Julien Ries

Cardinal coat of arms by Julien Ries. Text: The love of Christ drives us. (The guiding principle of the Christian order of the Alexians .)

Julien Cardinal Ries (born April 19, 1920 in Fouches, now part of Arlon ; † February 23, 2013 in Tournai ) was a Roman Catholic archbishop , doctor of theology , ancient orientalist and religious historian .

Life and career

Julien Ries joined after attending high school in the minor seminary of Bastogne into the seminary of Namur. On December 8, 1945, he received by Bishop André Marie Charue the priesthood . He continued his studies in theology and oriental studies at the Catholic University of Leuven , and later at Louvain-la-Neuve . There he completed a licentiate in history and philosophy and was awarded a doctorate theologiae in 1957 . As a priest of the Namur diocese , he was first chaplain in Martelange , professor of religion in the high school of Athus (1950-1959), pastor and dean of Messancy (1959-1968) and finally pastor of Suarlée from 1968 to 2000. He then worked as a pastor active in Villers Saint Amand and committed a. a. for the spiritual family “Das Werk” .

From 1960 Julien Ries taught in Louvain . In 1968 he took over the chair for the history of religion and founded the "Center for the history of religion", of which he was president. From 1975 to 1980 he headed the "Institute for Oriental Studies of Louvain-la-Neuve". From 1979 to 1985 he was a member of the papal “Secretariat for Non-Christians” (from 1988 Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue ) and from 1984 to 1993 a member of the editorial board of the “Dictionnaire des Religions”. In 1990 he retired from the Catholic University of Leuven.

On February 11, 2012, Julien Ries received the ordination as titular archbishop of Bellicastrum from the Apostolic Nuncio in Belgium, Archbishop Giacinto Berloco , in Villers Saint-Amand ; Bishops Rémy Vancottem and Aloysius Jousten were co-consecrators . His motto Caritas Christi urget nos (“The love of Christ urges us”) comes from the 2nd Corinthians ( 2 Cor 5:14  EU ). In the consistory of February 18, 2012, Pope Benedict XVI took him . as cardinal deacon with the title deaconry Sant'Antonio di Padova a Circonvallazione Appia in the cardinals college . On October 20, 2012 the solemn occupation of this church took place.

In 1984 Julien Ries was accepted into the Order of Knights of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem . In 1992 he was appointed Commander and in 2012 with a motu proprio from the Grand Master he was raised to the rank of Grand Cross Knight of the Order.

Julien Cardinal Ries died on February 23, 2013 in Tournai and was buried in the cemetery at the Notre Dame church in Villers-Saint-Amand .

Honors

In 1986 he received the Dumas Miller Prize of the Académie Française for his complete scientific work. In 1987 he was also awarded the Furtado Prize by the Académie Française . In 2010 he was awarded an honorary doctorate in philosophy in the field of bioethics by the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart in Milan . Some of his books received other prizes, for example in the USA.

Work and characteristics

Julien Ries is considered the founder of religious anthropology . Until his retirement in 1990 he taught the subject “History of Religions” at the Catholic University of Leuven , where in 1970 he also founded the Center d'Histoire des Religions of Namur- Suarlee. He was the author, editor and co-editor of around 40 relevant books and has published over 400 articles on the history of religion, including numerous scientific articles on Manichaeism , Gnosticism , comparative religious studies and on the topic of "Dialogue between Religions and Cultures".

Julien Ries, whose importance for religious studies is compared to Mircea Eliade , whose ideas he has dealt intensively with and is regarded as his legacy, was particularly fascinated by the phenomenon of the sacred and the anthropology of Homo religiosus as well as the role played by the Development of human consciousness plays a role especially in the discovery of transcendence . Myth and symbol of what he called Homo symbolicus , rituals and structures of religious behavior are also essential topics for him in this context. Overall, however, his interests were very broad, including writing books on world religions for children. (The 12-volume series on the religions of mankind, which he had actually published for students at Jaca Book together with Clément Olivier and Lawrence Sullivan, received the Hans Christian Andersen Prize for the best series in children's literature in 2000 ) All of this reflects Among other things, in his extensive private library, which he held together with manuscripts, notes, worksheets for courses and the scientific correspondence that he had conducted with specialist scholars around the world, the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore ( Catholic University of the Sacred Heart ) in Milan in 2009 handed over, a total of around 8000 published and unpublished objects, which now form the “Julien Ries Archive for Symbolic Anthropology”, which is headed by Professor Silvano Petrosino, who holds the chair for semiotics and moral philosophy .

The best way to sum up the character of his oeuvre, however, is the reason for being awarded an honorary doctorate in philosophy in Milan in 2010, where it is said that he had the Dr. phil. hc received: "for the intrinsic value of his studies, his tireless work in the field of cultural studies, for his decisive contribution, which he has made with his research for the understanding of the phenomenon of religion, especially with regard to the nature of Homo religiosus ." the topic of his lecture held on this occasion is typical in this sense, because his topic was: “Death, survival, immortality. Thoughts and Religious Traditions of the People ”.

The Italian priest, anthropologist and paleoanthropologist Fiorenzo Facchini writes in the foreword to "The Origin of Religions" by Julien Ries about this and his methods, which are no longer primarily based on evolutionary, ethnological, sociological or purely philosophical-phenomenological foundations, as they were still in the 19th century. and early 20th century were common in the absence of prehistoric and early historical evidence: “He adheres to the historical, phenomenological and hermeneutical method that, according to Mircea Eliade , the historian of religion is allowed to use, and relies essentially on paleoanthropological, prehistoric and prehistoric documents and their corresponding interpretations […] Julien Ries not only shows that Homo religiosus already existed in the oldest human forms ( Homo habilis and Homo erectus ). He also provides us with a masterly picture of the concepts and methods of religious historical research and presents the religious experience in the various historical epochs with great fidelity to the source and with a coherent interpretation [...] In this work the author shows his inimitable ability to the reader to transport you back to the atmosphere of the past. He almost includes him in the religious experience. ” According to Ries, mythograms , symbolic thinking and transcendence were the main factors in the development of religious thinking even in early man, according to him in Christianity with the encounter between the divine and the human found its highest expression.

With the 10-volume series " Treatise on the Anthropology of the Sacred ", Julien Ries, together with over 50 scholars from all over the world, made a decisive contribution to the development of the subject of religious anthropology , in the history of religion, history, Cultural history, prehistory and paleoanthropology, ethnology and sociology have entered into a close connection.

Publications

The collected works of Julien Ries are currently being published by the Milanese publishing house Jaca Book . 11 parts in a total of 18 volumes are planned.

Already published:
(The partly Italian, partly French titles are reproduced here in German and offer an additional overview of the entire spectrum of his work.)

• Christians and Religions (Part 1, Volume 1; 2007).
• The religious man and his experience of the sacred (3rd part; 2007).
• Man and the sacred in human history (Part 2; 2007).
• The symbol (4th part, 1st volume; 2008).
• Myth and Ritual (Part 4, Volume 2; 2008).
• The science of religion (5th part; 2008).
• Comparative religious history and hermeneutics of religions (6th part, 2009).
• Encounter and Dialogue (Part 1, Volume 2; 2009).
• The Gnostics. History and teaching (9th part, 1st volume, 2010).

To his other works:

• The Religions of Mankind (1999–2001, published in 10 languages).
• The expression of the saint in the great religions (3 vols., Louvain-la-Neuve, 1978–1986).
• Dictionaries of Religion (Paris, 1984, 1993).
• The symbols in the major religions (ed.) (1988/1997, Jaca Book).
• Discoverer of human thought. George Dumézil and Mircea Eliade (2000, Jaca Book).
• The myth. His message and language through culture (ed.) (2005, Jaca Book).
• The sense of the sacred in cultures and religions (2006, Jaca Book).
• In Search of God through Religious Anthropology (2009, Jaca Book).
• On the Anthropology of the Sacred (10 volumes, 1989–2009, Jaca Book).
• Sacred Mountains (2010, Jaca Book).

Currently available in German from Julien Ries are:

• Julien Ries: Origin of Religions . Pattloch Verlag, Munich 1994, ISBN 3-629-00078-9 .
• Natale Spineto, Fiorenzo Facchini , Julien Ries: The symbols of humanity . Patmos Verlag, Ostfildern 2003, ISBN 3-491-96145-9 .
• Julien Ries: Islam . In: The world religions . Innsbruck 2004, ISBN 3-7022-2583-8 ( manufacturer recommended age: 12–13 years ).
• Julien Ries, Peter Lindenthal : The world religions. Buddhism . Tyrolia Verlag, Innsbruck 2004, ISBN 3-7022-2582-X . (also for children and teenagers)
• Julien Ries: The world religions. Hinduism . Tyrolia Verlag, Innsbruck 2004, ISBN 3-7022-2610-9 . (also for children and teenagers)

Web links

• Literature by and about Julien Ries in the catalog of the German National Library
• Ries, Julien. In: Salvador Miranda : The Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church. ( Florida International University website), accessed November 17, 2016.
• Entry on Julien Ries on catholic-hierarchy.org ; Retrieved November 17, 2016.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Monseigneur Julien Ries A SIGNIFICANT MERRY CASE FOR THE ORDER - Annales ordinis equestris sancti sepulcHri hierosolymitani 2013 (PDF; 544 kB)
2. ↑ Annales 2013: Obituary Julien Ries , Order of Knights of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem, p. 29.
3. ↑ La morte del cardinale Julien Ries
4. ↑ Cardinal Julien Ries (93) overleden
5. ↑ Ries, Julien. In: Salvador Miranda : The Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church. ( Florida International University website , English)
6. ↑ See the video on YouTube
7. ↑ studyitaly.it: UCSC celebrates its 90th anniversary ( Memento of the original from May 4, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The  archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Accessed April 3, 2011.
8. ↑ centridiateneo.unicatt.it: Archivio Julien Ries: Presentazione - Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore ( Memento of May 8, 2012 in the Internet Archive ), accessed on April 3, 2011.
9. ↑ Mircea Eliade: the hermeneutics of the religious phenomenon (PDF; 278 kB)
10. ↑ meetingrimini.org: The Rimini Meeting and the Church ( Memento January 22, 2013 in the Internet Archive ), accessed April 3, 2011.
11. ↑ Ries, origin d. Religions, pp. 116–156.
12. ↑ ^{a b} TREATISE ON THE ANTHROPOLOGY OF THE SACRED (PDF; 301 kB)
13. ↑ Academic Newsletter - Spring 2010
14. ↑ cattolicanews.it: Le motivazioni per la laurea - Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore ( Memento of the original from November 3, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The  archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Accessed April 3, 2011.
15. ↑ Morte, sopravvivenza, immortalità Il pensiero e le tradizioni religious dei popoli (PDF; 96 kB)
16. ↑ Ries: Origin of Religions, p. 5.