sacramental violence, 110–112
and the sacred, 6–7
as crime against humanity, 189
criminal sin of, 111
definitions of, 7, 179
ethics, not metaphysics, 179–190
public crime to personal offence, 109–117
Salafi, 59
samsara, 90
Saramago, Jose, 21
Schleiermacher, Friedrich, 184–186, 188
Schuldfrage, 84
Scully, Olga, 19
‘secret women’s business’, 197
secularism, 2, 54
in Australia, 100
West as bastion of, 99
Western democracy and, 60
secularisation, 1, 5, 54, 119, 120, 126, 130
culture of, 7
and secularism, 2–4
of the state, 8
September 11, 2001, 18, 19, 20, 24, 58
Serrano, Andres, 4, 35
servility of the spirit, 174
shadow theocracy, 100
shaki tsûnen (social consensus), 151
Shari’a law, 6, 53, 58
honest citizenship, 58
Shoah, 23, 80
‘Shoah business’, 82
Shôwa Emperor (Hirohito), 147
funeral of, 147, 151
Shôwa era, 148
skull-cap, 94
Smith, William Robertson, 67
Society, place of religion in, 1
special disadvantage, 137
spiritual influence, 135
spiritualism, 76
Stephens, A.G., 43, 44
St Foy’s bones, 91
Stoicism, 110
Stubbe, Henry, 33
suicide bombings, 21
sunnah, 56
suspicion, 175
the scalpel of, 169–177
suspicious circumstances doctrine, 134, 137
tajdid, 56
Tampa, 24
taqlid, 56
Tawhid, 51
Taylor’s Case, 35
‘technocracies of sensuousness’, 100, 101, 102, 104
terra nullius, 45
‘testosterone Islam’, 59
thangkas, 89, 90, 94
The Antichrist, 172
The Canterbury Tales, 91
The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life, 67
‘The Love That Dares to Speak Its Name’, 35
The Natural History of Religion, 171
The Passion of the Christ, 32
The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, 20, 22
The Recollections of Georryer Hamly, 45
The Satanic Verses,4, 31
The Trustees of Church Property of the Diocese of Newcastle v Ebbeck, 138–139
The Varieties of Religious Experience, 43
Thirty Years War, 113
Thomasius, Christian, 114, 115, 116
Three Religions Conference, 156, 157
Thus Spake Zarathustra, 169
Tibetan culture,
aestheticisation of, 7
commodification of, 7, 94
museum exhibitions of, 92, 93, 94
religious artefacts of, 7, 89–98
sky burial, 89–90
Western attitude towards, 93
Tibetan symbolism, 89
Tickner, Robert, 191, 194, 201
Tilmouth, Tracker, 202
Toben, Dr Frederick, 19
Todd River, 192
tolerance, 9, 104
and the state, 7–10
religious, 12
toleration, 2, 3, 5, 8, 11, 114
transcendence
aspiration toward, 52
desire for, 101, 105
Tsu City case, 151, 152
ulama, 55, 56, 129
decline of, 57
ul-Haq, President Zia, 122
unconscionable dealings, 134
United Church of Christ in Japan, 154
United Nations Universal Declaration on Human Rights, 60
unity of being, 182
Upanishads, 187
US-Japan Security Treaty, 153
van Tongeren, Jack, 18, 19
Vidal-Naquet, Pierre, 83, 85
violence, threat of, 202–203
Volozhiner, Rabbi Hayim, 39
von Hagens, Gunther, 89, 95
War on Terror, 26, 99
Wassermann, Jacob, 21
Wenn v Howard, 139
Werfel, Franz, 83
Western liberalism, 61
‘White Australia Policy’, 44, 45
white Australians, 197, 199
white supremacy, 20
Whitehouse, Mary, 4, 35, 36, 37
Wiesel, Elie, 80, 81
Williams, Michael, 75–76
wills, 9, 10
‘wise and just testator’, 9, 10
Wistrich, Robert, 22
witchcraft, 7, 110, 111, 115
Women’s Interfaith Network, 25
xenophobia, 5, 24, 46
Yahweh, 182
Yanner, Murrandoo, 202
Yasakuni Shrine, 152, 153
Zionism, 23