The Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Religions (182 page)

BOOK: The Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Religions
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Anamchara
(soul-friend)
:
Anamnesis
(Gk., ‘remembrance’). A prayer in the Christian
eucharist
which follows the words of institution, commemorating the
passion
,
resurrection
, and
ascension
of
Christ
.
Ananaikyo
.
A New Sect Shinto organization (see
SECT SHINTO
) founded in 1949 by Nakano Yonosuke. It is deliberately eclectic: the name means ‘the teaching’ (
kyo
) of ‘the three’ (
ana
) and ‘the five’ (
nai
), referring to the religious traditions from which it draws inspiration. It practises
kami
possession and ecstasy, through a technique known as
chinkon kishin
, ‘stilling the self to become one with the kami’. The principal kami worshipped is Kuni Tokotachi no Mikoto.
Anan ben David
(8th cent. BCE).
Jewish Babylonian sage, regarded as the founder of
Karaism
. According to Karaite legend, when the
exilarchate
of Babylon was bestowed on Anan's younger brother, Anan consequently founded an alternative sect. His immediate followers, the Ananites, rejected the
Talmudic
tradition and relied on the
Bible
alone as the source of divine law. Anan's own book,
Sefer ha-Mitzvot
(Book of Precepts), became an important text in the later Karaite movement.
nanda
(Skt.).
1
A chief disciple and first cousin of the
Buddha
. Though not an intellectual,
nanda could explain the 60,000 words of the Buddha and was known as the Dhammabha
g
rika, ‘treasurer of the Teachings’.
2
Initially a qualitative attribute of
Brahm
, it became, especially in
Ved
nta
, the consciousness that is free from all entanglements in
sam
dhi
. It is usually found in association with
sat
and
cit
, hence in the fused form, Satchid
nanda, Being, Consciousness, Bliss. A
sa
ny
sin
in the
ankara tradition is given the word
nanda as part of his name—e.g. Vivek

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