The Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Religions (212 page)

Anti-semitism
.

Hostility against the Jewish people. The term was first used by Wilhelm Marr in Germany) in 1879, but prejudice against the Jews appeared in ancient times. With the triumph of Christianity, Jews were increasingly persecuted, marginalized, and deprived of civil rights. In 1215, the 4th Lateran Council decreed special clothing for Jews, thereby increasing their isolation. They were accused of desecrating the Christian
host
, of poisoning wells, and of killing Christian children.
Although Jews fared somewhat better in Islamic lands, they did not achieve full civil rights in Christian Europe until the 19th cent. Anti-Semitic feelings did not disappear then, however, as is illustrated by the
Dreyfus case
in France in 1894, the pronouncements of Richard Wagner in Germany, the circulation of such spurious works as
The Protocols of the Elders of Zion
, and the huge numbers of Jews who emigrated to the United States to escape the
pogroms
of E. Europe, culminating in the
Holocaust
. The foundation of the state of Israel was believed by Zionists to be the only solution to anti-Semitism, but as a result of the Arab-Israeli conflict, Muslim anti-Semitism is today even more virulent than its Christian counterpart.

 
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c.
250–356).
Christian hermit whose life and actions lie at the foundation of
monasticism
. He withdrew into the desert in
c.
285, in order to develop holiness of life away from the distractions of the world. Athanasius wrote the
Vita Antonii
, from which details of his life are derived. He is regarded as ‘the father’ of Christian monasticism.

 
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(?1195–1231).
Christian
Franciscan
,
patron saint
of the poor. His zeal, especially against the Cathars, earned him the title of
malleus haereticorum
, ‘hammer of heretics’. As his cult developed, he became associated with the power to restore or locate lost property—perhaps because of an incident in which a novice was forced, by an apparition, to return a psalter which he had taken. He was canonized in 1232 and made a Doctor of the Church in 1946. Feast day, 13 June.

 
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Antye
i
,
Antyeshti
.

(‘cremation’) The sixteenth sacrament in Hinduism, dealing with funeral rites. There is no other
sa
sk
ra
for the body after the last rites. In modern times, when cremation can be by gas or electricity, only a token ceremony is performed and
mantras
are recited, but generally no oblations can be offered.
On the third day, the near relatives go back to the funeral ground and collect the few remaining bones and either bury them in the ground nearby or throw them in the river. The
Vedas
do not mention any rites, yet in practice on the twelfth day, relations and friends are invited for the feast of the wake. The annual
r
ddha
(ancestor veneration) is performed by the surviving relatives.