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Inter-Religious Understanding

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297 views9 pages

Inter-Religious Understanding

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jayal
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INTRODUCTION Inter-Religious Understanding Nancy M. Martin T= challenge of inter-religious understanding has a new urgency and new dimensions in our day and for our increasingly global world community, but this challenge has been with us for a long time. In some parts of the world, like India, the encounter with people from different religious traditions has-been a daily fact of life for centuries. Hindus of many different persuasions — Buddhists, Muslims, Jains, Sikhs, Christians, and even small and very ancient communities of Jews and Parsis — have long lived together in villages across the South Asian subcontinent and have shared each other’s holy days and rituals, honored each other’s saints, and debated and appreciated each other’s religious teachings. Medieval poet-saints like Kabir have called for Hindus and Muslims to realize the sameness of the God they worship, just as there have also sometimes been violent conflicts, particularly when religion, communal identity, and politics have been interwoven. We can learn much from the Indian case, for the inter-religious encounter there has not been abstract but personal and immediate. Take for example one recent evening when I was in western Rajasthan in north India, not far from the Indian border with southern Pakisthan. Darkness had fallen and a dozen people converged on the courtyard outside a simple, small dwelling. The visitors, dressed in finery for the occasion, were directed to sit outside on string cots covered with brightly colored fabric mats, and a kerosene lamp was brought to offer a soft circle of light. 2 erncs wre wont secon rryonds spits wee high an here was grea antics ofthe mest to cane This wav a tine of lebron. The Malin hots wre observing ne ofthe Sve plas of sn ~ fasting bers and snow very forthe entire nar month of Ramadan ~ andthe day fasting fad come to an end There was much huge and convertion andthe spiey array of gat meat nd vegas with fs at read called hats or ras was exten with rea (though sme didnt partake of the meat). there in that courtyard wer Mess bit a ain, Hind, and Christians. Thogh ths was dsincly reiousoceion anda decely Masi one, twas joyous shared’ by ates of diferent faiths ~ a Alifienc tht ms ot meray teste bt elt oy led, Similar aterings ae eld thoughout the month of Ramadan in many lags and onthe econo ote Hindu and Masi bly days tn th ‘lage word those btongng tothe: lgions are fiends and nebo, ad this matualepptciation and elebration is much mere character ota than the pore lee inane by religous htrc wich is the stl of newspaper ates or teen ‘Unik in nds in many pars fsbo ord was posible uni ite ‘cnt tlie without tly encountering pope with dal sient igo Bal Buti is now becoming ceasing impose and, idee, undesirable, to lve in telgiowalyhemogencoue or lated Communes, And though dilgue might begin with an atempt 0 ‘explain the teachings of ons own tation to anther (py with he intent of conesion) and wih the emparion of repousemperinc, ‘ten very guy moves int the exploration of ow we 1s we might never conc divergent TER GOaE WORK ind ‘ruth claims, but dialogue can lad to a fmer baci for motual action in ‘the wot or standing together to denounce injustice and to promote the and at ome contin fo pedi the imme deme of the world religions, these religions are playing an increasing rather than decreasing rol on the worl stage. So much of our understanding of what Istight and wrong and how we think about the way we sould act inthe ‘wot is grounded in our understanding ofthe nature and mesning of Martin, wrxopvcrion 3 fan understanding that for the majority of the people in the work i ciecamscrbed by rion. th wos he much oe, Te ect eal the resoures wecan tes nd his ince the powell motion {bats rom he commited regs ie whether ane a Msi or 3 Badabinor«Conficano a Chistian, intel wer cto undo _ ‘on option or leita puss. Ths ome end the rer res of ‘hich itisa par, “The Library of Global Ethics and Religion ke up the halenge to Farther muta undestning among rligons partly ‘dh repr othe Das ethical prince they old nd the sures they tight bring to the adherents and tothe global community at we face Presing ethic challenges. This focus on ethic iv Rndamental Character of ntereliious encounter st the beginning of the twenty emu. But ow did we gett he pin? INTER-RELIGIOUS ENCOUNTER IN THE PAST Dalen eee eee ee ho ar poet tnt tah ves stat val agin or eijor RG Tannen nieces Bee ce toeee eta ete cae ee cca sor Potente mca tt eet ey Ta hs wey a Be ten rae ie came Gear aces ferptues. And the question-of. how. tances and caltual contents and what elements ae ceri to pa oe cs Feesioci eee ee eae res Ceickny bp ein ida eit meer, eng de Joe, cir mcrae ne da aa apse eg a are plabapeogherptiiegreieloy sad line Youn was ad ae ec 4 ees THe woRkD RALIIONS techn of Js Mohammad grew op among Js and Christan and Sow hedonic inn ith ht ofthe Jews nd Christian trlons ws hr euch rton nore thn anything de tht it de the ine Between In south Aa ixcenurs ere thi fea and wee unre yea bre Mund od nd Jini ew lng with he Upuishadcwaon ef Hindus rexcing ante pec oe ‘tng toni ena wtes Ince wil ont wer eat tanya identi themes ing the ince fd of Hindalm(oupt ow bene ofthe policiain of oan in ontempre) ln tnd the asiging of speci preg t lig tiniest has bcome expt ut ain spre) Dans {Tn conan gre up oer Chiao frm he sc entry tx anti par enc ee ih her. Un the Daoist Piloapher Chun Ts hunoroar stax, Conf nd his fllwer hen appear ste miguel oa Dai adept When Bodhi toned Ginn sroud 0x hoe tations were well 1 Two schools Tien Tal and usp, selected the Chine (Wath Dacia and Confacan) focas on harmony by inerating the various and sometimes seemingly conicing Dhuhist teachings and tere int nied stems, and_Ch ‘mesg. at ofthe contuenc of Buddhism and Daoist Confucianism «foe o Bain by dersopng a metas densa in its Neo-Confician forms. But thes rcigions abo co-exist in the les of Japa or amp, enti tema allows of FOF when that proximity Be ihe rr of cry 2 loi ‘Marta, wermooucion 5 domination, then intr-relgious understanding is often more limited, ‘we find in early encounters between "Western Christians and “other” religion such as Hinduism and Buddhism. Though some ofthe writings of travelers, misionaries, and colonizers sbowed deep appreciation, ‘most accounts were matked by an emphasis on the theres” the utter Aiferentness of those encountered. As European Christendom his ten done with Muslims, what they saw was an inverse of themselves — an “other” who was alernatey exotic or the embodiment of ether all those ‘ings they wished they were o al the things they did nt want to amit ‘hey were or potentially might be! In theater cae, thi often meant that ‘he “oher™ was sen as backward, stupid, childlike, superstitious, weak cruel, immoral and. in the colonialist rhetoric of hyper asclinty. effeminate An ample of ode’ version of this woud be the fle images Derpetuated in the American media ofall Mains ae violent terrorists ho oppress women, Man Css soot whos mening pom oot month) ond the wna ha Cau oc _wete all destined for etemal damsaign, Such viet ite reomefor-an—— “appreciation-of the-religioni of these “others” Further when Protesia Christians looked a Hindu ual prc, they sw wba seemed to te teth the dolaty condemned inthe Hebrow sips andthe Kind of ‘upeton and lind ert pitta ty od ted in the nase Enlghcameat analy andthe Relation Sichansodeean (or ack there) bleed the Bish jst oC height C0 Te over Inia ld ying gtr ony heya temas superior and beg avy ‘nthe ober hand some Buropen colonial fcr and ceri ely Achar sawn indi ami and ptt depth tht seemed to ave een Io inthe india evolution sod mae cu ofthe West They Iomaniczed indi. But agai, what they saw wat a reflection of theres either thin India or Hinds in il. (This Kind of Fomanizaton with us il para nthe way Budi se in Hines day. The site ofthe trae 2en Buchs monastic He a Jopn would quickly sharer most merc images of Buds) ALU tine, some Indians in South Asi struggling to def themes redhm th owe hag nthe fe of Br clonal domination technological sper ko embraced the Kea of Hind spi 6 aries nv THE WORLD RELCIONS superiority. They accepted. he-ctiqueeof Hinds stual practices and Jocatd the tre Hind tradition inthe distant pasand the TEs of the “Upanishads a nerpettions ofthe Vis that they chimed were he more ancient and 1 7 Twig there ic considerable variation nthe nature of interaction through the nineteenth century, iner-eligiows encounter was marked ‘rimarly by a sense ofthe radical difeence between world religions. “The First Partiament of the World's Religions ees ores Bee at ge io Plime Wa tromacd we Won ain Cag, Wie ~ ae een ee eee ‘ssaning (uh i rp wera Acc Peat Cena hag ee eat nd omelet Cameron wou wt cone scr he contre oni Chitty be Bae ta ee ae ele poorer on tan bce cre nt ones Zn moe sea pore thee maar Soe Sh tet tl beeen fr hi fucken mcd nunry ste Und Sta The hope of he ee ee ee Pade ee ee ee ee poe ney i apanese hits opel nt of tir dition Because the Christians knew litle sbout Buddhism, and, encountering. signs thnsing Japanese from some establishment, claimed tha they preferred to remain “heathens if this prejaicl tet ed Christian Vivekananda spoke from the Bhagavad Gite of the mile paths of Hinds and the unity of alt “Hindus” i itself an fnlsiit erm, ‘orginally coined. by ontsiersan'reeting merely Yo the people on the ‘er sd of the Indus (hat ison the whole South Asin subcontinent) ‘Manin, peropecrion 7 fad, even among unsophistated and formally uneducated Findus. When I was viding on a bus through rural Rajasthan, a poor farmer asked me who my ishadey was (in what form did I worship Go). Seeking to show understanding | spoke of God being one. The man said rather inpatieny, well of curse God is one, but who is your ihiadert (On a grander scale, Virekanands's teacher Ramakrishna had Visionary ‘encounters with Mohammad and with Christ which frm the ultimate tunity of rlgious paths” Although many delegates atthe Ptiament vere not yet ready to accept this Hindu incluiviy, they were deeply impresed with Vivekananda’ philosophical and theological presentation Of Hindeism, which ofred them an appeaing glimpse of a tradition raliallydiferet fom thee previous undersaing. ‘There was a gener call toward universality and common sround st ‘wasn confined to any c that all fad perceptions of tra and the rea. Ethical ‘considerations were raised, both caleagig the regis istutioos themselves and abo calling fr religion people to work together and 19 strive to live upto their own high ie, Critical woes, uch as Blzabeth Cady Stanton, who was inthe proces of writing The Woman’ Bible atthe lime, spoke out against racism and sexs across adions and eld for ‘mention w the plight of the pooc* Notably however, there was a been to practitioners of various African indigenous religious traditions tun African Musims among the save populations Forced conversion 19 CCrisinity marked much ofthe encounter with Native trations, with usopean Americans scemingly unabieto recogiae tho oer tations ts relipions and the massacre at Wounded Knee had happened only three Yrs before? Commonaiy and Diference cit began in ees Intensive translation work dat way ted re ntenth century insed and increased, making a ist aray of new material eval anncs the wider would, and there was a hf away from the adil “therog”of| dierent traditions toward a seach for the commonality bebween texdons a — pint Wis rans SER rte apo of we ‘perience sounded similar and oten seemed otanscend the partic of doctrine and practice, Wiliainar “Religious Experience in 1902, mapping ou the characteris of a mystical ‘aPeiene-that is seemingly commen to all religions and beyond the Aisinctve content of particular religious belie. The German scholar Radelph Owo explored thi sue farther in The Hes ofthe Holy (1923) nd Mystic Bast and Wes (1882, offering his now famous notion ofthe ‘ocourer withthe Divine a the nuninons Sper thon ‘sina. invoking in the human being seme of eve and bam, asin and paring ad the experince ofthe "whl other" Ino Ainge wa ecaming fr rgion the sprartional experince o this rely, + consiounen of which mus be weakened in us rater than fave (and arguing ais the mates of suspicion” ~ Feuerbach Freud and Mare who bad radial lenge the vaity of a religion). ens he fund this nivel, however OHS language remained thoroughly Cristian =the commonality est Was 2 ike ws" kind of ormonaliy= a reletin of howe Chistian cote Are developed is comparison erween Eas abd Wes, he sbowe exp appreciation or Shalar the eghth-emury formulstorof Ada Vea, bt nthe cod i wa cat hte ade hi comparison in dr jadgeeaitons inthe Goal anaybe hs jedpment vas rec. sfrention of CChvisianity which he aw asthe culation ofthe evolution ofthe sprit consccuses of humanity, even as Cs dlegitesatending the Paament i 1893 had. And mich ofthe comparative sty inthe fist ha ofthe twentieth entry shared thi ame oemation(ahough James managed arg to avoid this pt, “he apenas inthe Wes 1 the possi that eligins othe Grist might onan tru tepn to encompass Wider end wider ices Inthe radial ors ofthe most Tce coun ofthe Reman ‘Cote Church Vaca nh ent 196 he Dogue Consaton repiding Catholic ates toward the other regions ofthe word ‘ns arming that the ay be Wh in ter eins alg Mart nerrooecrion 9 psf et pan ing on eng ee aes [ok] crete tee ot aarsoaey acs ‘ibogh ail orig th al ed uit eth of Ces ‘opts of this inclasvst vison are traced back, tings ofthe early churd ‘hited to preserving and exploring diference a the pendulum swung back to the ned to recognize that other religous takions were net simply variants of "us" A postive result of thi y ee (tai on ad mater mye su povsnng thn ai Gus Da sete radial etun to sein ater religions ss 7 ‘Dring the later decades of the wenseth cenury. dialog berween| ‘cligious leaders wo enhance understanding began in est. Following the ‘model of the carly Parent, this was first and foremost an explanation tnd defers of ones ine example ofthis inthe work athe Kyoto School Zen philosopher who worked to explin Buddhism through « comparison with Western philosophy and Christianity. The am was not to convert one's dialogue partner bt deepen understanding. Key in a Fie, though there might not be recent on metaphyseal and theological te The Cte Church n Jrticula has sponsored formal dslogues betwen Catholic and leaders ‘nd practitioners of Judaism, Iam, Hinduism, Buddhism, and other Dances and denominations within the Christian fel fs cata Poms seal pasa eal igen tgs orp “hin the participants own, = The Ar anterbury x pena verrengan teens ree ail cry tas wi — 10 exntcs 2H WontD RELIGIONS and the Sultan of Turkey had seen no reason for dsiogu in 189, but Bodhists and Christine gained much from their encounters in the next eatury. Inthe case of Cristian, the encounter with Buddhism (and forms of Hinduism) lel to a re-examination of the meditative prayer Mee bine tent meme rosin Carte nvements or socal engged Bais droving Buh ompasion inthe rel of cal aon, Chrisans dd not become ‘ous or Maddhists Chsany but the practice of ech was enhanced ikecwouen noe Param of te Wool Repo were abo comrened fee eee dea Tae cal ooo Cooction fathering ain proved frum for gous Ides to preset hi Trains to reepie adie seeking deeper undetanding and Spretin and wer marked by celbatons of he abundant ribose ‘tical elm. The aim ofthis project was to find common ground ~ @ Shared floor to begin building etiea consensus - one marked by 4 ‘Commitment *monvolence and respect for if” “soldariy anda is _ssonomic onder? "oerance and Wie of tubules,” and “equal “and the partnership of mien aad women" Given the history of ealer Sniveralicing” any ac atespte-mese-be approached with great caution, but members of the worlds religions and onpanizrs of the Paslanent elt ery strongly thatthe world zligions had an ethical ole to ‘ly, ad this was one way to begin the discussion, TA the hind mesing ofthe Paliament in Cape Town this focus on ‘ec continued with cl to the guiding soc, poiical, economic, nd Marts erRopecron 11 took tis commitment one sep further, cling depts and regous lender to jin other to engage in concrete ction 0g 40 Boi, or ‘example ~ 10 make a real ference in the world, And parliamentary debate ofthe ello guiding intone rested in many partpants finding spec ways to bing about change inthe Hnsttons sn which they participated in thir home counties. This represents an immense shit rom century before when he focus was primarily on Isteing and coming to understand each other "et me ofr one concrete example ofthe king of inter religous action the Dalai Lama wat adocting pin from India. In ey 200, 5 ‘Chuan misonary nd his two cir were barn alive nthe at Ontesbythis was becruse they wee converting peopl, nd Hindus had to defend thee faith against such incursions, But sich viol ant Christian sentiment isnot the norm i Tia, and further investigation howe the kilings to be policy motivated. Leaders ofl he elon of India and beyond — Chrinians. ais, Shs, Hinds, Pasi, Jews and Buddhists ~ eae wo that plac to honor this man who ad served lepers for years as «physician and to denoance this king of violence couched in ‘gious terms Such solidarity aro eligi ince ofr a powerful and very pubic challenge 1 he individuals and isitwtions who wuld — Peseta mich ace even tt fives sultry kent. ETHICS IN THE WORLD RELIGIONS FOR THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY [Ac we move into the teeny century, there important as ishing Chita, theologies, frgiged Buddhism, and the nonviolence of Gandhi all prefigee what Inst be apart of reign’ increasing role in thie new milena, aan Iitve fore for socal change. In the ist volume ofthis series, emiled The Meaning of Life in the 12 rics Te WontD mELcions seats possible hop, religion provides the greatest posible motation dare these neal spt of dhe Td fer eggs iat ooo we elgoar val eget eases ttey ied oeecgecietebeias cfr advil dri rol td by wide, compat Ree tees eects betec tapas Pealeeie emesis aie lier sreeeicicl nana geal a ca teed ed poem of ; Thong igor rarer eg eee a Sea sae npr power of «regu erpecive to ge preter meaning ‘hope, and motivation — all deeply needed in our world today Ti casa ts vlume te up he chlge of seo ee eer eae er eel te tolume begins with 98-cplraion ofthe fname faonaectiog) between (ie) and eos and the possbiliis and “cules of understand ent across trations ‘ets the framework forthe discussion by analyzing the fi He ‘tha “metaphysics dives res the mane in which” prople fo difrat regions uadions and tho th OMerest

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