Volume 5 of the
EC contains 295 articles constituting the alphabetical entries Si-Z -- articles on significant topics ranging from sin, spiritual direction, Sufism, and terrorism to Vatican I and II, Vineyard Christian Fellowship, World Alliance of Reformed Churches, and Zionism. Like each volume in the complete
EC, this book incorporates many enhancements of and additions to the third revised edition of the German
Evangelisches Kirchenlexikon: Internationale theologische Enzyklopadie, on which the
EC is based. Among the features of this English work are the following:
- articles on all but the smallest countries of the world, including former communist states that have gained their independence since 1989;
- the latest, best statistical information, compiled by David B. Barrett, on the religious affiliation and ecclesiastical breakdown of each country and continent;
- the addition of over seventy biographical articles on prominent figures throughout church history;
- many expanded or entirely new articles that address topics of particular interest to English-speaking readers.Unparalleled in scholarship and breadth of content, theEncyclopedia of Christianity will long serve as the standard reference work for the study of Christianity in the past and the present -- and its trajectory into the future.
