The Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Religions (2203 page)

BOOK: The Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Religions
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, who sought to identify comparable spiritual and cosmological principles underlying all the great religions; and through the work of Frithjof Schuon.
Shadkhan
.
Jewish
marriage
broker. Traditionally all marriages were arranged in Judaism.
Shadow-boxing
:
Shadow theatre
:
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego
.
Babylonian names for Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, the three Jewish exiles who were cast into the fiery furnace for their refusal to worship idols (Daniel 3).
Shaf
‘a
(Arab.,
shafa‘a
, ‘double, repeat a prayer’).
Intercession
in Islam. The
Qur’
n
insists that no intercession will be possible on the
Day of Judgement
, which will evaluate a strict balance of good and evil works. However, the efficacy of
Mu
ammad's
intercession becomes a matter of
ijma‘
(agreed belief by consensus), making him something much closer to a redeemer. To Mu
ammad were then added many other intercessors, e.g. angels and martyrs (
shah
d
), and, among the
Sh
‘a
,
Im
ms
(especially for
Ithna ‘Ashariy(y)a
,
al-Mahd
), and
F
ima
.

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