A review of Inter-Faith Dialogue and World Community edited by Ch. Sreenivasa Rao

Scott, David C.

English

Digital Commons @ Butler University

Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies Volume 5 Article 12 January 1992 Book Review: "Inter-Faith Dialogue and World Community" David C. Scott Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.butler.edu/jhcs  Part of the Religion Commons Recommended Citation Scott, David C. (1992) "Book Review: "Inter-Faith Dialogue and World Community"," Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies: Vol. 5, Article 12. Available at: https://doi.org/10.7825/2164-6279.1065 The Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies is a publication of the Society for Hindu-Christian Studies. The digital version is made available by Digital Commons @ Butler University. For questions about the Journal or the Society, please contact cbauman@butler.edu. For more information about Digital Commons @ Butler University, please contact digitalscholarship@butler.edu. 36 Book Reviews Research Library," which, besides the pro-ceedings of the abovementioned symposia, has published also major monographs, text-edi-tions and translations, including Anand Amal-adass' own thesis: "Philosophical Implications of Dhvani: Experience of Symbol Language in Indian Aesthetics" (1984). Dr. Oberhammer, before devoting himself to Indian studies, studied philosophy at the Jesuit College in Innsbruck at a time when Karl Rahner was at the height of his fame. Many of Karl Rahner's pupils began imitating his very style and lan-guage, something which made them difficult to read in their native German. It is all the more admirable that Dr. Amaladass was able not only to read Dr. Oberhammer's difficult Rah-nerian prose but to translate it into lucid En-glish - making it much easier to follow than in its original German. The pieces which are col-lected in Philosophy of Religion in Hindu Thought are certainly worthwhile studying, es-pecially for scholars engaged in Hindu-Chris-tian Dialogue. They deal with important issues, are based on thorough familiarity with Indian texts and treat more often than not little known aspects of Indian religious systems or rarely mentioned Indian thinkers. They are amply documented and contain substantial extracts from Sanskrit texts. While the eight papers contained in the work have originally not been written with a view to form parts of a single book, one can identify a central concern in all of them: salva-tion. Some, like "Manifestation of Salvation" (No.2) and "Transcendence as Salvation in Early Nyaya" (No.4) directly address the issue, others like "Experience of Transcendence in Hinduism: The Testimony of Paramasamhita" (No.5) or "The transcendental structure of human bondage (samsara) according to Pa~ilasvamin" (No.6) implicitly deal with it. The rest, such as "The Structure of Tradition and Revelation" (No.1), "Man as the Place of Revelation" (No.3), "God-Experience in Yo-gic Meditation" (No.7), "The Use of Mantra in Yogic Meditation: The Testimony of the Pasupatas" (No.8) offer substantial investiga-tions of issues closely linked to salvation. This should come as no surprise to the student of religion, least of all to the student of Indian re-ligions, in which salvation is and has remained the central issue, towards which all reflection is directed and which gives "religion" its very meaning. Several of the papers were presented as introductions to symposia organised by the In-dological Institute Vienna. Having made such a successful translation of Dr. Oberhammer's contributions, Dr. Amaladass might perhaps be persuaded to try the others as well. Such work not only removes the linguistic barrier between those who publish in German and those who read only English but also fosters intercultural and Hindu-Christian dialogue in and by itself. The translation has provided in the ap-pendix to the book a brief C. V. of Gerhard Oberhammer and a bibliography, which shows the wide range of Dr. Oberhammer's scholar-ship. Klaus K. Klostermaier University of Manitoba Winnipeg, Canada R3T 2N2 Inter-Faith Dialogue and World Community. Ch. Sreenivasa Rao (ed). The Christian Literature Society, 1991, xxxix + 284p., Rs. 75.00 paper. THE PRESSURES OF contemporary history throw together people of various faith tradi-tions, cultures and ideologies. At the same time, people of all faith traditions cultures and ideologies are seeking new forms of community in the search for freedom, justice, dignity and self-respect. In this context the great religious traditions, with their visions for the future of 1Scott: Book Review: "Inter-Faith Dialogue and World Community"Published by Digital Commons @ Butler University, 1992humanity, are in interaction today as perhaps never before. They are also faced with the promise of abundance as well as the threats which science and technology bring. Certainly, there can no doubt about the timely relevance of the International Seminar on "Inter-Faith Dialogue for National Integration and Human Solidarity" conducted at the Madras Christian College in January 1986, of which the contents of this book are the fruit. The participants in the seminar included a remarkably wide spec-trum of persons - religious leaders, philoso-phers, theologians, social scientists, educators and others -who have been and are being nur-tured by one or another from among the major religious traditions of the world, but Christians were present in greatest number. Among the participants were a number of experienced practitioners of inter-faith dialogue, e.g. Bed Griffiths, Karan Singh, Gopal Singh, Stanley Samartha, S. Vahiduddin, K. Klostermaier, R.R. Raghavachar, Pema Rigzin, Wesley Ari-arajah, to mention a few of the more well known. Indeed, the over all variety is indicative of the immensity of the problem of religious pluralism in the world today. The collection of articles is divided into five seemingly arbitrary sections which do not appear to reflect a prior well thought through conceptual framework which would give a much needed structure to the seminar, but rather an attempt, after the fact, to break up the mass of material into manageable units. The belated dedication of the volume to the memory of the late Bishop A.J. Appasamy and the inclusion [Appendix II] of the text of a lec-ture on the good bishop delivered by the Gen-eral Secretary of the Christian Literature Soci-ety half a decade after the original seminar was held adds to the lack of coherency of the collec-tion. Nor does the lengthy rambling Introduc-tion by the editor of the volume help in this re-gard. Here the author attempts to trace the birth of inter-faith dialogue to "the conflicts and challenges between Christianity and Hin-duism for supremacy, during the 19th and early 20th centuries." In the process the author di-lates on, among other things "the beginnings of Christian missions," "the negative reactions of Hindus and the vigorous activities of the mis-sionaries in return," how in the process of Book Reviews 37 struggle and competition "the two religions got transformed into Universal Religions." The reader will also find here "some possible solu-tions offered by Religious leaders and Philoso-phers of the World to the grievous problem of Religious Pluralism in the Modern World," ending with a "brief outline of Hick's Theory of Pluralism." Indeed, the rather disparate charac-ter of the Introduction seems symptomatic of the wide ranging variety of articles which con-tributes to the lack of coherency of the collec-tion. One also experiences a numbing sense of deja vu as one reads through "Inter-Faith Dia-logue-A Hindu Perspective," "Inter-Faith Di-alogue - A Catholic Christian Perspective," "Inter-Faith Dialogue-A Sikh Perspective," "Religion and Religions - An Islamic Re-sponse," "Ecumenical Issues in Dialogue." There is also a pall of doctrinaire dullness re-sulting from, among several things, the recita-tion of oft repeated cliches which seem to bear little specific relationship to the particular re-alities of our present several situations. Per-haps part of the problem lies in the day - five years - in getting the papers published after their initial presentation. This is not to say, however, that there are no new perspectives and concerns to be found in the collection. A case in point is Stanley Samartha's article on "Inter-Religious Rela-tionships in the Secular State." Basically, Sa martha argues that to reject religious beliefs as unsecular is to empty public life of its moral and social base. Rather, in pluralistic societies it is necessary to reject the secular tolerance which is indifferent to all religious values. Likewise, it is wise to repudiate the religious tolerance which affirms that all religions are the same when in actual fact they are distinct, different, even 'unique.' Only when different religions are recognised as distinctive and dif-ferent responses to the mystery of Truth can dialogue become a genuine relationship be-tween different communities of faith and open up possibilities of mutual enrichment in the larger life of the nation. There is need for both a commitment that requires sharing one's faith with one's neighbours and a tolerance that makes mutual enrichment possible. "Interfaith dialogue helps us hold together in balance both commitment to our particular faith and open-2Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies, Vol. 5 [1992], Art. 12https://digitalcommons.butler.edu/jhcs/vol5/iss1/12DOI: 10.7825/2164-6279.106538 Book Reviews ness to those of our neighbours." There are other examples of well-researched and pre-cisely argued articles that explore the central elements of the theme of the seminar in a cre-atively realistic manner. Other valuable reflections are to be found in the piece on "The Contribution of religion to the Harmony-Conflict Process" by the social scientist Ram Singh. Countering the commonly held belief that for peace and prosperity people communities must function harmoniously, Ram Singh argues that harmony and conflict both are necessary to keep a society vitally sta-ble. The Thai Buddhist savant, Saeng Chan-Ngarm, has some refreshingly relevant things to say in his article on "The Human Grounds for Religious Unity and Harmony." The same is true of the piece on "Theological Elitism" by Daniel White. But each of these is an individ-ual piece and there is no dialogue among them. Maybe it is too much to expect from an anthol-ogy of this type that it have any Significant de-gree of interactive coherence. Even if this be admitted, there still are serious questions with regard to various understandings of the ele-ments in the title of the volume. There is fairly wide spread throughout the articles a degree of basic, underlying assumption of what is in-volved in "inter-faith dialogue." Karan Singh, in his article, states what is by other authors a widely assumed, if not explicitly stated, under-standing of dialogue as an interaction of reli-gious groups in order to solve/settle problems in a harmonious fashion. He even distinguishes traditional categories of "internal" and "exter-nar' dialogue, and accepts the wider scope of dialogue beyond the specifically "inter-faith" to include dialogue between religion and ideolo-gies, between religion and science. But how are we to understand the term "world commu-nity?" There is, of course, no gain saying the fact that the contemporary historic context in which the participants in the seminar met was one of increasing conflict and tension. This seems even more pronounced now in the early years of the final decade of the 20th century. Both within nation states and in the international community old structures that held communi-ties together are disintegrating and new groupings are forming. The energy crisis has further complicated the process and in doing so has manifested sharply not just the "inter-de-pendence" but an almost one-sided depen-dence of certain parts of the world on raw ma-terials produced in other parts. The economic control and political use of these resources has thrown out of gear the older relationships within and between communities of nations. However, fresh criteria for new human rela-tionships that go beyond economic and politi-cal structures have yet to emerge. Surely values that sustain personal life within the commu-nity, giving a sense of freedom and participa-tion in larger communities need to be defined. Virtually none of the contributors to the pre-sent volume-Wesley Ariarajah, Russell Chandran, Stanley Samartha, and Ram Singh being notable exceptions - seem to recognise that unless justice and peace are transformed into a concrete sharing of power in the com-munity of nations, there are signs that we may witness merely a rearrangement of old posi-tions and relationships. Indeed, one would have thought the theme of the seminar be-comes particularly significant insofar as the search for values and criteria involves not only the religious or transcendental dimensions - of which there is ample detailed discussion - but also the more mundane socio-economic, politi-cal dimensions of world community - to which distreSSingly little attention is paid. The term world community is ambiguous at best, and is likely to be misunderstood. The peril of this ambiguity, distortion, confusion has not been adequately addressed by any of the participants. Perhaps it was not suffiCiently recognised and articulated by the organizers, or the partici-pants. True, the absence of clear-cut definitions need not necessarily be a hindrance for seeking community provided there is genuine struggle to discern resources and recognise responsibili-ties for living together. Indeed, one would have hoped that greater attention would have been paid to the business of identifying responsibili-ties and restating resources that are available in the long histories of the several religious tradi-tions in terms of meeting these responsibilities. While this process is part of the ongoing life and continuing search for renewal within each community of faith, the crucial factor in the 3Scott: Book Review: "Inter-Faith Dialogue and World Community"Published by Digital Commons @ Butler University, 1992contemporary situation, symbolised by this in-ternational, interreligious seminar, is that whether we like it or not we are thrown to-gether in this task. Sometimes even those of us who live daily in multi-religious contexts forget the implications of this "togetherness." The search for new patterns of relationships is not the prerogative of anyone particular commu-nity of faith. However, despite its shortcomings, there is much to be gained in terms of fellowship and insight from such dialogue meetings and the publication of their proceedings. Both the meetings and the sharing of wisdom need to be encouraged, pressing forward towards the ful Book Reviews 39 fillment of the vision of a world community characterised by peace with justice which is a guiding light for all religious communities. In this quest, there are things to be learned from the present undaunted attempt to shed light from the various religious traditions on the ar-ticulation of this vision in the expectation of furthering the struggle for its achievement. We are in the debt of both the participants and the editor. David C. Scott United Theological College Bangalore The Role of PramiiQas in Hindu-Christian Epistemology. K.P. Aleaz. Punthi-Pustak, Calcutta, 1991, 154p. THE AUTFlOR STATES his objective as discovering the six Indian pramiiIJas as "an au-thentic aspect of Indian Christian Theological method vis-a-vis the Christian pramiiIJas as understood by some Indian Christian theolo-gians." (p.3) He finds that the earlier attempts in this direction do not take into account the six pramiiIJas of Indian philosophy and their possible use as Christian pramiiIJas. As the ti-tle of the book stands, the project itself is laudable and one would expect a break-through in a theological method building upon the earlier attempts. In the process of inculturation there was a stage where equivalents of Christian tradi-tion were sought in Hindu tradition, to adapt, if not adopt fully, for the enrichment of the Indian Christian theology. And in that sense it is valuable to look into the six traditional sources of knowledge - pramiiIJas - from which Christianity could gain some insight into its own tradition. So the author examines the six means of knowing and appeals to the Christian community that these should be used in theological reflection. But as such it does not offer any further reflection on the possible gains through this method. It is high time to go beyond this stage and see what response the metaphors of one tradi-tion evoke in another tradition, with a view to develop an inter-cultural and inter-religious concept of pramiiIJas - as a precondition for the meeting of cultures and religions, so that dialogue between traditions is possible with-out losing their identity. But the author tends to be descriptive rather than addressing him-self to the larger issues of Hindu-Christian epistemology while dealing with the role of pramiiftas. Any theological method takes into ac-count revelation, reason, and experience. Even within a particular religious framework, for example in Hinduism, revelation is differently interpreted, depending on the specific tradi-tion one comes from - as in the case of the Vedantins. Tradition is always a complex whole. In Christianity what is meant by reli-gious tradition depends on the core of the ba-sic beliefs which have their point of reference to scriptures, teaching authority, saints and enlightened leaders of this tradition, liturgy 4Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies, Vol. 5 [1992], Art. 12https://digitalcommons.butler.edu/jhcs/vol5/iss1/12DOI: 10.7825/2164-6279.1065

Book Review:  Inter-Faith Dialogue and World Community

David C. Scott

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