The Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Religions (2703 page)

 
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World's Parliament of Religions
.

A meeting of representatives of the major world religions at Chicago in 1893. The meeting was sponsored by the League of Liberal Clergymen, who saw the encounter of religions as an opportunity of extending religious vision and morality by co-operation rather than by proselytizing conflict. A further World Parliament of Religions was held in 1993, to mark the centenary of the first, also in Chicago. Attempts to establish a World Council of Religions were coolly received. Instead, the possibility of Centres for Interfaith Study were envisaged, which might then form networks of consultation. A Global Ethic was proposed, drawing together the common elements in the
ethics
of different religions.

 
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see
ARMSTRONG, H. W.

 
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see
CONCORDAT
.

 
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Worms, Diet of
.

The imperial diet of 1521 at which M.
Luther
defended his teaching before the emperor Charles V. He refused to recant. According to an early tradition he concluded his answer with the famous words ‘Here I stand. I can do no other. God help me. Amen.’ A few weeks later he was declared an
‘outlaw’
by the papacy and his teachings were formally condemned.

 
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Worship
.

The offering of devotion, praise, and adoration to that which is deemed worthy of such offering, usually God. Worship of that which is less than God as though it is equivalent to God, especially if it is addressed to particular images, is
idolatry
. In non-theistic religious, worship is more usually expressed as gratitude to the enlightened guide or guides, as with Buddhists and Jains.
More often, however, worship is associated with the adoration of the supreme Being, the unproduced Producer of all that is, from whom all things and all events ultimately come, and to whom all things return. This sense of the transcendence of God necessarily evokes worship. From this sense of the absolute majesty, holiness, and supremacy of God derives Israel's life of worship, of the constant recognition of God in
Temple
,
sacrifice
,
Psalms
,
pilgrimage
, and eventually
synagogue
,
liturgy
, and
Prayer
Book—epitomized in
kiddush ha-Shem
. By wearing the
tefillin
, an observant Jew bears on his body a constant worship of God.
Christians inherited this sense of God's independence from, and yet concern for, the universe which he has created—and in particular they inherited the Psalms, which from the start informed their religious intelligence and became the backbone of prayer and devotion. But Christianity recognizes in Jesus the incarnate presence of God, through whom praise and worship is offered to the Father—in other (less contingent) words, transcendence and immanence are held together in the reality of Jesus’ own prayer.
Islam shares the Jewish sense of the absolute uniqueness and oneness (tawh
d) of God. Since this and its consequences (not least in belief and behaviour) are made known in the
Qur’
n
, the very chanting of the Qur’
n (even without a knowledge of what it means) becomes an act of worship. But the acknowledgement of God is so fundamental that it becomes a daily obligation in
al
t
, and an annual obligation in
awm
, the month-long fast in Rama
n—both of these being among the
Five Pillars of Islam
. But Muslim devotion goes far beyond obligation, spectacularly so in the case of the
S
f
s
.
An attitude of worship and devotion is equally characteristic of Hindus and it defies brief description. Worship (
p
j