The MA Religious Studies at Leiden University is designed to equip students with the tools and knowledge required for studying, interpreting, and analysing religion as a diverse (human) phenomenon. With its world-class scholars and access to exceptional research collections, the programme offers the…

What moves an individual, a society or a culture? How does religion relate to politics, economics and morals? Religion is everywhere and often plays, unnoticed, a large role in the daily lives of yourself and others.

Mathilde Mechling defended her thesis on 28 january 2020.

This dissertation focuses on a new field of artistic research in which a visual artist takes on the role of researcher. The main research question is whether performance art integrated in an ecumenical service, combined with artistic directions from the artist, can enhance the religious experience of…

Markus Altena Davidsen and colleagues Michaël van der Meer, Maurits Berger and Kim Beerden received a subsidy from the KNAW-Pilotfund. They will use the 10.000 € for an inspiration book for teachers religion/worldview.

A selected group of unpublished amulets from various collections in the world will be studied and edited.

Jifeng Liu defended his thesis on 2 February 2017

Linda Stuckrath Gottschalk defended her thesis on 6 April 2016.

The bachelor program Religious Studies has, besides also Linguistics and Ancient Near Eastern Studies, been awarded by the 'Keuzevakkengids Universiteiten 2019' with the predicate top program.

Leiden’s Religious Studies ranks 40th place in the QS World University Rankings by Subject.

This study investigates and analyses didactical approaches in theory and practice of both scholars and expert teachers in Religious Education/Life World Orientation (for secondary level) in their role as Identity Agents in order to discover and develop didactical key components contributing to religious…

This study discusses the position of the monasteries in pre-1950s Tibetan societies and how that position was informed by Buddhist monastic ideology.

This project explores the religious lives of a Surinamese Hindu community practicing in Amsterdam at the Sri Radha Krishna Mandir from an interdisciplinary perspective.

Thirteen Centuries of Creed, Conflict and Coexistence

The BA Religious Studies programme has been awarded the label 'Topopleiding' (Top Education) in the Keuzegids 2021.

The presence of religious idioms in people’s responses to vulnerability and misfortune is not unique to Aceh, or to Indonesia. Yet the scale of the tsunami coupled with the historically deeply ingrained presence of religion in Acehnese everyday life has magnified religious discourses on misfortune,…

History and Religious Studies in Leiden rank # 17 and #32 in the QS World University Rankings by Subject. With this, History in Leiden ranks as the best in The Netherlands and Religious Studies ranks as second best.

Religions involve belief in the unbelievable: in evil spirits causing disease, in souls surviving death, and in gods punishing wrongdoers and blessing the just. Cognitive studies suggest that humans are predisposed to speculate about fate and divine agency, but support from so-called ‘plausibility structures’…

This project will lead to a critical edition and annotated translation of the Niśvāsamukha, the opening book of the Niśvāsatattvasaṃhitā.

How has interreligious encounter in Ogbómòsó created multiple religious belongings and identities among individuals and groups?

Recently, studies have shown the similarities and differences in sources of meaning between religionists, ‘nones’ and atheists (see several studies of Schnell and others). The present study that will be conducted in three European countries tries to clarify the relationship between meaning giving and…

This study elucidates a critical facet of modern global Buddhism that has escaped the attention of the scholarly community by exploring the life, teachings and influence of Master Wuguang 悟光上師 (1918-2000).

The programme focuses on the medieval dynamics of intellectual life in the Rhineland and the Low countries, nowadays divided over five countries (Switzerland, France, Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands) but one cultural region in the later Middle Ages.

They might not have had Twitter, but they did have brochures (pamphlets), the Roman Catholics and ‘modern’ Protestants between 1840 and 1870. In these, they launched a passionate attack on each other’s ideas. Ineke Smit has catalogued the brochures from the collection of the University Library and outlined…

Leiden University Centre for the Study of Religion (LUCSoR), Thursday 10 and Friday 11 November 2016

Abdessamad El Amraoui defended his thesis on 6 Mai 2015.

This study describes religion in Java.

It gives us great pleasure to report that the search for a University Lecturer in Christianity in the Modern World has resulted in the appointment of Corey Williams, starting January 2015.

Channi Li defended her thesis on 15 October 2019.

Religion and ethnicity are inextricably linked in discourse within and about Central Asia. One common narrative suggests that as a result of differences between historically sedentary and nomadic populations, ethnic Tajiks and Uzbeks are naturally more religious and more likely to radicalise than their…

How can the importance of the image in late medieval spirituality be understood in the context of the love mysticism inspired by the imagery of the Song of Songs?