The Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Religions (710 page)

(Gk.,
ekkesia
, ‘assembly’). Originally the study of Christian church architecture, but now reflection on the nature of the
Church
. Ecclesiology points at one extreme to the hierarchical and authoritarian system of Vatican Catholicism (modified in theory, but not yet in practice, by conciliarity: see
ANTIPOPE
), and at the other to the
koin
nia
(communion) of the New Testament which is translated into house churches, local gatherings networked into monitoring organizations.

 
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(1486–1543).
German Roman Catholic theologian and opponent of
Luther
. Eck was appointed Professor of Theology at Ingolstadt in 1510, a post he held throughout his life. After the
indulgence
controversy, he opposed Luther's teaching, engaged in public debate with him and
Carlstadt
at Leipzig in 1519, and exerted his influence to procure their condemnation in the papal
bull
Exsurge Domine
of 1520. He wrote against Luther,
Melanchthon
and
Zwingli
, and defended the papacy.

 
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(union with God; cf
Ik Onkar
). A new religious movement (the Religion of Light and Sound) ‘revived’ by Paul Twitchell (1908–71) in San Francisco in 1965. Its teaching is
pantheistic
. The movement has many centres in the USA and Europe, and reports a worldwide membership of 50,000 chelas or students.

 
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(
c.
1260–1327).
German Christian mystic. Accused of
heresy
in 1326, he died during the proceedings. In the 14th cent., his insistence on the reality of God's gift to humanity of himself in his son, a gift which deifies the human, sounded
pantheistic
; conversely, his development of
seelenfünklein
, the spark of the soul, achieving union with God, sounded as though the two are merged.
Despite his condemnation, his influence, largely mediated by
Tauler
and
Henry Suso
, was considerable.

 
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Ecology
:

see
ANIMALS
.

 
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(Gk.,
ek-stasis
, ‘standing out of’). The experience, common in all religions, of being carried beyond ordinary, everyday experience into moments of extreme and intense transcendence. The word is used of such a wide range of such experiences that no common core can be identified. Thus it is used of the out-of-the-body experiences of
shamans
, the third (and next to highest stage) of the analysis of mystical union of
Teresa of Avila
, trance states,
fan
’
among
S
f
s
, the
rapture
of spirit possession. The neurophysiology of these (usually) brief states is not yet understood (but see
BIOGENETIC STRUCTURALISM
), though it is well-known that the inhibition or exclusion of external stimuli (even by the insistent repetition of one stimulus, e.g. by drumming) can lead to dramatic brain consequences, some of which approximate to some of the conditions defined as ecstatic.
The converse is
enstasy
.