Open Questions

Open Feri Tradition

Why It Is Open Feri passes from teacher to student through small covens and houses with no central registry, and general surveys of American Paganism count Wiccans and Pagans as one combined category without separating this smaller initiatory current from the larger traditions around it.

What Would Settle It A survey that asked self-identified witches or Pagans specifically which initiatory lineage, if any, they belong to would let a Feri-specific figure be drawn where only a combined estimate exists today.

Question posed in Her Hidden Children: The Rise of Wicca and Paganism in America, Chas S. Clifton.

Open Folk Shinto

Why It Is Open Folk Shinto names an uncodified stratum of household and local custom rather than an organization anyone joins, with no shrine registry or denominational rolls of the kind Shrine Shinto and Sect Shinto both keep, so no demographic source counts its practitioners apart from the general population.

What Would Settle It A household practice survey that asked specifically about unaffiliated local and seasonal kami observance, rather than about formal religious affiliation, would be the only way to estimate a population that institutional records cannot capture by design.

Question posed in Folk Shinto (Encyclopaedia Britannica), The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica.

Open Mennonites

Why It Is Open Mennonite Church USAs Executive Board publishes its own annual audit, and a net-asset figure was reported in secondary coverage, but that figure could not be independently confirmed by reading the underlying audited document in this research pass, so it was not written into the atlas.

What Would Settle It A directly readable copy of Mennonite Church USAs own audited financial statement, or a current Mennonite World Conference Fair Share total with its underlying figures.

Expertise Needed Nonprofit financial reporting and Anabaptist denominational administration.

Question posed in Fair Share Contribution (Mennonite World Conference).

Open African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church

Why It Is Open Reporting outlets and denominational pages carrying a consolidated total-assets or budget figure for the AME Zion Church returned access errors when checked directly; the denomination does not appear to publish a single consolidated financial statement the way some larger denominations do.

What Would Settle It A consolidated financial statement, IRS Form 990-equivalent filing or audited annual report published by the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church's own General Board, or a reporting outlet's successful access to one.

Expertise Needed Nonprofit and denominational finance, religious studies

Open Jehovah's Witnesses

Why It Is Open Jehovah's Witnesses' UK and Canadian branches file public charity returns, and US Brooklyn real estate sales are documented property records, but Germany imposes no comparable financial disclosure requirement, and a German media report on a ZDF documentary investigation records the German headquarters declining to state its annual donation income when asked directly.

What Would Settle It A German regulatory filing requirement reaching the Jehovah's Witnesses' public-law corporation, a leaked or court-disclosed internal financial statement, or the organization's own voluntary disclosure of a figure it has so far declined to give.

Expertise Needed German religious law (Körperschaftsrecht) and the sociology and investigative journalism of new religious movements' finances.

Question posed in ZDF-Reportage Zu Den Spenden Bei Den Zeugen Jehovas (pro Medienmagazin, 2023), Jorn Schumacher.

Open Bulgarian Orthodox Church

Why It Is Open The Bulgarian Orthodox Church's own governing Statute, adopted by the Sixth Church-People's Council on 11 December 2008 at Rila Monastery and read in full at its official hosted address, covers ecclesiastical structure, the selection of church leaders, synodal organization and diocesan administration, and contains no provision anywhere on parish funding, member giving, tithes, dues or voluntary contributions. No other Bulgarian Orthodox source addressing member giving specifically has yet been found on this axis.

What Would Settle It A primary Bulgarian Orthodox Church source (a parish or diocesan stewardship statement, a Holy Synod financial policy) or a scholarly study of Bulgarian Orthodox parish finance, stating whether an ordinary member is expected to give a set amount or percentage.

Expertise Needed Bulgarian Orthodox studies, primary source review of Bulgarian Orthodox Church financial governance

Question posed in Statute of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church.

Open Church of God in Christ

Why It Is Open Two scanned editions of the Official Manual, the denomination's own binding text, were located and fetched directly and both render only as compressed image data, not readable text. Four other sources describing the denomination in detail were checked and none of them addresses tithing at all, so the only description of the Manual's own tithing language found so far is a secondhand, unverified reference.

What Would Settle It A text transcription or OCR of the Official Manual's own chapter on tithes and church finance, or a scholarly source that quotes the Manual's tithing language directly rather than describing it secondhand.

Expertise Needed African American religious history and Pentecostal denominational studies

Question posed in Divinity Atlas Open Questions Register, First Edition.

Open Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church

Why It Is Open The word asrat, literally "tithe", is well documented historically, but as a state-administered land tax of one tenth of agricultural produce collected by secular officials (mesle, gult gash, cheqa shum), administered separately from the Church's own monastic gult land holdings, per a peer-reviewed regional economic history of one Ethiopian ruler's own early-20th-century tax system. Two bands across this axis have now searched (scholarly databases, the Fetha Nagast, the Encyclopaedia Aethiopica) and found no canonical or doctrinal Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church text stating a personal member giving percentage. A modern US diaspora parish's own fundraising campaign uses the word "Asrat" in its title, showing the term is in living use, but a single campaign title is not a doctrinal statement of what the Church formally expects.

What Would Settle It A direct reading of a canonical Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church text, a Holy Synod statement, or a scholarly ethnography of contemporary EOTC parish finance (in Ethiopia or in the diaspora) stating whether an ordinary member is expected to give a set percentage of income and what follows if they do not.

Expertise Needed Ethiopian studies, primary source review of Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church canonical texts

Question posed in The Taxation System of Ras Haylu Taklu Haymanot of Gojjam: 1907-1932, Geremew Eskezia.

Open Georgian Orthodox Church

Why It Is Open A named-author 2021 Carnegie Endowment for International Peace policy report on the Georgian Orthodox Church's political and financial position documents its state funding channels in real detail, annual budget transfers, land, buildings and vehicles from the Georgian government and local municipalities, and never once addresses ordinary parishioner or member giving. Two bands on this axis have now searched specifically for a Georgian Orthodox tithe, due or stewardship norm (the 2002 state concordat, general Orthodox stewardship literature, Georgian-language donation terminology) and found nothing that names the Church's own practice.

What Would Settle It A primary Georgian Orthodox Church source (a parish or diocesan stewardship statement, a Patriarchate financial policy) or a scholarly study of Georgian parish-level finance specifically, stating whether an ordinary member is expected to give a set amount or percentage.

Expertise Needed Georgian religious studies, primary source review of Georgian Orthodox Church financial governance

Question posed in The Orthodox Church in Georgia's Changing Society, Archil Gegeshidze and Mikheil Mirziashvili.

Open Ukrainian Orthodox Church

Why It Is Open The Ukrainian Orthodox Church's jurisdiction is genuinely contested (the Orthodox Church of Ukraine under the 2019 Tomos of Autocephaly against the church previously under the Moscow Patriarchate), and no single source found across two bands establishes a giving norm for either reading of it. The Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the USA's own institutional announcement of a general stewardship resource promotes giving only in general spiritual terms, "the deep spiritual roots of Orthodox stewardship", with no stated percentage, due or consequence for a member who does not give, distinct from the codified due-with-consequences shape already recorded on this axis for Serbian and Armenian parish practice.

What Would Settle It A primary source from a specific Ukrainian Orthodox jurisdiction (the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the USA, or the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of Canada) stating a specific dues, pledge or tithe structure and what follows, if anything, when a member does not meet it; or a scholarly study of Ukrainian Orthodox parish finance addressing member giving specifically.

Expertise Needed Slavic Orthodox studies, primary source review of Ukrainian Orthodox jurisdictional finance

Question posed in New Blog: Office of Stewardship.

Open Skoptsy

Why It Is Open The sect produced no systematic theology. It left its teaching in hymns sung from memory and in the answers its members gave under interrogation, and almost everything recorded about that teaching passed through police, consistory and missionary hands. Those witnesses were prosecuting or refuting the sect and had every reason to record it at its most extreme, so the necessity claim may belong to the sect or to the men writing it down. The surviving hymn corpus has never been edited critically, and it has not been read against the depositions district by district and decade by decade.

What Would Settle It A critical edition of the Skoptsy hymn corpus and of the community manuscript books held in Russian archives, collated against the interrogation depositions from the same districts and dates, would show whether the necessity claim is the sect's own language or the language of the officials recording it.

Expertise Needed Slavic philology and the history of Russian religious dissent, with archival access to imperial police and consistory files

Question posed in Castration and the Heavenly Kingdom: A Russian Folktale, Laura Engelstein, The state's files on the sect and the problem of reading a doctrine out of them.

Open Kimbanguist Church

Why It Is Open The scholarly literature the atlas holds on this church is Marie-Louise Martin's 1975 study and Bengt Sundkler's earlier comparative work on prophet movements, which argue opposite readings of the founder's status but both predate the church's later doctrinal development by decades. The atlas has no source of its own for what the church's leadership has taught since, so the debated relation it carries is written from the two twentieth century camps only.

What Would Settle It A current Kimbanguist catechetical or confessional document, or a recent peer-reviewed study of the church's twenty-first century teaching, either of which would let the debated relation be dated and scoped properly instead of resting on sources fifty years old.

Expertise Needed African church history; the study of African Initiated Churches; Congolese religious studies

Question posed in Divinity Atlas Open Questions Register, First Edition.

Open Order of Nine Angles

Why It Is Open The identification most often made in print, with David Myatt, is denied by Myatt himself, and no independent documentary or forensic evidence establishes who wrote under the name. The order's early history is documented mainly through its own publications.

What Would Settle It A stylometric comparison of the earliest Anton Long texts against Myatt's other pseudonymous and signed writing, or documentary evidence such as publisher correspondence or internal order papers naming the author, would settle it.

Expertise Needed Textual and stylometric analysis; history of new religious movements

Question posed in Satanism: A Social History, Massimo Introvigne.

Open Shwedagon Pagoda

Why It Is Open Gold-tonnage claims for the pagoda circulating in travel journalism range roughly tenfold, six to over sixty tons, and a widely repeated three billion dollar figure for the gem-crowned finial traces to no identifiable primary source or methodology.

What Would Settle It A published inventory or valuation from the Board of Trustees of Shwedagon Pagoda itself, or an independent appraisal by a body with access to weigh and assess the gold and gems in place.

Expertise Needed Cultural heritage appraisal and Myanmar religious-trust administration, and financial journalism with primary-source access.

Question posed in Cash Donations Rising for Myanmar Pagodas: Religion Minister (The Irrawaddy).

Open Wat Phra Kaew and the Emerald Buddha

Why It Is Open No source, credible or otherwise, attempts a monetary figure for the statue or the temple building specifically. Only the far broader Crown Property Bureau, of which the temple is one holding among many, has drawn outside estimates, and those cannot be read back onto the temple itself.

What Would Settle It A statement from the Bureau of the Royal Household or Crown Property Bureau isolating a value or insurance figure for the Emerald Buddha or Wat Phra Kaew specifically, apart from aggregate crown-property estimates.

Expertise Needed Thai royal and crown-property administration, and cultural heritage appraisal.

Question posed in Temple of the Emerald Buddha (Google Arts & Culture).

Open Dwarkadhish Temple, Dwarka

Why It Is Open The temples own Wikipedia article and the Devbhumi Dwarka district government tourism page both give no administering body and no financial information. Searches repeatedly surface unrelated organisations sharing similar names, a diaspora temple in Parlin, New Jersey among them, which risk misattribution if not held apart.

What Would Settle It Identification of the current legal trust or committee administering the Dwarka temple, ideally via a Gujarat state devasthan or trust-registration record naming it directly.

Expertise Needed Gujarat temple-trust and charity-law administration.

Question posed in Dwarkadhish Temple (District Devbhumi Dwarka, Government of Gujarat).

Open Trinity Lavra of St Sergius

Why It Is Open The monastery is well documented as historically one of Russias wealthiest landowners through the 19th century, but no source addressing its finances since its 1945 reopening to the Church was located.

What Would Settle It A published statement from the Lavra administration or the Moscow Patriarchate naming any income, endowment or budget figure, or scholarly research into post-Soviet Russian Orthodox monastic finances.

Expertise Needed Russian Orthodox Church administration and post-Soviet religious economics.

Question posed in Trinity St. Sergius Monastery (David B. Miller, Encyclopedia of Russian History, via Encyclopedia.com), David B. Miller.

Open Mount Athos

Why It Is Open Documented figures cover only external Greek government and EU support to the peninsula as a whole. None of the twenty self-governing monasteries, nor the Holy Community that coordinates them, was found to publish its own financial statement.

What Would Settle It A published account from the Holy Community of Mount Athos or an individual monastery naming its own income, endowment or treasury, or an independent scholarly economic study of the monastic republic.

Expertise Needed Greek Orthodox monastic administration and the economics of self-governing religious communities.

Question posed in PM Mitsotakis Pledges 100 million euros for Mount Athos.

Open Ajmer Sharif

Why It Is Open The statutory Dargah Committees own books cover only its own income and fixed deposits. Nazarana offerings collected directly by Khadims through the Anjuman committees sit outside those books, and their scale is the subject of a live 2024-25 dispute: the Ministry of Minority Affairs ordered a CAG audit in March 2024 after allegations of misuse, and the Anjuman challenged the order in Delhi High Court in May 2024, arguing the offerings belong to the Khadims personally.

What Would Settle It Publication of the ordered CAG audit findings, or a court-settled determination of whether Khadim-collected Nazarana falls within the Dargah Committees disclosure duty.

Expertise Needed Indian statutory-trust law, the Ministry of Minority Affairs regulatory process, and investigative journalism.

Question posed in CAG Audit of Ajmer Sharif Dargah Finances: Know the Anjuman Committee Claim.

Open Saint Peter's Basilica and the Vatican Necropolis

Why It Is Open The Holy See has released whole-institution budget and balance sheet figures since October 2020, but the Fabbrica di San Pietro, the historic office administering Saint Peter's Basilica since the sixteenth century, has never published a figure isolated to the Basilica's own income, offerings, or the Fabbrica's own maintenance and construction fund.

What Would Settle It A future Vatican financial disclosure that itemizes the Fabbrica di San Pietro's own accounts separately from the Holy See's consolidated statement, or a leaked or independently audited figure for the Basilica's own finances.

Expertise Needed Vatican financial administration and canon law, and investigative or financial journalism covering the Holy See.

Question posed in Vatican Releases Budget, Balance Sheet Amid Financial Scandal (Associated Press via Al Jazeera, 2020), The Associated Press.