John Thatamanil

This article seeks to define and defend the work of transreligious theology and invite a broad range of instructors from a variety of institutional settings to teach it. What is distinctive here is my definition of transreligious theology understood as the quest for interreligious wisdom. My central questions will be these: Just what is transreligious theology? Why should it be taught? Finally, this essay will take up the concrete question of how transreligious theology might be taught in a variety of institutional settings including undergraduate religious studies departments and even within the state university context. This article1 seeks to define and defend the work of transreligious theology and invite a broad range of instructors from a variety of institutional settings to teach it.2 What is distinctive here is my definition of transreligious theology understood as the quest for interreligious wisdom, a vital project in a time of robust religious diversity. My central questions will be these: Just what is transreligious theology? Why should it be taught? Finally, this essay will take up the concrete question of how. Just how might transreligious theology be taught in a variety of institutional settings including undergraduate religious studies departments and even within the state university context? I shall be mindful, of course, that the latter context raises some significant questions about the teaching of theology of any stripe. Let me begin with the labor of definition. We all know definitions are never innocent, especially when a definition seeks to name and thereby constitute a field of study. Moreover, every definition of this sort implies and even amounts to a compressed theory. Transreligious theology, as I understand it, is constructive theology done in conversation with and drawing from the resources of more than one tradition. Several features of this definition require extended elaboration. First, transreligious theology is not merely an exercise in comparing theologies. The transreligious theologian does far more than engage in comparison. Why? Because the comparison of theologies might 1 This article was initially given as the plenary address for the Mid-Atlantic Regional AAR conference. I'd like to thank then President Jill Snodgrass and other members of the Executive Committee for the invitation to give this lecture. 2 A variety of terms are now in use for normative constructive reflection that draws from the resources of more than one tradition. These include comparative theology, " theology without walls, " interreligious theology, and now here, transreligious theology. I am not invested in any one particular term. All hold promise as well as limitations. In this essay, I join with those who prefer the term " transreligious theology " although I also use the term " interreligious " throughout.

Abstract For the benefit of those who have not read my book, let me offer a few framing remarks. I begin by noting that my initial working title for the book was Ecstasy and Nonduality, not The Immanent Divine. Although somewhat technical, the earlier title had ...

RELIGIONISTS AND THEOLOGIANS assume that their respective tasks differ insofar as religionists speak about traditions whereas theologians speak for them. Religionists qua religionists are objective outsiders and theologians subjective insiders. 1 Although individual scholars work both as religionists and theologians, some religionists express concern about whether persons who hold religious commitments can maintain the objectivity necessary for a truly scientific study of either their own tradition or the traditions of others. Under these operative assumptions, theology can be the object of the religionist's studies, but theology must not inform or shape those studies lest scholarly integrity is compromised. This division of labor has been called into question by a number of recent studies. These studies claim that the secular study of religion is shaped thoroughly by theological presuppositions. John Milbank, for example, has argued that secular social theories, including secular theories of religion, are in the end based on arbitrary theological claims that are no more "rational" or "scientific" than the claims of Christian theol-John J. Thatamanil is Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at Millsaps College, Jackson, MS 39210. I would like to thank David Eckel not only for launching me in my study of Sanskrit and Advaita but also for making possible the fieldwork in India discussed herein. Not surprisingly, there are important points of convergence between the argument advanced here and his own argument in defense of a properly religious study of Buddhism. 1 The term religionist will refer to scholars of religion who seek to advance a secular or "scien-tific" study of religion and who so attempt to characterize their undertakings as explicitly non-theological in character. As will become clear in due course, I believe that this distinction is difficult to sustain. Boundaries between these two families of inquiry are highly permeable.

Readers familiar with current theological trends might expect that a
book entitled On the Scope and Truth of Theology would proffer yet
another argument that aspires to return theology to its rightful place
as Queen of the Sciences.Christian theology, especially in its radically
orthodox and postliberal varieties, has been marked by an aggressive
and newfound confidence.Robert Neville does not disappoint readers
but he does surprise them. Neville begins his book by declaring that
his theology of symbolic engagement—unlike other conceptions of
the theological task—aspires to nothing less than truth and not to
other, albeit legitimate, ends such as the perpetuation of the life of a
particular religious community. He insists that nothing short of truth
will do in the long run. Theology is a normative discipline and not a
descriptive, quasi-anthropological business of reading off the doctrinal
implications that follow from Christian practices.