War on Sacred Grounds - 9780801448065

War on Sacred GroundsAuthor(s): Ron E. Hassner\nFormat: Hardback\nPublisher: Cornell University Press, United States\nImprint: Cornell University Press\nISBN-13: 9780801448065, 978-0801448065\nSynopsis\nSacred sites offer believers the possibility of communing with the divine and achieving deeper insight into their faith. Yet their spiritual and cultural importance can lead to competition as religious groups seek to exclude rivals from practicing potentially sacrilegious rituals in the hallowed space and wish to assert their own claims. Holy places thus create the potential for military, theological, or political clashes, not only between competing religious groups but also between religious groups and secular actors.\n\n In War on Sacred Grounds, Ron E. Hassner investigates the causes and properties of conflicts over sites that are both venerated and contested; he also proposes potential means for managing these disputes. Hassner illustrates a complex and poorly understood political.