Events Archive 2012

Erich Kolig

Department of Theology and Religion, University of Otago

Islam in Western liberal democracy.

Taneli Kukkonen

Department of Theology and Religion, University of Otago

Al-Ghazali on the Sufis of Old: Polemic and Theory.

Lori Lefkovitz

Northeastern University, Boston

Not a Man: Joseph and the Character of Masculinity in Judaism and Islam

Chaisit Suwanvarangkul

Department of Theology and Religion, University of Otago

Mahaparinirva?a Sutra : the Last Discourse of the Buddha.

Amir H. Zekrgoo

International Institute of Islamic Thought & Civilization (ISTAC) and International Islamic University (IIUM), Kuala Lumpur, Malasia.

Snake Symbolism in Buddhist and Hindu Iconography.

Christopher van der Krogt?

Religious Studies and History Programmes, Massey University

The greater jihad: from sufi trope to apologetic topos.

Intro & Ch. 1

pp. 1-47

Introduction: Real Presence

THe Obsolescence of the Gods

Chs. 2 & 3

pp. 48-112

Abundant History

Holy Intamacies

Ch. 4

pp. 113-161

Printed Presence

Chs. 5 & 6

pp. 162-214

The Dead in the Company of the Living

The Happiness of Heaven

Ch. 7 & Epilogue

pp. 215-254

Events of Abundant Evil

Epilogue: A Metric of Presence

This initial presentation examines the relationship between scientific and theological interests by resurrecting the scholarly debate over primitive monotheism which consumed much of the attention of anthropologists and ethnologists at the end of the nineteenth century and during the first two decades of the twentieth century. The aim of the lecture is to demonstrate that the academic arguments which were raging at the turn of the twentieth century and which still bear on the contemporary efforts to locate the Christian God in pre-Christian Indigenous Religions, were based largely on ideological presuppositions that pre-determined the interpretations scholars gave to the data they uncovered. On the one hand, those following the evolutionary theories of Herbert Spencer, such as E.B. Tylor, J.G. Frazer and Baldwin Spencer, were anti-religious, one could even say anti-Christian. On the other hand, those who promoted the idea of an original, pure form of monotheism, chiefly Andrew Lang, Wilhelm Schmidt and, later Mircea Eliade, did so because they firmly believed in the value of religion for human societies (interpreted largely in Christian terminology and language). Neither position had anything to do with the interests of indigenous people themselves nor was it intended to treat Indigenous Religions as worthy of study in their own right. Rather, the protagonists in the debate primarily were engaged in an argument over the origins of the religious beliefs of Europeans.

This lecture analyses how Christian theologians have interpreted Indigenous Religions in Australia by considering the case of ‘The Rainbow Spirit Theology’, which originated in the 1980s in north Queensland. Such theological interpretations have been created in response to a ‘catalogue of crimes’ committed against Aboriginal peoples. The Rainbow Spirit Elders, in conjunction with the Lutheran theologian Norman Habel, have sought to integrate Christian teaching into ideas found in Aboriginal spirituality by suggesting that the ‘rainbow spirit’ represents an ancient symbol of the Creator God. Anthropological evidence suggests that such an endeavour to locate the Christian God amongst indigenous Australian societies is a theological invention. The question for scholars of religion raised by the Rainbow Spirit Theology is an ethical rather than an empirical one. Can we justify non-contextualised Christian interpretations of a postulated belief in God amongst Aboriginal societies on the grounds that theologians are attempting to instil in indigenous peoples pride in their own traditions after suffering so many years of denigration both by academics and colonial authorities?

This lecture investigates oral traditions surrounding Mwari, the so-called Shona High God in Zimbabwe in the light of traditional patterns of authority which demonstrate a close interconnection between Indigenous religious beliefs and the hierarchical order which still persists within Shona society. During the early part of the twentieth century Mwari was spread as the name for God by missionaries familiar with the High God shrines located in southwest Zimbabwe. Research into the pre-Christian understanding of Mwari suggests that Mwari is best understood as a fertility deity closely associated with founding ancestors. This conclusion raises critical issues surrounding the now nearly universal Christian understanding in Zimbabwe of Mwari as equivalent to the Christian God.