The Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Religions (1368 page)

 
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Leo I, St
,
known as ‘Leo the Great’

(d. 461).
Pope from 440, who worked to enhance the pre-eminence of the see of Rome, claiming jurisdiction in Africa, Spain, and Gaul. Leo composed his
Tome
, expounding the
Christology
of the Latin Church, according to which Jesus Christ is one person, the divine Word, in whom are two unconfused natures, the divine and human; each of these exercises its own particular faculties, but because of the
communicatio idiomatum
it may be said that the Son of Man descended from heaven, and the Son of God was crucified. The
Tome
was given formal authority at the Council of Chalcedon in 451. Leo was declared a
Doctor of the Church
by Benedict XIV.

 
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(1475–1521).
Pope
from 9 Mar. 1513. As pope he showed himself a patron of learning and of the arts, but wholly failed to appreciate the strength of
Luther's
convictions (he issued the
bull
Exsurge Domine
in 1520) or the degree of hostility felt in Germany towards the taxes he had demanded to finance a
crusade
against the Turks. His period of office plunged the papacy deeply into debt, through its extravagance.

 
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(1810–1903).
Pope
from 20 Feb. 1878. Born Giocchino Vincenzo Pecci, he was sent to Perugia as
archbishop
in 1845. He immediately set about improving the education of his clergy, and encouraged the study of Thomas
Aquinas
in the diocesan seminary (Thomism was later to be strongly advocated in the
encyclical
,
Aeterni Patris
). He carried his support of neo-
scholasticism
into his pontificate, and one of his first acts was to write the encyclical commending the study of Aquinas's philosophy. He was a considerable patron of learning, insisting that the Church had nothing to fear from the truth. He failed to reach an accommodation with the new kingdom of Italy, and his encyclical
Rerum Novarum
gave support to those wishing to restore the
ancien régime
, though his endorsement of the workers' movement was of great psychological importance as the first such act by an authority of international standing.

 
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Leontopolis
.

A 2nd-cent. BCE Jewish settlement in Egypt. As a reward to Jewish soldiers, the ruler Onias IV converted an Egyptian temple into a
temple
for the God of Israel which survived until its closure by the Romans in 73 CE.

 
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(1729–81).
German poet, dramatist, and religious essayist who influenced theological and philosophical discussion both within Germany and beyond. He helped to arrange publication of some controversial essays by Hermann Samuel Reimarus (the
Wolfenbüttel Fragments
, 1774–8) in which then-novel methods of criticism were employed to undermine traditional aspects of Jewish and Christian scripture. Lessing's own religious views were broadly
deistic
. He advocated complete toleration in matters religious in his play
Nathan the Wise
, a work modelled loosely on his close friend Moses
Mendelssohn
.

 
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