Paper short abstract:

Architect Lipót Baumhorn co-designed Szeged's synagogue (in Hungary, 1903) with dr Immánuel Löw rabbi and botanist who applied his immense knowledge in the decoration of the synagogue. Löw designed the synagogue garden as an organic part of the synagogue, presenting the flora of Israel and Hungary.

Paper long abstract:

Synagogues are usually not built in gardens or parks, yet this is what happened in Szeged, Hungary in 1903, and it is by no means a coincidence. The co-designer of the synagogue was the chief rabbi of Szeged, one of the greatest botanic scholar of his time, specialised in the plants of the Jewish tradition. He wrote several books both as a rabbi and a scientist. His most famous work is probably Die Flora der Juden (“The flora of the Jews”), which deals with the various plants mentioned in Jewish sources with a focus on Rabbinic literature. Thus he applied his knowledge to the iconography of the synagogue and the plants in the garden. The garden around the synagogue was designed according to Immánuel Löw’s plans presenting the flora of Eretz Israel and Hungary.

The garden was destroyed in 1944, and the synagogue was empty after the Holocaust since Szeged lost most of its Jewish population. Recently, between 2015-18 it was renovated from the outside, and the garden too was reconstructed. 35 of the 76 plants were replanted, those that are frost tolerant. These include cedar, amber, pomegranate, fig, yew, apple, almond, rowan, wild grape, thuja, myrtle, linden and birch. Researchers identified the original flora based on the speeches of the chief rabbi, the plant motifs of the windows of the synagogue, and the Jewish Folklore Bulletin of 1907-1908. The Szeged synagogue might be the only synagogue standing in a garden.

Paper short abstract:

Western Siberia is home to three sacred springs on the sites of Stalin-era prison camps. This paper will examine how people perceive these beautiful locations in spite of (or because of) their connection to a violent and troubled past and renegotiate its memory.

Paper long abstract:

Western Siberia is home to three sacred springs located on the sites of former Stalin-era prison camps. The prison buildings were razed after the camps were shuttered, and portions of the sites returned to a natural state. This paper will examine how people perceive these beautiful locations in spite of (or because of) their connection to a violent and troubled past. Interviews with local residents make clear that the physical features of the springs plays an important role in understanding their sacrality. While local legends paint a horrific picture of the camps, this past has been re-framed through the lens of the spring's beauty. These two elements provide a start contrast between the present-day loveliness and the violent past. This paper will explore how these two contrasting views of the site serve to remake the GULAG past. The narratives focus on the religious victims, a selective vision of history that illustrates how memory of this period is being reconstructed. The religious practices at the springs in a place of great beauty are set against the backdrop of this remade past. The springs and the stories told about them allow visitors to come to terms with the disturbing history of their region and to forge an identity consonant with post-socialist values.

Paper short abstract:

Weatherlore documents the folklore of the environment. Using the concept of belief as process and based on a collection of work on weather and religion, this paper queries why, in an age of meteorology and climate science, understanding the weather remains so tied to belief and religion in the west.

Paper long abstract:

Weatherlore documents the folklore of the environment and human interactions with it, from red skies at night predicting fine weather to small talk about an especially wet summer. Climate change, however, while global, has shifted how humans engage with and make sense of their weather locally. Seeking to document this phenomenon, a colleague and I began to collect articles for a book on weatherlore in the age of climate change in early 2020. Nearly half of the articles submitted centered on religion, religious belief, and faith. Authors probed the division in how climate change is understood in American evangelicalism, considered how weather events were construed as divine retribution, and examined how climate change has affected the teaching of religious scripture to children in Ireland. Even the way that most of us in the west interact with our daily weather forecast suggests a relationship centered on belief. While forecasting the weather may be defined as a scientific paradigm and methodology, its listed synonyms suggest something else: augury, prediction, soothsaying. Using Marilyn Motz’s understanding of belief as process, this paper queries why – why, in an age of scientific rationalism, of university degrees in meteorology, is human understanding of climate in the west tied so closely to belief and religion?

Paper short abstract:

Crystals as natural minerals are valued as a way to (re)connect with spiritual powers of nature, which is based on a holistic worldview in New Spirituality. Perception and use of crystals express human-nature relationship and green ideology. However, the ecological effect of mining is often ignored.

Paper long abstract:

Crystals are natural minerals that belong to material religion of New Spirituality, and they are also part of spiritual commerce and global trade. My presentation is based on my anthropological research on the practice of wearing crystals and commerce of crystals in Estonia.

According to a holistic worldview in New Spirituality, material world and nature, and spiritual realm are essentially connected and interrelated. This unity of nature and the spiritual world is based on immanent and divine essence, often described as spiritual energy. Crystals are attributed with energetic qualities that have a healing effect on people who wear them or practice crystal therapy. Crystals are also valued as natural minerals. My informants associate spiritual power of crystals with their long-term formulation in the ground, which is linked to a perception of the Mother Earth, or Gaia, who is seen as a living organism in New Spirituality. Minerals too are perceived as other-than-human persons to communicate with, in new animist terms. Crystals as material objects are spiritually and aesthetically valued as a way to (re)connect with spiritual powers of nature.

Perception and use of crystals express a human-nature relationship and green ideology in New Spirituality. Crystals are valued and regarded as being powerful because of their inherent connection with the Earth and nature. However, mining crystals has an ecological effect, that retailers and shopkeepers are aware of, but not communicating it to clients, and due to the extensive global trade of minerals, their origin often remains not located.

Paper short abstract:

Within Scotland and Wales are two sites with ancient yews in which churches were built around them. However, as yews are considered sacred by multiple spiritualities, who is responsible and who is allowed to claim responsibility for protection of these yews?

Paper long abstract:

One of the oldest trees in the world, the yew tree is considered sacred by multiple spiritualities including Christians and pagans. The Celts of early Britain regarded it with reverence, utilising branches for their own religious purposes while also viewing it as tree that represented life and death. As Christianity moved, then settled, into Britain churches began to spring up around yews, incorporating their sacredness within the Christian framework. Although yew trees are contemporarily associated with Christianity, many neo-pagan groups are reclaiming yews into their own spiritual context. However, when a sacred element is physically housed within one spirituality's landscape, who is the proper steward? Utilising case studies from my own PhD research within Scotland and Wales, I explore the concept of who is responsible for ensuring the maintenance and protection of the sacred yew within the confines of the churchyard and how that responsibility manifests outside the governance of the church.