Religion and Human Rights An Introduction

The relationship between religion and human rights is complex and problematic throughout the world. Most of the world's religions have been used for violence, repression, and prejudice. Yet each of these religions can play a crucial role in the modern struggle for universal human rights. Human rights depend upon the values of human communities to give them content, coherence, and concrete manifestation. Religions have constantly provided the sources and scales of dignity and responsibility, shame and respect, restraint and regret, and restitution and reconciliation that a human rights regime needs to survive and flourish. This volume provides authoritative examinations of the contributions to human rights of Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Confucianism, Buddhism, and indigenous religions. Each chapter grapples with the concept and origins of "human rights," and offers insight into the major human rights issues that confront religious individuals and communities. These include core issues of freedom of religious conscience, choice, exercise, expression, association, morality, and self-determination. They also include analysis of the roles of religious ideas and institutions in the cultivation and abridgement of rights of women, children, and minorities, and rights to peace, orderly development, and protection of nature and the environment. With contributions by a score of leading experts, Religion and Human Rights offers a wealth of knowledge and analysis for understanding the contributions to human rights and the challenges faced by the world's religions.

John Witte, Jr., Director of the Center for the Study of Law and Religion at Emory University, is a world authority on legal history, marriage law, religious liberty, and human rights. He has published 25 books, 15 journal symposia, and 200 articles, and lectured throughout the world. His writings have appeared in ten languages, and he has won dozens of awards for teaching and research. M. Christian Green is a Senior Fellow of the Center for the Study of Law and Religion at Emory University. She has taught at Emory, Harvard, and DePaul. Her specialties include law and religion, feminism and the family, human rights, comparative religious ethics, and religion and international affairs.