This paper focuses on the theology of mission of the Rhenish Missionary Society (RMS). The RMS succeeded in converting the Batak peoples in North Sumatra (present‑day Indonesia) to Protestantism. The work of RMS missionary Johann Warneck “The Batak Religion” (1909), on the one hand, presented the correct description of the indigenous Batak religion, and on the other hand, criticized it from a strict religious‑exclusionist position. Such a configuration is rare: usually apologetic texts debunk the beliefs of opponents by old traditional templates, when scholars of religious studies strive to minimize their confrontation to another culture. This is namely an “epistemological blade”: Warneck could never himself have developed the methods he successfully employed, while scholars of religious studies would never have agreed with Warneck’s relation to the Batak religion. This case highlights an unobvious problem for further study: in what historical, social, religious, political situations can texts that walk the epistemological razor’s edge be produced? Answers to these questions will pave the way to the correct discussion on whether the Western methodology of science is universal.

This article analyzes the main English-language works and the concepts related to the study of the Buddhist cult of relics. This area of research is actively developing in global Buddhology, while only the first publications in this area are appearing in the Russian academic literature. The introductory part of the article gives the classification of Buddhist relics and briefly examines the historical and terminological issues associated with this cult. Next, three main research approaches to this phenomenon are considered. The first considers relics as an ontological and/or functional equivalent of the Buddha, who left this world and entered nirvana. Within this framework, the most typical interpretation perceives the relics as special “bodies” of the Buddha. The second, “narrative” approach, considers the relics of the Buddha and the stories associated with them as a continuation of the Buddha’s “biography.” The third approach looks at the connection between relics and power relations. The last two concepts, however, seem to be complementary to the first one which remains fundamental.

The article, using the memories of the life of Radjabova Salikha Idiyatovna (born 1926) — the Soviet Muslim woman, examines the processes and practices of constructing identity of Muslims of USSR in the interdiscourse space of the Bogoyavlensky Staro-Golutvin Monastery monastery in Kolomna in the 20–50s years of the 20th century. The author focuses on the interaction of three key components of this process: Muslim, ethnic and Soviet discourses, and analyzes their influence on the construction of the identity of the article’s heroine. Drawing upon Yuri Lotman’s notion of subjectivity and examining the practices of Soviet Muslims that focus on identity construction, along with their agency and various forms of interaction or resistance to dominant power narratives — particularly the responses of individuals to the encroachments of external discourses, this work seeks to articulate the concept of Muslim subjectivity.

The article examines the merging of Soviet and Islamic discourses in the manuscripts of Muslim scholar Fatḥ al-Qādir Babichev (1890–1973). Engaging with atheistic ideology, Babichev crafts a unique refutation of atheism, where Marxist-Leninist and Islamic teachings intertwine, forming an integrated but complex discursive space where elements of each support the other. In analyzing the ways of such overlapping, I consider Babichev’s casus as a manifestation of “cultural bilingualism” in the late-Soviet context. The attempt to legitimize Islamic thought for Soviet realities and Soviet ideology for Islam demonstrates a nuanced Muslim engagement with the Soviet regime, suggesting a more intricate relationship than simple resistance or assimilation. A microhistorical lens reveals Babichev as an agent navigating various models of adaptation while contributing to the intellectual history of Soviet Muslims as keeper of local scholarly traditions.

The article, based on ethnographic material collected among Muslim entrepreneurs in 2023–2025 in Moscow, Saint Petersburg, Tatarstan, and Dagestan, analyzes the practice of istikhara as a way of dealing with uncertainty when making economic and life decisions. Relying on the concept of semiotic ideologies, the article demonstrates that istikhara takes various forms, both ritual and semiotic. The study distinguishes three analytically distinct semiotic regimes of istikhara: divinatory, hermeneutic-procedural, and normative-ethical. Each of them differently defines permissible ways of “reading” divine signs and differently structures the uncertainty of the future — from delegating the decision to the ritual to refusing the semiotization of events. An important place in the study is given to the concept of good (blago), correlated with the concept of barakat (blessing) — informants refer to these categories to describe the consequences of their decisions, which allows them to interpret failures and setbacks as part of the divine plan. In conclusion, the article proposes to view istikhara as a way of existing in conditions of uncertainty by delegating responsibility to divine predestination.

The article discusses the peculiarities of the perception of peasant religiosity in the research of Soviet ethnographers of the 1920s–1930s who were members of the research groups led by N. M. Matorin (1898–1936). It is difficult to consider Matorin’s research activities outside the political history of Soviet ethnography, whose status and tasks were revised throughout the 1920s–1930s. In his early works, Matorin used the terms “double-belief” and “triple-belief”, while in later studies “religious syncretism” became the main subject of study. The traditional ideas of “mythological criticism” of Christianity were supplemented by Matorin’s “hypermythologism” of the semantic-paleontological approach. One of the group’s tasks was to show how the Soviet state was displacing the “old” way of life by collectivising agriculture, establishing schools and libraries, and bringing the “village” to a level of economic and social development close to that of the “city”. However, Matorin’s own texts pay very little attention to how the “'new” everyday life destroys the “old” one: his interest in the semantic-paleontological method was probably intended to create a universal model of cult development that could be used directly by anti-religious propagandists. Obviously, conceptually, the ideas and methods of Matorin and his followers were quite contradictory, forming a specific ethnographic “optic” determined by the ideological goals of modernisation and the “anti-religious struggle”. At the same time, the empirical material collected by the group’s members allows us to assess, at least in part, the peculiarities of the religious culture of the Soviet village in the 1920s and early 1930s.

The inseparable unity of dogmatics and mysticism as a distinctive feature of Eastern theology in comparison with Western theology, is one of the main theses that V. N. Lossky puts forward in his works. Lossky tried to demonstrate this unity using the example of the Corpus Areopagiticum, where he was proving that the triadological dogma is also revealed by Pseudo-Dionysius at the level of apophatic theology. Lossky makes a fundamental assertion that the antinomy of dogma is a manifestation of its apophatic ground. This article explores the manner in which this concept is manifested in Lossky’s interpretation of the fragment DN XIII, 3, which he consistently analyzed during his creative quest. It is suggested, specifically, that the misquotation of this passage in Lossky’s earlier writings stems from his reliance on a Latin translation of the treatise. Nevertheless, his later clarification of the text of “Areopagitica” based on the Greek original does not eliminate the issues associated with its interpretation, which are mainly reflected in the neglect of the terminology used by Pseudo-Dionysius. This terminology, as is well-known, evolved under the influence of Neoplatonists, including Proclus. Furthermore, it is proposed and supported that the specific formulation of the problem suggested by Lossky is influenced not primarily by the theology of the Ecumenical Councils era, but rather by the theological debates of the early twentieth century. During this period, a significant topic of discussion withIn Russian theological circles was the relationship between mystical experience and the principles of theological doctrine. Initial efforts were undertaken to clearly associate the normative depiction of mystical experience with established theological teachings.

The article focuses on P. D. Ouspensky’s assessment of Karl Duprel’s interpretation of Kant’s philosophy in “Tertium Organum”, his first major work. It considers the similarities and differences in the interpretation of Kant’s philosophy by Duprel and Ouspensky, and the cause of these differences. It shows that both thinkers use Kant’s philosophy to criticize materialism and “positive”/“official” science oriented on materialist ontology, as well as to justify the fundamental possibility of supersensible cognition. The main difference separating Ouspensky and Duprel is the understanding of the status of matter: while for Duprel matter really exists and will always exist in a transformed form, for Ouspensky matter is nothing more than a phantom, it has never really existed. In addition, for Duprel the world is a developing system, where the main subjects of development are individuals who always preserve their identity. Ouspensky, on the other hand, denies the reality of both any development and the existence of individuals (as understood by Duprel). Thus, the presence of obvious important coincidences combined with equally important differences leads to an unusual attitude of Ouspensky to Duprel’s ideas. He approves of him, quotes the German philosopher when considering Kant’s ontology and criticizes him omitting any reference when considering the key issues of the theory of cognition.

The article is dedicated to the memory of the outstanding Russian scholar Marianna Mikhailovna Shakhnovich (1957–2025). Analyzing the life of Marianna Mikhailovna, the authors of the article tried to identify the main milestones in the history of the formation of this outstanding scholar. The article notes the influence of Marianna Mikhailovna’s parents on her worldview, famous Russian religious researchers M. I. Shakhnovich and L. I. Emelyakh. The authors analyse the significance of M. M. Shakhnovich’s works as a historian of ancient philosophy and researcher of the Epicurean tradition. They also show the importance of Shakhnovich’s historical and religious studies for her work on the history of ancient philosophy. In this context, the researcher of Epicureanism I. A. Borichevsky is mentioned, whose diaries she prepared for publication. Authors give a general overview of the works and projects of M. M. Shakhnovich devoted to the study of the Russian religious tradition. The authors also refer to the methodological problems of the study of Soviet period, discussed in Shakhnovich's works. Her recent works devoted to the scientific legacy of the religious scholar E. G. Kagarov are particularly considered. The last thematic section of the article is devoted to her work on cognitive religious studies, for the development of which she had high hopes.