K. M. University, India Christianity in the Land of Santhals: a study of Resistance and Acceptance in Historical Perspective(03U)

Itu, Mircea

Romanian Academy, Romania

John Cassian's Mystical Vision and Cosmic Christianity(06Q)

Weber's distinction between rational and mystical worldviews can be applied to the difference between approaches that seek to dominate nature from those that seek harmony with it. This attitude, in turn, easily passes over to the human world, so that as rationalized civilization progresses, violence is done not only to nature but also to beings. Some sort of reintegration of the mystical worldview is called for, and for this we can turn with benefit to our study of the mystics. In particular, I focus on the fifth-century mystic, John Cassian, and try to show how his views of the descent of God in man (De incarnatione Domini contra Nestorium Libri), of the primacy of mystical experience, and of free will and human virtues are fundamental for spiritual fulfillment in union with the divine and for the struggle with evil (Collationem Sanctorum Patrum). The aim of his mystical vision is a path towards virtue that liberates one from violence in a profane and modern existence, and in this liberation leads to religious redemption.

Organized panel, English
Iwagami, Kazunori

Musashino University, Japan

The Satisfaction of Desires and True Happiness: The Problem of Desire in Buddhism(01D)

From the early stage of its history, Buddhism has been interested in the analysis of the human mind and has regarded a mind occupied with desire as a mental defilement. Consequently, Buddhism takes a negative attitude toward desires to acquire such pleasures as wealth, prestige, health and long life, which are regarded as essential in our lives. This presentation discusses the problem of human desire from the Buddhist point of view.

Symposium, Japanese
Iwai, Hiroshi

Kansai University of International Studies, Japan

Dynamics of Religious System: Centrifugal and Centripetal(14K)

This paper is an essay on the centrifugal and centripetal forces of religion from the viewpoint of system analysis. By the centrifugal force, I mean the tendency of religious systems to move away from the center of religion. By the centripetal force, I mean the tendency of religious systems to move towards the center of religion. I will briefly sketch premises on the centrifugal and centripetal forces of religion along the following topics: (1) the instinct of self-multiplication inherited in religion and the control over the inflation of religious values, (2) the epidemiological approach of religion, (3) religion as a meme, (4) the "deviation/amplification" of religion and the immune response of religion, and (5) the management of religious secrets. Consequently, I will propose a hypothesis that the built-in pendulum of religion has oscillated between the two polar opposites, namely the centrifugal force and the centripetal one, in the world history of religion.

Organized panel
Iwai, Hiroshi

Kansai University of International Studies, Japan

Japanese Model of Folk and Popular Religion(17G)

Organized panel

Iwaki, Akira

Poole Gakuin, Japan

Tillich's Religious Socialism and the Problem of Nationalism(13U)

Paul Tillich's religious socialism underwent a series of phases of development. In the 1930's it focused on the confrontation with Nazis. He referred to the currents of German nationalism, represented by Nazis, as political romanticism, and struggled with it by revealing its inner conflict, while recognizing in it a structural similarity with socialism. He aimed at involving those people who were under the influence of political romanticism. The structural similarity was related to Tillich's vital concept, the myth of origin. The Self-conscious human being cannot but question the Whence of existence, which is the root of the myth of origin. At the same time, he puts a future-oriented question, Whither. From the viewpoint of glaubiger Realismus, Tillich unites these two questions and understands them in a unified way. Hence he thought national elements were involved in the socialist principle. My report will also treat the problem of nationalism in Japan and the contemporary world.

Organized panel, Japanese
Iwano, Yusuke

Kyoto University, Japan

Kanzo Uchimura on Christianity and Social Justice(15I)

The theme of our panel is "The religious Situation in East Asia and the social Justice. Around the Mu-Kyokai Christianity of Japan and South Korea." I would like to speak on Kanzo Uchimura's thoughts on Christianity. Knowing Kanzo Uchimura's thoughts would be the basis for the research on Mu-Kyokai Christianity. In particular, to know how Uchimura was thinking of society, which is a group of humanity, would be an important factor when we think about social involvement of Mu-Kyokai Christians. Uchimura expressed his thoughts basically through writings and public lectures. But that does not mean that his emphasis were on academic works only. From the incident of disrespect against the Emperor to his pacifism and the Awaiting the Second Coming of Christ Movement, he had to think how to be involved in Japanese society. In this presentation, both his writings and actions will be referred to.

Organized panel, Japanese
Iwasaki, Maki

University of Tsukuba, Japan

A Study of a Folk Belief in Middle Egypt: -a Fertility Ritual in Village "T" as a Case Study-(12F)

This presentation deals with a fertility ritual at village "T" in al-Miniya governorate, Middle Egypt. The presenter aims to inquire an aspect of Egyptian folk belief through analyzing it from the points of views such as modernization/Islamization, religious syncretism, etc. This fertility ritual is practiced at the Isis Temple by people not only from village "T" but also neighboring areas and both Muslims and Copts are involved. Although there are prior studies that dealt with nadhr (rituals of offering a prayer with a vow) at mausoleums of saints, mosques, churches, etc., there are few studies that refer to rituals at Pharaonic ruins or rituals in which Muslims and non-Muslims take part in modern Egypt. Therefore through her fieldwork of 2004, the presenter studies this ritual through the points of views mentioned above by paying special attention to such things as its components, attributes of participants, etc.

Organized panel, English
Iwasaki, Takashi

Tsukuba University, Japan

Interpretation and Analogy: A Discourse on the Aztec Human-sacrifice(01F)

The essential task of religious studies is to interpret religious phenomena. We can understand the interpretation as an act of making religious phenomena, whose meanings are opaque as they are, into something clear and comprehensible. Thus one tackles with varied materials, comes in contact with unfamiliar religious life of cultural "others," and then tries to overcome such an unfamiliarity and "otherness." Religious Studies is, in this way, nothing but a field of cultural contact. Following this concept, I will take up some discussions on the Aztec human-sacrifice, made by contemporary scholars, in which the ritual have been interpreted by the "life-giving" theory (a sacrificed human body is seen as a kind of divine food which sustains daily activities of the sun-god). My point is that though the analogy of human-body/divine food may have its use in some case, in general, it fails to overcome an unfamiliarity of cultural "others," and even fixes the gaps between the interpreter and the interpreted.

Organized panel, English
Iwashita, Yoshihiro

Waseda University, Japan

Another View of Joseph Campbell's Research in Japan(07U)

Joseph Campbell participated in the 9th IAHR world congress held in Japan in 1958. Campbell presented a paper entitled "Oriental Philosophy and Occidental Psychoanalysis." After that, Campbell's books, "The Hero with a Thousand Faces," "Mythic Image," and "The Power of Myth," were translated into Japanese. Now there are at least 11 books translated into Japanese. After the TV series "The Power of Myth," with journalist Bill Moyers, aired, the notability of the mythologist Joseph Campbell became much greater in Japan. But there are not many papers about works of Campbell in Japan. There are also only a very small number of Campbell researchers in Japan. I believe that the some of the papers on Campbell in Japan do not grasp the gist of Campbell's real intention. I would like to examine these papers and to propose another point of view.

Organized panel, Japanese
Iwata, Fumiaki

Osaka Kyoiku University, Japan

Chikazumi Jokan and the "Ajase Complex"(04U)

Two distinct streams of spiritual movements in modern Japan originated from a Shin Buddhism priest, CHIKAZUMI Jokan. One stream is Japanese psychotherapy. It is under the strong influence of CHIKAZUMI that KOSAWA Heisaku founded a basis for Japanese psychoanalysis, presenting the idea of "Ajase complex." "Ajase complex" has been a key idea in Japanese psychoanalysis and a clue to understanding the Japanese mentality. DOI Takeo and OKONOGI Keigo, for example, follow the way of KOSAWA. The second contribution made by CHIKAZUMI to modern Japanese spiritual movements is his lectures on historic religion. He gave a series of lectures on the principles of Shin Buddhism to young promising students. Among them, MIKI Kiyoshi, TANIKAWA Tetsuzo, TAKEUCHI Yoshinori, and others became leaders in both university education and in journalism to propagate the ideas of Shinran. CHIKAZUMI can be regarded as a centre of interrelationship between psychotherapy and the historic religion in modern Japan.

Organized panel, Japanese
Jacobs, Rachelle Marie

University of Tennessee, USA

World Peace through Inner Peace: the Dhammakaya Vision of a New Global Community(06H)

My paper will explore the discourses and technologies of proselytization utilized by the Dhammakaya temple, one of Thailand's most progressive Buddhist temples. Through this analysis, I will demonstrate how the temple adapts its message to suit the needs and sensibilities of both local and global audiences. While the local audiences tend to respond to the temple's linkage of traditional discourses on merit-making and material prosperity with the creation of a world center for Buddhist practice, international audiences are drawn to the temple's messages of "world peace through inner peace" and "personal transformation through meditation." By looking at the temple's use of varying discourses and technologies in its dissemination of Dhammakaya Buddhism, I wish to examine the dynamic between local and global constructions of Buddhist communities in the contemporary world.

Symposium, English
Jacobs, Steven Leonard

The Last Uncomfortable Question: Monotheistic Exclusivism and Textual Superiority in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam as Sources of Hate and Genocide(15P)

This presentation (paper) is a preliminary examination of some of the texts of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam – Hebrew Bible, New Testament, Qur'an – that appear to affirm such exclusivism, and, at the same time, a reflection upon the meanings and implications of those texts coterminous with their historical realities. The first part of this presentation (paper) is an examination of representative texts from these three great monotheistic traditions which affirm, each in their own way, the exclusivistic nature of their understandings of (1) the singular reality of the God of Israel/Allah as the Only True Divine Reality (i.e. the Christ being here understood as an expression/manifestation of that Oneness), and (2) the self-perceived privileged nature of the relationship each of these three religious traditions has with and to that Reality. The second part of this presentation (paper) is a reflection by one trained in reading, analyzing, understanding classical Jewish texts (i.e. Torah, Midrash, Talmud, etc.), and theological thinking upon the meanings and implications of such texts as they do/do not reinforce certain potentially hateful and pre-genocidal orientations of these three groups in relation to each other and other groups. The concluding section of this presentation (paper), encompassing the three questions to be shared with those in attendance , is one of praxis: What, in concrete terms, is to be done with such information for a future potentially devoid of hate and one where genocide is but an historical memory?

Organized panel
Jacobsen, Knut Axel

University of Bergen, Norway

The Glorification of the Goddess as Samkhya Prakriti(01L)

In Hinduism, the Samkhya concept of prakriti has been used to glorify the goddesses and to conceptualise the relationship of the goddesses to the gods, the world and the devotees. However, the goddesses who are glorified as prakriti have few properties in common with the Samkhya prakriti. This paper compares properties of prakriti as a philosophical concept in the Samkhya and Samkhya-Yoga texts with properties of goddesses glorified as prakriti. It is argued that the identification of goddesses with prakriti was part of a process in which the Samkhya concept of prakriti became mythologised.

Organized panel, English
Jacobsen, Knut Axel

University of Bergen, Norway

Hindu Processions and Religious Pluralism(03L)

The main festival of the Hindus in Norway, mainly Tamil Hindus from Sri Lanka, is the twelve days' annual temple festival, called mahotsav. A great amount of ritual work is invested. The temple committee wants their festival to attract public attention beyond the Hindu community. Public attention is perceived as an acknowledgment of the effort of the temple committee and the other volunteers, and as a sign of success. Television stations and newspapers are invited to cover especially the chariot festival, the rathotsav. However, the mass media show little interest in the event. One of the purposes of the festival is to exhibit Tamil culture to the Norwegian public, but the religious minorities in Norway compete for the attention of the media for their ritual events. Different strategies are worked out to attract the public attention.

Organized panel, English
Jaffe, Richard M.

Duke University, USA

Japanese Buddhists and the Purchase of Bodh Gaya(17E)

Scholars generally are aware of the important role played by Anagarika Dharmapala in Buddhist efforts to wrest control of Bodh Gaya from Indian Hindus during the late-nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. In my paper I examine the extent of Japanese Buddhist interest in and Participation in the effort to establish a center for world Buddhism at Bodh Gaya. Although given little attention, particularly in non-Japanese language scholarship, Japanese Buddhists actively participated in the founding of the Maha Bodhi Society and in aiding efforts by Buddhists to establish a center for Buddhism at Bodh Gaya. The interactions between such figures as Dharmapala, Shaku Kozen, Shaku Unsho, and Edwin Arnold, among others, were part of a growing network of global interactions that shaped the emergence of Buddhism as modern, pan-Asian tradition. Although the initial attempt by Japanese to intervene on behalf of world Buddhists failed, the contacts made in the process helped reestablish India as a focal point for Japanese Buddhist identity.

Organized panel, English
Jang, Sukman

The Korea Institute for Religion and Culture, Korea

Religious Knowledge in Modern Korea(16L)

This paper will examine the formation of religious knowledge during the heyday of Korea's modernization, from 1900 through 1940. As an externally generated process, modernization engendered two forms of responses from Korean traditional religions. On the one hand, they struggled to maintain their distinctive identities, and on the other, they absorbed and transformed imported Western religious ideas. The paper will focus on Buddhism and Confucianism to illustrate this pragmatic symbiosis of continuity and change in Korean religious landscape.

Symposium, * Session Abstract, English
Janssen, Guy

EHESS - Paris, France

Catholics without Priests : the Petite Eglise in France and the Hidden Christians in Japan. A Comparative Anthropological Approach.(01U)

In France (Poitou, Lyons, Burgundy) and Belgium (Brabant) nowadays, hundreds of families still belong to what is known as the Petite Eglise. They are the last descendants of a 200-year long opposition against the Concordat between Napoleon and Pope Pius VII. Their last priests died in 1840, and since then they have built a special form of Catholicism which has been practised without priests. In recent years, field research has been undertaken, visiting the families, their chapels, listening to their stories and their vision of the world. The Kakure Kirishitan in Japan have survived centuries of oppression, keeping their faith secretly. These stories can be read carefully alongside one another. I shall discuss political power and repression in the building of a religious minority's identity. How have these communities been able to cross the centuries until now? And what may be their future?

Organized panel, English
Jemiriye, Timothy Folorunso

University of Ado-Ekiti, Nigeria

Religion, Conflict and Peace in Contemporary Nigeria: Acceptance as the Way out(02V)

Inhumanity of man to man is the major source of conflict in the world. Peace however should not be seen as absence of war, but should go beyond mere peaceful co-existence. Religion should be able to bring about genuine cordiality, love and progressive harmonious living. Nigeria has witnessed the repeated failure of the policy of tolerance as a viable strategy for a harmonious living together of its religiously pluralistic people. This paper therefore proposes an alternative to tolerance, namely acceptance of the religious rights of others in terms of tenets, faith and practice. Such acceptance advocated should not be in terms of words only. It should be taught from the grassroot to the most sophisticated people. This will remove the negative notions that have characterized religious conflict in Nigeria hitherto.

Organized panel, English
Jensen, Jeppe Sinding

University of Aarhus, Denmark

New Conceptual Modeling. Reflections on the Role of Models in Comparative and General Studies of Religion(06K)

The comparative and general studies of religion have for long suffered from problems stemming from the impressionistic classifications of the earlier phenomenology of religion. Charges of idealism, ethnocentrism or 'religionism' have rendered much of the earlier classificatory endeavours obsolete and to a large extent discredited comparative studies as well as the idea of a valid stock of terms that scholars could agree on. However, much of the previous criticism was based on particularist and positivist notions of the relations between word and objects and the study of religion will be in a severe crisis if it does not have a reasoned terminology. In the pursuit of theoretically validated models and the conditions for their construction I shall venture a range of reflections on the status and role of models in the study of religion.

Symposium, * Session Abstract, English
Jensen, Jeppe Sinding

Arhaus University, Denmark

Interpretation and Explanation in the Study of Religion(10K)

One of the real stumbling blocks in the advancement of a science is the question of adequate and legitimate theorizing on its passing from one phase to another. The study of religion has already gone from the formative, descriptive 'what?' phase to the theoretically more interesting 'how?' phase - the one that focuses on functions and relations between religion and other issues - typically formulated in congress titles. Lately, we may say that it has now entered the 'why?' phase, because 'why?' issues that are characteristic of 'mature' sciences, have surfaced in the study of religion with renewed intensity. 'Why?' questions are typically explanatory in the more traditional causal sense and they seek to explain the occurrence and evolution of an object. In the study of religion this is now evident especially in the cognitive approaches. There are, however, other possibilities for explanatory avenues than those emulated from the natural sciences. In order to demonstrate this, I shall propose strongly revised notions of explanation and interpretation. These are supported by theoretical and philosophical developments that seem to have been overlooked by scholars of religion.

Organized panel
Jensen, Jeppe Sinding

Aarhus University, Denmark

The Insider/Outsider Problem as Hoax in the History of Religions(13K)

A consideration that the problem is a political construction – a philosophical approach that draws on Donald Davidson and others.

Organized panel, English
Jensen, Tim

University of Southern Denmark, Denmark

Religion and the Media(03J)

*chairperson

Organized panel
Jensen, Tim

University of Southern Denmark, Denmark

Religion in Conflicts in the Danish Media(03J)

Based on an quantitative as well as qualitative analysis of the major Danish newspapers in the period following September 11, the paper outlines and discusses the ways in which conflicts and religion(s) is interrelated in the representations in the dailies. The conflicts analysed include conflicts related to international and global happenings as well as to matters pertaining to the local Danish context such as conflicts pertaining to migrants and integration in Denmark.

Organized panel
Jiménez Berrios, Sonia

Center for Psychological and Sociological Research, Cuba

The New Age and Oriental Religions: a Caribbean Approach(15F)

In the 1990s, a religious revival took place in Cuba influenced by the Special Period, the collapse of the socialist camp, the intensification of the US blockade and the international socioeconomic, ethical, and moral crisis. This "religious revival" in Cuba and the Caribbean did not just increase the social spaces of traditional religions, but included new alternative spiritual proposals rooted in oriental philosophies and religions. This presentation aims at discussing these philosophical and religious trends, and how they have modified or influenced popular religiosity, showing the dissemination and extent of some Buddhist and Reiki schools in Cuba, and how believers of many religions have adopted its symbols, essence and foundations without abandoning their original religion.

Organized panel, English
Joy, Morny

University of Calgary, Canada

Women, Violence and Religions(17I)

Many religions are aware today that there is a problem with endemic violence against women. Web pages of advice and therapeutic resources abound. Yet there has been very little study and assessment, from an academic perspective of the etiology of this violence against women in religions. This paper will offer some insights, gleaned from an examination of contemporary literature on the topic in Christianity and Hinduism. The basic question is whether religions enjoin a particular orientation for women that renders hem passive and submissive to men – a situation that fosters violence and for which women are then held responsible.

Organized panel, English
Joy, Morny

University of Calgary, Canada

Reflections on Gender and Violence in Religion(17I)

This panel will investigate the phenomenon of violence in religion with specific reference to gender.

Organized panel, * Session Abstract, English