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Beata Maria/Dea Vults is a thesis for the degree of master (one year) in theology.

The thesis explores the role of the Virgin Mary as a martial saint in catholic combat with Islam and muslims between the years 1119 AD to 1648 AD with a focus on symbolism. The paper is focusing on symbolism in war banners, patron saints and semiotic symbols on arms and armour.

There are three different events or phenomenons in the study, separated in time as well as space.

Firstly the war banner used at the battle of Las Navas (1212 AD) during the reconquista of Spain. The banner of Mary with child is the prime subjekt as well as the myths appearing in the aftermath of the battle, and the ceremony that was devised from it.

The second phenomenon is the knights templars use of Mary as patron saint, and the ceremony that followed this relationship. There is also discussion of the belts worn that were related to Mary, the use of wich is attested in documents from the trials of the templars between 1307 and 1312 AD.

Lastly the paper focuses on the armours of the polish winged husars of 1648 AD and the seige of Vienna. The thesis explores the relationship between the symbols of the armour of the husars and the religious views of King John III Sobieski of Poland.

The main question of the study is:

• What were the meaning of the symbols of Mary as she was carried as a ritualistic symbol for war?

The subsequent questions are:

• How do you trace a progression in the useage of Mary as a symbol from the templars all the way to the use of Mary as a symbol for the winged husars?

• Which types of worship of Mary as a symbol were used primarliy in wars with muslims?

The paper is researched by qualitative methods including text analysis as well as semiotic symbolism reading. There are two theories used in the analysis. Smarts dimensions and Andersons and Hulls Warrior elites, with Smarts dimensions as the dominant theory.

This study examines four suits of armour that belonged to two Swedish kings, one protestant and one catholic, during the renaissance. The study tries to determine if it is possible to extract the religious identity of these kings based upon the decorations or other connotations of the suits of armour. Since the two kings, Erik the XIV:th and John the III, where half brothers and they succeeded each other, the suits of armour are closley matched in time and style.

The study also examines the grave effigy of one of the kings, John the III of Sweden, to examine if there is a connection between crossed legs on effigys and the perception of religion during the period.

The study is conducted through a archeological and historiological method and uses a combination theory of Smarts seven dimensions and the pictoral turn.

The main question of the study is:

-          What does it take to track religious bias through armour?

The subsequent questions are:

-          Is it possible to find the religious identity in the suits of armour?

-          Was the Gothicism movement a religious movement?

-          The effigy of John the III was sculpted in a style popular in the eleventh century, created in the 16:th century and placed in the 18:th century. What conclusions can be drawn from this while also tracking the discourse of effigys in the same time expance.

The study concludes that if the identity of the owner of a suit of armour is known, the symbols that adorne the suit can be interpreted fairly well. It also conludes that the gothic movement in Sweden where an extremely aggressive catholic movement. Finally it concludes that the creation and placement of the tomb in Uppsala cathedral closely follows the different discourses about the meaning of crossed legs on effigys in Europe and that the makers most likely gave the position a devout religious connotation.

From the middle of the 19th century onwards the number of protestant missionaries in China increased tremendously. The evangelical revival movement played an important role in this development with pioneers like J. Hudson Taylor and his China Inland Mission (CIM) on the frontlines. The Swedish Holiness Union (SHU) decided to join CIM in the northern parts of China were the union established its missionary field in 1890. This essay aims to explore changes in how other religious practices, groups and subjects are constructed within SHU missionary letters from China published 1891-1950. The source material consists of missionary letters published in the Unions own periodical Trons Segrar 1891, 1928 and 1950. By basing the analysis on Laclau’s and Mouffe’s discourse theory the study will explore how different discursive formations change, affirm or undermine each other and how different religious practices, groups and subjects are constructed and characterized within a discursive framework.

This study investigates the similarities between early Christian- and Roman rites, and examines if these similarities are fruits of influences taken from roman rites. Christianity outlived roman religion but perhaps, through syncretism, some aspects or elements survived as part of the Christian faith. This study focuses on religious roman rituals, how the Christians implemented or rejected it, and what the motivation behind the rejection was, if expressed.Ritual group meals and the concept of sacrifice is the two most similar rituals traits in these religions. The group-affirming and ideal-creating function of the meal rituals are similar in both religions, and the concept of sacrifice exists in both as central elements of the religion. However, the Christian rejection of animal sacrifice and the destruction of the temple of Jerusalem created a new understanding of the concept. The offer-ritual centered on remembering the only sacrifice that was needed, the perfect sacrifice, the one of Jesus Christ.

The Islamic state is on the rise with a self-proclaimed caliphate. Research has shown that thousands of people travel to join the organization. Even though Swedish news coverage constantly reports about women being victims of the Islamic state, fifteen to twenty young Swedish women travelled to the caliphate in year 2014 alone. This study analyzes the Islamic state’s propaganda magazine Dabiq’s women section, “To/From Our Sisters”, and constitutes the material basis for this research. The research aims to answer what kind of roles women are ascribed in Dabiq, and which role, if any, women is ascribed in the Islamic state’s militant Jihadism.

To achieve this, framing as content analysis of Dabiq’s articles directed toward women will be conducted. The material is analyzed with a social constructivist theory. The analysis shows that women are ascribed a number of roles in the articles. The roles are the strong woman; the wife; women as a possession; the woman as the Muslim ideal; mother and the woman as a passive participator of jihad. The study also show that the part woman play in jihad is not as an active participant of battle, but as a mother who produce sons to the Islamic state who can be sent out in war. Along with being a satisfying wife who is loyal toward her husband no matter what happens to him.

Western scholars have long sought to grasp the essence of and explain Buddhism. Western representation of Buddhism has been in a manner that reflects their concerns and interests. In addition to this it is also known that Buddhism in Sweden is seen in a favorable way. This study tries to locate where this positive attitude toward Buddhism stems from and if it is represented in this manner in Swedish textbooks. Therefore three textbooks of upper secondary class of religion are to be examined, not only to see if there is a positive attitude towards it, but to see in what manner Buddhism is depicted in Swedish schools on the whole. To achieve this, a content analysis that contains two different methods are conducted to approach the matter. The analysis shows that the chapters which regard Buddhism is depicted in an all together favorable way, with a focus on the life of the Buddha and his discipline, the doctrine. The authors try to de-emphasize aspects of the mythical and narrative dimension which can be conceived as strange in the west. Theravada is portrayed as “pure” Buddhism. Furthermore monks are mentioned in a more comprising way in comparison to nuns. To conclude Buddhism is depicted in a manner that reflects western values and interests.

The aim of this essay was to investigate how the syllabuses of religious education have changed from 1970–2011. To do this the following questions were answered: How have the syllabuses of religious education changed from 1970–2011? What has been removed and what has been added? How have the training course objectives changed? How has the content of the syllabuses changed? The method used in this essay is content analysis. The results of this essay show that the content of the syllabuses has not changed, although it is now described in further detail. The modern syllabuses are far more detailed then the oldest syllabus. One conclusion was that Christianity was the only expressly named religion.

The aim of this study is to analyze how buddhism and hinduism has been portrayed in textbooks for high school in the subject of religious studies. The textbooks are scrutinized with a content analysis. I will therefore scrutinized and compare the contents of three different textbooks from 1968, 1997 and 2015 with each other. The study of how Hinduism and Buddhism has been presented takes place from a perspective that makes a difference between "us" and "them". Furthermore, I use Edward Said's postcolonial theory of orientalism. This theory is used as an approach to investigate the extent to which orientalism occurs in the textbooks. The analysis shows that orientalist tendencies can be found in all books. It’s common to make a difference between "we" and "them" in different respects. As one might have previously thought, some changes has taken place over the years, but no drastic change has been made. Orientalism still occurs, albeit to a lesser extent.

Today modern scholars only have a few records left that discusses personal birthdays in the Roman society. This paper serves to discuss how personal birthdays during the 1 century BC were religiously charged by three components: genius, liba and the dies natalis. It will focus on four Roman authors: Ovid’s, Tibullus, Horace’s, and Cicero’s descriptions of these components. The material will be examined from the theoretical viewpoint of religious agency, religious agent and religious identity with the interest to discuss the personal birthdays celebrations. The analysis is inspired by Kathryn Argetsinger´s article from 1992 where she at length analyzed the roman view on private birthdays celebrations for the first century BC and AD. The genius, liba and the meaning of the dies natalis can be argued to charge the birthday celebrations with the religiously meaning. The genius was a god that was often prayed to and presented with offering like liba during the birthday celebration. This led to a communication between the humans who participated and the supernatural genius who created a religious experience for the humans. The meaning celebrating a person’s dies natalis on the same date led to an identity on that day. When the person then celebrated his birthday and his genius on the same day a religious identity was created. 

This article addresses the issue of teaching Judaism for students in the teacher-trainingprogramme and those training to become clergy in a Swedish milieu. A major challenge in thesecular post-Protestant setting is to pinpoint and challenge the negative presuppositions of Judaismas a religion of legalism, whereas the student’s own assumption is that she or he is neutral. Even ifthe older paradigms of anti-Jewish stereotypes are somewhat distant, there are further patterns ofthought which depict Judaism as a ‘strange’ and ‘legalistic’ religion. Students in the teacher-trainingprogramme for teaching religion in schools can in class react negatively to concepts like kosherslaughter, circumcision and the Shabbat lift. Even if the explanatory motives vary, there is nonethelessa tendency common to ordination students, relating to a Protestant notion of the Jewish Torah,commonly rendered as ‘Law’ or ‘legalism’. This notion of ‘the Law’ as a means of self-redemptioncan, it is argued in the article, be discerned specially among clergy students reading Pauline textsand theology. This analysis shows that both teacher-training and textbooks need to be updated inaccordance with modern research in order to refute older anti-Jewish patterns of thought. As forthe challenge posed by the simplistic labelling of both Judaism and Islam as religions of law, theimplementation of the teaching guidelines concerning everyday ‘lived religion’ enables and allowsthe teacher to better disclose Judaism, Christianity and Islam as piously organised living faiths ratherthan as being ruled by legalistic principles.