1. Mahatma Gandhi and Interreligious Encounter
2. Buddhist King Ashoka
(c.304-232 B.C.) ( 2nd August 2002)
3. Pope Paul VI ( 7th August)
4. AMECEA 14th Plenary Assembly: 14th to 28th July, 2002) Pastoral Resolution on Ecumenism and Interreligious Dialogue ( 12th August 2002)
5. Pope John-Paul II ( 21th August 2002)
6. Jonathan Sacks (new 1st May 2003)
I would like to make two proposals concerning the objective on Encounter and Dialogue:
1- Food for Thought: Short statements, reflections etc., that different people have said about the topic. Confrères could send to us such statements. It could also be their reflections/meditations etc.
2- Proverbs and sayings: Confreres are invited to send us proverbs/sayings that they come accross which can be used in promoting Encounter. They could be invited to accompany the proverb with a short reflection/meditation. It is not neccessary that the proverbs come from Africa
Send your contribution to the webmaster and I will put it on .Thanks
Food for Thought - 1
Mahatma Gandhi and Interreligious Encounter
(All the quotations are from: Robert Ellsberg, Gandhi on Christianity, New York 1999)1. For a time, I struggled with the question: "Which is the true religion out of those I knew?", but ultimately, I came to the deliberate conviction that there was no such a thing as only one true religion and every other false. There is no religion that is absolutely perfect. All are equally imperfect or more or less perfect. Hence the conclusion that Christianity is as good and true as my own religion. But also is Islam or Zoroastrianism or Judaism. (p. 66)
2. I came to the conclusion that all religions were right, but every one of them was imperfect, imperfect naturally and necessarily, because they were interpreted with our poor intellects, sometimes with our poor hearts, and more often misinterpreted. (p. 35)
3. I may not have any design upon my neighbour as to his faith, which I must honour as I honour mine. For I regard all religions of the world as true, at any rate for those people professing them as mine is true for me. (p. 48)
4. All faiths constitute a revelation of Truth, but all are imperfect and liable to error. Reverence for other faiths need not blind us to their faults. We must be keenly alive to the defects of our own faiths also, yet not leave it on the account, but try to overcome those defects. Looking at all religions with an equal eye, we would not only hesitate, but would think it our duty to blend into our faith every acceptable feature of other faiths. (p. 62)
5. We should, by living the life according to our lights, show the best with one another, thus adding to the sum total of human effort to reach God. (p. 14)
6. Consider whether you are going to accept the position of mutual tolerance or of equality of all religions. My position is that all the great religions are fundamentally equal. We must have the innate respect for other religions as we have for our own. Mind you, not mutual tolerance, but equal respect. (p. 14)
7. Duty of tolerance: If you cannot feel that the other faith is a true as yours, you should feel at least that the people are as true as you. (p. 42)
8. Tolerance: My doctrine of toleration does not include toleration of evil, though it does the toleration of the evil-minded. (p. 57)
9. Tolerance does not mean indifference towards one's own faith, but a more intelligent and purer love for it. (p. 62)
10. I plead for the broadest toleration, and I am working to that end. I ask people to examine every religion from the point of the religionists themselves. I do not expect the India of my dream to develop one religion, i.e., to be wholly Hindu or wholly Christian; but I want it to be wholly tolerant, with its religions working side by side with one another. (p. 59)
11. In nature, there is a fundamental unity running through all the diversity we see about us. Religions are no exception to the natural law. They are given to mankind so as to accelerate the process of realisation of this fundamental unity. (p. 39-40)
12. The different religions are beautiful flowers from the same garden or they are branches of the same majestic Tree. (p. 65)
13. Even as a Tree has a single trunk, but many branches and leaves, so is there one true perfect Religion, but it becomes many as it passes through the human medium. (p. 62)
14. I believe that it is impossible to estimate the merits of the various religions of the world, and moreover, I believe that it is unnecessary and harmful even to attempt it. But each one of them, in my judgement, embodies a common motivating force: the desire to uplift man's life and give it a purpose. (p. 28)
15. A Hindu refuses to change his religion, not necessarily because he considers it to be the best, but because he knows that he can complement it by introducing reforms. (p. 31)
16. Complement the faith of the people instead of undermining it. Make us better Hindus, i.e. better men or women. (p. 42)
17. I disbelieve in the conversion of one person by another. My effort should never be to undermine another's faith, but to make him better follower of his own faith. This implies belief in the truth of all religions and, therefore, respect for them. It again implies true humility, recognition of the fact that the Divine Light having been vouchsafed to all religions through the medium of flesh, they must share, in more or less degree, the imperfection of the vehicle. (p. 44)
18. I would not only not try to convert, but would not even secretly pray that any anyone should embrace my faith. My prayer would always be that Imam-saheb should be a better Mussalman, or become the best he can. Hinduism, with its message of Ahimsa (non-violence) is to me the most glorious religion in the world - as my wife is the most beautiful woman in the world - but others may feel the same about their own religions. Cases of real honest conversion are quite possible. If some people, for their inward satisfaction and growth, change their religion, let them do so. (p. 57-58)
19. If a man has a living faith in him, it spreads its aroma like the rose its scent. A rose does not need to preach. It simply spreads its fragrance. The fragrance is its own sermon. (p. 45)
20. All religions say: Your life is your speech. Language is a limitation of the truth which can be only represented by life. (p. 53)
21. Sacred duty: I hold that it is a duty of every cultured man or woman to read sympathetically the Scriptures of the world. If we are to respect other's religions as we would have them to respect our own, a friendly study of the world's religions is a sacred duty. (p. 58)
22. It is not enough to read the Song Celestial or the Koran. It is necessary to read the Koran with Islamic spectacles and the Gita with Hindu spectacles, just as you would expect me to read the Bible with Christian spectacles. (p. 50)
23. I have come to the conclusion, in my own experience, that those who, no matter to what faith they belong, reverently study the teaching of other faiths, broaden their own instead of narrowing their hearts. Personally, I do not regard any of the great religions of the world as false. All have served in enriching mankind and are now even serving their purpose. (p. 23)
24. Assuming too much: You have not examined all the religious beliefs. But even if you had, you may not claim infallibility. You assume knowledge of all people, which you can do only if you were God. I want you to understand that you are labouring under a double fallacy: That what you think is best for you is really so; and that what you regard as the best for you is the best for the whole world. It is an assumption of omniscience and infallibility. I plead for a little humility! (p. 51-52)
25. Your difficulty lies in your considering the other faiths as false or so adulterated as to amount to falsity. And you shut your eyes to the truth that shines in other faiths and which gives equal joy and peace to their votaries. (p. 55)
Food for Thought - 2 -
Buddhist King Ashoka (c.304-232 B.C.)
An Indian ruler (c. 272 - 232) of the Mauryan dynasty who converted to Buddhism after a great victory on the battlefield of Kalinga which made him sick of violence and vowed never to fight again or to use violence. He dedicated himself to the victories of "Dharma" (i.e., kindness, generosity, truthfulness, purity of heart, gentleness and goodness). He did much to promote the Buddhist faith while at the same time allowing freedom of worship to all creeds. He seems to have genuinely hoped to be able to encourage everyone to practice his or her religion with the same conviction that he practised his. He considered it as one of the duties of the state to protect all religions and to promote and foster the harmony between them. To this end, he created the institution of the Dharma Mahamatras which would correspond to the ministry of religious affairs in a modern state. Ashoka considered the moral/spiritual order of "Dharma" as the instrument par excellence to promote unity in his empire so much characterised by the diversity of religion, ethnicity and many cultural aspects. The summary of his teachings and deeds can be found in his edicts sculpted in rocks and pillars. Ashoka had the title Davanampiya (Beloved-of-the-Gods) and Piyadasi (He Who looks on with Affection). The following are extracts from his edicts taken from the translation of Ven. S. Dhammika. (Cf. Web-site http://www.cs.colostate.edu/~malaiya/ashoka.html.)1. I have honored all religions with various honors. But, I consider it best to meet with the people personally.
2. In the past there were no Dharma Mahamatras but such officers were appointed by me thirteen years after my coronation. Now they work among all religions for the establishment of Dharma, for the promotion of Dharma, and for the welfare and happiness of all who are devoted to Dharma. They work among the Greeks, the Kambojas, the Gandharas, the Rastrikas, the Pitinikas and other peoples on the western borders. They work among soldiers, chiefs, Brahmans, householders, the poor, the aged and those devoted to Dharma -- for their welfare and happiness -- so that they may be free from harassment. They (Dharma Mahamatras) work for the proper treatment of prisoners, towards their unfettering, and if the Mahamatras think, "This one has a family to support," "That one has been bewitched," "This one is old," then they work for the release of such prisoners. They work here, in outlying towns, in the women's quarters belonging to my brothers and sisters, and among my other relatives. They are occupied everywhere. These Dharma Mahamatras are occupied in my domain among people devoted to Dharma to determine who is devoted to Dharma, who is established in Dharma, and who is generous.
3. Beloved-of-the-Gods, King of Piyadasi, desires that all religions should reside everywhere, for all of them desire self-control and purity of heart. But people have various desires and various passions, and they may practice all of what they should or only a part of it. But one who receives great gifts yet is lacking in self-control, purity of heart, gratitude and firm devotion, such a person is mean.
4. Beloved-of-the-Gods, King Piyadasi, honors both ascetics and the householders of all religions, and he honors them with gifts and honors of various kinds. But Beloved-of-the-Gods, King Piyadasi, does not value gifts and honors as much as he values this -- that there should be growth in the essentials of all religions. Growth in essentials can be done in different ways, but all of them have as their root restraint in speech, that is, not praising one's own religion, or condemning the religion of others without good cause. And if there is cause for criticism, it should be done in a mild way. But it is better to honor other religions for this reason. By so doing, one's own religion benefits, and so do other religions, while doing otherwise harms one's own religion and the religions of others. Whoever praises his own religion, due to excessive devotion, and condemns others with the thought "Let me glorify my own religion," only harms his own religion. Therefore contact (between religions) is good. One should listen to and respect the doctrines professed by others. Beloved-of-the-Gods, King Piyadasi, desires that all should be well-learned in the good doctrines of other religions.
Those who are content with their own religion should be told this: Beloved-of-the-Gods, King Piyadasi, does not value gifts and honors as much as he values that there should be growth in the essentials of all religions. And to this end many are working -- Dharma Mahamatras, Mahamatras in charge of the women's quarters, officers in charge of outlying areas, and other such officers. And the fruit of this is that one's own religion grows and the Dharma is illuminated also.
5. We must respect the followers of other religions in every way. By doing so we can help the growth of our religion and we can help other religions also. If we act in a different way it will harm our religion and also other religions. The man who wants his religion to spread rapidly and honors only his religion and speaks ill of other religions will harm the interests of his own religion. The power of all religions should grow. Devanampiya does not consider charity and worship more important than this.
6. All people should live a life of truthfulness, justice and love. Respect your parents. Treat your teachers and relatives with affection. Be modest in their presence. Give charity. Do not be unkind to animals. No one should think that he and his religion are the greatest. All religions preach the same virtues. Just as it is bad to indulge in self-praise and slandering others, it is bad to condemn other religions. Respect for other religions brings glory to one's own religion.7. The victory of Dharma brings with it love and affection. Devanampiya believes that, however small may be the love gained by its victory, it brings ample reward in the other world.
8. Of all victories, the victory of Dharma is the noblest. One may win a piece of land by fighting a war. But by kindness, love and pity one can win the hearts of people. The sharp point of the sword spills blood; but from Dharma springs the fountain of love. The victory won by arms brings fleeting joy but the victory of Dharma brings lasting joy.
9. There is no gift that can equal the gift of Dharma, the establishment of human relations on Dharma, the distribution of wealth through Dharma, or kinship in Dharma.
10. All men are my children. What I desire for my own children, and I desire their welfare and happiness both in this world and the next, that I desire for all men. You do not understand to what extent I desire this, and if some of you do understand, you do not understand the full extent of my desire.
Food for Thought - 3 -
Pope Paul VI
Extracts taken from Francesco Gioia: Interreligious Dialogue.
The Official teaching of the Catholic Church (1963-1995). Boston 1997
1. Every religion raises us to the transcendence of the Being, without whom there is no reason for existence, for reasoning, for responsible action, for hoping without illusion. Every religion is the dawn of faith. (art. 192)
2. Are we not all one in the struggle for a better world, in this effort to make available to all people those goods which are needed to fulfil their human destiny and to live lives worthy of the children of God?
We must therefore come closer together, not only through modern means of communication, through press and radio, through steamships and jet planes - we must come together with our hearts, in mutual understanding, esteem and love. We must meet not merely as tourists, but as pilgrims who set out to find God - not in buildings of stone but in human hearts. Man must meet man, nation must meet nation, as brothers and sisters, as children of God. (art. 200)
3. We are all children of one human family, sons and daughters of the one God, and in that spirit we shall labour together to make of the world an acceptable place where all children can rightly enjoy the creation of God. (art. 218)
4. Every aspiration toward perfection is a tendency toward God. (art. 257)
5. There is no dialogue possible without a thorough understanding of our interlocutor, or, to use the term popular today, of the other. This noble program calls for a generous sense of man, real asceticism! It is necessary to go beyond the limits of all language, cultural reflexes, even polemics and mistrust, to be open to things greater than ourselves and to universality. (art. 295)
6. We hope we will soon see the day when all religions will unite their efforts concretely in the service of man, his freedom, and his dignity. (art. 297)
7. These (other religions) in fact must no longer be regarded as rivals, or obstacles to evangelisation, but as a field of lively and respectful interest, and of a future with already begun friendships. (art. 317)
8. All of us are pilgrims to the Absolute and the Eternal, who alone can fulfil the heart of man. (art. 319)
AMECEA
14th Plenary Assembly: 14th to 28th July, 2002
Pastoral Resolution on Ecumenism and Interreligious Dialogue1. We maintain that Ecumenism and Inter-religious dialogue is one of the major pastoral priorities explicitly recommended by the recent Popes (Pope John Paul II, Ut Unum sint) and the African Synod (Nº 77). The AMECEA Secretariat in collaboration with the National Secretariats should continue the work of research in this field.
2. We want to ensure that in all our AMECEA Institutions well formulated courses in Ecumenism and Inter-religious Dialogue are incorporated in the formation of the clergy, religious and laity.
3. Collaboration between Catholic and other Christian seminaries or schools of theology should be seriously considered by the Conferences of each country of the Region.
4. Education to ecumenism and inter-religious dialogue should be part and parcel of an integral catechesis, either during the catechumenate or in the normal process of religious education in schools.
5. We ask the Pastoral Department of AMECEA to compose and publish a prayer to be translated into the major languages within the AMECEA Region for the promotion of ecumenism and inter-religious dialogue as well as for the advancement of peace, unity and reconciliation.
6. We encourage the Episcopal Conferences to continue fostering ecumenical and inter-religious dialogue and organizing common prayer services as well as collaborating with other Churches and religious groups in addressing common social problems.
7. The Pastoral Department of AMECEA should gather objective information on the challenges of ecumenism and inter-religious dialogue in the countries of the region, especially in those countries where basic human rights and freedom of religion are restricted. A strategic action to address these situations should be proposed by the Pastoral Department.
8. We desire that at the occasion of AMECEA Plenaries and other National Assemblies, leaders or representatives of other churches and religions be invited at a certain moment for an exchange of prayers and reflections oriented to promote better mutual knowledge.
9. We recommend a study to be undertaken by AMECEA Secretariat on the new Christian sects and movements in the Region in order to find ways of adequately responding to the challenges they present.10. The AMECEA Executive Board should give serious consideration to the issue of lack of freedom of religion in the Sudan and elsewhere where Christians are a minority among Muslims. They should also suggest an appropriate plan and strategy for the relations and dialogue between the Catholic Church and Muslims.
Food for Thought - 5 -
Pope John Paul II
Extracts taken from Francesco Gioia: Interreligious Dialogue.
The Official teaching of the Catholic Church (1963-1995). Boston 1997.
1. For us believers the origin of the one human family is found in God. We can call God by many names, without ever completely exhausting his reality, which is beyond us. However, we can recognise in him the Creator, Life-giver, providence, and supreme destiny of every person. (art. 740)
2. The living God, Creator of heaven and earth and the Lord of history is the Father of the one great human family to which we all belong as members. He wants us to bear witness to him through our respect for the faith, religious values and traditions of each person. He wants us to join hands in working for human progress and development at all levels, and to work for the common good, while at the same time assuring reciprocal respect for the religious liberty of individual persons and that of communities. (art. 808)
3. Belief in God as the Creator of all things is a powerful stimulus to promote a respectful dialogue among adherents of the various religions. (art. 657)
4. Our God is a God of dialogue who has been engaged, from the very beginning of history, in a dialogue of salvation with the humanity which he created. This dialogue continues to the present day, and will go on until the end of time. (art. 744)
5. Sincere faith does not divide people but rather unites them, despite their differences. There is nothing like faith to remind us that we have one Creator, we are all brothers and sisters! (art. 797)
6. The Church's relationship with other religions is dictated by a twofold respect: Respect for man in his quest for answers to the deepest questions of his life, and respect for the action of the Spirit in man. (art. 177)
7. The Spirit's presence and activity affect not only individuals but also society and history, peoples, cultures and religions. Indeed, the Spirit is at the origin of noble ideals and undertakings which benefit humanity on its journey through history. (art. 176)
8. The action of the Holy Spirit, who in every time and place has prepared the encounter with the living God in all souls and all peoples, is still at work today in the hearts of human beings, in cultures, and in religions. (art. 710)
9. Every authentic prayer is prompted by the Holy Spirit, who is mysteriously present in every human heart. (art. 177)
10. What seems to bring together and unite, in a particular way, Christians and the believers of other religions is an acknowledgement of the need for prayer as an expression of man's spirituality directed toward the Absolute. Even when, for some, he is the Great Unknown, he nevertheless remains always in reality the same living God. We trust that wherever the human spirit opens itself in prayer to this Unknown God, an echo will be heard of the same Spirit who, knowing the limits and weakness of the human person, himself prays in us and on our behalf, "expressing our plea in a way that could never be put into words" (Rm 8:26). (art. 371)
11. Prayer is the best means by which all humanity can be united. It disposes people to accept God's will for them. It also affects the relationship of those who pray together, for coming together before God in prayer people can no longer ignore or hate others. Those who pray together discover that they are pilgrims and seekers of the same goal, brothers and sisters who share responsibility for the same human family, children of the same God and Father. (art. 517)
12. In the witness to the absoluteness of the moral good, Christians are not alone: they are supported by the moral sense present in the peoples and by the great religious and sapiential traditions of East and West, from which the interior and mysterious workings of God's Spirit are not absent. (art. 185)
13. With the world religions we share a common respect for and obedience to conscience, which teaches all of us to seek the truth, to love and serve all individuals and peoples, and therefore to make peace among individuals and among nations. (art. 543)
14. A Christian finds it of the highest interest to observe truly religious people, to read and listen to the testimonies of their wisdom, and to have direct proof of their faith to the point of recalling at times the words of Jesus: "Not even in Israel have I found such faith" (Mt 8:10). (art. 332)
15. It sometimes happens that the firm belief of the followers of non-Christian religions- a belief that is also an effect of the Spirit of truth operating outside the visible confines of the Mystical Body- can make Christians ashamed at being often themselves disposed to doubt concerning the truths revealed by God and proclaimed by the Church, and prone to relax moral principles and open the way to ethical permissiveness. (art. 150)
16. Evangelisation is a two-way street. The herald of the Good News invites non-Christians religions to discover Christ. But he himself is challenged, by the signs of God's presence in those religions, to welcome new light on differing ways to live a human life, and therefore to live with God. (art. 636)
17. God does not want to be an idol in whose name one person would kill other people. On the contrary, he wills that in justice and peace we join together in the service of life. As servants of his life in the hearts of men and human communities, we are bound to give to one another the best there is in our faith in God, our common Father. (art. 808)
18. It would be a mistake if religions or groups of their followers, in the interpretation and practice of their respective beliefs, were to fall into forms of fundamentalism and fanaticism, justifying struggles and conflicts with others by adducing religious motives. If a struggle worthy of man exists, it is the struggle against his own disordered passions, against every kind of selfishness, against attempts to oppress others, against every type of hatred and violence; in short, against everything that is the exact opposite of peace and reconciliation. (art. 735)
19. Dialogue is based on hope and love, and will bear fruit in the Spirit. (art.179)
20. Dialogue leads to inner purification and conversion which, if pursued with docility to the Holy Spirit, will be spiritually fruitful. (art. 179)
21. Dialogue is a path toward the Kingdom and will certainly bear fruits, even if the times and seasons are known only to the Father. (art. 180)
22. The fruit of dialogue is union between people and union of people with God, who is the source and revealer of all truth and whose Spirit guides men in freedom only when they meet one another in all honesty and love. By dialogue, we let God be present in our midst, for as we open ourselves in dialogue to one another, we also open ourselves to God. (art. 510)
23. I am fully convinced that the time is ripe in human history for followers of various religions to seek a new respect for one another. In a world that is increasingly interdependent, there is a great need for dialogue and co-operation among believers in order to build the future of the human family on the solid ground of respect for each person's inalienable dignity, equal justice for all, tolerance and solidarity in human relations. (art. 821)
24. No religious group can afford to live and act in isolation. While respecting one another's convictions, we need each other's help. Our challenge today is to help the world to live in peace and harmony, with respect for the human dignity of all. In this effort the God of love and peace will be with us. (art. 464)
25. The challenge that not only Christians but people of all religions face is how to learn to understand other religious beliefs and practices, to resolve conflicts peacefully, to build esteem and respect among those whose ways and values are different. (art. 672)
26. In today's world, it is more important than ever that people of faith place at the service of humanity their religious conviction, founded on the daily practice of listening to God's message and encountering him in prayerful worship. (art. 514)
27. Interreligious contacts, together with ecumenical dialogue, are now seen to be obligatory paths, in order to ensure that the many painful wounds inflicted over the course of centuries will not be repeated, and indeed that any such wounds still remaining will soon be healed. (art. 734)
28. Humanity is in search of a new social balance. It is therefore necessary and urgent to find again the desire and determination to walk together to build a more united world, overcoming special interests of peoples, ethnic groups and nations. What an important task religions can carry out in this regard! Poor in human means, they are rich in that universal aspiration which has its roots in a sincere relationship with God. They all remind the men and women of this world that they have a common destiny: that of forming one family of God. (art. 800)
29. While we have walked in silence, we have reflected on the path our human family treads: either in hostility, if we fail to accept one another in love; or as a common journey to our lofty destiny, if we realise that other people are our brothers and sisters. The very fact that we have come to Assisi from various quarters of the world is in itself a sign of this common path which humanity is called to tread. Either we learn to walk together in peace and harmony, or we drift apart and ruin ourselves and others. We hope that this pilgrimage to Assisi has taught us anew to be aware of the common origin and common destiny of humanity. Let us see in it an anticipation of what God would like the developing history of humanity to be: a fraternal journey in which we accompany one another toward the transcendent goal which he sets for us. (art. 546)
30. On this earth we are all pilgrims to the Absolute and Eternal, who alone can save and satisfy the heart of the human person. Let us seek his will together for the good of all humanity. (art. 342)
Food for Thought
- 6 -
Jonathan Sacks
The following extracts are from his book: The Dignity of Difference. How to Avoid the Clash of Civilisations, published in 2002. It is about globalisation. In the prologue, Sacks says: "This book is about globalisation, the challenges it raises, the good it brings, the suffering it causes, the resistances and resentments it generates." (p. 2) He argues that peaceful co-existence in this new context of globalisation need a new paradigm where we have to learn to make space for difference, even and especially at the heart of the great world faiths. He believes that there is 'one God, creator of diversity, commands us to honour his creation by respecting diversity.' (p. 200) Elsewhere he says: 'We will make peace only when we learn that God loves difference and so, at last, must we.' (p. 23) And he concludes saying: 'We will learn to live with diversity once we understand the God-given, world-enhancing dignity of difference.' (p. 209)1. Religion can be a source of discord. It can also be a form of conflict resolution. We are familiar with the former; the second is far too little tried. Yet it is here, if anywhere, that hope must lie if we are to create a human solidarity strong enough to bear the strains that lie ahead. (p. 4)
2. The great faiths must now become an active force for peace and for the justice and compassion on which peace ultimately depends. That will require great courage, and perhaps something more than courage: a candid admission that, more than at any time in the past, we need to search - each faith in its own way - for a way of living with, and acknowledging the integrity of those who are not of our faith. Can we make space for difference? Can we hear the voice of God in a language, a sensibility, a culture not our own? Can we see the presence of God in the face of a stranger? (p. 4-5)
3. It (i.e. religion) is fire - and like fire, it warms but it also burns. And we are the guardian of the flame. (p. 11)
4. I believe that globalisation is summoning the world's great faiths to a supreme challenge, one that we have been able to avoid in the past but can do so no longer. Can we find, in the human other, a trace of the Divine Other? Can we recognise God's image in one who is not in my image? There are times when God meets us in the face of a stranger. The global age has turned our world into a society of strangers. That is not a threat to faith but a call to a faith larger and more demanding than we had sometimes supposed to be. Can I, a Jew, hear the echoes of God's voice in that of a Hindu or Sikh or Christian or Muslim or in the words of an Eskimo from Greenland speaking about a melting glacier? Can I do so and feel not diminished but enlarged? What then becomes of my faith, which until then had encompassed the world and must now make space for another faith, another way of interpreting the world? (p. 17-18)
5. I will argue that the proposition at the heart of monotheism is not what it has traditionally been taken to be: one God, therefore one faith, one truth, one way. To the contrary, it is that unity creates diversity. The glory of the created world is its astonishing multiplicity: the thousands of different languages spoken by mankind, the hundreds of faiths, the proliferation of cultures, the sheer variety of the imaginative expressions of the human spirit, in most of which, if we listen carefully, we will hear the voice of God telling us something we need to know. That is what I mean by the dignity of difference. (p. 21)
6. We need … not only a theology of commonality - of the universals of mankind - but also a theology of difference: why it exists, why it matters, why it is constitutive of our humanity, why it represents the will of God. (p. 21)
7. Oddly enough, it is the market place - the least overtly spiritual of contexts - that delivers a profoundly spiritual message: that it is through exchange that difference becomes a blessing, not a curse. When difference leads to war, both sides lose. When it leads to mutual enrichment, both sides gain. (p. 22-23)
8. I speak from within the Jewish tradition, but I believe that each of us within our own traditions, religious or secular, must learn to listen and be prepared to be surprised by others. We must make ourselves open to their stories, which may profoundly conflict with ours. …. We must learn the art of conversation, from which truth emerges not, as in Socratic dialogues, by the refutation of falsehood but from quite different process of letting our world be enlarged by the presence of others who think, act, and interpret reality in ways radically different from our own. (p. 23)
9. We will make peace only when we learn that God loves difference and so, at last, must we. God has created many cultures, civilisations and faiths but only one world in which to live together - and it is getting smaller all the time. (p. 23)
10. One belief, more than any other is responsible for the slaughter of individuals on the altars of the great ideals. It is the belief that those who do not share my faith - or race or my ideology - do not share my humanity. At best they are second-class citizens. At worst they forfeit the sanctity of life itself. They are the unsaved, the unbelievers, the infidel, the unredeemed; they stand outside the circle of salvation. If faith is what makes us human, then those who do not share my faith are less than fully human. From this equation flowed the crusades, the inquisitions, the jihads, the pogroms, the blood of human sacrifice through the ages. From it - substituting race for faith - ultimately came the Holocaust. (p. 45-46)
11. Judaism is a particularist monotheism. It believes in one God but not in one religion, one culture, one truth. The God of Abraham is the God of all mankind, but the faith of Abraham is not the faith of all mankind. … Biblical monotheism is not the idea that there is one God and therefore one truth, one faith, one way of life. On the contrary, it is the idea that unity creates diversity. (p.52-53)
12. The radical transcendence of God in the Hebrew Bible means nothing more or less than that there is a difference between God and religion. God is universal, religions are particular. Religion is the translation of God into a particular language and thus into the life of a group, a nation, a community of faith. In the course of history, God has spoken to mankind in many languages, through Judaism to Jews, Christianity to Christians, Islam to Muslims. Only such a God is truly transcendental - greater not only than the natural universe but also than the spiritual universe articulated in any single faith, any specific language of human sensibility. How could a sacred text convey such an idea? It would declare that God is God of all humanity, but no single faith is or should be the faith of all humanity. Only such a narrative would lead us to see the presence of God in people of other faiths. (p. 55)
13. God as we encounter Him in the Bible is not a philosophical or scientific concept: the first cause, the prime mover, initiator of the Big Bang. He is a parent, sometimes male ("Have we not all one father?"), sometimes female ("Like one whom his mother comforts, so will I comfort you"), but always bearing the love that a parent feels for a child he/she has brought into being. The God of the Hebrew Bible is not a Platonist, loving the abstract form of humanity. He is a particularist, loving each of his children for what they are: Isaac and Ishmael, Jacob and Esau, Israel and the nations, choosing one for a particular destiny, to be sure, but blessing the others, each in their own way. The God of Abraham teaches humanity a more complex truth than simple oppositions - particular/universal, individual/state, tribe/humanity - would allow. We are particular and universal, the same and different, human beings as such, but also members of this family, that community, this history, that heritage. Our particularity is our window on to universality, just as our language is the only way we have of understanding the world we share with speakers of other languages. God no more wants all faiths and cultures to be the same than a loving parent wants his or her children to be the same. That is the conceptual link between love, creation and difference. We serve God, author of diversity, by respecting diversity. (p. 56)
14. We encounter God in the face of a stranger. That, I believe, is the Hebrew Bible's single greatest and most counterintuitive contribution to ethics. God creates difference; therefore it is in one-who-is-different that we meet God. Abraham encounters God when he invites three strangers into his tent…. The human other is a trace of the Divine Other….. The supreme religious challenge is to see God's image in one who is not in our image. (p.59-60)
15. The God of Israel is larger than the faith of Israel. Traces of his presence can be found throughout the world. We do not have to share a creed or code to be partners in the covenant of mankind. The prophets of Israel wrestle with an idea still counterintuitive to the Platonic mind: that moral and spiritual dignity extend far beyond the boundaries of any one civilisation. They belong to the other, the outsider, the stranger, the one who does not fit our system, race or creed. (p. 60)
16. The faith of Israel declares the oneness of God and the plurality of man. It moves beyond both tribalism and its antithesis, universalism. Tribalism and its modern counterpart, nationalism, assumes there is one god (or 'spirit' or 'race' or 'character') for each nation. Universalism contends that there is one God - and therefore one truth, one way, one creed - for all humanity. Neither does justice to the human other, the stranger who is not in my image but is nevertheless in God's image. Tribalism denies rights to the outsider. Universalism grants rights if and only if the outsider converts, conforms, assimilates, and thus ceases to be an outsider. Tribalism turns the concept of a chosen people into that of a master-race. Universalism turns the truth of a single culture into the measure of humanity. The result are often tragic and always an affront to human dignity. (p.61)
17. We will need to understand that just as the natural environment depends on biodiversity, so the human environment depends on cultural diversity, because no one creed has a monopoly on spiritual truth; no one civilisation encompasses all the spiritual, ethical and artistic expressions of mankind. (p. 62)
18. Truth on the ground is multiple, partial. Fragments of it lie everywhere. Each person, culture and language has a part of it; none has it all. (p. 64)
19. Truth on earth is not, nor can it aspire to be, the whole truth. It is limited, not comprehensive; particular, not universal… In heaven there is truth; on earth there are truths. Therefore, each culture has something to contribute. Each person knows something no one else does. The sages said: 'Who is wise? One who learns from all men.' The wisest is not one who knows himself wiser than others: he is one who knows all men have some share of the truth, and is willing to learn from them, for none of us knows all the truth and each of us knows some of it. (p. 65)
20. Nothing has proved harder in the history of civilisation than to see God, or good, or human dignity in those whose language is not mine, whose skin is a different colour, whose faith is not my faith and whose truth is not my truth. There are, surely, many ways of arriving at this generosity of spirit, and each faith must find its own. The way I have discovered, having listened to Judaism's sacred texts in the context of the tragedies of the twentieth century and the insecurities of the twenty-first, is that the truth at the beating of heart of monotheism is that God is greater than religion; that He is only partially comprehended by any faith. He is my God, but also your God. He is on my side, but also on your side. He exists not only in my faith, but also in yours. That is not to say that there are many gods. That is polytheism. Nor is to say that God endorses every act done in His name. On the contrary: a God of your side as well as mine must be a God of justice who stands above us both, teaching us to make space for one another, to hear each other's claims and to resolve them equitably. Only such a God would be truly transcendent - greater not only than the natural universe but also than the spiritual universe capable of being comprehended in any one language, any single faith. Only such a God could teach mankind to make peace other than by conquest and conversion, and as something nobler than practical necessity. (p. 65)
21. What would faith be like? It would be like being secure in one's home, yet moved by the beauty of foreign places, knowing that they are someone else's home, not mine, but still part of the glory of the world that is ours. It would be like being fluent in English, yet thrilled by the rhythms and resonances of an Italian sonnet one only partially understands. It would be to know that I am a sentence in the story of my people and its faith, but that there are other stories, each written by God out of the letters of lives bound together in community, each bearing the unmistakable trace of his handwriting. Those who are confident in their faith are not threatened but enlarged by the different faith of others. In the midst of our multiple insecurities, we need that confidence now. (p. 65-66)
22. No religion can propose precise policies for the alleviation of hunger and disease. What it can do, and must, is to inspire us collectively with a vision of human solidarity and with concepts, such as tzedakah with the Jewish tradition and its counterparts in other faiths, that serve as a broad moral template for what constitutes a fair and decent world. (p.123)
23. My own view is that the world faiths embody truths unavailable to economics and politics, and they remain salient even when everything else changes. They remind us that civilisations survive not by strength but by how they respond to the weak; not by wealth but by the care they show for the poor; not by power but by their concern for the powerless. The ironic yet utterly humane lesson of history is that what renders a culture invulnerable is the compassion it shows to the vulnerable. The ultimate value we should be concerned to maximise is human dignity - the dignity of all human beings, equally, as children of the creative, redeeming God. (p. 195)
24. … moving from the view that 'Faith is supremely important, and therefore all men must have one true faith' to the proposition that 'Faith is supremely important, and therefore every man must be allowed to live by the faith with which seems true to him'. This is not relativism but a deeply religious understanding that faith coerced is not faith; that religious worship must be free if it is to be a genuine assent of the soul. (p. 199)
25. .. one God, creator of diversity, commands us to honour his creation by respecting diversity. God, the parent of mankind, loves us as a parent loves - each child for what he or she uniquely is. The idea that one God entails one faith, one truth, one covenant, is countered by the story of Babel. (p. 200)
26. Until the great faiths not merely tolerate but find positive value in the diversity of the human condition, we will have wars, and their cost in human lives will continue to rise. (p. 200)
27. There is nothing relativist about the idea of the dignity of difference. It is based on the radical transcendence of God from the created universe, with its astonishing diversity of life forms - all of which, as we now know through genetic research, derive from a single source - and from the multiple languages and cultures through which we, as meaning-seeking beings, have attempted to understand the totality of existence. Just as the human situation would be impoverished and unsustainable if we were to eliminate of all life forms except our own, so it would be reduced and fatally compromised if we were to eliminate all cultural, civilisational and religious forms except our own. The idea that we fulfil God's will by waging war against the infidel, or converting the heathen, so that all humanity share the same faith is an idea that - as I have tried to argue - owes much to the concept of empire and little to the heritage of Abraham, which Jews, Christians and Muslims claim as their own. It was not until the Abrahamic faith came into contact with Greek and Roman imperialism that it developed into an aspiration to conquer or convert the world, and we must abandon it if we are to save ourselves from mutual destruction. To repeat my formulation in an earlier chapter: fundamentalism, like imperialism, is the attempt to impose a single truth on a plural world. It is the Tower of Babel of our time. (p. 2001)
28. The test of faith is whether I can make space for difference. Can I recognise God's image in someone who is not in my image, whose language, faith, ideals, are different from mine? If I cannot, then I have made God in my image instead of allowing him to remake me in his. (p. 2001)
29. Pluralism is a form of hope, because it is founded in the understanding that precisely because we are different, each of us has something unique to contribute to the shared project of which were a part. In the short term, our desires and needs may clash; but the very realisation that difference is a source of blessings leads us to seek mediation, conflict resolution, conciliation and peace - the peace that is predicated on diversity, not on uniformity. (p.203)
30. God's world is diverse. The paths to his presence are many. There are multiple universes of faith, each capturing something of the radiance of being and refracting it into the lives of its followers, none refuting or excluding the others, each as it were the native language of its followers, but combining in a hymn of glory to the creator. (p. 204)
31. Every great faith has within it harsh texts which, read literally, can be taken to endorse narrow particularism, suspicion of strangers, and intolerance toward those who believe differently than we do. Every great faith also has with it sources that emphasise kinship with the stranger, empathy with the outsider, the courage that leads people to extend a hand across boundaries of estrangement or hostility. The choice is ours. Will the generous texts of our tradition serve as interpretative keys to the rest, or will the abrasive passages determine our ideas of what we are and what we are called on to do? No tradition is free from the constant need to reinterpret, to apply eternal truths to an ever-changing world, to listen to what God's word requires of me, here, now. That is what religious leaders have always done, in the past no less than now. (p. 208)
32. I believe that we are being summoned by God to see in the human other a trace of the divine Other. (p. 209)
33. Difference does not diminish; it enlarges the sphere of human possibilities…. Only when we realise the danger of wishing that everyone should be the same - the same faith on the one hand, the same McWorld on the other - will we prevent the clash of civilisations, born of the sense of threat and fear. We will learn to live with diversity once we understand the God-given, world-enhancing dignity of difference. (p. 209)Food for Thought
- 7 -SWAMI VIVEKANANDA
[1863-1902]
Vivekananda is known in the West as the wandering monk and in his motherland as the patriot saint/prophet of modern India. He was a lover of humanity and strove to promote peace and human brotherhood on the spiritual foundation of the Vedantic Oneness of existence: We have always heard it preached, "Love one another." What for? Why should I love everyone? Because they and I are one. Why should I love my brother? Because he and I are one. He chose service to man as his mission on earth with a deep conviction that service to man was service to God and therefore divine worship: Where seekest Though, friend, God leaving aside those before you in myriad forms? He indeed serves God who loves God in all living beings. In serving his fellow people, he always acted on the principle that all hold within themselves the means to achieve their full potential. And, this means is nothing else other than the spark of divinity found within every human being: I direct my attention to the individual, to make him strong, to teach him that he himself is divine, and I call upon men to make themselves conscious of this divinity within. That is really the ideal --conscious or unconscious --of every religion. He preached the ideal of a strength-giving and man-making religion. About the reality and future of religious pluralism he says: If anybody dreams of the exclusive survival of his own religion and the destruction of the others, I pity him from the bottom of my heart, and point out to him that upon the banner of every religion will soon be written in spite of resistance: "Help and not fight", "Assimilation and not Destruction," "Harmony and Peace and not Dissension." In our world today, his words and teachings carry the power of inspiration and transformation. The following quotations are taken from different web-sites.
1. You may invent an image through which to worship God, but a better image already exists, the living man. You may build a temple in which to worship God, and that may be good, but a better one, a much higher one, already exists, the human body.2. Look upon every man, woman, and everyone as God. You cannot help anyone; you can only serve; serve the children of the Lord, serve the Lord Himself, if you have the privilege. If the Lord grants that you can help anyone of His Children, blessed you are; do not think too much of yourselves. Blessed you are that that privilege was given to you, when others had it not. Do it only as worship.
3. We have always heard it preached, "Love one another." What for? That doctrine was preached, but the explanation is here. Why should I love everyone? Because they and I are one. Why should I love my brother? Because he and I are one. There is this oneness, this solidarity of the whole universe. From the lowest worm that crawls under our feet to the highest beings that ever lived --all have various bodies, but are the one Soul. Through all mouths you eat; through all hands you work; through all eyes you see. You enjoy health in millions of bodies, you are suffering from disease in millions of bodies. When this idea comes and we realise it, see it, feel it, then will misery cease, and fear with it. How can I die? There is nothing beyond me. Fear ceases, and then alone come perfect happiness and perfect love. That universal sympathy, universal love, universal bliss that never changes, raises man above everything.
4. The infinite oneness of the Soul is the eternal sanction of all morality, that you and I are not only brothers --every literature voicing man's struggle towards freedom has preached that for you --but that you and I are really one. This is the dictate of Indian philosophy. This oneness is the rationale of all ethics and all spirituality.
5. Aye, let every man and woman and child, without respect of caste or birth, weakness or strength, hear and learn that behind the strong and the weak, behind the high and the low, behind every one, there is that Infinite Soul, insuring the infinite possibility and the infinite capacity of all to become great and good. Let us proclaim to every soul "Arise, awake and stop not till the goal is reached."
6. We have to cover everything with the Lord Himself, not by a false sort of optimism, not by blinding our eyes to the evil, but by really seeing God in everything. Thus we have to give up the world, and when the world is given up, what remains? God. What is meant? You can have your wife; it does not mean that you are to abandon her, but you are to see God in the wife. Give up your children; what does that mean? To turn them out-of-doors as some human brutes do in every country? Certainly not. That is diabolism; it is not religion. But see God in your children. So, in everything, in life and in death, in happiness and in misery, the Lord is equally present. The whole world is full of the Lord. Open your eyes and see Him. This is what Vedanta teaches.
7. Manifest the divinity within you, and everything will be harmoniously arranged around it.
8. You know but little of that which is within you. For behind you is the ocean of infinite power and blessedness. Men are taught from childhood that they are weak and sinners. Teach them that they are glorious children of immortality, even those who are the weakest in manifestation. Let positive, strong, helpful thought enter into their brains from the very childhood. Lay yourselves open to these thoughts, and not to weakening and paralysing ones. Say to your own minds, "I am He [pure, free, immortal spirit]," "I am He [pure, free, immortal spirit]."
9. Each soul is potentially divine. The goal is to manifest this Divinity within by controlling nature, external and internal. Do this either by work, or worship, or psychic control, or philosophy-by one, or more, or all of these-and be free. This is the whole of religion. Doctrines, or dogmas, or rituals, or books, or temples, or forms, are but secondary details.
10. The history of the world is the history of a few men and women who had faith in themselves. That faith calls out the divinity within.
11. The whole religion of the Hindu is centred in realisation. Man is to become divine by realising the divine.
12. We reap what we sow. We are makers of our own fate. None else has the blame, none has the praise. Religion is the greatest motive power for realising that infinite energy which is the birthright and nature of every man. In building up character, in making for everything that is good and great, in bringing peace to others, and peace to one's own self, religion is the highest motive power, and therefore, ought to be studied from that standpoint.
13. The power of religion, broadened and purified, is going to penetrate every part of human life. So long as religion was in the hands of a chosen few, or of a body of priests, it was in temples, churches, books, dogmas, ceremonials, forms and rituals. But when we come to the real, spiritual, universal concept, then, and then alone, religion will become real and living; it will come into our very nature, live in our every movement, penetrate every pore of our society, and be infinitely more a power for good than it has ever been before.
14. The more advanced a society or nation is in spirituality, the more is that society or nation civilised. No nation can be said to have become civilised, only because it has succeeded in increasing the comforts of material life by bringing into use lots of machinery and things of that sort. ... In this age as on the one hand people have to be intensely practical, so on the other they have to acquire deep spiritual knowledge. No civilisation can grow, unless fanaticism, bloodshed, and brutality stop. No civilisation can begin to lift up its head until we look charitably upon one another, and the first step towards that much-needed charity is to look charitably and kindly upon the religious convictions of others. Nay more, to understand that not only should we be charitable, but also positively helpful, to each other, however different our religious ideas and convictions may be.
15. It is a man-making religion that we want. It is man-making theories that we want. It is man-making education all round that we want. And here is the test of truth --anything that makes you weak physically, intellectually, and spiritually, reject as poison, there is no life in it, it cannot be true. Truth is strengthening. Truth is purity, truth is allknowledge; truth must be strengthening, must be enlightening, must be invigorating.
16. Truth is my God, and the Universe is my Country.
17. To the Hindu, man is not travelling from error to truth, but from truth to truth, from lower to higher truth. To him all the religions from the lowest fetishism to the highest absolutism, mean so many attempts of the human soul to grasp and realise the Infinite, each determined by the conditions of its birth and association, and each of these marks a stage of progress; and every soul is a young eagle soaring higher and higher, gathering more and more strength till it reaches the Glorious Sun.
18. The Bible, the Vedas, the Koran, and all other sacred books are but so many pages, and an infinite number of pages remain yet to be unfolded. I would leave it open for all of them. We stand in the present, but open ourselves to the infinite future. We take in all that has been in the past, enjoy the light of the present, and open every window of the heart for all that will come in the future. Salutation to all the prophets of the past, to all the great ones of the present, and to all that are to come in the future.
19. I am sure God will pardon a man who will use his reason and cannot believe, rather than a man who believes blindly instead of using the faculties He has given him...WE MUST REASON; and when reason proves to us the truth of these prophets and great men about whom the ancient books speak in every country, we shall believe in them. We shall believe in them when we see such prophets among ourselves. We shall then find that they were not peculiar men, but only illustrations of certain principles.
20. Our watchword, then, will be acceptance, and not exclusion. Not only toleration, for so-called toleration is often blasphemy, and I do not believe in it. I believe in acceptance. Why should I tolerate? Toleration means that I think that you are wrong and I am just allowing you to live. Is it not a blasphemy to think that you and I are allowing others to live? I accept all religions that were in the past, and worship with them all; I worship God with every one of them, in whatever form they worship Him. ...
21. Much has been said of the common ground of religious unity. I am not going just now to venture my own theory. But if any one here hopes that this unity will come by the triumph of any one of the religions and the destruction of the others, to him I say, "Brother, yours is an impossible hope." Do I wish that the Christian would become Hindu? God forbid. Do I wish that the Hindu or Buddhist would become Christian? God forbid…. The Christian is not to become a Hindu or a Buddhist, nor a Hindu or a Buddhist to become a Christian. But each must assimilate the spirit of the others and yet preserve his individuality and grow according to his own law of growth. (Refer to his address to the final session of the World's Parliament of Religions, Chicago, September 27, 1893)
22. If the Parliament of Religions has shown anything to the world, it is this: It has proved to the world that holiness, purity and charity are not the exclusive possessions of any church in the world, and that every system has produced men and women of the most exalted character. In the face of this evidence, if anybody dreams of the exclusive survival of his own religion and the destruction of the others, I pity him from the bottom of my heart, and point out to him that upon the banner of every religion will soon be written in spite of resistance: "Help and not fight," "Assimilation and not Destruction," "Harmony and Peace and not Dissension." (Same address as no. 21)
23. If there is ever to be a universal religion, it must be one which will have no location in place or time; which will be infinite like the God it will preach, and whose sun will shine upon the followers of Krishna and of Christ, on saints and sinners alike; which will not be Brahminic or Buddhistic, Christian or Mohammedan, but the sum total of all these, and still have infinite space for development; which in its catholicity will embrace in infinite arms, and find a place for every human being from the lowest grovelling savage, not far removed from the brute, to the highest man towering by the virtues of his head and heart almost above humanity, making society stand in awe of him and doubt his human nature. It will be a religion which will have no place for persecution or intolerance in its polity, which will recognize divinity in every man and woman, and whose whole scope, whose whole force, will be centered in aiding humanity to realize its own true, divine nature. Offer such a religion and all the nations will follow you. (World's Parliament of Religions, Paper on Hinduism, Chicago, September 19, 1893)
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