Interreligious Comparisons in Religious Studies and Theology: Comparison Revisited

Can religions be compared? For decades the discipline of religious studies was based on the assumption that they can. Postmodern and postcolonial reflections, however, raised significant doubts. In social and cultural studies the investigation of the particular often took precedence over a comparative perspective. Interreligious Comparisons in Religious Studies and Theology questions whether religious studies can survive if it ceases to be comparative religion. Can it do justice to a globalized world if it is limited on the specific and turns a blind eye on the general? While comparative approaches have come under strong pressure in religious studies, they have started flourishing in Theology. Comparative theology practices interfaith dialogue by means of comparative research. This volume asks whether theology and religious studies are able to mutually benefit from their critical and constructive reflections. Can postcolonial criticism of neutrality and objectivity in religious studies create new links with the decidedly perspectival approach of comparative theology? In this collection scholars from theology and religious studies discuss the methodology of interreligious comparison in the light of recent doubts and current objections. Together with the contributors, Perry Schmidt-Leukel and Andreas Nehring argue that after decades of critique, interreligious comparison deserves to be reconsidered, reconstructed and reintroduced.

Table of Contents:
Contributors Acknowledgements Introduction Andreas Nehring, Perry Schmidt-Leukel Part 1 Comparison: Contestation and Defence 1 Comparative Methodology and the Religious Studies Toolkit Paul Hedges 2 Comparison in the Maelstrom of Historicity: A Postcolonial Perspective on Comparative Religion Michael Bergunder 3 Modes of Comparison: Towards Creating a Methodological Framework for Comparative Studies Oliver Freiberger 4 Comparison as a Necessary Evil. Examples from Indian and Jewish Worlds Philippe Bornet Part 2 Phenomenology and the Foundations of Comparison 5 Camouflage of the Sacred – Can We still Branch Off from Eliade’s Comparative Approach? Andreas Nehring 6 The Singular and the Shared: Making Amends with Eliade after the Dismissal of the Sacred Kenneth Rose 7 Religious Practice and the Nature of the Human Gavin Flood 8 On All-Embracing Mental Structures: Towards a Transcendental Hermeneutics of Religion Fabian Völker Part 3 Reciprocal Illumination and Comparative Theology 9 Comparative Theology and Comparative Religion Klaus von Stosch 10 Reciprocal Illumination Arvind Sharma 11 On Creativity, Participation and Normativity. Comparative Theology in Discussion with Arvind Sharma’s Reciprocal Illumination. Ulrich Winkler 12 Christ as Bodhisattva – A Case of Reciprocal Illumination Perry Schmidt-Leukel Bibliography Index

About the Author :
Perry Schmidt-Leukel is Professor of Religious Studies and Intercultural Theology at the University of Muenster, Germany. Andreas Nehring is Professor of Religious Studies and Intercultural Theology at the University of Erlangen, Germany.

Review :
A contemporary and in-depth study of issues in interreligious comparisons and an impetus for new studies of this topic. [A] coherent and well-constructed work ... Strongly documented and without excessive jargon, these essays provide useful insights into current issues and debates. (Bloomsbury Translation) Truly refreshing … represents a very important and much needed contribution to methodological questions in the study of religions, and I will be certain to use it in my graduate course on history and method in comparative religion. To the many critics of religion as a universal phenomenon and of comparative theology as a valid academic project, this collection offers a needed and a multi-faceted response. The contributors make their diverse cases that the complexity and dangers of comparison do not outweigh the possibility, the promise and indeed the urgency of “reciprocal illumination” (Arvind Sharma). This book not only “revisits,” it revitalizes comparative studies and the promise of real learning from real differences. Interreligious Comparisons in Religious Studies and Theology: Comparison Revisited edited by Andreas Nehring, Perry Schmidt-Leukel is an important and timely contribution to renewed discussions of comparative method in religious studies and in theology. Its twelve chapters provide us with thoughtful and probing analyses of comparative method and its role in the study of religions. The essays range across the field, addressing comparison from historical, phenomenological, cognitive, and theological perspectives. Interreligious Comparisons is a signal contribution to the study of religion, and its essays both build on and challenge current methodological orthodoxies. It will be the go-to resource for those seeking a renewed role for comparative method in the study of religion and in comparative theology.