BOOK REVIEWS

I srael B artal : The Jews of Eastern Europe, 1772–1881 , trans. C haya N aor . Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2005 [2002]; pp. vi + 203. J ay R. B erkowitz : Rites and Passages: The Beginnings of Modern Jewish Culture in France, 1650–1860 . Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004; pp. 333. G eorge B ernard : The King's Reformation. Henry VIII and the Remaking of the English Church . New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2005; pp. xii + 736. M adeleine B iardeau : Stories about Posts: Vedic Variations around the Hindu Goddess . Trans. A lf H iltebeitel , J ames W alker , and M arie ‐L ouise R einiche . Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2004. pp. 358. 108 halftones, 10 figures, 3 maps. T. P atrick B urke : The Major Religions: An Introduction with Texts , 2d ed. Malden, Oxford, and Carlton: Blackwell Publishing, 2004 [1996]; pp. xix + 380. L orne L. D awson , ed.: Cults and New Religious Movements: A Reader . Malden, MA, Oxford, and Melbourne: Blackwell Publishing, 2003; pp. 312. C arl W. E rnst : Rethinking Islam in the Contemporary World . Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2003. I an F orrest : The Detection of Heresy in Late Medieval England . Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2005; pp. vii + 277. I an H unter , J ohn C hristian A nderson , and C ary J. N ederman , eds: Heresy in Transition: Transforming Ideas of Heresy in Medieval and Early Modern Europe, Catholic Christendom, 300–1700 . Ashgate: Aldershot, 2005; pp. xii + 205. M arion M addox : God Under Howard: The Rise of The Religious Right in Australian Politics . Crows Nest: Allen and Unwin, 2005; pp. 386. A rthur F. M arotti : Religious Ideology and Cultural Fantasy: Catholic and Anti‐Catholic Discourses in Early Modern England . Notre Dame: The University of Notre Dame Press, 2005; pp. xii + 307. C hristine M eek and C atherine L awless , eds: Studies on Medieval and Early Modern Women: Pawns or Players? Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2003; pp. 224. S ushil M ittal and G ene T hursby , eds: Religions of South Asia: An Introduction . Abingdon: Routledge, 2006; pp. 307. S ushil M ittal and G ene T hursby , ed.: The Hindu World . New York and London: Routledge, 2004. pp. 657. K arla P oewe : New Religions and the Nazis . New York and London: Routledge, 2006; pp. xii + 218. A dam P ossamai : Religion and Popular Culture: A Hyperreal Testament . Brussels: Peter Lang, 2005; pp. 176. J anine T asca S awada : Practical Pursuits: Religion, Politics, and Personal Cultivation in Nineteenth‐Century Japan . Honolulu: University of Hawai Press, 2004: pp. 432. S tefanie B. S iegmund : The Medici State and the Ghetto of Florence: The Construction of an Early Modern Jewish Community . Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2006; pp. xxii + 624, 2 maps, 9 figures. A nna M. S ilvas : The Asketikon of St Basil the Great, Oxford Early Christian Studies . Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005; pp. xx + 517, 1 map, 7 appendices. M ichael S trmiska (ed.): Modern Paganism in World Cultures: Comparative Perspectives . Santa Barbara, Denver and Oxford: ABC‐CLIO, 2005; pp. ix + 382. R obert A. F. T hurman and the AIBS team , trans.: The Universal Vehicle Discourse Literature (Mahayanasutralamkara) . New York: American Institute of Buddhist Studies at Columbia University and Columbia University's Centre for Buddhist Studies and Tibet House US, 2004. pp. 368. C laire W alker : Gender and Politics in Early Modern Europe: English Convents in France and the Low Countries . New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003; pp. xii + 247. R. W illis and P. C urry : Astrology, Science, and Culture: Pulling Down the Moon . Oxford and New York: Berg, 2004; pp. v + 170. J ohn W itte , J r . and R obert K ingdon : Sex, Marriage and Family in John Calvin's Geneva: Volume 1: Courtship, Engagement and Marriage . Grand Rapids, Michigan, and Cambridge: William B. Eeardmans Publishing Company, 2005; pp. xxxii + 512.