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This presentation advocates for the revival of theology as a craft, specifically by teaching theological students the craft of a theologian. To achieve this, it raises three questions: 1. What is the artisan mentality compared to the peasant mentality? 2. How should theology be understood as a craft, and how can it be taught as such? 3. Is it even permissible to pursue theology as a craft? In conclusion, it draws several insights: the theologian we increasingly need is a true artisan who continually learns, is willing to retrain to provide the best for the congregation; who becomes humble by projecting themselves and their theology; and who, while respecting the traditions of the fathers and the lives of Christian people, is ready to purify the Gospel from the sterile explanations of bygone eras and proclaim it as eternal truths.

In ancient Israel, the lack of winter rains was not only seen as an economic crisis, but also as a warning from God. Whenever the rainy season passed without rainfall, the sages proclaimed a public fast. Part 2 of the Mishnaic tractate Tacanit treatise deals in detail with the rituals that the patriarch, the president of the tribunal, the clergy and the members of the congregation were required to perform. The external ceremonies, such as the sprinkling of ashes on the ark, included various blessings which pointed to the real purpose of fasting: to set the heart back on the right path. The days of fasting, therefore, provide an opportunity to fulfil the prerequisites for conversion: confession and repentance of sins. The chapter also mentions the days on which fasting is expressly forbidden and those who are exempt from fasting in the strict sense. Lastly, because it was a matter of the repentance of the community, the sages also took care to ensure that thus traders did not fall into the sin of greed, and tried to exclude any attempts of abuse in business.

Der Para-Traktat der Mischna erklärt unter dem Titel die „Die rote Kuh“ die Bestimmun­gen bezüglich 4 Mose 19. Nach einer kurzen Einleitung folgt die Übersetzung von drei Kapi­teln mit kurzen Sacherklärungen. Dies ist die erste ungarische Übersetzung des Textes.

In 1956 Bishop László Ravasz expressed his views on church policy and the general situation of religious communities in Eastern Europe before the meeting of the Central Committee of the World Council of Churches in Galyatető, Hungary. His text was conceived as “advice” addressed to the members of the Bethany Movement. My paper’s main target is to contextualise and publish this interpretation regarding the relationship between Christian Churches and the communist state.
In 1958 a major turning point appeared in the church-state relation on both sides of the “Iron Curtain”. After the Lambeth and Nyborg Conferences, Western openness and diplomatic efforts led to the enlargement of the World Council of Churches (New Delhi 1961), gathering Protestant and Orthodox Churches in the communion of prayer and work. At the same time, Nikita Khrushchev’s totalitarian attempt to annihilate religious structures in the Soviet Union was concealed behind his apparent “disposability for dialogue”. By organising the „Christian” Peace Conference (Prague 1958), the Kremlin continued “destalinisation”, promoting, in fact, Stalin’s policy of apparent peace in the East-West relations, while the political police went on destroying the Church and the aim it was created for. The new abuses were justified by the slogan of “Leninist legality”. Trying to find the Romanian way to build communism, Gheorghe Gheorghiu Dej, the old-new party leader and his subdued judicial system brought religious faith in the prisoner’s box. Persecution focused especially on religious minority groups, such as Catholics, Reformed, Unitarians, Lutheran Evangelicals, Pentecostals, Baptist, and others, but, also, attacked the majority Orthodox monastic life. During the show-trials, the fictive scene became a sacrificial place, where those who were searching for the truth of God fell prey to the injustice of the immolators who imposed by force their atheistic “truth”.
The National Council for the Study of the Securitate Archives (CNSAS) has been preserving detailed data, descriptions of the facts and nuances concerning thousands of aggressors and victims of (post-) Stalinism. Emblematic was the case of Richard Wurmbrand, who first suffered imprisonment (after a sentence pronounced in a Kangaroo Court), being released afterwards by the authorities in 1964, for an amount of 10 000 USD.