Religion

Facts and Background Information
Selected print and electronic encyclopedias, dictionaries, handbooks, etc.
Books
Locate items in the library catalog and other libraries.
Articles
Use indexes to search for articles in journals, proceedings, etc.
Primary Sources
Websites
Recommended academic, professional, and learned societies sites, and more.
Contact a Librarian

Below are a few major, frequently used sources for the study of Religion. See also the research guides to Philosophy, Classical Studies, and General Humanities.

Please consult with a reference librarian for directions to many more sources in your topic. Internet resources require a Tufts I.D. number for off-campus access (authorized users statement).

 

Facts and Background Information     [back to top]

Dictionaries

Dictionary of Comparative Religion
[PRINT. Tisch Reference BL31 .D54]

Dictionary of Non-Christian Religions
[PRINT. Tisch Reference BL31 .P36]

Modern Religious Movements: The Annotated Dictionary of Modern Religious Movements
[CD-ROM - Request at Tisch circulation desk]

Oxford Dictionary of World Religions
[PRINT. Tisch Reference BL31 .O84 1997]

Encyclopedias

Encyclopaedia Judaica
[PRINT. Tisch Reference DS102.8 .E496]

Encyclopaedia of Islam
[PRINT. Tisch Reference DS37 .E5]

Oxford Islamic Studies Online
A comprehensive source of articles on religious and political aspects of Islam and the Islamic world, including the Oxford Dictionary of Islam, the Oxford History of Islam, and a concordance and two translations of the Qur’an.

Encyclopedia of Religion
[PRINT. Tisch Reference BL31 .E46]

Encyclopedia of Eastern Philosophy and Religion: Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, Zen
[PRINT. Tisch Reference BL1005 .L4813]

Mythologies
[PRINT. Tisch Reference BL311 .D513 1991]

Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Contains full content of the original 10-volume set on subject matters including Anglo-American, ethical and political, cross-cultural, interdisciplinary, continental and contemporary philosophy. Also includes regularly added new articles, as well as editorially reviewed links to other sites and resources on the web.

Companion to Literary Myths : Heroes and Archetypes
[PRINT. Tisch Reference PN56.M95 D4813 1992]

Find Books     [back to top]

These databases use Library of Congress subject headings:

Library Catalog How To Use

Boston Library Consortium Catalogs How To Use

Worldcat How To Use
Catalog records from thousands of North American libraries.

For more on how to find books, see Database Searching Tips (also available in PDF).

Find Articles     [back to top]

ATLA Religion Database 1949- How To Use
The American Theological Association's Religion Database covers journals, multi-author books, and book reviews in Biblical studies, world religions, church history, and religious perspectives on social issues. This is the online edition of Religion Index One and Two, and Index to Book Reviews in Religion.

Philosopher's Index 1940- How To Use
An international index to philosophical journals, books, dissertations, and translations. Links to the full-text of all Project Muse philosophy journals.

Bibliography of Asian Studies
An index of Western-language articles, monographs, and book chapters published since 1971.

Index Islamicus
The Index Islamicus covers Islam, the Middle East and the Muslim world. It is produced by the Islamic Bibliography Unit of the Cambridge University Library and indexes articles back to 1906.

International Medieval Bibliography. Brepols, 1967-
An international index to medieval topics (400-1500) in literature, language, history, archaeology, art, music, theater, Arabic and Islamic studies, and religion and philosophy. IMB covers 4,500 journals and over 5,000 miscellany volumes in 30 languages.

Expanded Academic ASAP How To Use
Articles from more than 1,500 scholarly, trade, and general-interest publications, including national news and commentary. Coverage is from 1980 to current and is updated daily. Some full text is available.

Arts & Humanities Citation Index. Institute for Scientific Information, 1974- How To Use
Provides author, subject and citation access to journal articles and book reviews in the arts and humanities. Coverage from 1974. Part of Web of Science.

Electronic journals

Periodicals are listed in the library catalog. Holdings in all formats are unified in one record, and most entries for journals held in electronic format contain a hyperlink to the source; searches in the web-based catalog enable one to follow these links directly. A complete list of electronic journals is on the Tisch homepage under Electronic Journals.

Many humanities/social sciences journals held in digital format are parts of Project Muse or JSTOR. Although these databases include search engines for the journals they contain, the indexes listed above are the most comprehensive and authoritative sources for the literature of the discipline, and frequently link directly to our electronic journals.

For more on how to find articles, see Database Searching Tips (also available in PDF).

Primary Sources     [back to top]

Acta Sanctorum How To Use
A collection of documents examining the lives of saints.

ArchivesUSA How To Use
Information about primary source materials from U.S. manuscript repositories, with detailed indexes of manuscript and other special collections.

The Bible in English How To Use
20 different versions of the English Bible from the 10th to the 20th century, including 12 full Bibles, 5 New Testament texts, 2 versions of the Gospels only, and William Tyndale's translations of the Pentateuch, Jonah and the New Testament.

CETEDOC. Brepols, 1991-
[CD-ROM - Request at Tisch reference desk]
Full-text database of Christian Latin texts, covering the late 2nd century to the 15th century.

Early American Imprints 1639-1819
An online collection reproducing every extant book, pamphlet, and broadside published in America from 1639 to 1819 - the complete printed, non-serial source materials of American culture for the 17th and 18th centuries. Covers titles in the Evans and Shaw-Shoemaker bibliographies. Available also in microform: TISCH MICROFORMS F700.

Early English Books Online How To Use
Over 125,000 titles listed in Pollard & Redgrave's Short-Title Catalogue (1475-1640), Wing's Short-Title Catalogue (1641-1700), and the Thomason Tracts (1640-1661), comprising all known English language books from the beginning of printing to 1700. Years 1474-1640 are available also in microform, TISCH MICROFORMS R484.

Patrologia Latina How To Use
The works of the Church Fathers from Tertullian in 200 AD to the death of Pope Innocent III in 1216.

Patrologiae Graecae
The most comprehensive record of Greek patristic material in existence, comprising digital images of more than 160 book volumes.

Websites     [back to top]

Internet Resources for the Study of Judaism and Christianity

National Reference Center for Bioethics Literature

Search Religious Texts

TOCS-IN
Provides searchable tables of contents of 160 journals in Classics, Near Eastern Studies, and Religion. Complete coverage from 1992 to present, with earlier contents from some journals.

Voice of the Shuttle: Religious Studies Page

For more on how to find and evaluate websites, see How to Evaluate Web Sources.

Contact a Librarian     [back to top]

Christopher Barbour. Contact for questions about library collections.
Chris Strauber. Contact for reference questions and instruction requests.

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