A seminar entitled ‘Hindu Visions of Divinity: Doctrinal Vignettes for Christians – Prolegomena to a Monograph’ – Dr Ankur Barua (Lecturer in Hindu Studies, Faculty of Divinity) on 11 October 2019
Friday, 11 October 2019: 1.30 – 3.30pm in the Lightfoot Room, Faculty of Divinity
‘Hindu Visions of Divinity: Doctrinal Vignettes for Christians – Prolegomena to a Monograph’ – Dr Ankur Barua (Lecturer in Hindu Studies, Faculty of Divinity)
Respondent – Dr Ruth Jackson (Sidney Sussex College)
Dr Barua will present 'work-in-progress' for a book he is writing. He is seeking to systematically explore the validity of some specific translations of Indic terms into English which are offered in lectures to undergraduate students – can brahman, karuṇā, prasāda, and prema be translated as ‘God’, ‘mercy’, ‘grace’, and ‘love’, and if these translations are to be rejected because of their distinctively Christian inflections, examine how might we speak in English at all about Hindu life-worlds?
Second, he will offer the following invitation to those who might be doctrinally more orthodox: "If you wish to draw on your current understanding of Christian theology as a cognitive-experiential bridgehead into Hindu styles of spirituality, you could read these introductory vignettes."
Written from the perspective of a friendly critic, Dr Barua's book is an invitation to Christian theologians to articulate fully incarnationalist visions in which the motif of deep religious diversity is not relegated to parenthetical remarks or passing footnotes or stray appendices but is instituted as a topic that is as vitally integral to doctrinal reflection as the standard loci of creation, atonement and redemption.
All colleagues, MPhil and PhD students in the Divinity Faculty or other areas (such as Classics, History, Modern and Medieval Languages, English, Philosophy, and FAMES) are warmly welcome to attend this seminar.