882 sacred sites: Africa and customs to follow in every minute detail of the temple cult, precisely because it could no longer actually be realized The substitution of text for cult was so complete that when in the 350s the Apostate Roman Emperor Julian undertook to rebuild the temple (never completed because of his death), Jewish religious leaders were far from enthusiastic over his offers to allow them to renew cultic practice there Nevertheless, prayer performed at the ruins of the temple (but not inside them, for entry is forbidden to Jews by Talmudic law) is considered especially holy; one of the things they must pray for there is the restoration of temple by the coming messiah For this reason, and in light of the entire history of Jerusalem, the city and the land of Israel as a whole was a destination of pilgrimage to Jews throughout the Middle Ages Christians, too, considered Jerusalem and Israel, as the scene of Jesus’ life and ministry, to be their own sacred place, and pilgrimages to the Holy Land were being made in late antiquity One impetus of the Crusades was the belief that those sacred lands ought to be under Christian political control Since journeys to a place as far distant from western Europe as Jerusalem was impractical, however, medieval Christians began to make pilgrimage to sites considered holy because they supposedly contained relics of the persons described in the New Testament, such as the body of James the Apostle in the cathedral at Santiago de Compostela in northwestern Spain Pilgrimages also could be made to churches containing the relics of later saints In fact, an entire itinerary was developed, describing the spiritual merits of the pilgrim that derived from the importance of the relics visited, the distance traveled, and the personal inconvenience endured (Walking up flights of steps on one’s knees was considered beneficial, for example.) Pilgrimage is an even more central feature of Islam Every Muslim (unless prevented by some extraordinary circumstance) is required to make at least one pilgrimage to Mecca (the hajj) to view the places important in the early history of Islam there and at the neighboring city of Medina Jerusalem, the site of Muhammad’s ascension to heaven in Islamic tradition, is equally an object of Islamic pilgrimage as much as in Judaism and Christianity Islamic authorities built two shrines on the Temple Mount, the Dome of the Rock, from where the prophet is said to have ascended, and the al-Aqsa Mosque Africa by Tom Streissguth The religious worldview known as animism has been present in Africa for thousands of years By one definition, animism finds spiritual force in natural surroundings Spirits inhabit lakes, rivers, forests, mountains, and deserts, providing essential water, food, and soil to those living nearby and protecting such places from desecration by outsiders Unlike the monotheistic faiths that arose in the Middle East and which arrived in Africa in the centuries just before and during the early medieval period, the animism of Africa was not expounded in books; its doctrines changed with each society, often with each individual community Through the medieval period animist beliefs on the African continent were an integral part of everyday life; they were learned within families and understood by all members of African communities, providing a basic framework for their perception of the world and for understanding the workings of fate and the natural world Animist belief was not under the guard of experts or scholars, nor was the faith renewed by regular visits or prayers in sanctified buildings There were few sanctified locations at all; rather the entire natural world was understood as the abode of spirits—good or bad, benevolent or malevolent Manifestations of otherworldly energies were seen in natural phenomena, such as a volcanic eruption, which often marked a location as important Particular locales, as a result of human or natural events or merely through their appearance, were also sacred or taboo African societies perceived certain forest groves, remote mountains, empty deserts, or bodies of water as having a strong connection with the unseen world, making them appropriate places for sacrifice or propitiation of the spirits Other places threatened death or other misfortune for those who unwisely trespassed The Yoruba of Nigeria, whose kingdom flourished in the medieval period, marked off sacred groves outside their villages One of the most enduring was the abode of the river goddess Osun, who inhabited a forest near the city of Osogbo The goddess of the Osun River, she bestowed fertility, healing power, and protection on all those who came to worship her at the river’s edge Mount Kenya, or Kirinyaga, was known to the Kikuyu of eastern Africa as the home of Nagai, the god who created the world According to tradition, Ngai bestowed on the Kikuyu the surrounding land and granted worldly goods and good fortune in exchange for sacrifices made to the mountain Beginning in the 15th century the Dogon of Mali inhabited several hundred villages lying along a series of sandstone ridges—the cliffs of Bandiagara—that are 125 miles in length and reach 2,000 feet in elevation Sacred places in this area are associated with the cult of Binu; they were (and still are) used for ancestor worship, sacrifices, and communication with the spirits In the Dogon story of creation the sky god Amma made the god Nomo, who was transformed into several pairs of twins One of these offspring was sacrificed by Amma by