The goal of this article is to argue for the three following theses: (1) that Moses Mendelssohn’s Philosophische Gespräche (1755) offer a rehabilitation of Baruch Spinoza (1632–1677) in explicit opposition to the stigmatization that Spinoza suffered in the German lands from the beginning of the 1670s; (2) that the article “Rorarius” from Pierre Bayle’s (1647–1706) Dictionnaire historique et critique (1697–1698) is a crucial source for Mendelssohn’s strategy to rehabilitate Spinoza; (3) that Mendelssohn’s use of Bayle as a source constitutes an unexplored link between oppressed religious minorities. To show this, the article will consist of an introductory part to set the subject matter and three subsequent parts, one for each of the points that I am going to argue for.
{"title":"Scepticism against Intolerance? Moses Mendelssohn and Pierre Bayle’s “Dialogue” on Spinoza in Mendelssohn’s Philosophische Gespräche (1755)","authors":"Guillem Sales Vilalta","doi":"10.3390/rel15010049","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15010049","url":null,"abstract":"The goal of this article is to argue for the three following theses: (1) that Moses Mendelssohn’s Philosophische Gespräche (1755) offer a rehabilitation of Baruch Spinoza (1632–1677) in explicit opposition to the stigmatization that Spinoza suffered in the German lands from the beginning of the 1670s; (2) that the article “Rorarius” from Pierre Bayle’s (1647–1706) Dictionnaire historique et critique (1697–1698) is a crucial source for Mendelssohn’s strategy to rehabilitate Spinoza; (3) that Mendelssohn’s use of Bayle as a source constitutes an unexplored link between oppressed religious minorities. To show this, the article will consist of an introductory part to set the subject matter and three subsequent parts, one for each of the points that I am going to argue for.","PeriodicalId":38169,"journal":{"name":"Religions","volume":"27 108","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.8,"publicationDate":"2023-12-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139154603","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In medieval India, the desire for “the unity of Brahman and Self” was present in the Vedānta tradition of Hinduism. Adi Śaṅkara, the master of Vedānta philosophy, proposed the six-fold sādhana: mind control, sense control, mental tranquility, endurance, potential faith, and concentration. These six-fold practices can help Vedānta followers realize unity with Brahman. In medieval Christianity, mysticism was regarded as an important path for Christians to seek a closer relationship with God. Pursuing “the unity of God and man” became the goal and direction of Christians at that time, which could be achieved through spirituality. Bonaventure, known as the Seraphic Doctor, was a representative figure of medieval Christian mysticism. He proposed six stages of spirituality: Sense, Imagination, Reason, Intelligence, Understanding, and Spark of Conscience, through which one can achieve unity with God. This article attempts to compare Bonaventure’s theory of six stages of spirituality with Śaṅkara’s idea of six-fold practice and discover the similarities and differences between Eastern and Western religious spirituality in the Middle Ages. Through this comparison, we can further explore the medieval religious believers’ desire for ultimate reality and try to find the possibility of dialogue between Christianity and Advaita Vedānta.
{"title":"A Comparative Study of Medieval Religious Spirituality: Bonaventure’s Theory of Six Stages of Spirituality and Śaṅkara’s Sixfold Practice Theory of Advaita Vedānta","authors":"Yixuan Liu","doi":"10.3390/rel15010039","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15010039","url":null,"abstract":"In medieval India, the desire for “the unity of Brahman and Self” was present in the Vedānta tradition of Hinduism. Adi Śaṅkara, the master of Vedānta philosophy, proposed the six-fold sādhana: mind control, sense control, mental tranquility, endurance, potential faith, and concentration. These six-fold practices can help Vedānta followers realize unity with Brahman. In medieval Christianity, mysticism was regarded as an important path for Christians to seek a closer relationship with God. Pursuing “the unity of God and man” became the goal and direction of Christians at that time, which could be achieved through spirituality. Bonaventure, known as the Seraphic Doctor, was a representative figure of medieval Christian mysticism. He proposed six stages of spirituality: Sense, Imagination, Reason, Intelligence, Understanding, and Spark of Conscience, through which one can achieve unity with God. This article attempts to compare Bonaventure’s theory of six stages of spirituality with Śaṅkara’s idea of six-fold practice and discover the similarities and differences between Eastern and Western religious spirituality in the Middle Ages. Through this comparison, we can further explore the medieval religious believers’ desire for ultimate reality and try to find the possibility of dialogue between Christianity and Advaita Vedānta.","PeriodicalId":38169,"journal":{"name":"Religions","volume":"26 15","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.8,"publicationDate":"2023-12-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139156097","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In this study I propose rethinking the nature, purposes, and impacts of relations between the kingdoms of Portugal and Kongo in the period between 1511 and 1665. My main argument is that the Pact of Confederation formed by these two kingdoms was decisive, exceptional, and unprecedented. While covert attempts by the Portuguese to gain control of the Kingdom of Kongo were common during this period, the relations spelled out by the pact nevertheless endured for over a century and would have global repercussions. From the vantage point of historiography, the pact presents modern historians with serious difficulties, largely because it spells out modes of interaction that do not fit readily into recognized systems of European colonialism. Central to these modes of interaction is the significant role that religion played in defining Portuguese imperialist policies in Central Africa. In the end, the Pact of Confederation between the kingdoms of Portugal and Kongo forces historians to rethink Portuguese imperial dynamics and the modalities of their presence in Africa and beyond.
{"title":"The Confederation between the Kingdoms of Portugal and Kongo, 1511–1665","authors":"Jaime Ricardo Gouveia","doi":"10.3390/rel15010038","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15010038","url":null,"abstract":"In this study I propose rethinking the nature, purposes, and impacts of relations between the kingdoms of Portugal and Kongo in the period between 1511 and 1665. My main argument is that the Pact of Confederation formed by these two kingdoms was decisive, exceptional, and unprecedented. While covert attempts by the Portuguese to gain control of the Kingdom of Kongo were common during this period, the relations spelled out by the pact nevertheless endured for over a century and would have global repercussions. From the vantage point of historiography, the pact presents modern historians with serious difficulties, largely because it spells out modes of interaction that do not fit readily into recognized systems of European colonialism. Central to these modes of interaction is the significant role that religion played in defining Portuguese imperialist policies in Central Africa. In the end, the Pact of Confederation between the kingdoms of Portugal and Kongo forces historians to rethink Portuguese imperial dynamics and the modalities of their presence in Africa and beyond.","PeriodicalId":38169,"journal":{"name":"Religions","volume":"4 12","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.8,"publicationDate":"2023-12-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139156606","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This paper is an attempt to consider an alternative pluralist pantheism (Mary Jane Rubenstein) as the next step in the evolution of interpersonal, interspecies, and God–human–nature relationships and its possible realisation in (post-)Christian ecofeminism and its epistemology. It follows the methodology and epistemology of theological ecofeminism, which assumes that the oppression of women and the exploitation of nature stem from the same constellation of phenomena: patriarchal domination, dualistic anthropologies, and global hypercapitalism. Recognising that pantheism is a very complex phenomenon and should not be viewed as a single codified viewpoint, but rather as a diverse family of different doctrines, this paper understands pantheism primarily as the paradigm that asserts that everything is part of a divine unity consisting of an all-encompassing, manifested deity or God/Goddess. The paper first explains the pan-en-theistic turn in Christian ecofeminism as a tool for deconstructing the dominant Cartesian dualistic binaries and their symbolism and metanarratives, and as the first “safe” phase of transition from Christian anthropocentrism. From this standpoint, Grace M. Jantzen’s defense of pantheism as an alternative to transcendental theism is further explored as she argues that divinity is found “in” the physical and material world and nowhere else. The paper then moves to the second phase, proposed in the final part of the paper, on the possibility of the theoretical adoption of pluralist pantheism in (post-)Christian ecofeminist ecotheology. Here, the question of the “fear and horror of pantheism” in Western thought is discussed.
本文试图将另一种多元泛神论（玛丽-简-鲁宾斯坦）作为人与人之间、物种与物种之间以及上帝-人类-自然之间关系演变的下一步，及其在（后）基督教生态女权主义及其认识论中的可能实现。它遵循神学生态女权主义的方法论和认识论，认为对女性的压迫和对自然的剥削源于同一系列现象：父权统治、二元人类学和全球超资本主义。本文认识到泛神论是一种非常复杂的现象，不应将其视为单一的成文观点，而应将其视为一个由不同学说组成的多样化家族，因此，本文将泛神论主要理解为一种范式，即主张万物都是由无所不包的显现神或上帝/女神组成的神圣统一体的一部分。本文首先解释了基督教生态女性主义中的泛神论转向，将其作为解构占主导地位的笛卡尔二元对立及其象征主义和元叙事的工具，并将其作为从基督教人类中心主义过渡的第一个 "安全 "阶段。从这一角度出发，本文进一步探讨了格蕾丝-M-詹特森（Grace M. Jantzen）对泛神论的辩护，她认为神性 "存在于 "物理和物质世界中，而非其他任何地方。然后，本文进入第二阶段，即本文最后一部分提出的关于在（后）基督教生态女性主义生态神学中从理论上采纳多元泛神论的可能性。这里讨论了西方思想中 "泛神论的恐惧和恐怖 "问题。
{"title":"Is There a Place for Pantheism in (Post-)Christian Ecofeminist Reconstruction of the God/Goddess–World Relationship","authors":"Nadja Furlan Štante","doi":"10.3390/rel15010032","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15010032","url":null,"abstract":"This paper is an attempt to consider an alternative pluralist pantheism (Mary Jane Rubenstein) as the next step in the evolution of interpersonal, interspecies, and God–human–nature relationships and its possible realisation in (post-)Christian ecofeminism and its epistemology. It follows the methodology and epistemology of theological ecofeminism, which assumes that the oppression of women and the exploitation of nature stem from the same constellation of phenomena: patriarchal domination, dualistic anthropologies, and global hypercapitalism. Recognising that pantheism is a very complex phenomenon and should not be viewed as a single codified viewpoint, but rather as a diverse family of different doctrines, this paper understands pantheism primarily as the paradigm that asserts that everything is part of a divine unity consisting of an all-encompassing, manifested deity or God/Goddess. The paper first explains the pan-en-theistic turn in Christian ecofeminism as a tool for deconstructing the dominant Cartesian dualistic binaries and their symbolism and metanarratives, and as the first “safe” phase of transition from Christian anthropocentrism. From this standpoint, Grace M. Jantzen’s defense of pantheism as an alternative to transcendental theism is further explored as she argues that divinity is found “in” the physical and material world and nowhere else. The paper then moves to the second phase, proposed in the final part of the paper, on the possibility of the theoretical adoption of pluralist pantheism in (post-)Christian ecofeminist ecotheology. Here, the question of the “fear and horror of pantheism” in Western thought is discussed.","PeriodicalId":38169,"journal":{"name":"Religions","volume":"16 6","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.8,"publicationDate":"2023-12-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139158232","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This article examines Ukrainian folkloric parallels to Viy, a character in the horror novella of the same name by Nikolai Gogol. It is a formidable chthonic, demonic creature whose eyelids cover the eyes and need to be lifted, and the gaze sees what is hidden from others. Although the writer claimed that this character, like the entire plot of the story, was taken from Ukrainian folklore, some modern researchers claim that Viy is the author’s own invention. This is contradicted by folkloric data, primarily Ukrainian lore. Demonic characters with different names but with the same appearance and very similar functions as Viy appear in Ukrainian folk tales, legends and beliefs recorded in the 19th and 20th centuries. The plots have various degrees of closeness to the plot of Gogol’s story, showing that Viy is an authentic figure from Ukrainian folklore.
{"title":"Viy in Nikolai Gogol’s Novella and Related Mythological Creatures in Ukrainian Folklore","authors":"Kostyantyn Rakhno","doi":"10.3390/rel15010033","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15010033","url":null,"abstract":"This article examines Ukrainian folkloric parallels to Viy, a character in the horror novella of the same name by Nikolai Gogol. It is a formidable chthonic, demonic creature whose eyelids cover the eyes and need to be lifted, and the gaze sees what is hidden from others. Although the writer claimed that this character, like the entire plot of the story, was taken from Ukrainian folklore, some modern researchers claim that Viy is the author’s own invention. This is contradicted by folkloric data, primarily Ukrainian lore. Demonic characters with different names but with the same appearance and very similar functions as Viy appear in Ukrainian folk tales, legends and beliefs recorded in the 19th and 20th centuries. The plots have various degrees of closeness to the plot of Gogol’s story, showing that Viy is an authentic figure from Ukrainian folklore.","PeriodicalId":38169,"journal":{"name":"Religions","volume":"12 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.8,"publicationDate":"2023-12-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139157492","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Despite the distance between their different communities and the difficulties of medieval travel, the Jews of northern Europe developed typical common legal and communal traditions. Rabbinic students traveled hundreds of kilometers to study with famous rabbis, rabbis themselves often relocated from one community to another, and questions were regularly sent to faraway rabbinic authorities and were quickly answered. This article sheds light on the movement and communication patterns of medieval Jewish scholars as a social group. It includes three sections; the first focuses on the movement patterns of prominent rabbis, the second on their forms of communication, and the third on the way these practices were reflected in the organization of larger communal structures. Overall, the article highlights the major role that networks of movement and communication played in the intellectual culture of the rabbinic elite (and other Jews as well) in high medieval northern Europe.
{"title":"Movement, Geography, and Rabbinic Culture in High Medieval Northern Europe","authors":"Tzafrir Barzilay","doi":"10.3390/rel15010034","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15010034","url":null,"abstract":"Despite the distance between their different communities and the difficulties of medieval travel, the Jews of northern Europe developed typical common legal and communal traditions. Rabbinic students traveled hundreds of kilometers to study with famous rabbis, rabbis themselves often relocated from one community to another, and questions were regularly sent to faraway rabbinic authorities and were quickly answered. This article sheds light on the movement and communication patterns of medieval Jewish scholars as a social group. It includes three sections; the first focuses on the movement patterns of prominent rabbis, the second on their forms of communication, and the third on the way these practices were reflected in the organization of larger communal structures. Overall, the article highlights the major role that networks of movement and communication played in the intellectual culture of the rabbinic elite (and other Jews as well) in high medieval northern Europe.","PeriodicalId":38169,"journal":{"name":"Religions","volume":"38 7","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.8,"publicationDate":"2023-12-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139158692","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Every year around 200,000 Māyāmārā Vaiṣṇavas congregate in a small village in Mājulī, Assam, India, for the annual śevā, or worship service, to Ājali Āi, a 16th-century female figure. She was the mother of Sri Sri Aniruddhadeva, the founder of Māyāmārā Vaiṣṇavism, a religious sect originating in medieval Assam that experienced royal persecution and ethnic cleansing. Among contemporary Māyāmārā Vaiṣṇavas, veneration of Ājali Āi as the mother of the founding Guru has become popular, which is somewhat puzzling since historical information about her life is scarce. Nevertheless, as Guru-Mā, Ājali Āi today has become a symbol of holiness in Māyāmārā society with community members attributing to her mahimā, translated as a divine agency, mysterious glory, or supremacy. Guru-riṇ and Mātri-ṛin, categories that are a part of the Vaiṣṇava and the larger Hindu canon, can generally explain the holiness accorded to the mother of the Guru. In the case of the Māyāmārā Vaiṣṇavas, however, they are not sufficient to explain the power in the form of mahimā that the community ascribes to her in the present day to the degree of attributing to her the power to grant wishes. This exploratory chapter argues for a systems approach to understand the phenomenon of the mahimā of Ājali Āi in contemporary Māyāmārā society. The chapter finds that socio-economic and political forces interacted with extant legends around Ājali Āi and ideas around Āi as Devi and mother in complex ways to create the community’s contemporary understanding of Ājali Āi as a holy and loving maternal figure with mahimā—one who keeps a watchful and nurturing eye over the community and grants the wishes of ardent devotees.
{"title":"The Mahimā of Ājali Āi and the Persecuted Māyāmārā Śatra: Guru-Mā as Holy Patroness and Divine Mother","authors":"Arunjana Das","doi":"10.3390/rel15010036","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15010036","url":null,"abstract":"Every year around 200,000 Māyāmārā Vaiṣṇavas congregate in a small village in Mājulī, Assam, India, for the annual śevā, or worship service, to Ājali Āi, a 16th-century female figure. She was the mother of Sri Sri Aniruddhadeva, the founder of Māyāmārā Vaiṣṇavism, a religious sect originating in medieval Assam that experienced royal persecution and ethnic cleansing. Among contemporary Māyāmārā Vaiṣṇavas, veneration of Ājali Āi as the mother of the founding Guru has become popular, which is somewhat puzzling since historical information about her life is scarce. Nevertheless, as Guru-Mā, Ājali Āi today has become a symbol of holiness in Māyāmārā society with community members attributing to her mahimā, translated as a divine agency, mysterious glory, or supremacy. Guru-riṇ and Mātri-ṛin, categories that are a part of the Vaiṣṇava and the larger Hindu canon, can generally explain the holiness accorded to the mother of the Guru. In the case of the Māyāmārā Vaiṣṇavas, however, they are not sufficient to explain the power in the form of mahimā that the community ascribes to her in the present day to the degree of attributing to her the power to grant wishes. This exploratory chapter argues for a systems approach to understand the phenomenon of the mahimā of Ājali Āi in contemporary Māyāmārā society. The chapter finds that socio-economic and political forces interacted with extant legends around Ājali Āi and ideas around Āi as Devi and mother in complex ways to create the community’s contemporary understanding of Ājali Āi as a holy and loving maternal figure with mahimā—one who keeps a watchful and nurturing eye over the community and grants the wishes of ardent devotees.","PeriodicalId":38169,"journal":{"name":"Religions","volume":"1 3","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.8,"publicationDate":"2023-12-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139158493","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The classical doctrine of the eternal relations or origin (ERO) claims that these relations are (1) atemporal and (2) causal. In this paper, I investigate the casual nature of the ERO, highlighting that the patristic and medieval Christian thinkers who developed this doctrine understood causality in terms of Aristotle’s efficient causality, highlighting that these are casual acts that produce an effect. I then provide an analysis of some of the major theories of efficient causation on offer in contemporary metaphysics to see which theory best comports with how the ancient and medieval Christian thinkers understood the efficient–causal aspect of the ERO, concluding that a powers theory of causation seems to work best. I conclude by discussing the implications the classical doctrine of the ERO has for models of God, arguing that they are compatible only with classical theism and neoclassical theism.
{"title":"The Eternal Relations of Origin, Causality, and Implications for Models of God","authors":"Andrew Hollingsworth","doi":"10.3390/rel15010035","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15010035","url":null,"abstract":"The classical doctrine of the eternal relations or origin (ERO) claims that these relations are (1) atemporal and (2) causal. In this paper, I investigate the casual nature of the ERO, highlighting that the patristic and medieval Christian thinkers who developed this doctrine understood causality in terms of Aristotle’s efficient causality, highlighting that these are casual acts that produce an effect. I then provide an analysis of some of the major theories of efficient causation on offer in contemporary metaphysics to see which theory best comports with how the ancient and medieval Christian thinkers understood the efficient–causal aspect of the ERO, concluding that a powers theory of causation seems to work best. I conclude by discussing the implications the classical doctrine of the ERO has for models of God, arguing that they are compatible only with classical theism and neoclassical theism.","PeriodicalId":38169,"journal":{"name":"Religions","volume":"11 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.8,"publicationDate":"2023-12-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139157699","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This paper develops Mark D. Linville’s brief description of “a sort of moral fine-tuning argument”. I develop the argument in four ways: I unpack the argument and give it a clear formulation, I unpack the theistic explanation of why a somewhat reliable moral capacity is expected, I point to the significance of not seeking to explain a perfect moral capacity, and I put the argument up against the recent work on non-theistic moral epistemology by Derek Parfit, David Enoch, and Erik Wielenberg.
{"title":"A Moral Fine-Tuning Argument","authors":"Martin Jakobsen","doi":"10.3390/rel15010031","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15010031","url":null,"abstract":"This paper develops Mark D. Linville’s brief description of “a sort of moral fine-tuning argument”. I develop the argument in four ways: I unpack the argument and give it a clear formulation, I unpack the theistic explanation of why a somewhat reliable moral capacity is expected, I point to the significance of not seeking to explain a perfect moral capacity, and I put the argument up against the recent work on non-theistic moral epistemology by Derek Parfit, David Enoch, and Erik Wielenberg.","PeriodicalId":38169,"journal":{"name":"Religions","volume":"2014 11","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.8,"publicationDate":"2023-12-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139160145","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This paper argues that interreligious dialogue through study and friendships across the religious divide makes participants less susceptible to religious and cultural misinformation that is often used to maintain social bubbles, in which members draw clear boundaries between “us” and “them”. Differences between social groups can culminate in a struggle between good and evil that can escalate into tension and violence. Preventing tensions and conflicts requires respect for differences, willingness to engage in dialogue, and a sound understanding of what religion is and the historical processes that have determined its development, distinguishing between empirical facts and images to which believers adhere. Because the author is a Dutch sociologist turned journalist from a conservative Christian family involved in interreligious dialogue in the Netherlands, Israel, and Egypt, the literature review presents contemporary religious developments in all three countries. The literature review is flanked by the author’s personal narrative on the events that changed his views on truth and spirituality, making him more aware of the commonalities between peoples of different beliefs and leading him to a lifelong commitment to interreligious and intercultural dialogue.
{"title":"From Religious Bubble to Interreligious Dialogue: A Personal Story of Transformation","authors":"Cornelis Hulsman","doi":"10.3390/rel15010028","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15010028","url":null,"abstract":"This paper argues that interreligious dialogue through study and friendships across the religious divide makes participants less susceptible to religious and cultural misinformation that is often used to maintain social bubbles, in which members draw clear boundaries between “us” and “them”. Differences between social groups can culminate in a struggle between good and evil that can escalate into tension and violence. Preventing tensions and conflicts requires respect for differences, willingness to engage in dialogue, and a sound understanding of what religion is and the historical processes that have determined its development, distinguishing between empirical facts and images to which believers adhere. Because the author is a Dutch sociologist turned journalist from a conservative Christian family involved in interreligious dialogue in the Netherlands, Israel, and Egypt, the literature review presents contemporary religious developments in all three countries. The literature review is flanked by the author’s personal narrative on the events that changed his views on truth and spirituality, making him more aware of the commonalities between peoples of different beliefs and leading him to a lifelong commitment to interreligious and intercultural dialogue.","PeriodicalId":38169,"journal":{"name":"Religions","volume":"662 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.8,"publicationDate":"2023-12-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139160525","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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