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Pure Land Buddhism

(Encyclopedia)Pure Land Buddhism or Amidism, devotional sect of Mahayana Buddhism in China and Japan, centering on worship of the Buddha Amitabha. According to the Pure Land Sutras, composed in India in the 2d cent...

Yazoo land fraud

(Encyclopedia)Yazoo land fraud, name given to the sale in 1795 by an act of the Georgia legislature of vast holdings in the Yazoo River country to four land companies following the wholesale bribery of the legislat...

Shalim, Land of

(Encyclopedia)Shalim, Land of shāˈlĭm [key], in 1 Samuel, unidentified region, perhaps N of Jerusalem. ...

reclamation of land

(Encyclopedia)reclamation of land, practice of converting land deemed unproductive into arable land by such methods as irrigation, drainage, flood control, altering the texture and mineral and organic content of so...

Kollontai, Aleksandra Mikhaylovna

(Encyclopedia)Kollontai, Aleksandra Mikhaylovna əlyĭksänˈdrə mēkhīˈləvnə kələntīˈ [key], 1872–1952, Russian revolutionary, diplomat, and novelist, whose maiden name was Aleksandra M. Domontovich. Th...

Eric IX

(Encyclopedia)Eric IX (Eric the Saint), d. 1160, king of Sweden. He led (1157?) a Christian crusade to Finland, where he left the bishop of Uppsala in charge of missionary work. While attending mass he was killed b...

Cincinnati, Society of the

(Encyclopedia)Cincinnati, Society of the [Lat. pl. of Cincinnatus], organization formed (1783) by officers of the Continental Army just before their disbanding after the American Revolution. The organization, with ...

Friends, Religious Society of

(Encyclopedia)Friends, Religious Society of, religious body originating in England in the middle of the 17th cent. under George Fox. The members are commonly called Quakers, originally a term of derision. The org...

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