Download WS religious diversity issue texts WR12

OLM - THEOLOGY DEPARTMENT
WORLD RELIGIONS
TEXTS & STUDY QUESTIONS ON
THE RELIGIOUS DIVERSITY ISSUE
“HE WHO DOES NOT LOVE DOES NOT KNOW GOD”
1 JOHN 4
“CHRIST ONLY IN WHOM CAN BE FOUND THE FULLNESS OF THE RELIGIOUS LIFE”
NOSTRA AETATE
– FLF 12
A. Nostra Aetate, article 2
“Indeed, [the Catholic Church] proclaims, and ever must proclaim Christ "the way, the truth, and the life" (John 14:6), in whom men may find the
fullness of religious life, in whom God has reconciled all things to Himself.”
Pope Benedict XVI, His Companions and Their Deceptions
by Khalid Jan
“The current Pope [John Paul II] has personally endorsed a document called "Dominus Iesus", published in August 2000, by Cardinal Ratzinger, Prefect
of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. It has been ratified and confirmed by Pope John Paul II "with sure knowledge and by his apostolic
authority." This document states that people outside of Christianity are "gravely deficient" in their relationship to God.”
Study question A:
Why are the two above messages inclusive but neither syncretic-pluralist nor exclusive?
B. Truth and Tolerance
An article by Saint Ignatius Press on former cardinal Ratzinger’s book:
How can Christianity insist it is true in the face of other religions and philosophies making competing claims? Do truth and tolerance inevitably conflict
with each other? Does respect for others mean all religions are equally true? Does the diversity of religions prove there’s no such thing as religious
truth? Or do all religions ultimately teach the same thing? Are all religions capable of saving their adherents?
Truth and Tolerance is Ratzinger’s careful answers to these important questions.
Ratzinger confronts head-on the claim that Christianity has imposed European culture on other peoples. "Christianity … originated, not in Europe, but in
the Near East, in the geographical point at which the continents of Asia, Africa, and Europe come into contact," he writes.
Yes, Christianity has a European element. But above all it has a perennial message that comes from God, not from any human culture, argues Ratzinger.
While Christians have sometimes pushed their cultures on other peoples, as have non-Christians, Christianity itself is alien to no authentically human
culture. Its very nature as a free response to God’s gift of himself in Jesus Christ, means that Christianity must propose itself to culture, not impose itself.
The issues of truth and diversity in religion are also tackled by Ratzinger. Some people relegate religion to the realm of feelings and taste. As people’s
feelings and tastes vary, so, too, do their religious ideas and practices. Ratzinger responds by presenting what he calls "the inevitability of the question of
truth."
Other people argue that all religions essentially affirm the same things. Truth and Tolerance points to fundamental, non-negotiable differences among
religions, as well as certain common elements.
Ratzinger distinguishes two main forms of religion. On the one hand, there is a kind of mysticism in which one seeks to merge into or become identical
with everything, in an all-embracing, impersonal unity. Many Eastern religions and the New Age movement are religions of that sort. On the other hand,
there is "a personal understanding of God," in which one is united in love with a personal God and yet remains distinct from him. Christianity, Judaism,
and Islam are examples of the latter kind of religion.
A first-rate theologian, as well as a church leader, Ratzinger also assesses the strengths and weaknesses of the three main contemporary approaches to a
"theology of religions": exclusivism, inclusivism, and pluralism.
Exclusivism holds that only those who explicitly accept Christ and the Christian message can be saved. Inclusivism is the view that non-Christian
religions implicitly contain Christian truth and therefore that their adherents are "anonymous Christians." Pluralism holds that there are many valid ways
to God among the various religions.
At the heart of the discussion about the diversity of religions, contends Ratzinger, is the identity of Jesus Christ. Is he the sole savior, prefigured by other
religious leaders perhaps but nonetheless unique? Is he one among many religious figures who bring salvation? Is he the one true God in human flesh,
rather an avatar or one among many different manifestations of the divine?
Christianity has always held that the revelation of God in Jesus Christ is definitive, argues Ratzinger. The divinity of Jesus is "the real dividing line in
the history of religions," which makes sense of "two other fundamental concepts of the Christian faith, which have become unmentionable nowadays:
conversion and mission."
Relativism, which Ratzinger calls "the central problem for faith in our time," lurks behind most modern mistakes about faith and morality. The net result
is a deep skepticism about whether anything is true or can be known to be true.
Christianity can help modern thought overcome its relativism and skepticism by presenting the One who is the truth, Jesus Christ, the one who sets
people free by their coming to know, understand and love the truth. Ratzinger explains how tolerance, reason and freedom are not only compatible with
truth, but ultimately depend upon it.
With respect to the difficult subject of things interreligious, Ratzinger strongly supports interreligious dialogue, so long as it isn’t understood as
assuming all points of view are and must be, in the end, equally valid.
Study questions B:
1. Why are truth and tolerance often seen as conflicting values?
2. Why would the diversity of religions prove there’s no such thing as religious truth?
3. Why isn’t it right to say that Christianity imposed European culture on other peoples?
4. What’s the problem in relegating ‘religion to the realm of feelings and taste’?
5. What argument shows the problem in believing that ‘all religions essentially affirm the same things’?
6. What are the ‘two main forms of religion’?
7. Name and explain ‘the three main… approaches to’ the world religions diversity issue?
8. Why ‘is the identity of Jesus Christ at the heart of the discussion about the diversity of religions’?
9. What is ‘the central problem for faith in our time’?
10. What doesn’t ‘interreligious dialogue’ imply?
C. Excerpts from Truth and Tolerance by Cardinal Ratzinger, Ignatius Press 2004
1. Rahner had, quite naturally, regarded the question concerning the salvation of the non-Christian as being really the only question for the Christian
who is thinking about the phenomenon of the multiplicity of religions in the world... The three basic lines of response in the present discussions about
Christendom and world religions [are] exclusivism, inclusivism [and] pluralism... (Ratzinger 17)
2. The position that Christianity assigns itself in the history of religions is one that was basically expressed long ago: it sees in Christ the only real
salvation of man and, thus, his final salvation. In accordance with this, two attitudes are possible (so it seems) with regard to other religions: one may
address them as being provisional and, in this respect, as preparatory to Christianity and, thus, in a certain sense attribute to them a positive value,
insofar as they allow themselves to be regarded as precursors. They can of course also be understood as insufficient, anti-Christian, contrary to the truth,
as leading people to believe they are saved without ever truly being able to offer salvation. The first of these attitudes was shown by Christ himself with
respect to the faith of Israel, that is to say, the religion of the Old Testament. That this may also, in a way, be done with regard to all other religions has
been clearly shown and emphasized only in recent times. We may in fact perfectly well say that the story of the covenant with Noah (Gen 8) establishes
that there is a kernel of truth hidden in the mythical religions... This is the way that constitutes [...] the unified background to Asiatic higher religion.
What is characteristic for this mysticism is the experience of identity: the mystic sinks down into the ocean of the all-one, irrespective of whether this is
portrayed [...] as "nothingness" or, in a positive sense, as "everything". In the final stage of such an experience, the "mystic" will no longer be able to say
to his God, "I am Thine"; the expression he uses is "I am Thee". The difference has been left behind in what is provisional, preparatory, and what is
ultimately valid is fusion, unity... [In] this experience of inner identification [...] all distinctions fall away and appear as an unreal veil over the hidden
unity with the ground of all things... (Ratzinger 33)
3. The essential understanding that we gain from this investigation lies in the perception that the whole panorama of the history of religions sets before
us a basic choice between two ways, [...] “mysticism" and "monotheism". Today I would prefer to talk instead about "a mysticism of identity" and "a
personal understanding of God". Ultimately it is a question of whether the divine "God" stands over against us, so that religion, being human, is in the
last resort a relationship-love-that becomes a union ("God is all in all": 1 Cor.15:28) but that does not do away with the opposition of I and Thou; or,
whether the divine lies beyond personality, and the final aim of man is to become one with, and dissolve in, the All-One... "Is it a question of dissolving
into the unity of the whole or of the most basic trust in an endless 'Thou', in God"... [Buber says:] "It is not merging into unity but encounter that is the
basic constituent of the human experience of existence." Levinas regards the resolution of multiplicity into an all-absorbing unity as confusion of
thinking and as a form of spiritual experience that does not get to the bottom of things. For him, Hegel's "infinity" represents the most dreadful example
of such a view of unity. He objects that in the philosophy and mysticism of identity the "face of the other", whose freedom can never become my
possession, is eliminated in a nameless "totality".
In reality, however, true eternity is only experienced in trustfully putting one's hopes in the freedom of the other to remain other. Over against the unity
of merging, with its tendency to eliminate identity, should be set personal experience: unity of love is higher than formless identity.
Biirkle has shown again from another angle, that of actual practice in the life of society, how the idea of a person is irreplaceable, an ultimate value:
“The development of modern Hinduism shows that for the idea of man in India today, also, this concept of personhood has become indispensable... The
experience of identity as found in the Upanishads [...] offers no adequate basis for the enduring validity and dignity of the uniqueness, as an individual,
of every single person. This cannot be reconciled with the notion that this life is merely a transitory phase in the rhythm of changing levels of
reincarnation. It is impossible to maintain the individual value and dignity of the person if this is merely a passing phase and subject to variation.... The
modern reforms of Hinduism are thus quite logically committed to asking about the dignity of man. The Christian concept of the person is taken over by
them in the Hindu context as a whole, without its foundation in the concept of God."
It would not be difficult to show, however, that the concept of the individual as a person, and thus the defense of the individual value and dignity of each
person, cannot in the end itself be maintained without its foundation in the idea of God.
Finally, in the course of his reflections, Sudbrack draws our attention to a criterion that is no less fundamental and by which the difficulties in the
mysticism-of-universal-identity position become glaringly obvious: "The problem of evil, as a turning against the absolute goodness of God, most
clearly reveals the difference in the conceptions of being." In a philosophy of the unity of everything, the distinction between good and evil is
necessarily relativized. We can find some important clarifications of this question in the thinking of Guardini. In his philosophy of opposition, Guardini
thought out the basic distinction between "opposition" and "contradiction", which is what it finally comes down to here. Oppositions are complementary;
they constitute the richness of reality. In his most important philosophical work, he made "opposition" the central principle of the way he looked at
reality, in which he saw in the many tensions of life the wealth of existence.
Oppositions refer us to one another; each needs the other; and only between them do they produce the harmony of the whole. But contradiction breaks
out of this harmony and destroys it. Evil is not even - as Hegel thought and as Goethe tries to show us in Faust - one side of the whole, and thus
necessary to us, but is the destruction of being. It is in fact unable to say of itself, as does Faust's Mephistopheles, I am "a part of that power which
always seeks evil and always works good." Good would then have need of evil, and evil would not really be evil at all but would just be a necessary part
of the world's dialectical process. The sacrifice of countless thousands of victims by Communism was justified with this philosophy, building upon the
dialectic of Hegel, which Marx then turned into a political system... God, [...] as a threefold unity represents [...] pure goodness, whereas in the
mysticism of identity there is in the end no distinction between good and evil [and] neither has priority over the other. (Ratzinger 45-49)
4. So in fact relativism has become the central problem for faith in our time. It by no means appears simply as resignation in the face of the
unfathomable nature of truth, of course; rather, it defines itself positively on the basis of the concepts of tolerance, dialectic epistemology, and freedom,
which would be limited by maintaining one truth as being valid for everyone. Relativism thus also appears as being the philosophical basis of
democracy, which is said to be founded on no one's being able to claim to know the right way forward... (Ratzinger 117)
5. In the Roman crisis of the late fourth century the senator Symmachus [said] "It is the same thing that we all worship; we all think the same; we look
up to the same stars; there is one sky above us, one world around us; what difference does it make with what kind of method the individual seeks the
truth? We cannot all follow the same path to reach so great a mystery." This is exactly what enlightenment is saying today: We do not know truth as
such; yet in a variety of images, we all express the same thing. So great a mystery as the Divinity cannot be fixed in one image, which would exclude all
others, to one path obligatory for all. There are many paths; there are many images; all reflect something of the whole, and none is itself the whole. He is
practicing, the ethic of tolerance who recognizes in each one a little of the truth, who does not set his own above what is strange to him, and who
peacefully takes his place in the multiform symphony of the eternally unattainable that hides itself in symbols, symbols that yet seem to be the only way
we have to grasp in some sense the Divinity. Has the claim of Christianity to be religio vera [true religion], then, been overtaken by the progress of
enlightenment? Is it bound to step down from its claim and take its place in the Neo-platonic or Buddhist or Hindu view of truth and symbol? (Ratzinger
176)
Study questions C:
1. What are the three basic lines of response to the only question for the Christian who is thinking about the phenomenon of the multiplicity of religions
in the world?
2. With regard to other religions, explain the ‘provisional’ attitude.
3. Describe the mysticism of Asiatic higher religion?
4. What two basic choices does the panorama of the history of religions set before us?
5. What is, for each basic religious choice, the final aim of man?
6. What is the basic constituent of the human experience of existence for Buber?
7. For Levinas, what’s the downfall of the philosophy and mysticism of identity?
8. Why can’t the Upanishads [sacred Hindu texts] offer an adequate basis for the dignity of every single person?
9. Why does the problem of evil challenge the mysticism-of-identity position?
10. How does Guardini’s basic distinction between "opposition" and "contradiction" help understand the mistake of the mysticism-of-identity position?
11. What’s the ethic of tolerance and what are its key arguments?
D. Excerpts from Without Roots by Cardinal Ratzinger and Marcello Pera
6. The dominant culture in the West [...] reveals its prejudices through a major flaw in reasoning. It thinks that "ought" descends from "is." According to
this way of thinking, if a person maintains that the West is better than Islam - or, to be more specific, that democracy is better than theocracy, a liberal
constitution better than sharia [Islamic law applied to social and political realms], a parliamentary decision better than a sura [a verse of the Koran], a
civil society better than an umma [the Muslim community], a sentence by an independent tribunal better than a fatva [a religious legal decree], [...] and
so forth - then he or she ought to clash with Islam. This is an error of logic that compounds the error of believing that our institutions have no right or
basis to be proclaimed as universal…
I personally reject these positions. I deny that there are no valid reasons for comparing and judging institutions, principles, and values. I deny that such a
comparison cannot conclude that Western institutions are better than their Islamic counterparts. And I deny that a comparison will necessarily give rise
to a conflict. I do not deny, however, that if an offer to dialogue is responded to with a conflict, then the conflict should not be accepted. For me the
opposite holds true. I affirm the principles of tolerance, peaceful coexistence, and respect that are characteristic of the West today. However, if someone
refuses to reciprocate these principles and declares hostility or a jihad against us, I believe that we must acknowledge that this person is our adversary. In
short, I reject the self-censorship of the West. This self-censorship much more than the universalist claims of Western institutions [...] is something that I
find unjustified and dangerous. (Ratzinger Vera 9-10)
7. So the answer that the expert theologian provides to the uneducated believer would seem to be to engage in self-censorship. The believer in Christ
cannot say that Christ is the truth, because that would be dogmatic and anti-historical. Nor can he or she say that Christ is the sole truth, because that
would constitute fundamentalism.
Cardinal Ratzinger rejects this thesis, which I, too, find contradictory, false, and counterproductive for Christians. Contradictory, because if relativism
leads us to claim that there are no basic truths, then not even relativism can be the foundation of democracy. False, because democracy places at its very
foundations the values of the individual, dignity, equality, and respect. Deny these values and you deny democracy. Counterproductive, because if,
relativistically speaking, one truth is equivalent to another, what is the purpose of dialogue? And if faith contains no truth, how can we be saved?
(Ratzinger Vera 26)
Study questions D:
1. What does Ratzinger find unjustified and dangerous?
2. According to some, what can’t an ‘uneducated’ believer in Christ say?
3. Why is relativism self-contradictory and why is it counterproductive?
E. Excerpts from Handbook of Christian Apologetics
by Peter Kreeft and Ronald K. Tacelli
8. We cannot address this question [are other religions true] until we agree on what is meant by "true." If we use the definition that is commonsensical in
the West namely, correspondence with objective reality, then the correct answer seems to be: Partly. (But as we shall see in a moment, other religions.
especially Eastern religions, have a different definition of truth.)
We could say, for instance, that Vedanta Hinduism is true in being monotheistic and false in being pantheistic, or that Islam's insistence on prayer and
justice are true, but its denial that God can have a Son is false.
But the very meaning of "truth" changes when you move East. For a pantheist the difference between truth and falsity cannot be the difference between
conformity and nonconformity between subjective (mind, ideas) and objective reality. For reality to a pantheist is one, not two; truth is not an idea's
conformity but its size, so to speak. Only the idea of Oneness or Brahman or Nirvana is totally "true"; all lesser ideas are partly true and partly false,
partial manifestations of the Whole.
This makes argument between East (Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism) and West (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) extremely difficult. For the West claims that
the East is wrong on some points, and the East claims that there is no such thing as being wrong. A Hindu can believe everything, including Christianity,
as a partial truth, or a stage along the way to total truth. Even contradictory ideas can be accepted as true; the stumbling block of East-West dialogue is
the law of non-contradiction. (Kreeft Tacelli 344)
9. There are some significant ethical contradictions between religions, however, based on their different theological beliefs. For instance, suppose you
were an orthodox Hindu. You would believe that (a) this body is ultimately only an appearance; (b) we must all work out our karma, or moral fate; and
(c) after death everyone except a fully enlightened mystic must go through many more reincarnations. For these reasons, you would not be swift to
rescue a dying derelict from the gutter. For (a) bodily death is not very important; (b) you may be interfering with the person's karma, or fated learning
experience through this suffering and dying; and (c) death is not terribly tragic because it is not final - we go round again and may get other chances
through reincarnation.
If, on the other hand, you were a Christian or a Jew or a Muslim, you would act like the good Samaritan because you believe that (a) the body is real and
good and important; (b) we are not fated but free (or both fated and free); and (c) we live only once, so life is incalculably precious.
However, such moral disagreements as these are unusual. More often there is not only agreement but remarkable agreement. Moral codes can be
classified into three levels: codes for pragmatic survival, codes of objective justice and codes of selflessness. All three tell us not to bash each other’s
brains out, but for three different reasons: not to get bashed back; because it's not fair; and because we should be unselfish like God, or the Ultimate
Reality. Everyone knows level one, and most civilized people know level two, but level three is high and rare. Yet all the great religions of the world
teach level three morality.
This fact makes it tempting to identify religion with morality and minimize theological differences, thus uniting all the religions of the world. The
modernists' reduction of Christianity to its morality, and their willingness to relativize or negotiate away theological doctrines, comes largely from this
source.
Orthodox Christians should not be afraid to learn something from modernists here. Although it is either stupid or dishonest to negotiate away Christian
doctrines (like Christ’s divinity and resurrection) to popular acceptance, it is nevertheless true and important that there already is a great amount of
agreement among world religions on morality... (Kreeft Tacelli 346)
10. On the one hand, there is a rich and orthodox tradition of Christian mysticism, so why look across the world for diamonds when your own back yard
is full of them? On the other hand, we can learn something from everything. On the one hand, we must remember that Eastern methods have been
developed as means to non-Christian ends; and there is an organic connection between means and ends. The Eastern end is mysticism; sanctity is only a
means. The Christian (and Jewish and Muslim) end is sanctity; mysticism is only a means to or a result of this higher end. For a Hindu or Buddhist,
sanctity only purifies the individual soul so that it can see through itself as an illusion. For Christians, mysticism is only a reward of sanctity or a motor
for more sanctity.
Christ tells us to love God; Hindus tell us we are God. Christ tells us to love our neighbor; Buddha tells us we are our neighbors. The Eastern goal is to
see through the illusions of ego, soul, body, self, other, matter, space, time, world, good, evil, false, beautiful, ugly, this and that. The Christian goal is to
know, love, Please, serve, and enjoy God in this life and the next. (Kreeft Tacelli 349)
Study questions E:
1. What’s truth in the Eastern tradition and why does it make religious dialogue difficult?
2. What’s the stumbling block of East-West dialogue and why?
3. Why would an orthodox Hindu be an unlikely Good Samaritan?
4. Why is it tempting to identify religion with morality?
5. How differently do Abrahamic and Eastern religions articulate mysticism and sanctity?
F. A text by Huston Smith*
“The opening chapter of this book [Textbook on World’s Religion] quoted Arnold Toynbee as saying that no one alive knows enough to say with
confidence whether or not one religion is superior to the others — the question remains an open one. True, this book has found nothing that privileges one
tradition above the others, but that could be due to the kind of book it is: It eschews comparisons in principle. Nothing in the comparative study of
religions requires that they cross the finishing line of the reader's regard in a dead heat.
A second position lies at the opposite end of the spectrum: It holds that the religions are all basically alike. Differences are acknowledged but,
according to this second view, they are incidental in comparison to the great enduring truths on which the religions unite.
This appeals to our longing for human togetherness, but on inspection it proves to be the trickiest position of the three. For as soon as it moves beyond vague
generalities — "every religion has some version of the Golden Rule"; or, "Surely we all believe in some sort of something," as a Member of Parliament once
ventured following a bitter debate in the House of Commons over the Book of Common Prayer—it founders on the fact that the religions differ in what
they consider essential and what negotiable. Hinduism and Buddhism split over this issue, as did Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.
In the nineteenth century Alexander Campbell tried to unite Protestants on grounds of their common acceptance of the Bible as the model for faith and
organization. To his surprise he discovered that denominational leaders were not prepared to concede that the uniting principle he proposed was more
important than their distinctive tenets; his movement ended by adding another denomination —the Disciples of Christ (Christian Church) —to the
Protestant roster.
On a world scale Baha'u'llah's mission came to the same end. Baha'i, which originated in the hope of rallying the major religions around the beliefs they
held in common, has settled into being another religion among many.”
Study questions F:
1. In regard with religious diversity, what 3 “positions” (one being implicit) does H. Smith refer to in this text?
2. What’s H. Smith’s position and why?
G. Understanding diversity in world religions*
At a medical ethics conference, I shared a panel with representatives from various religions who were asked to explain their views on death. A Buddhist
priest explained several of his beliefs, contrasting them clearly with Christian teachings: Buddhism is horizontal or human-oriented, not vertical or Godoriented, and the respective architectures of Christian churches and Buddhist temples demonstrate this. He politely added, "one way is not better than the
other--just different from the other."
But was his polite remark true? This gets to the heart of Professor James Carse's essay, "Diversity in the World's Religions" (National Forum: The Phi
Kappa Phi Journal, Winter 1994): How can we accurately understand and assess diverse religious traditions?
The question has urgency. As Professor Carse notes, because cultures are shaped by religion, we often cannot understand a culture without
understanding its religious tradition. Furthermore, the resolution of many of the world's conflicts requires that we pinpoint the religious
misunderstandings that fuel them. He also correctly asserts that religious "dialogue can only occur when each [religion] can criticize and challenge the
other."
Yet Professor Carse's proposal to understand these conflicts is somewhat perplexing. He seems to be advocating the thesis that religions are almost
totally incomprehensible to one another and that "we cannot distinguish one religion from another on the basis of belief." Religious belief, he claims, is
the unique concern of Christianity, "the only religion in the world that has a creed in the proper sense."
Religions do differ in how much emphasis they place on creeds; however, it is false that Christianity alone is creedal or that "belief is not itself an issue
in any religion but Christianity." Judaism affirms the Shema (Deuteronomy, chapter six), Islam has its own short creed and much theology, and Sankara,
the Hindu theologian, stressed the importance of belief for salvation: "If the soul . . . is not considered to possess fundamental unity with Brahman--an
identity to be realized by knowledge--there is not any chance of its obtaining final release."
Furthermore, we can distinguish religions according to beliefs. First, Professor Carse's article itself distinguishes among religions on the basis of their
beliefs. He mentions that when Hindus speak of Brahman they are referring not to the Judeo-Christian view of God but to "a Reality so inclusive as to
have no distinguishing characteristics of its own: no personality, no gender, no will, not even thought or mind." This is true, at least for Advaita Vedanta
Hinduism. It is not true for the Bhakti traditions--another distinction made on the basis of belief.
Second, he observes that for Buddhism there is no deity, and in Zen, there is no soul as well. It is true that Theravada Buddhism denies or ignores any
supreme deity and rejects the notion of a soul. But Mahayana Buddhism is much more metaphysically inclusive (especially concerning the Trikaya, or
three levels of Buddhahood) and has a different view of the soul--another distinction made on the basis of belief.
Christians, as opposed to some Hindus, Professor Carse notes, reject the avatar doctrine that Jesus was "but one of several equivalent incarnations" to be
included in the Hindu pantheon. Again, this is a clear disagreement over religious beliefs, as Professor Geoffrey Parrinder has demonstrated in his
distinguished work, Avatar and Incarnation.
So, we find that Professor Carse's own illustrations belie his premise that religions cannot be compared on the basis of beliefs. This is related to another
questionable claim he makes: "There is no one common element by which all religions can be compared, in spite of the many scholarly and popular
attempts to do so." In so far as this statement refers to the fact that religions differ in their claims about reality, it is correct. Any attempt to find a
common doctrinal or experiential core in all religions is phenomenologically misguided. However, the fact of diversity does not entail incomparability.
Christians and Muslims disagree about the nature of God. Christians confess God as triune; Muslims confess Allah as unitary. Nevertheless, both
Christians and Muslims believe that God is personal and revelatory. In this they disagree with Advaita Vedanta Hindus, such as Sankara, who view
Brahman as impersonal and unknowable through discursive means. Religious comparisons can and should be made, so long as those doing the
comparisons adequately comprehend the traditions that they are addressing.
Professor Carse to the contrary, all religions have at least three formal or topical elements in common: a conception of ultimate reality or the supremely
sacred (whether Yahweh, the Trinity, Allah, Nirvana, Brahman, or the Tao), an assessment of the human situation (either as the image of God, Atman,
or no-soul), and a salvific prescription for spiritual liberation (whether faith in Yahweh or Christ, obedience to Allah's law, yoga, or the Eightfold Path).
On these thematic concerns conceptual comparisons can be made.
I suggest that religious dialogue will only progress when the following assumptions are in place. First, religions make truth-claims that are irreducible.
These cognitive claims constitute the core of each religion's identity and differentiate one religion from another, aside from whatever other elements
may be vital to religious life (such as ritual and religious experience). Second, it is not impossible to compare the truth-claims of one religion with those
of another religion. They can be juxtaposed and rationally assessed so long as those in dialogue sufficiently understand the religious traditions of which
they speak. Third, the truth-claims of one religion are sometimes logically incompatible with those of another, as seen above. These disagreements
should be recognized and rationally discussed, as Professor Paul Griffiths argues in his fine work, An Apology for Apologetics.
Was my fellow panelist correct in saying, with regard to Buddhism and Christianity, that "one is not better than the other?" Well, both religions cannot
be true in their essential beliefs. The Buddha and the Christ held mutually contradictory beliefs on the issues of God, the soul, and salvation. However,
Buddhists and Christians can engage in stimulating dialogue when they agree to disagree agreeably in a nation that honors the freedom of religion. Let
us hope that such conditions begin to emerge globally as well.
Study questions G:
1. Identify the problem discussed.
2. What’s the relevancy of the problem for the author?
3. Identify P. Carse’s two theses.
4. Identify the author’s arguments against P. Carses’ theses.
5. Identify the author conclusive statement.
H. The Permanent Committee for Islamic Academic Research and Ifta (Verdict)
“1-2. One of the fundamentals of Faith in Islam, which is known
as an essential part of the religion and upon which all Muslims have agreed, is that there is no true religion on the earth except Islam, and that it is the
Final religion which abrogated all previous religions and creeds. Therefore, no other religion remains on earth by which Allah can be worshipped except
Islam. Allah The Most High says, "And whoever seeks a religion other than Islam, it will never be accepted of him, and in the Hereafter he will be one
of the losers." [Al-Qur'an 3:85].
3. It is our belief that both the Torah and the Bible were abrogated by the Qur'an, and that they were changed by means of additions or deletions by their
followers…
4. Another fundamental of Faith in Islam is that our Prophet and Messenger Muhammad (sallalahu 'alaihi wa sallam) is the seal of all the prophets and
messengers. Allah says, "Muhammad (sallalahu 'alaihi wa sallam) is not the father of any man among you, but he is the Messenger of Allah and the last
(end) of the Prophets. And Allah is Ever All-Aware of everything." [Al-Qur'an 33:40] As such, no other messenger is left to be followed except
Muhammad (sallalahu 'alaihi wa sallam).
5. One of the fundamentals of Islam is that any Jew or Christian who does not embrace Islam should be considered and designated as an unbeliever
(Kafir) as well as an enemy of Allah, of His Messengers and the Believers (Muminoon), and such people will be the people of the Fire in accordance to
Allah's Saying, that, "Those who disbelieve from among the people of the Scriptures (Jews and Christians) and among al-Mushrikun (Polytheists), were
not going to leave (their disbelief) until there came to them clear evidence." [Al-Qur'an 98:1]
6. Adulterating the fundamentals of Islamic Faith and the facts of Islamic Law (Shari'ah) to serve the call (for the unification of religions), by mixing
them together and casting them to one mould is but a wicked call. It aims at mixing the Truth with Falsehood, destroying Islam, demolishing its
foundations and bringing all Muslims to clear apostasy (Riddah). This can be seen in the saying of Allah, The Most High, "And they will never cease
fighting you until they turn you back from your religion (Islamic Monotheism) if they can." [Al-Qur'an 2:217]. Allah Says, "They wish that you reject
faith, as they have rejected (Faith), and thus that you will become equal (like one another)." [Al-Qur'an 4:89]
7. The inevitable consequence of such evil is: The cancellation of differences between Islam and Kufr, Truth and Falsehood, and complete negation of
enjoining the right and forbidding the wrong. Breaking of barriers of alienation between Muslims and Kafiroon (unbelievers) so that no loyalty nor
Jihad nor struggle for the sake of elevating Allah's Word on Allah's earth may take place. Allah, The Most High, commands "Fight against those who
(1) do not believe in Allah, (2) nor in the Last Day, (3) nor forbid that which has been forbidden by Allah and His Messenger, (4) those who
acknowledge not the religion of Truth, Islam, among the people of the Scriptures (Jews and Christians), until they pay the Jizyah with willing
submission, and feel themselves subdued." [Al-Qur'an 9:29] "And fight against the Mushrikun (polytheists, pagans, idolaters, disbelievers in the oneness
of Allah) collectively, as they fight against you collectively. But know that Allah is with the pious." [Al-Qur'an 9:36]”
National Forum article, June 1994.
Study questions H:
1. Quote a clear expression of this Muslim committee’s exclusivist view.
2. Quote a clear expression of this Muslim committee’s proselyte view.
3. What are 3 fundamentals of the Islamic faith?
4. Why does the Qur’an abrogate the Torah and the Bible?
5. What’s the meaning of the words kafir and shari’ah?
6. Quote a clear expression of this committee anti-syncretist view.
7. Explain the expression: ‘barriers of alienation’.
I. From The Gospel of Ramakrishna March 11, 1883.
“MASTER: "With sincerity and earnestness one can realize God through all religions. The Vaishnava will realize God, and so will the Saktas, the
Vedantists, and the Brahmos. The Mussalmans and Christians will realize Him too. All will certainly realize God if they are earnest and sincere.
"Some people indulge in quarrels, saying, 'One cannot attain anything unless one worships our Krishna', or, 'Nothing can be gained without the worship
of Kali, our Divine Mother', or, 'One cannot be saved without accepting the Christian religion.' This is pure dogmatism. The dogmatist says, 'My religion
alone is true, and the religions of others are false.' This is a bad attitude. God can be reached by different paths.
"Further, some say that God has form and is not formless. Thus they start quarrelling. A Vaishnava quarrels with a Vedantist.
"One can rightly speak of God only after one has seen Him. He who has seen God knows really and truly that God has form and that He is formless as
well. He has many other aspects that cannot be described.
"Once some blind men chanced to come near an animal that someone told them was an elephant. They were asked what the elephant was like. The blind
men began to feel its body. One of them said the elephant was like a pillar; he had touched only its leg. Another said it was like a winnowing-fan; he had
touched only its ear. In this way the others, having touched its tail or belly, gave their different versions of the elephant. Just so, a man who has seen
only one aspect of God limits God to that alone. It is his conviction that God cannot be anything else.
"How can you say that the only truth about God is that He has form? It is undoubtedly true that God comes down to earth in a human form, as in the case
of Krishna. And it is true as well that God reveals Himself to His devotees in various forms. But it is also true that God is formless; He is the Indivisible
Existence-Knowledge-Bliss Absolute. He has been described in the Vedas both as formless and as endowed with form. He is also described there both
as attributeless and as endowed with attributes.
"Do you know what I mean? Satchidananda is like an infinite ocean. Intense cold freezes the water into ice, which floats on the ocean in blocks of
various forms. Likewise, through the cooling influence of bhakti, one sees forms of God in the ocean of the Absolute. These forms are meant for the
bhaktas, the lovers of God. But when the Sun of Knowledge rises, the ice melts; it becomes the same water it was before. Water above and water below,
everywhere nothing but water. Therefore a prayer in the Bhagavata says: 'O Lord, Thou hast form, and Thou art also formless. Thou walkest before us,
O Lord, in the shape of a man; again, Thou hast been described in the Vedas as beyond words and thought.'
"But you may say that for certain devotees God assumes eternal forms. There are places in the ocean where the ice doesn't melt at all. It assumes the
form of quartz."
KEDAR: "It is said in the Bhagavata that Vyasa asked God's forgiveness for his three transgressions. He said: 'O Lord, Thou art formless, but I have
thought of Thee in my meditation as endowed with form; Thou art beyond speech, but I have sung Thee hymns; Thou art the All-pervading Spirit, but I
have made pilgrimages to sacred places. Be gracious, O Lord, and forgive these three transgressions of mine.' "
MASTER: "Yes, God has form and He is formless too. Further, He is beyond both form and formlessness. No one can limit Him."”
Study questions I:
1. Quote a clear expression of the master’s syncretist view.
2. What other name did you learn for dogmatism?
3. Quote an expression of the master’s pantheist or monist view of the divine.
4. What would be your response if the master said that, by being Christian, ‘you limit God’?
5. How does the master explain that god is ‘formless and endowed with form’?
6. Who is the divine figure allowing Hindus to easily connect with the Christian mystery of the Incarnation?
7. What does each of the following represent: the elephant, the blind men, the ocean, the blocks of ice, the cooling bhakti and the sun?
8. What are 3 great Hindu sins? What, then, is the source of all suffering and evil?
9. Show that the master’s advocacy of syncretism is self-contradictory.
J. Dialogue not monologue: Benedict XVI & religious pluralism.
By Francis X. Clooney, SJ, Parkman Professor of Divinity at Harvard University.
How is Benedict XVI, long a defender of orthodoxy and famous critic of the "dictatorship of relativism," likely to approach interreligious dialogue?
Does he see religious pluralism and tolerance as little more than an enticement to indifferentism or as something potentially more spiritually and
intellectually fruitful?
While in India this summer… I was perhaps providentially visited by some concerned Hindus who accused me--Catholic priest, Jesuit, aficionado of
interreligious dialogue, and provocatively named "Francis Xavier"--of being the "pope's man," come to fulfill his plan to subvert and convert the
subcontinent… I had to ask myself, what would it mean to be sent as a missionary to India by the pope…? What follows is not so much a summation of
Benedict's writings as a practical reflection written with Hindu concerns in mind too.
Benedict takes religious diversity seriously; indeed, he sees it as central to Christian identity in the twenty-first century. Simplistic solutions to the
challenges posed by interreligious dialogue are discouraged: the relativizing of doctrines, the disparaging or praising of positions we do not understand,
the unending deferral of truth claims. But any competition for converts or resolution of disagreements merely by appeals to authority is also rejected, I
think. Resorting to such strategies would not make the gospel message clear or advance understanding… Benedict reminds us, God dwells in the still,
small voice heard by Elijah only after he flees the scene. Benedict asserts that it is "when [Elijah] lets go of his own greatness, when he no longer
believes that he himself is able to reestablish God's kingdom that God's new paths begin to open up.”
Benedict insists that dialogue is always about truth--participating in the underlying Word (Logos)--and it best occurs as a search for truth, not for mere
tolerance… Dialogue is not polite conversation meant to comfort people who prefer to stay just as they are or who want to avoid disagreements.
At the same time, the search for truth cannot mean, "We have the truth; they are searching for it," a view that would turn interreligious exchanges into
pantomime and farce. The quest for truth obliges everyone involved, and what is learned will have consequences even for those of us who, by grace,
know Jesus… We live by faith, but still we do not know in advance the whole truth. We can learn from others. The trick, of course, lies in the Zen-like
balance Benedict seems also to be urging on us: search for truth, but do not ignore the "indispensable elements" of Christian revelation; dwell in Christ,
but remain vulnerable to an unpredictable dialogue that may actually change us.
Benedict's key negative point supports the positive: we in the West have forgotten that dialogue is a search for truth, not simply a modus Vivendi (A way
to live together). Benedict's real target, in everything he writes here, is secular modernity, not Hinduism or Buddhism. His real worries concern modern
Catholic intellectuals, largely trained in the West, not Jewish or Muslim believers and scholars. According to the pope, we in the West are intellectually
lazy; we have forgotten how to seek religious truth with a conviction that it actually exists and we can actually find it… Given the high premium our
culture places on "tolerance," modern Western theologians certainly value harmony, equality, and the need to take outsiders' views seriously. Yet,
Benedict worries that the indiscriminate application of such "liberal" virtues ignores what is religiously and intellectually challenging about differences
in belief. Truth is seen to be fluid and amenable to every expression and religious practices detachable from broader worldviews.
In the essay "The Unity and Diversity of Religions" (Truth and Tolerance), Benedict approvingly cites Horst Burkle, a scholar of interreligious dialogue.
Burkle argues that [Hinduism] cannot support a fundamental respect for persons. Mystical monism, the belief that material and spiritual reality form one
substance or being, is of course central to Hinduism. For the monist, life is transitory, persons come and go in different bodies, and there is no absolute
or enduring value to any particular human person. Accordingly, Hindus who wanted to defend human dignity often turned to the Western concept of the
individual, an idea rooted in the Christian idea of God's creative action.
Study questions J:
1. For Benedict, what is central to Christian identity in the twenty-first century?
2. What two kinds of simplistic solutions to the challenges posed by interreligious dialogue are discouraged by Benedict?
3. What does Benedict deem necessary, as experienced by Elijah, for ‘God's new paths begin to open up’?
4. What two opposite attitudes are both rejected by Benedict as not conducive to an inter-religious dialogue about truth?
5. For Benedict, what Zen-like balance seems to be urging on us?
6. In discussing religious diversity, what’s Benedict's real target and why?
7. What is mystical monism and what’s its central problem?