A Critical Study of Classical Religious Texts in Global Contexts: Challenges of a Changing World 1433154412, 9781433154416

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A Critical Study of Classical Religious Texts in Global Contexts

Challenges of a Changing World

ed ited by Beth E. El n e s s - H a ns o n an d J on S k ar p e id

ADVANCE PRAISE FOR

A Critical Study of Classical Religious Texts in Global Contexts “This wide-ranging book is an exploration of ways of knowing and interpreting classical religious texts from a variety of perspectives. Together, the chapters speak to the diverse, innovative, and sometimes surprising ways that such texts are integrated in and shape everyday lives, including kindergarten teachers, students, and cancer patients. Highlighting the global context in which such texts circulate, the book simultaneously illustrates the importance of local interpretive practices.” —Lori G. Beaman, Canada Research Chair in Religious Diversity and Social Change, University of Ottawa “This excellent collection of essays by Scandinavian scholars of religious studies, assembled by Beth E. Elness-Hanson and Jon Skarpeid, discusses issues related to the impact of globalisation on classic religious texts in a variety of national contexts. Collectively, the chapters present examples of research which contribute engagingly to the breaking of stereotypes and to the development of religious literacy. The book will be of great interest to those participating in religious education and religious studies, as well as to a wider readership.” —Robert Jackson, Emeritus Professor of Religions in Education at the University of Warwick and Visiting Professor in the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences Education at Stockholm University

A Critical Study of Classical Religious Texts in Global Contexts

This book is part of the Peter Lang Humanities list. Every volume is peer reviewed and meets the highest quality standards for content and production.

PETER LANG

New York  Bern  Berlin Brussels  Vienna  Oxford  Warsaw

A Critical Study of Classical Religious Texts in Global Contexts Challenges of a Changing World Edited by Beth E. Elness-Hanson and Jon Skarpeid

PETER LANG

New York  Bern  Berlin Brussels  Vienna  Oxford  Warsaw

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Elness-Hanson, Beth, editor. Title: A critical study of classical religious texts in global contexts: challenges of a changing world / edited by Beth E. Elness-Hanson & Jon Skarpeid. Description: New York: Peter Lang, 2019. Includes bibliographical references. Identifiers: LCCN 2019017572 | ISBN 978-1-4331-5441-6 (hardback: alk. paper) ISBN 978-1-4331-5442-3 (ebook pdf) | ISBN 978-1-4331-5443-0 (epub) ISBN 978-1-4331-5444-7 (mobi) Subjects: LCSH: Sacred books—History and criticism. | Religions. Globalization—Religious aspects. Classification: LCC BL71 .C735 2019 | DDC 208/.2—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019017572 DOI 10.3726/b13328

Bibliographic information published by Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek. Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the “Deutsche Nationalbibliografie”; detailed bibliographic data are available on the Internet at http://dnb.d-nb.de/.

© 2019 Peter Lang Publishing, Inc., New York 29 Broadway, 18th floor, New York, NY 10006 www.peterlang.com All rights reserved. Reprint or reproduction, even partially, in all forms such as microfilm, xerography, microfiche, microcard, and offset strictly prohibited.

To Pam and Charlie Scalise, mentors and friends for the journey, from Beth To Mom from Jon “So do I write, and color the runes.” Håvamål (stanza 158)



Contents

Foreword ix Acknowledgments xi Part One: Introduction for Classic Religious Texts in Global Contexts 1. Introduction for Classic Religious Texts in Global Contexts 3 Beth E. Elness-Hanson and Jon Skarpeid Part Two: Defining the Contexts 2. Globalization and Religion: Defining the Contexts 13 Jon Skarpeid Part Three: Secular Contexts at the National Level 3. “The Great Binding Law of Peace”: International Judicial-Political-Economic Impacts of the Revered Story of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy 37 Lars Kirkhusmo Pharo 4. Religious Education and Pluralism in Norwegian Kindergartens 53 Gunnar Magnus Eidsvåg 5. “I bring it with me everywhere”: The Materiality of the Bible in Critical Illness 69 Marta Høyland Lavik

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Contents Part Four: Diaspora: Group and Individual

6. Sacred Texts and Muslim Youth in Turkish-Norwegian Diaspora Communities 87 Gerd Marie Ådna 7. The Multifaceted Scripture: Patterns, Conflicts, and Ambiguities in Muslim Ways of Relating to the Qur’an 101 Jonas Svensson Part Five: Intercultural Bible Reading and Hermeneutics 8. Multi-Epistemological Exegesis: The Strength of Hybridity With a Case Study Analysis of Exod 20:4–6 121 Beth E. Elness-Hanson 9. Malagasy, Thai, and Norwegian Youths Reading Luke 15 Together 139 Knut Holter 10. Occult Scriptural Exegesis: Theosophical Readings of the Bible 153 Olav Hammer Contributor Biographies 167



Foreword

Five years ago, Knut Holter and Jon Skarpeid started the cluster group “Classical Sacred Texts in Global Contexts.” This was part of the research area Religion, Culture, and Globalization, a collaboration between the University of Stavanger and VID Specialized University, Stavanger, Norway. “Classics,” as we like to call it, started with only a handful of people, and we presented papers to each other and discussed issues related to the challenges of engaging religious texts in a globalized world. When Knut received funding for his Maasai project, PhD and post-doc students became part of the research cluster. The globalized world started to be reflected in the members of the group. One of the PhD students that became part of the Maasai project was Beth Elness-Hanson, and other scholars, as well, became affiliated with Classics. The question arose as to whether the group should pursue a publication, and we decided to develop an anthology. Since there was quite a broad span in the research fields among them members of Classics, we decided to send an invitation to everybody affiliated. For the preparation of the anthology, we arranged a couple of seminars in Stavanger. We ended up with nine chapters, which, in various ways, discuss sacred texts in global contexts. These include sacred texts among diaspora community, in secular state institutions like hospitals and educational contexts, and cross-cultural readings. Sacred texts seems to weave their way into nearly all aspects of life, in one form or another. 

—Jon Skarpeid

Acknowledgments

As we have come to the materialization of our publication project, we would like to thank our colleagues who contributed in many ways. We benefited from being part of the larger research area, Religion, Culture, and Globalization. Stavanger University and VID Specialized University provided us with funding and provided necessary facilities. A special thank goes to University of Stavanger, represented by the Dean Elaine Munthe, who provided the financial resources needed to print this volume. 

—Jon Skarpeid and Beth E. Elness-Hanson

Part One: Introduction for Classic Religious Texts in Global Contexts

1. Introduction for Classic Religious Texts in Global Contexts Beth E. Elness-Hanson

and

Jon Skarpeid

Beyond Stereotypes and Religious Illiteracy Toward the Other Storyteller Chimamanda Adichie’s TED Talk on “The Danger of a Single Story” was viewed over 17.3 million times in almost a decade as of the time of this writing.1 Adichie warns that stereotypes—or a single story—are dangerous because they inadequately represent the complexity of human stories and prevent us from understanding what connects us with other people as equals. Instead, we need many stories in order to avoid flattening experiences and robbing people of dignity. Adichie encourages, “When we reject the single story, when we realize that there is never a single story about any place, we regain a kind of paradise.” In a similar concern, Diane Moore, director of Harvard Divinity School’s Religious Literacy Project, identified that “widespread illiteracy about religion…spans the globe.” In an interview with the Huffington Post, Moore stated that religious illiteracy “fuels bigotry and prejudice and hinders capacities for cooperative endeavors in local, national, and global arenas.”2 In an effort to develop religious literacy, Harvard University is now providing free online courses to learn about world religions through their scriptures.3 This collection of essays joins these important efforts to challenge toxic stereotypes by providing scholarly investigations into classic religious texts in global contexts. By engaging more perspectives, important connections and more complex “stories” are developed, which enable a humanizing as one begins to see the “face” of the other, and perhaps to see a bit of oneself in the other. Seeing the face of the other is elucidated in the philosophy of Emmanuel Levinas, who describes the reality that we understand the world on the basis

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of the Other.4 Writing in a time when masculine pronouns were standard, Levinas writes regarding the Other in a way that is inclusive, stating: To approach the Other in conversation is to welcome his expression, in which at each instant he overflows the idea a thought would carry away from it. It is therefore to receive from the Other beyond the capacity of the I, which means exactly: to have the idea of infinity. But it also means: to be taught.5

While we readers are not able to engage face-to-face encounters with all of the authors as Levinas would encourage, we are able to access a breath of knowledge as we receive from the Other in order to be taught. As we open ourselves to be confronted by the Otherness within these covers, we have the privilege of deepening our understandings in order to be better equipped in our responsibility as a global citizen for our next face-to-face encounters. In today’s world of increasing polarization and rise of nationalism, we welcome you to join our authors in a shared humanity that seeks understanding of the Other with their sacred writings that can then foster empathy.

Defining the Contexts A red thread that runs through each chapter relates to the challenges of globalization upon the sacred texts in various contextual settings. Thus, co-editor Jon Skarpeid (Associate Professor of Religious Studies, University of Stavanger, Norway), wrestles with “Defining the Contexts.” His starting point is James V. Spickard and others who claim that Globalization has to do with communal matters. On the basis of this, he operates with four dichotomies: minoritymajority, diaspora-homeland, center-periphery of the globalized world, and secular-religious. These elements by no means exhaust the issue, but they serve as a starting point for a discussion of relevant contexts in which sacred text are read. Some of the question that Skarpeid addresses are how the majority should approach minorities; what are the rights of the individual in a society; and are historic critical reading of sacred texts Eurocentric? Each of the four section in Skarpeid’s paper starts with a presentation and discussion of the scholarly debate and ends giving examples on how they may relate to sacred scripture.

Secular Contexts at the National Level In three essays, we look at how religion and sacred texts are treated in national contexts that are supposed to be secular. In the first essay, we see how a texts from the Indigenous Indians of North America have influenced the laws of several countries. The two other contributions examine sacred texts in an education system and in a hospital.

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“‘The Great Binding Law of Peace:’ International Political-JudicialEconomic Impacts of the Revered Story of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy” by Lars Kirkhusmo Pharo (Professor in the Faculty of Education, Art, and Culture at Nord University, Bodø, Norway) describes how one sacred text from eighteenth century indigenous North Americans has been incorporated into constitutions, human rights documents, and ecologically-concerned business projects globally. Pharo’s essay describes the historical context of the people group known to outsiders as the Iroquois from the North Atlantic region. Identifying key aspects, such as checks and balances of power, Pharo identifies how “The Great Binding Law of Peace” is reflected today in US and European constitutions, “The Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948,” and even multinational companies despite having originated in a sacred message that was received from the Great Creator. These are significant achievements by a contemporary minority. Then follows two contributions that investigate religious texts in two secular contexts. In “Religious Education and Pluralism in Norwegian Kindergartens,” Gunnar Magnus Eidsvåg (Associate Professor at the University of Stavanger, Norway) describes the challenges of religious pluralism in different early learning contexts of Norway. Formerly having a state church, Norway’s history of privileging Lutheranism has developed into a secular state that recognizes historical and cultural contributions of religious thought and practices while recognizing the human right issues involved. Thus, sociologists, legal experts, political scientist, pedagogues, theologians, philosophers, historians of religion, and more are engaged in developing religious education in a pluralist society. Eidsvåg’s research identifies the historical background, the legal frameworks, and engages in interviews with kindergarten teachers for understanding the practical realities of religious education in both public and faith-based educational contexts. Contrary to Eidsvåg who investigate in the official discourse related to education, Marta Høyland Lavik (Professor of Biblical Studies and Stavanger University Hospital and VID Specialized University, Stavanger, Norway) looks at how a sacred text, the Bible, is used by individuals. In “‘I Bring It with Me Everywhere:’ Performances around the Bible in Critical Illness,” she describes ways that people use the Bible when their context changes to situations of terminal illness. The performance of rituals includes a focus on the materiality of the Bible, recognizing that some of Høyland Lavik’s research participants “seemed to value the material side of the Bible just as much as its contents,” and they saw the Bible as a mediator of divine power and authority. Integrating phenomenological hermeneutics as a philosophical basis, Høyland Lavik provides two case studies to illustrate human behavior

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where there is an interdependence of text and rituals in order to connect the human with the divine.

Diaspora: Group and Individual In this group of essays entitled “Diaspora: Group and Individual,” we get a couple of examples as to how individuals relate to a group level. Both studies address the reading of the Qur’an in a Muslim context, the first, a congregation in Norway, and the second, Kenya. In her essay, “Sacred Texts and Muslim Youth in Turkish-Norwegian Diaspora Communities,” Gerd Marie Ådna (Associate Professor at VID Specialized University, Stavanger, Norway), shows how the community struggles to relate both to the Norwegian host culture and to the Turkish motherland. On the basis of Manuel A. Vásquez and Kim Knott, Ådna examines the migrant community and the practices of embodied performance, the spatial management of difference and belonging, and multiple embedding across networked spaces. Ådna concludes that although the Qur’an, and to some extent Hadith, are a sources of identity and belonging, it may indirectly prevent integration. The starting point in “The Multifaceted Scripture: Patterns, Conflicts, and Ambiguities in Muslim Ways of Relating to the Qur’an,” Jonas Svensson (Professor of Islamic Studies at Linnaeus University, Växjö, Sweden) is an incident where girls are getting instruction from a chairperson as to how they should treat the Qur’an. This context highlights the freedom of individuals within a group, and Svensson defends the girls on the basis of James Watts’ three dimensions in the ways that believers relate to sacred scriptures: the semantic, the performative, and the iconic. With this theoretical framework, Svensson provides a cogent way to examine the aforementioned conflicts and ambiguities. Yet as Svensson describes structural similarities of sacredness from other global contexts, he helps to “de-exotify” Muslim beliefs and practices by discovering similar roots in shared human nature. This leads to the next section of essays which relates to the (im-) possibility of common platform as to how we read and interpret sacred across cultures.

Intercultural Bible Reading and Hermeneutics The last segment of essays focuses on intercultural Bible readings and interpretation, which is a growing edge of biblical research due to the rise of World Christianity in the “Global South” or regions outside of traditional European and North American contexts. Beth E. Elness-Hanson (Lecturer in Old Testament at Johannelund School of Theology, Uppsala, Sweden) contributes an essay entitled, “Multi-Epistemological

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Exegesis: The Strength of Hybridity with a Case Study Analysis of Exod 20:4–6.” With the rise of World Christianity, Elness-Hanson is seeking to develop more authentic methods for engaging other epistemologies or ways of knowing. In contrast to an Enlightenment-influenced, scientist-only ethos of biblical studies, this essay discusses the strengths and ethical rationale for engaging the Majority World and the “epistemologies of the South” in a way that merges the strengths of diverse ways of knowing, while also integrating “centered set analysis” as a criterion for analysis of legitimate interpretations. Drawing upon qualitative research with Maasai theologians from Tanzania, East Africa, Elness-Hanson uses the Decalogue in Exod 20:4–6 to demonstrate that multi-epistemological exegesis is a fruitful approach to increase understandings which otherwise would have been limited by one way of knowing. In “Norwegian, Malagasy and Thai Youths Reading Luke 15 Together,” Knut Holter (Professor at the Centre for Mission and Global Studies & Faculty of Theology, VID Specialized University, Stavanger, Norway) analyses a multi-cultural Bible reading project with 16 to 18-year-olds from Madagascar, Norway, and Thailand. Over half a year, three ethnically-diverse groups of young adults reflected on the “Prodigal Son” text from Luke 15:11–32 in light of their own experiences and life situation. Each group then shared their notes with the other groups, discussed the others’ findings while taking more notes, which were again shared. In a third meeting, each group was challenged to try to understand how the other two groups understood their original contextually-informed reading. Finally, all young adults met in Madagascar to engage face-to-face in dialogue. Holter analyses the results that include specific examples, such as how understandings of shame or family relationships influence contextual understandings. These understandings shape Holter’s discussion of the “creative potential” of reading biblical texts and constructing meaning in relation to the contextual experiences and how there may be an “interpretive corrective” through the introduction of a socially or culturally “other reading” of the Bible, which then serves as a mirror of one’s own contextuality. Olav Hammer (Professor in the Department of History, Study of Religions at the University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark) discusses the early decades of the Theosophical movement in his essay, “Occult Scriptural Exegesis: Theosophical Readings of the Bible.” Believing that mainstream Christian interpretations were not only irrelevant but also an obstacle to true insight, the first generations of the Theosophical movement developed innovative interpretations beyond the literal sense. These symbolic readings were often guided by paranormal insight. In addition, early Theosophist leaders believed that Buddhist missionaries traveled to the ancient

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Near East, influencing the Essenes, which later impacted Jesus’ teaching through his study with the Essenes. Hammer stimulates inquiry by describing the approaches and legacy of the Theosophists, which continues in various global religious movements, including psychics, New Age, and contemporary occultists.

Summary All essays address issues of globalization’s impact upon classic religious texts in various contexts around the world. The authors describe various circumstances related to reading and interpreting sacred writings—whether historical or more recent—which continue to have an influence today. The breadth of research represented stimulates a deeper understanding which is important to move beyond stereotypes and religious illiteracy in order to learn and more meaningfully engage the Other with wisdom and empathy—important virtues needed for today’s world.

Notes 1. Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, “The Danger of a Single Story.” Accessed 7 February 2019, https://www.ted.com/talks/chimamanda_adichie_the_danger_of_a_single_story. 2. Antonia Blumberg, “Harvard Launches Free Online Class To Promote Religious Literacy,” HuffPost. Accessed 7 February 2019, https://www.huffingtonpost.com/ entry/harvard-world-religions-online-class_us_56c76b55e4b041136f16dd0a. 3. “HarvardX Courses.” Accessed 7 February 2019, https://rlp.hds.harvard.edu/ courses/harvardx-course. 4. Bettina Bergo, “Emmanuel Levinas,” in The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. Edward N. Zalta, Fall 2017 (Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University, 2017), https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2017/entries/levinas/. 5. Emmanuel Levinas, Totality and Infinity: An Essay on Exteriority, trans. Alphonso Lingis, 2nd edition (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: Duquesne University Press, 1969), 51.

Bibliography Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi. 2009. “The Danger of a Single Story.” TED.com, July. https://www.ted.com/talks/chimamanda_adichie_the_danger_of_a_single_story. Bergo, Bettina. 2017. “Emmanuel Levinas.” In The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall Edition), edited by Edward N. Zalta. Stanford: Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University. https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2017/entries/levinas. Blumberg, Antonia. 2016. “Harvard Launches Free Online Class To Promote Religious Literacy,” HuffPost, February 19. https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/harvardworld-religions-online-class_us_56c76b55e4b041136f16dd0a.

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Harvard Divinity School. 2019. “HarvardX Courses.” Harvard Religious Literacy Project: Harvard Divinity School. https://rlp.hds.harvard.edu/courses/harvardx-course. Levinas, Emmanuel. 1969. Totality and Infinity: An Essay on Exteriority, trans. Alphonso Lingis, 2nd edition. Pittsburgh, PA: Duquesne University Press.

Part Two: Defining the Contexts

2. Globalization and Religion: Defining the Contexts Jon Skarpeid

Introduction According to James V. Spickard, globalization is not about “Internet, the spread of hip-hop and rock music to all corners of the globe, the Davos World Economic Forum, and so on.” These are aspects of the globalized world, but not salient. Culture, including globalization, is about “communal matters,” and he points to the levels of individual, collective, and “interconnectness” (2007, 233). José Casanova includes the group level (2007), and Roland Robertson adds “the international system; and humanity” (2007, 10). An investigation in the contexts of religion and sacred texts in a globalized world will have to take into account the communal matters, and I will structure my paper in the following way: • Minority versus majority. There are many forms of minorities and how

they relate to the majority, and subsequently, how the individual relates to these two. • Diaspora versus homeland. Diaspora is a form of minority but relates to a homeland. A new culture with its customs can pose challenges and quite interesting solutions. • Center versus periphery of the globalized world. European countries colonized most of the world, and the West has, to a large extent, sustained its hegemony based upon economy, military, and political power. • Secular versus religious. Religious texts are not only interpreted in a religious context. Interpretations and allusions to religious texts are an important content of “secular contexts,” popular culture being perhaps the most notable.

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This list is by no means meant to be exhaustive, but it should make it possible to highlight some of the contexts that have relevance for religion. Although these axes are presented in the form of dichotomies, the contexts will not fall neatly onto one side of a continuum or another. Needless to say, the contexts also overlap with each other. My approach has been inspired by Peter Beyer’s “Axes of Variation in Global Religion” (2007, 99–100), but where he is examining how religion may glocalize, I am focusing on the contexts. I will however, give some examples as to how sacred texts are interpreted in various contexts. For each of the four sections, I will examine both political realities and the salient features of the scholarly debate within the research area, and I give a few examples as to how the context relate to sacred texts.

Minority Versus Majority Minorities are by no means a modern phenomenon, but European colonization— and subsequent new national states combined with present day migration—has brought minority rights to the table. Minorities are treated very differently, but according to John McGarry, Brendan O’Leary, and Richard Simeon, the countries have basically two main strategies, either “integration” or “accommodation” (2008). Integration consists of non-discriminating integration into shared national institutions. Accommodation means to establish some minority-specific institutions. In his article, “Internationalization of minorities rights,” Will Kymlicka (2008) demonstrates how western countries and the UN, differ as to whom is granted the accommodation and the integration status. European minorities such as Scotts, Basques, Catalans, etc., have been understood as “national,” while the minorities in the colonized territories, such as Indians, Inuits, Maori, Aborigines, and Sami in Lap as indigenous peoples. These two groups of minorities have both been treated according to the accommodation approach. On the other hand, the governments generally expect new minorities formed by diaspora groups to be integrated. The UN has also expected integration of new minorities but treats the old minorities differently. The UN is a dominant force, and two documents are particularly relevant: Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National, or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities (1992) and Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People (2006). The first uses the integrationist model, while the other has an accommodation approach. For the UN, only vulnerable people can claim minority-specific institutions. Thus, national minorities (Scotts, Basques, Catalan, etc.) are treated as new diaspora minorities. Kymlicka is skeptical of the criteria and claims that more or less all minorities in Africa, Asia, and the Middle East, are vulnerable. At the same time, most people have lived in their territories for generations, and thus, they can also be regarded as national minorities.

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The UN practice is to let the minorities who do not qualify for indigenous peoples, secure no more rights than today’s diaspora minorities, something Kymlicka is very critical of (2008, 10). For example, Kurds in the Middle East and Tibetans in China are national minorities, not indigenous peoples, according to the UN, which is strange taking into account that strong affiliation to a rural area is an important criterion: “geographically separate and is distinct ethnically and/ or culturally from the country administering” (Daes 1996, 7). Parts of the problem is the fact that neither the UN nor the Council of Europe give any thorough definition of the word “minority.” Minorities are treated very differently around the world. Of the 82 countries that responded to the UN survey The Representation of Minorities and Indigenous People, 28 percent answered “yes” to the question: “Are there any legal restrictions to the formation of political parties based on ethnic, cultural, or linguistic identity?” Restrictions were most common in Sub-Saharan Africa, where most countries consist of several ethnic groups, and the standard argument given was that the restrictions serve the purpose of state stability. Restrictions are “less widespread in Europe and entirely absent in Nordic countries” (Protsyk 2010, 7). In several countries, parliament seats are given to national minorities where religion is a major part of their identity. In the Balkan region, several countries have reserved seats for national minorities, e.g., Croats, Bosniacs, and Serbs, but Assyrian and Armenians in Iran should also be mentioned. Based on the overview by Mona Lena Krook and Diana O’Brian (2010) and Karen Bird (2014), there are seven countries in the world that reserve seats strictly on the basis of religion, if we include scheduled castes (India) and Jews (Romania). In addition, there are five countries in the Middle-East where religious minorities are granted seats in the parliament: Christian (all five countries); Jews and Zoroastrian (Iran); and Hindus, Ahmadis, Parsees, and others (Pakistan). Lebanon is an interesting case, having power sharing between Muslims and Christians. The 128 assembly seats are divided 50–50 among different Christian and Muslim denominations. Religions that do not have a long history in a country are often facing problems. Some countries are even defining legal religions, making others unacceptable, at least in theory. For example, China has five officially recognized religions: Buddhism, Islam, Taoism, Catholicism, and Protestantism. In 1999, as a result of the appearance of Falun Gong, China came up with the declaration of “evil cults.” The definition includes phrases like: “Relatively newly-founded groups;” “strong authoritarian and charismatic leadership;” “aggressive proselytizing methods;” and “a lack of benefit to members or the society” (Xiong 2016, 208–209). In the same year, four leaders were sentenced to prison terms between five to eleven years (Xiong 2016, 207).

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In France, the Inter-ministerial Mission for Monitoring Struggle against Sectarian Deviation, is established to “1. Ensuring the freedom of belief 2. Ensuring individual freedom, especially those of the weak (i.e., children, and, since 2001, people in a state of subjugation” (Machi 2013, 116). In the 1980s and early 1990s, government authorities in France, Australia, Mexico, Venezuela, Spain, and Argentina raided The Family International “with nearly 500 children removed from their homes” (Ezzy 2018, 282). However, not one of the children were found in court to have been abused. Douglas Ezzy demonstrates similar state hostility against The Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints and The Ordo Templi Orientis, but he argues, “Religious anti-discrimination legislation has a powerful effect on everyday actions … in preventing further harm and violence” (2018, 286). As we have seen, some countries have minority quotas for representation in government, but in some countries in the Middle East and North-Africa, there is an opposition “to the very idea of minority rights, or indeed to the very idea of ‘minority’” (Kymlicka 2015, 2493). Here and elsewhere in the world, political realities have partly to do with how national boarders were drawn at independence and to the fact that the colonial rule favored some communities at the expense of others. Although parliamentary quotas to religious minorities give a kind of protection, it separates the groups who are not represented in an ordinary election. Most of the countries with such minority quotas are not democratic, on the contrary, they give strong preferences to the majority religion. However, religious minorities are facing problems even in liberal democracies, as seen above. Some countries have a tradition of establishing a policy of communication with representatives of religious communities, including the minorities, while others, like France, have had a strong tradition for dealing with individuals rather than associations (Statham et al. 2005, 433). The scholarly reflection upon the different policies in the world countries indicates that not everybody favors minority rights. For Brian Barry (2001), giving groups or (religious) organizations particular rights means privileging them. Barry claims that culture is marginally important for human beings, and (collective) religion is not really needed. Another critic of minority rights, Anne Phillips, states that multiculturalism: …exaggerates the internal unity of cultures, solidifies differences that are currently more fluid, and makes people from other cultures seem more exotic and distinct than they really are. Multiculturalism then appears not as a cultural liberator but as a cultural straitjacket, forcing those described as members of a minority cultural group into a regime of authenticity, denying them the chance to cross cultural borders, borrow cultural influences, define and redefine themselves. (Phillips 2007, 14)

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At least one has to take into consideration that the communitarian position, giving organizations freedom for some forms of cultural identity and protections, may lead to “pillarization, where society is segmented into ‘pillars,’ each of which hold collective rights and obligations. Social rights and obligations are thereby based on membership in a community” (Riis 2010, 197). The fear of pillarization might be one reason why the UN hesitates to give too many religious minorities the status of indigenous people, although many are certainly vulnerable. Proponents of multiculturalism are aware of this problem. For Charles Taylor, the solution seems to be the force of the liberal state. The tremendous assimilation force of the way of life in advanced liberal, consumer-capitalist society is so great that there is no question of communities integrally retaining their whole original life-form (2009). Another multiculturalist, Kymlicka, holds that “We need new concepts to explain how minority rights can enhance liberal values” (2014, 8). Minorities are vulnerable and their rights and freedoms should be no excuse “to allow the minority to suppress the basic civil and political freedoms internally,” he continues. Since the communitarian position may give religious leaders too much power at the expense of individuals and prevent social integration, notable scholars claim that cultural rights are the rights of individuals only. In his book, Rethinking Multiculturalism (2006), Bhikhu Parekh makes a distinction between two ways “Collective rights can be acquired.” The first is “derivative collective rights,” where “individuals might pool their rights together or alienate them to the collectivity” (2006, 213). He list trade unions and clubs as examples. The other way collective rights can be claimed is “by virtue of being what they are and not derived from their members…primary collective rights” (2006, 213). But even the multiculturalist Parekh argues, “that only individuals can be primarily bearer of rights and that all collective rights are reducible to them” (2006, 214). Habermas, too, claims that cultural rights belongs to individuals only (1994). If so, what else can a society do other than protect the individual; either they want to express their faith in public or want to break free from (minority) religion? When it comes to minorities, they will need to relate both externally to the majority society and internally to its members. Although the strategies vary, they will need a minimum of acceptance from the majority. At the same time, they will need to point to the distinct character of their own religious society, in order to justify their existence. An interesting contemporary example of how a minorities refer to scripture in order to prevent or reduce negative attention is found in Muslim societies in the West. Muslims are careful how they refer to the concept “jihad,” which literally means to “strive,” but “the overwhelming majority of

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classical theologians, jurists, and traditionalists…understood the obligation of jihad in a military sense” (Lewis 1988, 72). This is also how jihad is understood in the authoritative Hadith collection al-Bukhari. In the West however, Muslims minorities very often refer to the “inner-jihad ” as “the struggle against oneself” and a greater form of jihad. The fact that jihad in this meaning does not appear in the “authoritative collections” (Streusand 1997, 13), does not seem to bother them. The traditional hierarchy of Hadith collections is suspended. Although many perceive multiculturalism as a challenge, some, like Parekh, claim that it is a great advantage since “no political doctrine or ideology can represent the full truth of human life…[but] represents a particular vision of the good life, and is necessarily narrow and partial” (2006, 338). Given the Indian background of Parekh, it should not come as a surprise that he gives Gandhi as an example. His “theory was born out of an intense critical engagement with the Hindu, Buddhist, Jaina, and Christian tradition and could not have been generated by any of them alone.” The ahimsa (non-violence) of Hinduism and the karuna (compassion) of Buddhism “was largely negative and passive.” Gandhi therefore integrated “the socially oriented Christian concept of caritas…and arrived at the idea of the active service of all living beings” (Parekh 2006, 371–72). At the basis of this approach, Parekh has suggested his own hermeneutics, where the reading from one sacred scripture should be contrasted or tested with the reading from sacred books of other traditions. Although modern democracies do not engage in cross-religious readings of sacred texts, some politicians facilitate religious dialogue, probably as a tool to increase integration. Studies indicate that dialogue is a conflict-reducing factor (Ipgrave et al. 2018). In the least, the majority becomes more positive in their attitude towards minorities. This applies not only to Western countries, but also to Muslim versus Christians in Indonesia (Kanas et al. 2015).

Diaspora Versus Homeland In most cases, a diaspora community can also be defined as a minority, unless it belongs to one of the rare cases where they make up for the majority, as in the Indian diaspora in Fiji. Therefore, diaspora is just a special version of minority, and sometimes it can be difficult to make a distinction between the two. Nevertheless, diaspora has been an important concept in academia for some decades. One influential article was William Safran’s “Diasporas in Modern Society: Myths of Homeland” (Safran 1991), which symptomatically appeared in the first issue of the peer-review journal Diaspora. Safran was mainly concerned with ethnic diaspora, e.g., Chinese, Hispanic, Indian,

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Maghreb, Polish, and Turkish. Fourteen years later, Rogers Brubaker concluded that the term was expanded to apply “essentially to any nameable population category that is to some extent dispersed in space” (2005, 5). Diaspora has undoubtedly become a keyword across all social science and humanities disciplines (Johnson 2012, 95). The first to introduce the concept within religious studies was Thomas Tweed (1997). Tweed’s approach was ethnically similar to that of Safran, but he added the religious element in his study of the Catholic-Cuban diaspora in Miami. Others have used the diaspora concept to cover larger groups, where the only thing they seem to have in common is religious affinity. Since religious boundaries are not always consistent with political, national, or linguistic aspects, it becomes problematic to use the diaspora concept where the only thing they share is belonging to a particular religion. In practice, the use of the term varies, depending on which religion we are talking about. The word “diaspora” stems from Jews living outside Israel, and it is still used for this group. Most researchers also have no objections to its use with Hindus, where India constitutes the sacred geography and is home to around 80 percent of this religion. Some also add Sikhism and Ismailis, who sacralize India (Vertovec 2009, 135). This is quite another use of the word than what Safran employed. He emphasized languages ​​and lands when writing about the Indian diaspora (1991, 90–91), rather than Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, or other religious groups from South-Asia. Hardly anyone speaks about the Buddhist or the Christian diaspora in a general sense, but for some reason, it is common to speak about the Muslim diaspora. What is then the Muslim homeland, and how do we define homelands? For Safran, the home country was either a national state like Poland, Turkey, or India, or units with strong similarities, like Maghrebis and Hispanics (emigrants to the United States). Is there a Muslim homeland? Sarah Albrecht (2016) discussed this in an article that appeared a few years ago, and among others, he refers to different views among prominent Muslim scholars. Some define Muslims in the West as a diaspora of the Islamic “homeland,” being any country with a Muslim majority. In this case, four continents would be the homeland of Christianity and South-East Asia of Buddhism. Tariq Ramadan rejects the term diasporic, since the division of al-islam and dar al-ıarb (land of peace and land of war) does not occur in the primary Muslim sources but belongs to later theology (Albrecht 2016, 120). Note that the classical texts are used to dismiss the dichotomy of land of peace and land of war. Others argue that a homeland does not exist, or that it exists wherever you are free to practice your Muslim faith (Albrecht 2016, 127). These arguments does not justify why we can talk about a Muslim diaspora as opposed to a Christian or Buddhist diaspora.

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Peter Beyer takes a historical approach when he speaks about historical homelands and religions that have spread from their supremely dominant geographic heartlands (2016, 100). This occurred earlier for Buddhism and Christianity than for Islam, which is probably the reason why he operates with the term “heartland Islam” but not “heartland Buddhism” or “heartland Christianity.” Unlike Islam, these religions are tiny minorities (in parts) of the lands they first inhabited. It appears to me that one of the reasons why we talk about a Muslim diaspora is due to the fact that many followers of this religion have migrated to Western countries in recent decades. Thus, there is a need to operate with categories, not only on the individual or the group level but also to denote the entire population, despite the fact that they come from quite different cultures. There are relatively many Christians emigrating from the Middle East, and these are sometimes referred to as one group. Had there been a massive escape of Christians into areas where other religions dominate, we might have talked about a Christian diaspora. “Homeland” is by no means uniform in the literature. Safran was leaning on the definition of diaspora given by Walker Conner as, “that segment of a living outside the homeland” (Conner 1986, 16). Murphy, on the other hand, emphasizes the more subjective aspect of the diaspora and claims, “It is the homeland as imagined that has salience” (Murphy 2004, 349). That myth formation was also supported by Tweed in his study of diaspora Cubans, who “transported themselves to the Cuba of memory and desire” (Tweed 1997, 10). The concept of “homeland myth” has been adopted by other studies of diaspora (Brubaker 2005, 5) and (Ben-Rafael 2013, 90). Peter Beyer also highlights the subjective attitude when he uses the concept of “heartland.” Paul Gilroy has even made a distinction between diaspora without a homeland, like “Black Atlantic,” and diasporas who have a certain territory, like “African Diaspora” (Gilroy 1991). This has been followed up by Rebecca Davies, stating, “Certain diasporic constituencies have disconnected entirely from any notion of a formal diasporic grouping, but remain connected to a subjective understanding of ‘fricanness’” (2007, 69). Paul Christopher Johnson has criticized such views and claims that if diaspora does not imply any territory, like the Black Atlantic, there is no possibility to distinguish “Diasporic Religion” from “Transnational Religion.” The concept of diaspora is used in a too wide sense, and Johnson advocates for “the circumscribing” of diasporic religion. If a home country cannot be identified, the term “Transnational Religion” should be preferred. Johnson writes, “Diasporic affiliations and sentiments should be clearly distinguished from transnational or cosmopolitan ones.” He concludes that “diaspora is extra-national more than transnational” (2012, 101). If so, second and third generation Muslims in Europe should be considered “transnational” rather than in “diasporic.” Eventually, the transnational aspects become the

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most important, and elements “that are not shared with other Muslim populations are likely to disappear” (Gibb 1998, 260). In a study of Bosnian and Albanian Muslims in Switzerland, Samuel M. Behloul (2016) explains how the first generation tried to establish a religion similar to that in the homeland, while second generation sought an authentic and universal Islam. Thus, the transnational aspects take over. Although Johnson seeks to narrow the use of diaspora, he uses the term flexibly. People can even join or shift diasporic horizons “in order to make something happen” (Johnson 2012, 107). He points to Westerners who have joined the Zen tradition and “are activating a Japanese diasporic horizon (often imagined) against which they calibrate their action” (2012, 102). If one accept this use of diaspora, non-Indian members of ISKCON (Hare Krishna) could be added. They are born in U.S.A., Europe, and elsewhere, and for the most part, they are not members of a migrant community, but still, India is the sacred homeland. In this sense, one can have a diaspora horizon towards a country or territory where one has never lived nor visited. This is the case for many ISKCON members. Johnson even speaks about “multiple diasporic horizons” (2012). Some communities can even be described as “twice migrant,” like African Sikhs in the US, who have bonds to both Africa and the Punjab (Murphy 2004, 365). With the ever-increasing migration and pluralization, it becomes more difficult to use the diaspora term as an analytical category. The word stars lose its meaning, as Brubaker pointed out many years ago, stating, “The universalization of diaspora, paradoxically, means the disappearance of diaspora” (Brubaker 2005, 3). Describing the Indian diaspora as “the ‘other,’” annihilated the whole concept (Jacobsen and Kumar 2004, xiv). Some scholars have never accepted the diaspora concept, such as Clifford (2004) and Gilroy (1991). It may be symptomatic that the aforementioned journal, Diaspora, was terminated in 2010. The de-territorialization of all cultural systems “threatens to dissolve the essential bonds between histories, people and territories which have defined all civilizations and world religions” (Casanova 2007, 117). Robin Cohen already wrote about the “Deterritorialized social identities” a couple of decades ago (1997, 173). However, in the preface of the second edition, he admits that “the stronger inflection of the homeland remain powerful discourses” (2008, 2). It should also be noted that new religious movements tend to have no defined homeland or center and, thus, no diaspora. They operate as networks rather than organizations and mix the narratives, rituals, believes, and concepts from several continents and religious traditions. The most obvious examples as to how diaspora directly relates to sacred texts are probably found in Judaism and Hinduism, due to a sacred geography

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relating to a distinct country. The Hebrew Bible narrates exiles both in Egypt and Babylonia. Ramayana, arguably the most important scripture in popular Hinduism, is about captivity and exile. A recent study of Hindus in diaspora in the Caribbean shows that Ramayana “resonated in the new communities that were born out of exile” (Rai and Sankaran 2014, 4). For many diaspora Tibetans, the books and narratives of the Dalai Lama seem to be more important than ancient Tibetan texts (Lopes 2015). Although he calls himself “a simple Buddhist monk,” he is an incarnation of the famous bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara, the God who looks down on the earth with compassion. This example illustrates that among diaspora community, longing is related to a homeland’s language and culture rather than a sacred text as such.

Center Versus Periphery in the Globalized World Spickard emphasizes that globalization and economy are two important components when it comes to what he denotes as “communal matters.” Defining the salient feature of globalism makes it possible to makes country indexes as to the level of globalization in the world’s countries. The KOF Index of Globalization1 includes three dimensions: the economic, the social, and the political level. The Good Country (TGC) index is made up of 35 data points, which are mostly generated by the United Nations. Though these lists vary a little bit, is goes for both that small and medium populated Western countries are found at the top at the list, though Hungary makes it up to number eight and Singapore to number five at the top of the KOF index. Since economic equalities are one of the parameters, huge countries like U.S.A., Germany, and France are not found at the very top, though France climbs to number seven on the TGC. Spickard divides globalization into three categories: the center and periphery; between them; and the semi-periphery. The center, which means countries scoring high on the globalization indexes, are mainly Western countries. In the periphery, countries scoring low, we find mainly postcolonial countries, countries that used to be colonized by a Western country. The semi-periphery consists of countries in Latin America and Eastern-Europe. For example, Spickard mentions the former Yugoslavian republics as semi-periphery. Employing such parameters, particular economy, as measurements for success, will only sustain the hegemony of the West, claim Indian scholars of subaltern studies branch some scholars in postcolonial theory. However, in his Postcolonial Theory and the Specter of Capital (2013), Vivek Chibber objects to this claim. Capitalism is universal, and he points to the crises of 2007–2008 and claims that the whole world was affected, not just parts of it.

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This is only an observation and not a defense of capitalism as such. In addition to the universality of capitalism, Chibber adds another factor as a response to the pressure of capitalism: people will embrace the values of the European Enlightenment. Although the values of rationality, critique, and individualism emerged in Europe, they are universal—not uniquely Eurocentric. Chibber repeats his arguments time after time, and in the last chapter, he sums that postcolonial theory “…assigns science, rationality, objectivity, and similar attributes to the West, instead of regarding them as common to both cultures” (2013, 289). Given this chasm, Cibber declares this as “Orientalist sociology” (2013, 290). And yes, on the second page in the introduction of Orientalism, Edward W. Said defines “Orientalism as a style of thought based upon an ontological and epistemological distinction made between ‘the Orient’ and (most of the time) ‘the Occident’” (1978). In an anthology that appeared a few years ago (Warren 2017), scholars of Subaltern Studies were given the opportunity to make their comments on Postcolonial Theory and the Specter of Capital, and Chibber followed with a response. However, of the three scholars that Chibber discusses in book—Partha Chatterjee, Dipesh Chakrabarty, and Ranajit Guha—only the former appears in the anthology. Nevertheless, Chatterjee takes pains to defend the two other as well. As to Chibber’s critique of him, Chatterjee (2017) seems to play down what he has written and accuses Chibber for misinterpretation (2017). Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak—a prominent scholar in subaltern studies but only briefly mentioned in Chibber’s book—is, in my view, more to the point when she states that there is “No room in this book for perceiving nuance” (2017, 72). Chibber seems to be too categorical when he concludes that postcolonial theory cannot serve “as an analytical framework or as anti-imperial critique” (2013, 289). In the following, I will examine postcolonial critique of Western hermeneutics and concentrate on Indian Christian scholars. After all, the Bible was the sacred book of the colonizers, and Chibber and other main figures in subaltern studies are hailing from India. According to Anne Runesson, “… the heart of postcolonial criticism is directed against the historical critical claim to universality” (2011, 63). This is very similar to the critique that subaltern studies posed to the Enlightenment. Even more so, historical-critical exegetical methodology is born out of the Enlightenment with its value of rationality, critique, and individuality. In other words, it seems that from a rejection of the Enlightenment, there follows a dismissal of historic-critical methodology. This is what two prominent Indian theologians seem to do, but let us examine and perceive the nuances in the writing of Rasiah S. Sugirtharaja. According to the Sugirtharaja, historic-critical exegeses is colonial and Western scholars regard “that their work is universal, comprehensive, and

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exhaustive” (Sugirtharajah 1998: 127). One can only admit that much exegesis which has been carried out under the banner of historical-critical method has been positivistic and flawed. European scholarship has even degraded the humanity of other people. When it comes to interpretation of sacred texts, particularly the use of the Bible on behalf of the Empire, it is easy to criticize the Europeans. Let me start using an old example of how Africans are perceived. In the Bible commentary written by Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch, there is more than one negative statements of Africa. In the discussion of Amos 9:7, the African people of Cush are mentioned, and Keil links African blackness to “spiritual blackness” (1878, 327). Unfortunately, the history does not end in the nineteenth century. The English version later appeared in a new edition in 1996. Even more, a PDF is now free to download and attractive for “…students and pastors…in economically less privileged contexts” (2017, 285–86). It is a fact that the literature in libraries in former colonies is old, due to limited economic resources. In addition, academic institutions do not have sufficient funds to support sending their employees to participate at international conferences. Even many Western universities cannot afford adequate relevant library sources or travel to conferences. Returning to Sugirtharajah, one of the most important elements of postcolonial exegesis, he claims, is to take into account the presence of colonial backgrounds of the biblical narratives. Contexts, including the social-political, is just what historic-critic method prescribes, but Sugirtharajah is right when he claims that Western scholarship “tends to ignore” this (2006, 68). At the end, the historic method can be used if it takes “epistemic transformation” (1998, 129) (For a discussion of African versus European epistemology, see Beth Elness-Hanson chapter 8 in this volume). Fellow Indian citizen, George M. Soares-Prabhu, takes a similar stand as Sugirtharaja. Soares-Prabhu describes the historic-critical method as irrelevant, incompatible with the claims in sacred texts, and lacking the neutrality it claims to possess. Nevertheless, “The application of a biblical text…might differ from place to place. But its exegesis (the disclosure of ‘meaning’) would always follow the standard procedures of historical criticism” (1994, 265). Even more, it can even bring liberation to “Asian religions—not excluding Christianity—from the pre-critical dogmatism which still plagues them and is a source of the malevolent fundamentalism that keeps irrupting in so many parts of Asia today” (1994, 273). Historic-critical methodology provides some principles, but must take into account the context of the reader. For an Indian, that means to take into account the traditions of Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism. He gives an example in his article, “Two Mission Commands,” where he interprets the Great Commission in Matthew 28:16–20 with the help of a

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Buddhist missionary command, and his exegesis concludes, “Matthew tends to neglect…the welfare of the missionized” (1994, 282). Soares-Prabhu concludes that the Buddhist text helps to fill out this and other “gaps” in Matthew’s Mission Command. One should also keep in mind that there exists a leap from the values of the Enlightenment to a particular method, let alone a particular epistemology and methodology. Any particular materialization of the principles of rational, critical, and freedom can hardly claim universality. At the same time, the very discussion of concepts like epistemology and ontology, bear the stamp of the historic-critic method. There should be a variety of ways we interpret sacred texts, and let me use the Marxist-inspired scholar Chibber’s description of capitalism as an analogy. It does not “homogenize…capitalism does dissolve many sorts of social differences. But it also sustains and generates differences” (2013, 287). The same goes for historic-critical exegesis. Reality shows that it does not homogenize. Let it be pluralistic. Fortunately, it dissolves many sorts of differences in a way that makes it possible to have rational discussions when reading sacred texts. At the same time, it generates differences; South-Asia is not Africa. North-Atlantic is not South-America. If the values of the Enlightenment were a response to the demands of capitalism, let the historic-critical exegesis be part of the liberation of any suppressed group or individual and, ultimately, freedom from the texts themselves.

Secular Versus Sacred One of the significant contributions to the secularization theme is by Charles Taylor in his magnum opus, A Secular Age. He starts with the traditional description of “secularizing” as: (1) religion disappearing from public space; and (2) a decreasing of religious belief and practice. In addition, he adds a third meaning to secularization: “a move from a society where belief in God is unchallenged and indeed, unproblematic, to one in which it is understood to be one option among others” (Taylor 2007, 3). Casanova points to the same, “…even those who adopt an ‘engaged’ standpoint as believers tend to experience reflexively their own belief as an option among many other” (2012, 30). Peter Berger has interpreted this third aspect in terms of pluralization rather than secularization. Berger writes that we have “Confused secularization with pluralization” (2012, 313), which is, more or less, only a continuation from an earlier claim. He continues, “The world is just as furiously religious as it ever was, and in some places more so than ever” (Berger 1999, 2). This leads us to the second element in the definition of Taylor: secularization as a decrease in belief and practice. The U.S.A. has been used as an

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example, or even demonstrates, that secularization has not taken place. We have seen a pluralization rather than a secularization, claims James Miller, who writes, “We certainly live in interesting times. But ‘A secular age’? What secular age?” (2008, 10). So concludes James Miller in his article. Taylor, on the other hand, says that if we look at his the third element—belief in God as one possibility among others—even the United States has been secularized. Adherents of the secularization theory argue that in the U.S.A., there has been a decline in terms of beliefs and practices. The title of one of the chapters in Steve Bruce’s book, Secularization: In Defense of an Unfashionable Theory (Bruce 2013), is called “Unexceptional America.” His research reveals a drop in the number of people attending church service and faith in a personal God. Davis Voas and Mark Chaves have followed up on this claim of “individual-level secularization” in the U.S.A., and they point to statistics that show that in 1957, three percent of the adult population had no religious affiliation, but in 2012, non-affiliation had risen to 20 percent. People never attending religious services had doubled, from 13 percent in 1990 to 26 percent in 2014 (Voas and Chaves 2016, 1523). Voas and Chaves oppose de Graaf’s argument of high religious activity (de Graaf 2013, 322). As long as the activity is falling significantly, one has to conclude that secularization takes place, even in the U.S.A. Like other scholars, Voas and Chaves claim that secularization takes place from cohort to cohort, not that one generation gets less religious as they age. Higher levels of religious activity in the U.S.A. compared to Europe, can, according to Casanova, be explained by “the weak development of a welfare state in the United States” (2012, 38). The discussion of secularization has, to a large extent, been related to U.S.A. and Europe since they, with the exception of Australia and New Zealand, are, to the largest degree, a part of the globalized economy. However, secularization seems to take place in other parts of the world as well. In Egypt, the highest populated Arab country, we witnessed a significant fall in traditional religious practice. Support for imposing sharia (Islamic law) fell from 84 percent in 2011 to 34 percent in 2016. Egyptians also pray less: among older Egyptians (55+) 90 percent prayed daily in 2011. Among the younger generation (age 18–24), that portion was only 70 percent. In contrast, by 2016, these numbers had fallen to less than 80 percent (55+) and less than 40 percent (18–24) (Economist 2017, 56). We move on to the first dimension of Taylor’s description of secularization: the disappearance of religion in the public sphere. In the pre-modern society, religion provided an all-embracing set of values, but this has been fragmented in modernity. However, the fact that religion does not have the same power as earlier does not imply that it has disappeared. This is the

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starting point for Jürgen Habermas’ famous article, “Notes on Post-Secular Society” (2008). He, by no means, wants to contest the secularization theory. The differentialization of society leaves less space for religious organizations, with the result that religious faith and practice moves to the private sphere, and as we have seen, are in decline. According to Habermas, a “post-secular” society means that the society “still has to ‘adjust itself to the continued existence of religious communities in an increasingly secularized environment’” and “religion maintains a public influence and relevance” (2008, 19–20). Even in secular societies, we see that religion and sacred texts are present and provided in contexts which are largely seen as secular. The most iconic example is the inauguration of the President of the United States, where every new president has to lay a hand on the holy scripture when being sworn into office. Less known is the inauguration of the new minister of Thailand in a ceremony that often includes Buddhist monks reading paritta texts, texts meant to protect the ministers and subsequently the Country (Jacobsen 2000, 158). In addition to such ceremonial examples, sacred texts are even being provided in public spheres that are normally viewed as secular. Until the year 2000, the Norwegian army equipped officers with a New Testament that perfectly fit the breast pocket of the uniform. Like many armies nowadays, soldiers are given religious services in accordance with their beliefs. The same goes for hospitals and prisons. Upon arrival prison, prisoners in the United Kingdom will be asked if they want to identify any religious affiliation. The list is long, and it also includes paganism and no religious identity. Prison staff can consult the database to answer questions about “prisoners’ eligibility for special diets…possession of sacred texts” (HM Prison Service 2000). Guantánamo prisoners received a Qur’an. In some democracies today, sacred texts are part of the school curriculum. In the last few years, there has been quite a heated debate in India related to the decision of some administrative areas to include Bhagavad Gita in the curriculum. Those who object argue that this is not in accordance with the secular state, while those who favor of it, claim that this book is part of India’s cultural heritage and contains universal truths. Although Turner holds that traditional forms of religion and religious faith practices have decreased, he by no means claims that we are less religious than at previous times. Religion or spirituality may simply take other forms. In our post-secular society, religion has obtained a very prominent part of media and popular culture, which have had the ability to adapt. Religion is present in media, on the Internet, and in popular culture to such an extent that it transcends the dichotomy of secular-sacred. However, religion in the mainstream media is very different from religion in social media and popular culture. On one hand, “media constitute an environment that makes

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it possible for religion to sustain a present in both public and private life” (Stolow 2010, 34). However, media governs the structure “how certain religions, religious groups, or religion-related issues and events become represented and constructed,” and media seems to favor “religious extremism, or scandals and controversies” (Moberg and Granholm 2012, 102). Mainstream media is perhaps not that occupied with sacred texts, but on the Internet, sacred texts are promoted and the major ones are available in a range of languages. They come as recitals, with or without music accompaniment. Movies portraying narratives from sacred texts have been with us for decades. I’ll give two examples in order to display how the film makers took strategies in order not to provoke religious institutions or public outcries. One interesting movie example is The Gospel According to St. Matthew (1964), by the Italian director Pier Paolo Passolini. He wanted to present his vision of Jesus, but in order to avoid problems with the Vatican, all verbal content of the movie is taken from the New Testament. He uses other tools than texts in order to portray his message like emphasizing children and innocence. Another example, the movie, Bhagavad Gita, is a part of Mahabharata but only a few of the total 700 stanzas (18 chapters long) of scripture was included in the movie. It is mainly verses from the second chapter explaining the nature of the self (atman). The class system is played down in the film, although the Bhagavad Gita is conservative when it comes to social values. Art and popular culture highlight some aspects and omit others. The dichotomy of secular-sacred is indeed problematic, which is contra to the view of phenomenology, where religion is seen as a “section” among others in society. Instead, religion seems to be everywhere, weaved into the culture. It is hardly a particular phenomenon of life that, under given circumstances, can disappear (from public life). Religions, including their sacred texts, are ubiquitous in various forms: present in media, the Internet, and popular culture to such an extent that they transcend the dichotomy of secular-sacred. Even the authorities are striving to draw a line between religious and culture, which was demonstrated in the Lautsi case. Ms. Lautsi claimed that a crucifix hanging in the classroom of her children in an Italian school, violated their religious freedom. In the first trial, she succeeded, but in the appeal, The Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg claimed that crucifixes are so integrated in the heritage of Italy that the symbol is more of a cultural one than religious. This is interesting, since the crucifix refers to the most important Christian narrative. Lori Beaman disliked the verdict since Christian institutions are in crisis, and the shift of religious symbols to culture is a way of protecting them. Then lies the possibility of switching the symbols from the culture to religion again. Regardless of how the majority of the public or the court

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view them, symbols, like the crucifix, are connected to colonial practices and can work as a strategy of the majority to oppress the minority (2013, 104). Another North-American Scholar, Canadian Rogers Brubaker, claims that in Europe, Christianity has become “privileged as culture in a way that is cannot be privileged as religion” (2016). Religion is seen as a “key matrix of political culture,” and the religious matrix of Europe is Christianity (2016). Habermas, on the other hand, has accused the Strasbourg court of exercising “militant secularism” or “enlightenment fundamentalism” (2008, 18). Section 1 of article 9 of the European Convention of Human Rights states that “everybody has the freedom of thought, conscience and religion,” and section 2 states that limitations can only be made for the sake of “public safety…or the protection of the rights of freedoms of others.” In other words, one’s internal faith has no restrictions whereas the external manifestations do. Roberta Medda-Windischer analyzed in her recent article, “Militant or Pluralistic Secularism?” a number of decisions by the Strasbourg Court. In some cases, the Strasbourg court has sustained a sort of strict secularism, but in other cases, a more accommodating form of secularism has been seen. Nevertheless, she sees a tendency of accommodation going in favor of Christianity, and points to the Lautsi and Eweida cases. However, the latter concerned the rights of four employees in British Airways to wear small cross hanging on a chain around the neck. The court argued that since the BA had accommodated Sikhs (turbans) and Muslims (hijabs), it should also accommodate Christian crosses. Although we may discuss the decisions of the European Court in Strasbourg, it is difficult to declare their decision results in the making of “militant secularism.” The Strasbourg court has a supportive role for the state authorities, and it can contribute in a “furthering of mutual respect and understanding which is so urgently needed in contemporary, diversified societies” (Medda-Windischer, 2017, 228).

Conclusion In this paper, I have tried to present some of the salient features of the global contexts in which sacred texts are read and interpreted. I structured the discussion in the following dichotomies: minority-majority; diaspora-homeland; center and periphery of the globalized world; and secular-religious. In each paragraph, I gave an overview of some of the topics from the academic debates and, subsequently, related some of the issues to sacred texts. When it comes to minorities, we discovered that the UN does not give any clear definition of the world, and it hesitates to give minority status to indigenous peoples. Some scholars, among them several multiculturalists, favor the rights

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of minorities, while other fear the pillarization of society. Parekh, an Indian multiculturalist, favors reading and using scriptures from several traditions, since none of them alone can grasp reality. Diaspora-homeland was the next dichotomy, but these two concepts are not that easy to define. Nevertheless, the most obvious diasporic people groups, who relate to religious narratives of a homeland, seem to be the Hindus and the Jews, due the sacred geography of the homeland. The third dichotomy was the center verses the periphery of the globalized world in relation to economic issues. This section involved a discussion of postcolonial theory and historical-critical methodology. Adherents of postcolonial theory challenge the method, but they are willing to accept it as long as it is fused together with the culture and context of the reader, be it in Asia, Africa, or anywhere else. Taking into account that the values of rationality, critique, and individuality seen in the Enlightenment were responses to the force of capitalism, these principles can be employed transculturally by any individual or people group that is oppressed. The last section consisted of a discussion of secularization. Does it exist? I argued that in terms of traditional beliefs and practices, we have been witnessing a secularization. However, this does not mean that religion is not part of the public life. On the contrary, the society has to relate to public religion. Even more so, the decline of traditional religion does not mean we are less religious. Religion takes new forms and, to a large extent, forms that are outside the control of institutionalized religion. Religion seems to be inherent within cultures to such extent that its prevalence annihilates the false secular-sacred dichotomy. Defining the four dichotomies of this paper is a strategic way of discussing context in our globalized world. Contexts like minority, majority, diaspora, and geographical overlap and mix. The same goes for how these contexts relate to sacred texts.

Note 1. KOF is an acronym for the German word “Konjunktforschungstelle.” It is a research institute working with economic cycles.

Bibliography Albrecht, Sarah. 2016. “Searching for the ‘Homeland’ of Islam: Concepts of Diaspora in Contemporary Islamic Discourse on Muslims in the West.” Journal of Muslims in Europe 5 (1): 106–31. Barry, Brian. 2001. Culture and Equality: An Egalitarian Critique of Multiculturalism. Cambridge: Polity.

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Beaman, Lori G. 2013. “Battles Over Symbols: The ‘Religion’ of the Minority Versus the ‘Culture’ of the Majority.” Journal of Law and Religion 28 (1): 67–104. Behloul, Samuel M. 2016. “Religion and the (de-)construction of Diaspora: A Comparative View of Albanian and Bosnian Muslims in Switzerland.” Journal of Muslims in Europe 5 (1): 65–86. Ben-Rafael, Eliezer. 2013. “Diaspora.” Current Sociology 61 (5–6): 842–61. Berger, Peter L. 1999. “The Desecularization of the World: A Global Overview.” In The Desecularization of the World: Resurgent Religion and World Politics, edited by Peter L. Berger, 1–18. Michigan: Grand Rapids. ———, 2012. “Further Thoughts on Religion and Modernity.” Society 49 (4): 313. Beyer, Peter. 2016. “Forms of Religious Communities in Global Society: Tradition, Invention, and Transformation.” In Dynamics of Religion: Past and Present. Proceedings of the XXI World Congress of the International Association for the History of Religions, eds. Christoph Bochinger, Jörg Rüpke and Elisabeth Begemann, 85–107. Berlin: Walter De Gruyter. ———, 2007. “Globalization and Glocalization.” In The SAGE Handbook of the Sociology of Religion, edited by James A. Beckford and N. J. Demerath, 98–117. London: Sage. Bird, Karen. 2014. “Ethnic Quotas and Ethnic Representation Worldwide.” International Political Science Review 35 (1): 12–26. Brubaker, Rogers. 2005. “The ‘Diaspora’ Diaspora.” Ethnic and Racial Studies 28 (1): 1–19. ———, 2016. “A New ‘Christianist’ Secularism in Europe.” Social Science Research Council, The Immanent Frame, 11 October. https://tif.ssrc.org/2016/10/11/a-new-christianistsecularism-in-europe/ Bruce, Steve. 2013. Secularization: In Defence of an Unfashionable Theory. United Kingdom: Oxford University Press. Casanova, José. 2007. “Rethinking Secularization: A Global Comparative Perspective.” In Religion, Globalization and Culture, edited by Peter Beyer and Lori G. Beaman, 101–20. Leiden: Brill. ———, 2012. “Are We Still Secular? Explorations on the Secular and the Post-Secular.” In Post-Secular Society, edited by Peter Nynäs, Mika Lassander, and Terhi Utriainen, 27–46. London: Transaction. Chatterjee, Partha. 2017. “Subaltern Studies and Capital.” In The Debate on Postcolonial Theory and the Specter of Capital, edited by Rosie Warren, 31–47. New York: Verso. Chibber, Vivek. 2013. Postcolonial Theory and the Specter of Capital. London: Verso. Clifford, James. 2004. “Diasporas.” Cultural Anthropology 9 (3): 302–38. Cohen, Robin. 1997. Global Diasporas: An Introduction. London: UCL. ———, 2008. Global Diasporas: An Introduction. 2nd edition. London: Routledge. Daes, Erica-Irene. 1996. “Indigenous People.” https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/ UNDOC/GEN/G96/129/80/PDF/G9612980.pdf?OpenElement. Davies, Rebecca. 2007. “Reconceptualising the Migration—Development Nexus: Diasporas, Globalisation and the Politics of Exclusion.” Third World Quarterly 28 (1): 59–76.

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de Graaf, Nan Dirk. 2013. “Secularization: Theoretical Controversies Generating Empirical Research.” In The Handbook of Rational Choice Social Research, edited by Rafael Wittek, Tom A. B. Snijders, and Victor Nee, 322–54. Stanford, California: Stanford Social Sciences, an imprint of Stanford University Press. The Economist. 2017. “The New Arab Cosmopolitans: Despots Are Pushing the Arab World to Become More Secular.” The Economist, Nov 2. European Court of Human Rights. 2013. Eweida and Others v. the UK. Appl. Nos. 48420/10, 59842/10, 51671/10 and 36516/10, judgement of 15 January. Ezzy, Douglas. 2018. “Minority Religions, Litigation, and the Prevention of Harm.” Journal of Contemporary Religion 33 (2): 277–89. Gibb, Camilla. 1998. “Religious Identification in Transnational Contexts: Being and Becoming Muslim in Ethiopia and Canada.” Diaspora: A Journal of Transnational Studies 7 (2): 247–69. Gilroy, Paul. 1991. “It Ain’t Where You’re From, It’s Where You’re At…: the Dialectics of Diasporic Identification.” Third Text 5 (13): 3–16. Habermas, Jürgen. 1994. “Struggles for Recognition in the Democratic National State.” In Multiculturalism: Examining the Politics of Recognition, edited by Charles Taylor and Amy Gutmann, 107–48. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press. ———, 2008. “Notes on Post-Secular Society.” New Perspectives Quarterly 25 (4): 17–29. Ipgrave, Julia, Thorsten Knauth, Anna Körs, Dörthe Vieregge, and Marie von Der Lippe, eds. 2018. Religion and Dialogue in the City: Case Studies on Interreligious Encounter in Urban Community and Education. Münster, New York: Waxmann. Jacobsen, Knut A. 2000. Buddhismen. Oslo: Pax. Jacobsen, Knut A., and P. Pratap Kumar. 2004. “Introduction.” In South Asians in the Diaspora: Histories and Religious Traditions, edited by Knut A. Jacobsen and P. Pratap Kumar, x–xxiv. Leiden: Brill. Johnson, Paul Christopher 2012. “Religion and Diaspora.” Religion and Society: Advances in Research 3: 95–114. Kanas, Agnieszka, Peer Scheepers, and Carl Sterkens. 2015. “Interreligious Contact, Perceived Group Threat, and Perceived Discrimination: Predicting Negative Attitudes among Religious Minorities and Majorities in Indonesia.” Social Psychology Quarterly 78 (2): 102–26. Keil, Carl Friedrich. 1878. Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament: The Twelve Minor Prophets. Edinburgh: T.&T. Clark. Krook, Mona Lena, and Diana Z. O’Brien. 2010. The Politics of Group Representation: Quotas for Women and Minorities Worldwide. Comparative Politics Comparative politics 42 (3): 253–72. Kymlicka, Will. 2008. “The Internationalization of Minority Rights.” International Journal of Constitutional Law 6 (1): 1. ———, 2014. “The Essentialist Critique of Multiculturalism: Theories, Policies, Ethos.” In EUI Working Paper RSCAS 2014/59, edited by European University Institute: Robert Schuman Centre for Advances Studies, 1–23.

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———, 2015. “Minority Politics in the Middle East and North Africa: The Prospects for Transformative Change.” Ethnic and Racial Studies 38 (14): 2489–98. Lewis, Bernard. 1988. The Political Language of Islam. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Lopes, Ana Christina O. 2015. Tibetan Buddhism in Diaspora: Cultural Re-Signification in Practice and Institutions. London: Routledge. Machi, Hervé. 2013. “The French System against Sectarian Deviations.” In State Responses to Minority Religions, edited by M. Kirkham David, 115–19. Surrey: Ashgate. McGarry, John, Brendan O’Leary, and Richard Simeon. 2008. “Integration or Accommodation? The Enduring Debate in Conflict Regulation.” In Constitutional Design for Divided Societies : Integration or Accommodation?, edited by Sujit Choudhry, 41–88. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Medda-Windischer, Roberta. 2017. “Militant or Pluralistic Secularism? The European Court of Human Rights Facing Religious Diversity.” Religion, State & Society 45 (3–4): 216–31. Miller, James. 2008. “What Secular Age?” International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society 21 (1): 5–10. Moberg, Marcus, and Kennet Granholm. 2012. “The Concept of the Post-Secular and the Contemporary Nexus of Religion, Media, Popular Culture, and Consumer Culture.” In Post-Secular Society, edited by Peter Nynäs, Mika Lassander and Terhi Utriainen, 95–127. London: Transaction. Murphy, Anne. 2004. “Mobilising Seva (‘service’): Modes of Sikh Diasporic Action.” In South Asians in the Diaspora: Histories and Religious Traditions, edited by Knut A. Jacobsen and P. Pratap Kumar, 337–74. Leiden/Boston: Brill. Parekh, Bhikhu. 2006. Rethinking Multiculturalism: Cultural Diversity and Political Theory. 2nd ed. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Phillips, Anne. 2007. Multiculturalism without Culture. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press. Protsyk, Oleh. 2010. The Representation of Minorities and Indigenous People in Parliament. Mexico: Inter-Parliamentary Union & United Nations Development Programme. Rai, Rajesh, and Chitra Sankaran. 2014. “Introduction.” In Religion and Identity in the South Asian Diaspora, edited by Rajesh Rai and Chitra Sankaran, 1–10. New York: Routledge. Runesson, Anna. 2011. Exegesis in the Making: Postcolonialism and New Testament Studies. Leiden: Brill. Safran, William. 1991. “Diasporas in Modern Societies: Myths of Homeland and Return.” Diaspora: A Journal of Transnational Studies 1 (1): 83–99. Said, Edward W. 1978. Orientalism. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Soares-Prabhu, George M. 1994. “Two Mission Commands: An Interpretation of Matthew 28:16–20 in the Light of a Buddhist Text.” Biblical Interpretation 2 (3): 264–82. Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty. 2017. “Postcolonial Theory and the Specter of Capital.” In The Debate on Postcolonial Theory and the Specter of Capital, edited by Rosie Warren, 71–101. New York: Verso.

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Statham, Paul, Ruud Koopmans, Macro Giugni, and Florence Passy. 2005. “Resilient or Adaptable Islam?: Multiculturalism, Religion and Migrants’ Claims-Making for Group Demands in Britain, the Netherlands and France.” Ethnicities 5 (4): 427–59. Stolow, Jeremy. 2010. “Religion, Media, and Globalization.” In The New Blackwell Companion to the Sociology of Religion, edited by Bryan S. Turner, 544–62. Chichester: John Wiley. Streusand, Douglas E. 1997. “What Does Jihad Mean?” Middle East Quarterly 4 (3): 9–17. Sugirtharajah, Rasiah S. 1998. Asian Biblical Hermeneutics and Postcolonialism: Contesting the Interpretations. New York: Orbis Books. ———, 2006. “Postcolonial Biblical Interpretation.” In Voices from the Margin: Interpreting the Bible in the Third World, edited by R. S. Sugirtharajah, 64–84. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books. Taylor, Charles. 2007. A Secular Age. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. ———, 2009. “Foreword: What Is Secularism?” In Secularism, Religion and Multicultural Citizenship, edited by Geoffrey Brahm Levey and Tariq Modood , xi–xxii. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Tweed, Thomas A. 1997. Our Lady of the Exile: Diasporic Religion at a Cuban Catholic Shrine in Miami. New York: Oxford University Press. Vertovec, Steven. 2009. Transnationalism. London: Routledge. Voas, David, and Mark Chaves. 2016. “Is the United States a Counterexample to the Secularization Thesis?” American Journal of Sociology 121 (5): 1517–56. Warren, Rosie. 2017. The Debate on Postcolonial Theory and the Specter of Capital. New York: Verso. Xiong, Ping. 2016. “China’s Responses to Minority Religions.” In State Responses to Minority Religions, edited by David M. Kirkham, 199–214. London: Routledge.

Part Three: Secular Contexts at the National Level

3. “The Great Binding Law of Peace”: International Judicial-Political-Economic Impacts of the Revered Story of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy Lars Kirkhusmo Pharo

A Sacred Story With Enduring International Political-Judicial-Economic Impact A religion is a system of ideology (ideas), symbols, and (ritual) practices commonly instituted upon sacred—oral and/or written—stories. It may not, however, only exercise religious stimulus, inside or outside its original domain but can have judicial (laws and justice system), political (power and institutions), and moral economic (profit and [re]distribution of material resources) impacts. This is the case with the story of the religious-judicial-political constitution “The Great Binding Law of Peace” (Onondaga, Kayȧneñ̇ hsä̇ ˀkó̇ na) of the Haudenosaunee (“People of the Long House”) Confederacy in the northeast of America. The Haudenosaunee is mainly known by outsiders as the Iroquois. The story and Confederacy have a much longer than a thousand years of history (see below). In this article, I, first, concisely outline how “The Great Binding Law of Peace” has exercised influence on the establishment of the U.S. Constitution circuitously other (European) constitutions, and consequently other political-judicial systems; secondly, that one can detect equivalent values of universal human rights and human dignity from “The Great Binding Law of Peace” in the much later United Nations Declaration of Human Rights of 1948; and thirdly, how an organizational structure and the concept of equity defined in “The Great Binding Law of Peace” is applied by a multinational business and finance corporation. Scholars need to do far more research on these topics.1 The historical and prevailing effects of “The Great Binding Law of Peace” are disproportional significant in consideration that the Haudenosaunee practice

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a non-universal religion, i.e., it is not missionary. Furthermore, the story is not originally a written scripture but orally transmitted through generations, although there are a few not well-distributed translations, initially made in the twentieth century into a lingua franca of English. “The Great Binding Law of Peace” is the account of the divine origin and principles of the religious-political-judicial system and moral values of the five original nations of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy: the Mohawks, Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas, and Senecas. The Tuscaroras became member of the confederacy in 1722/1723. The Haudenosaunee Confederacy was highly influential in colonial America. It dominated the northern New York region between the Hudson and Niagara rivers, from New England to Illinois (cf. Tooker 1978). I maintain that “The Great Binding Law of Peace” contains interrelated political, judicial, social, economic, and ecological values with lasting and increasing, effect among peoples and societies outside its original culturalgeographical setting. By means of “The Great Binding Law of Peace” as empirical example, I put forward two general theoretical propositions, which may comparatively benefit analyzes of receptions of other persistent international revered stories outside their historical and cultural-geographical context: (1) Predominantly, “The Great Binding Law of Peace” is not read by or orated to outsiders. The latter only refer to excerpts. Furthermore, its content is primarily transferred through intermediate (secondary) sources. Even when many do not know the source, principles and ideas of the story enjoy an enduring international effect. (2) Regardless of the divine origin and substance of the account, it is the logic reasoning of the judicial, political, and moral economic principles and ideas of “The Great Binding Law of Peace” that exercise appeal and influence on the global community. Consequently, explicating other sacred stories with a considerable (historical) international impression, scholars can ascertain influential principles and ideas, devoid of religious authority and/or rational, important to external peoples and communities. A brief introduction of this sacred story, which was recorded in the Onondaga language, of the Haudenosaunee tradition provides a background before I summarize the story’s international political, judicial, and economic influences.

The Revered Story of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy “The Great Binding Law of Peace” is the story about the establishment of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, that includes an outline of a condolence ritual, the judicial-political system and institutions as well as a variety of practices, and moral values (Woodbury 1992, xi). The Haudenosaunee did not have a writing system. The Haudenosaunee transferred knowledge orally but also with the sophisticated mnemonic technology called “wampum.” These are white or

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dark violet cylindrical seashell pearls used by the Haudenosaunee and Algonquian Nations in the north-eastern part of North America. Wampum is applied as an instrument in the oral recitations of “The Great Binding Law of Peace” in Long House, the traditional assembly of the Haudenosaunee (Arnold 2011). There are several contemporary (published) translated versions into English of “The Great Binding Law of Peace (Cf. for instance Parker: 2006 [1916].” Concerning the League: the Iroquois League Tradition as Dictated in Onondaga by John Arthur Gibson is the only complete account published in a language of the Haudenosaunee. In 1912, the Onondaga Chief John A. Gibson (1849–1912) dictated the story to anthropologist, Alexander A. Goldenweiser. On the basis of Goldenweiser’s manuscript, “The Great Binding Law of Peace” was elicited, edited, and translated by the Yale educated linguist of anthropology, Hanni Woodbury, in collaboration with Haudenosaunee linguists, Reg Henry, Harry Webster, Jacob Thomas, and Gladys Williams. It was published in 1992 (Woodbury 1992, xi). I employ the Woodbury linguistic-analytic translation as source to “The Great Binding Law of Peace,” but there are other far more known, although not complete, versions. These and in particular the edition of Woodbury is difficult to obtain. This is partly why “The Great Binding Law of Peace” is not widely acknowledged by a general audience despite that it merits as one of the great religious, moral, and political histories of the world. It is conceivable “The Great Binding Law of Peace” deserves recognized status exhibited by the fact that several of the sacred story’s general moral and political principles are credited by various stakeholders. “The Great Binding Law of Peace” states that the Great Creator (spelled both Hohsęníh and Haweniyoˀ) sent the messenger Tekánawìtaˀ, aka the Peacemaker, with a moral law so that the (original) Five Nations could co-exist in peace and equity. In a quite extensive narrative with several events, “The Great Binding Law of Peace” describes that the different nations were in state of war. The Peacemaker, born by a virgin, had special qualities. After receiving the message from the Great Creator, he went to the Five Nations (Gibson 1992, 1–22). The Peacemaker was able to convince the nations to adopt concord and enact equity through the appeal of following three basic moral concepts: “The Good Message”(kaihwíyóh), “the Power”(kaˀtshátstęhsæ˙ˀ), and “the Peace” (skę˙nųˀ) (Gibson 1992, 15–31). The Haudenosaunee Confederacy was established after the Peacemaker gave the Onondaga Hayeñháthaˀ mandate to convey “The Great Binding Law of the Peace,” which according to tradition takes a week to relate in Long House. He proclaimed the message of the constitution of the confederacy and defined the fundamental principles of the organization of the

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Confederacy Council, the Commonwealth, democratic (consensus system) procedures of the Council, and universal moral values (Woodbury 1992, xxvi, 251–263). This was the inauguration of a complex religious-political-judicial system of a confederacy incorporating the five original nations. The year 1142 is when several scholars place the formation of the Confederacy.2 European voyagers and Jesuit missionaries provide the initial written accounts of the Confederacy, which confirm institution long before the primary European colonialization of the early seventeenth century (Trigger 1978; Woodbury 1992, xi; Cf. Thwaites, Reuben G. ed. 1896–1901). What is certain is that many of the ethical principles for law, politics, religion, philosophy, ecology, and economy re-counted in the story are unique to the Haudenosaunee. There are correspondingly no influences from European political philosophy and judicial-political systems in “The Great Binding Law of Peace.” Using Haudenosaunee language, “The Great Binding Law of Peace” is recited in Long House. It operates as the headquarters of the government led by the Council of Chiefs (Hoyane). The Council is selected in accordance with the traditional democratic system. As one of few self-governing reservations in North America, the Onondaga is one of the democratic summit places for the Grand Council of Chiefs, the traditional religious-judicial-political governing body of the Haudenosaunee. This Long House is located south of the city of Syracuse in upper New York State (see www.onondaganation.org). The ideas of “The Great Binding Law of Peace” produced the system of shared power between the Council of the Chiefs. This structure has had direct judicial-political impact on the U.S. and indirect judicial-political impact on European nations.

Judicial-Political Principles: U.S. and European Constitutions and Democracies Several hundreds of years before the English Bill of Rights (1689), the American Declaration of Independence (1776), and the French Declaration of the Rights of Man (1798), “The Great Binding Law of Peace” laid out democratic principles and values. This political system of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy inspired the United States Constitution of 1787 and the constitutional democracy of the United States according to numerous scholars (Bagley and Ruckman 1983; Miller 1993; 2015; Schaaf 2004; Venables 1992; Weatherford 2010). This bears a wider significance. Given the direct stimulus of the U.S. Constitution there was projected (indirect) influence from “The Great Binding Law of Peace” upon European constitutions and democracies (see below). There are, however, claims that there is no documentation from the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia in 1789 verifying that concepts from the

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Haudenosaunee enthused the political philosophy of the Founding Fathers and participants at the Convention. Many of the primary sources are absent, but prior to the American revolution, colonizers, merchants, militaries, and politicians had exchanges (also with wampum) in meetings and councils with the Haudenosaunee. For instance, George Washington formed a military alliance with the Confederacy against England. In 1754 Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin journeyed to a council with the Haudenosaunee in order to discuss the structure of the Haudenosaunee government. On this background, it is credible that judicial-political principles of the “The Great Law of Binding Peace” influenced the American Revolution, Declaration of Independence, the founding fathers, and the United States Constitution, and the Bill of Rights. Likewise, the European colonists’ interaction with Indigenous peoples in diplomacy, trade, and war may even have inspired the democratic ideas of John Locke and Jean-Jacques Rousseau (Grinde 1992; Miller 1993; 2015; Mohawk 1992; Mohawk and Lyons 1992, 32–33; Venables 1992) exporting democracy from the New World to the Old World. There is no doubt that Greek and Roman political philosophy, The New Testament, Magna Carta, and ideas of the Enlightenment influenced U.S. and European judicial-political systems. U.S. democracy constitutes a combination of Native American and European political concepts (Grinde 1992, 280) expressed in “The Great Binding Law of Peace.” The U.S. officially acknowledged political-judicial effects of “The Great Binding Law of Peace” upon the U.S. Constitution and political system. In 1988, The U.S. Senate and House of Representatives passed Concurrent Resolution 331 and written in the Congressional Record. The decree recognizes the impact the Haudenosaunee had upon the Founding Fathers in formulating the Constitution and the development of the democratic system of the United States (Lyons et al. 1992): To acknowledge the contribution of the Iroquois Confederacy of Nations to the development of the United States Constitution….Whereas the original framers of the Constitution, including most notably, George Washington and Benjamin Franklin, are known to have greatly admired the concepts of the Six Nations of the Iroquois Confederacy; Whereas the confederation of the Original Thirteen Colonies into one republic was influenced by the political system developed by the Iroquois Confederacy as were many of the democratic principles which were incorporated into the Constitution itself…. (Concurrent Resolution 331)

This official appreciation from the U.S. federal bicameral legislature was reconfirmed November, 2013 by President Barack Obama in his speech at the 2013 White House Tribal Nations Conference, “…I think we could learn from the Iroquois Confederacy, just as our Founding Fathers did when they laid the groundwork for our democracy.”3

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The specific Haudenosaunee values and principles that influenced the U.S. structure of government are: Individual freedom, principle of free speech, representative and deliberative government, and democratic union of nations. These are articulated in “The Great Binding Law of Peace” (cf. Pharo 2014; 2018). After receiving “The Great Binding Law of Peace” from the Creator through Tekánawì̇taˀ, the original five nations of the Haudenosaunee established a democratic system of government led by a Grand Council consisting of fifty Hoyane (“good mind”), also known as Sachems, from each nation as representative Chiefs to the council. Decisions in the democratic institutions of the Haudenosaunee are based upon of interrelated meetings on the local level, clan and general meetings of each nation, and as well the Confederate Grand Council (Woodbury 1992: xxviii; Gibson 1992, 325–26; 334–45; cf. Tooker 1985). Establishing the democratic structure and law of the Confederacy according to Tekánawì̇taˀ: Moreover, when we meet again, what will be the first thing for us to consider, is the location of the various families of each of the nations. Moreover, it is necessary that as many as possible join together at the fire; therefore, you should bring along as many as possible of the ones they appointed and chose, those who may be able to assist with the Good Message and the Power and the Peace and the Great Law; moreover, to the extent possible, you should have along as much information as possible, if you have it, of existing clans. (Gibson 1992, 325–26)

As a constitution “The Great Binding Law of Peace” formulate, not only a religious moral value system, but a political ideology, defining the institutions of the Confederacy. This is a political and religious democratic system where every nation and representative chiefs enjoy equal power in a Commonwealth.4 The Haudenosaunee Confederacy composes a consensus democracy with representative government (Woodbury 1992, xxvii, 221, 304–11).5 Through following a rigid protocol, democratic procedures are established in council (Woodbury 1992, xxvi–xxvii, 252–63).6 Consultations within each clan are taken up to debate at the Great Council (Grinde 1992, 235–36). Matters are discussed between the different nations and clans before decision is unanimously agreed by the Hoyane. The parliamentary process of debate and consensus embody a checks-and-balance system (separation of powers) with a possible of veto between the nations.7 According to a multifarious procedure, matters are discussed before the Tadodaho8 announce the final decision in council (Tooker 1978, 429). Moreover, “The Great Binding Law of Peace” states that the Chiefs must put forward particular important matters to the people for decision. The people can instigate impeachment, charges of treason, forward opinions and laws, and even remove Hoyane from the council (Gibson 1992, 219–472; Woodbury 1992, xxv–xxix). Political and judicial principals

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of “The Great Binding Law of Peace,” formulated in subsequent US, and in European constitutions, accordingly consist of a deliberative political system in a representative democracy, with civil (individual) liberty freedom and rule of law, where there is both horizontal and vertical accountability (effective checks on rulers) (Coppedge et al. 2011; Dahl 1956; Held 2006). The sacred story of “The Great Binding Law of Peace” had subsidiary political and judicial influence upon countries beyond the US. The U.S. Constitution and the American political system have influenced quite a few countries. Democratic-liberal ideas and principles—separation of powers (checks-and-balances) and equality under the law—seen in The U.S. Declaration of Independence (1776) and The U.S. Constitution had validity on the conception of the Norwegian Constitution (1814). The checks-and-balances principle in the U.S. consist of a separation of powers between lawgiving power with Congress with two chambers the Senate and House of Representatives. Effecting power is also shared with the President and judicial powers of the Supreme Court and other federal courts. A consistent principle is reflected in the Norwegian constitution of 1814, which outlines three independent institutions exercising authority (the monarch and the appointed government), lawgiving power of the elected national assembly (the parliament), and the judicial power (courts). Although not equivalent institutions, “The Great Binding Law of Peace” express a corresponding concept of the separation of powers. At the end of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth centuries, lawmakers in Norway read reports from the convention in Philadelphia (1787) (Holmøyvik 2012). There are, however, no written records exhibiting direct transference of judicial-political principles from “The Great Binding Law of Peace” to the Norwegian Constitution. Incidentally, this took place through adapting the principles found within the U.S. Constitution. The continuation of the principles formulated in “The Great Binding Law of Peace” give evidence that it did exercise both direct and indirect judicial-political influence on other societies, although without a religious dimension. Additionally, the sacred story was not recited, read or even known by foreign peoples and other nations which appropriated its original principles.

Human Rights and Dignity: “The Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948” The story of “The Great Binding Law of Peace” designate a supra-national constitution conveying equivalent universal moral codes. Much later, it influenced “The Universal Declaration of Human Rights” produced by Member States of the United Nations and adopted by the UN General

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Assembly on 10 December 1948. “The Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948” (UDHR) advocate of principles for inalienable universal human rights and dignity, which constitutes freedom, justice, and peace. Integrated in the story recited in Long House north-eastern America hundreds of years before “The Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948,” “The Great Binding Law of Peace” proclaims equality between human beings and peace with foreign nations (Gibson 1992). These moral values of universal inalienable human rights and inherent human dignity expressed in “The Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948” has inadvertently been taken from the story of “The Great Binding Law of Peace” (cf. Pharo 2014). The combined moral principles of universal human dignity and human rights in “The Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948” refer to equal value and respect between members within any community/society/culture and towards other human beings/nations according to Donnelly (Donnelly 2003, 191). Tekánawìtaˀ (Peacemaker) announce analogue virtuous ideals of world-wide human dignity and rights to the various nations. According to “The Great Binding Law of Peace,” on his way he met some children: …When the children began walking around, and more especially, when they played, some of the children repeatedly quarreled, and they wanted to fight. Thereupon Tekánawìtaˀ prevented them, saying “you will stop it because it is an error9 for people to hurt one another; you especially, for you are all relatives, and so it is necessary for you to be kind to one another as well as to other people, those you know and those people you do not know; and you should respect the equally—all of the people—you should to be kind to everyone.” Thereupon the children were amazed at what Tekánawìtaˀ was saying. When they got back to where they had their homes, they repeated what he had said, Tekánawìtaˀ. Thereupon the elders said, “Now, indeed, they are beginning, the surprising events we heard about that he foretold, Tekánawìtaˀ, for never, in fact has it been the case that we might hear someone say, “It is an error for people to hurt one another” nor has anyone ever said, “You should all respect one another,” nor has someone said, “You should be kind to the people you know as well as those you don’t know.” Now, indeed, it is coming true, the kind of thing we have hear about. (Woodbury 1992, 27–29)

“…as well as those you don’t know” signify that these values apply to everybody. The story of “The Great Binding Law of Peace” therefore contains a judicial–political program expressing moral values of tolerance and equity where everyone enjoys respect and worthiness. Tekánawìtaˀ announces the philosophy of the Good Message (kaihwíyóh), the Power (kaˀshásteñsæˀ), and the Peace (skeñoñ) not only to the original Five Nations of the Haudenosaunee as every nation share equal worth (Woodbury 1992, xx; xxvii; Gibson 1992, 14–15; 27–33; 37–41; 304–5; Pharo 2014). “The Great Binding Law of Peace” provides an ethical model of freedom for everyone based upon their

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responsibilities. Peace is recognized as something that is built upon law and on the basis of justice practiced between different cultures and nations (Wallace 1998, 32, 34). This idea is accredited from the early colonial period where the Haudenosaunee invited with wampum different nations, also Europeans, to participate in councils and festivals (Arnold 2012; Tehanetorens [Ray Fadden] 1999, 83–93). The story outlines an ideal of human social and political relations based upon the principles of equality between human beings and communities (Gibson 1992, 251–63; Woodbury 1992, xxvi). It is the democratic system with a separation of powers that secures human dignity and human rights for every member of society. The story outlines and advances a secure and balanced system with the possibility of a use of veto by each nation. When a decision by the council is passed, it comes with the backing of all chiefs and is said to be “Of One Mind” (Gibson 1992, 38–40; Woodbury 1992, xxv, note 50). Rules for making decisions and in addition laws for peaceful relations between the nations are put forward (Gibson 1992, 440–46; Woodbury 1992, xxix) safeguarding human rights and dignity. Besides outlining the laws of unity within and between the original Five Nations, “The Great Binding Law of Peace” describe a supranational constitution that expresses unity in diversity and in which the rights, traditions and identity of every human being are protected (Gibson 1992, 37–41, 304–5). It is a moral story protecting of the rights of individual beings (Gibson 1992, 41–42; 457–60; Woodbury 1992, xxix). Every human being—men, women, young people and children—are related (Gibson 1992, 37–41). In “The Great Binding Law of Peace” Tekánawìtaˀ declares that: …now it is arriving, the Peace, this means that everyone will become related, men and also women, and also the young people and the children, and when all are relatives, every nation, then there will be peace as they roam about by day and also by night. Now, also it will become possible for them to assemble in meetings. Then there will truthfulness, and they will uphold hope and charity, so that it is peace that will unite all of the people, indeed, it will be as though they have but one mind, and they are a single person with only one body and one head and one life, which means that there will be unity. (Gibson 1992, 38–40)

A philosophy of dignity therefore encompasses every member of a society without regard to socio–political status or class and gender.10 Ethical principles of universal human rights and dignity in particle articulated in Articles 1–3 of “The Universal Declaration of Human Rights” was certainly already told in the sacred Haudenosaunee moral story. Although members states producing this statement most probably did not and still do not have knowledge of the story about this ancient international law.

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Economy, Finance, and the Environment: The Multinational Company Through an extensive study in progress, I argue that “The Great Binding Law of Peace” has impact upon principles in conducting modern business and finance. This sacred story constitutes the foundation for the applied ethics and the innovative business structure of the high-tech multinational company Plantagon AB located in Stockholm, Sweden. In 2004 SWECORP Citizenship Stockholm AB and Onondaga Nation founded the company. Plantagon develop vertical greenhouses for urban agriculture. The majority of the shares (80 percent at present) managed by Swedish executives in Stockholm, are owned by Onondaga Nation, one of the Six Nations of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy. The corporate institution and environmental technology of Plantagon combine knowledge of natural sciences and industrial technology in addition to ecological moral philosophy and democratic governance expressed in “The Great Binding Law of Peace.” Plantagon implement these comprehensive political and religious values in an innovative business model, with objective to export to other (business/finance) institutions/organizations. The objective is to develop and manage an economic competitive and moral accountable industrial company adapted to an international market. Its ideas represent a new form for capitalist thinking (Hassle 2012). Maximizing profit is not the principal goal for Plantagon, which precept is: “Business as usual is over” (cf. www.Plantagon.org). This signifies responsibility for the common good for human society and for nature. The Plantagon state-of-theart governance model of “companization” and original financial instruments constitute a synergetic ethical balance between an idealistic organization and a commercial (competitive) business venture (Hassle 2012). The governance model of two boards of the two separate bodies of Plantagon are modelled upon—although not identical with—general checks-and-balance (separation of powers) principles formulated in “The Great Binding Law of Peace” and Haudenosaunee religious-judicial-political system. The operation is controlled simultaneously by two objectives: commercial and non-profit. By implementing ethical issues into the articles of incorporation, moral questions become part of an otherwise purely economic forum. By implementing, through the nonprofit’s work, shareholder responsibility and individual participation in the long-term economic growth, economic questions become part of an otherwise purely ideological forum. (Hassle 2012, 32)

The separation of powers structure of “companization” therefore secure application of moral business and finance behavior.

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Democracy, transparency, and a long-term perspective constitute fundamental principles for the business profile, organization, and philosophy of Plantagon. There is implementation of the values of equity derived from the moral knowledge and policy system of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, as paradigm for responsible investment, competitiveness, and ethical decision-making for business. “The Great Binding Law of Peace” advocates for interrelated democratic, judicial, social and ecological values where relation between humans, other beings, culture and nature are recognized. The Haudenosaunee democratic government operates a complicated deliberative system for making decisions in order to obtain long-term political resolutions for the community. Decisions shall only be undertaken considering the future seventh generation and not from the perspective of short-term requirements. “Seventh generation” is a precept of “The Great Binding Law of Peace,” which mandates that the Chiefs contemplate the impact of their decisions on the seventh generation yet to come (Woodbury 1992, 320–321; www. onondaganation.org). The rationality of long-term is accordingly opposed to a rationality of short-term perspective, i.e., principles of making resolutions considering the future seventh generation. Plantagon apply and adapt these moral values in business ideology, structure, model, and financial instruments (Hassle 2012). On a profound level, this high-tech multinational company connects political and moral philosophy and religious knowledge from “The Great Binding Law of Peace” with applied ethics and practices of economics in international business and finance. Swedish executives and employees at Plantagon are familiar with the story of “The Great Binding Law of Peace” (personal communication with Hans Hassle 8–10 October 2018). That applies in particular to the co-founder Hans Hassle. The innovative moral business organization of Plantagon may set example for ethical governance making the epistemology of “The Great Binding Law of Peace” that is known to the international business and finance community.

Moral Judicial-Political-Economic Principles of a Revered Scripture Ignored Despite the hegemony of the Confederacy in eastern North America during the colonial period, the ancient revered story “The Great Binding Law of Peace” exercised no impulse on religions outside its geographic domain. This is largely because Haudenosaunee religion do not have a missionary impulse. With exceptions of the U.S. Congress and Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, 11 the political and judicial contribution of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy—conveyed in

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“The Great Binding Law of Peace”—has not enjoyed recognition. This sacred story has neither gained distinction within the international canon of philosophical and religious scriptures. This is due to systematic discrimination of Indigenous intellectual thinking and religious knowledge. “The Great Binding Law of Peace” has had and continues to have, however, impact upon interrelated moral judicial-political categories and on different institutions in various countries. In this brief essay, I have exhibited this to be a fact. The history of the origin of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy outlines values and principles of a democratic deliberative system where there is checks-and-balances (separation of powers) influenced both North Atlantic constitutions and a multinational corporation. It promotes ethics of international human dignity and rights later expressed in “The United Nation Declaration of Human Rights of 1948” and today applied by a multinational corporation.

Notes 1. The author of this article is preparing a monograph analyzing the impact of Haudenosaunee religious knowledge and political philosophy of “The Great Binding Law of Peace” on the structure and moral values of multinational business/finance corporations. 2. Cf. Tooker (1978: 418–22) for outline of various theories. 3. https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2013/11/13/remarks-presi dent-tribal-nations-conference 4. Federalism of the council concerns external affairs like diplomacy, treaties, war, and peace. The general council do not interfere with internal matters of the nation and clans, which have their own government (Grinde 1992: 238–40). 5. Consensus concepts in “The Great Binding Law of Peace” cf. Woodbury (1992: 322; 423–32; xxviii–xxvix). 6. Convening a council and rules of making decisions (Woodbury 1992: xxivx; 435–39; 440–46). 7. The distinguished political leader the Mohawk Thayendanegea or Joseph Brant (1743–1807) during and after the American Revolution (Stone [1838] 2003) and the Seneca Red Jacket whose original name was Otetiani, also called Sagoyewatha (1758?–1830) were not hereditary chiefs but “merit chiefs” aka “Pine Tree chiefs.” War chiefs were not Confederation chiefs. If a League chief went on a war campaign he put away his “horns of office.” This is another example of Check-andBalance government (Tooker 1978: 429). 8. The principal Onondaga Chief and the Firekeeper of the Confederacy (Woodbury 2003: 811). 9. I replace the original translation of the Onondaga concept hwanéˀákwęh (“matter-be mistaken”) into the English term “sinful” by Woodbury (Woodbury 1992: 27) with “erroneous”. This is because “sin” has a distinct Christian connotation and does not adhere to Haudenosaunee religious terminology. “Error” is not part of the nomenclature of any religious system and does not adhere exclusively to a religious-linguistic

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domain. Translating a sacred story from a non-European tradition into an Indo-European language there is a particular challenge avoiding Christian concepts. 10. Sally Roesch Wagner (2001) maintain that the gender ideology of the Haudenosaunee had impact on the woman’s rights movement in North America in the nineteenth century. 11. Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels were impressed by Haudenosaunee political institutions and moral principles (cf. Bagley and Ruckman 1983) outlined in the “The Great Binding Law of Peace.” Based upon the U.S. anthropologist Lewis Henry Morgan’s study Ancient Society: Researches in the Lines of Human Progress from Savagery through Barbarism to Civilization (1877)―Marx wrote the commentary The Ethnological Notebooks of Karl Marx (“Die ethnologischen Exzerpthefte”) between 1880 and 1882 (Marx 1972). In The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State (“Der Ursprung der Familie, des Privateigenthums und des Staats”) (1884) Engels applied notes from Marx’ manuscript. Engels describe the “democratic assembly” with equal votes for men and women of the Iroquois (Haudenosaunee) council. Furthermore, he asserts that “The Great Binding Law of Peace” was a public constitution” (Engels [1884]2010: 120; 124–30; 158–59).

Bibliography Arnold, Philip P. 2011. “Indigenous ‘Texts’ of Inhabiting the Land: George Washington’s Wampum Belt and the Canandaigua Treaty.” Postscripts: The Journal of Sacred Texts and Contemporary Worlds 6 (3): 277–89. Bagley, Carol L., and Jo Ann Ruckman. 1983. “Iroquois Contributions to Modern Democracy and Communism.” American Indian Culture and Research Journal 7 (2): 53–72. Coppedge, Michael et al. 2011. “Conceptualizing and Measuring Democracy: A New Approach.” Perspectives on Politics 9 (2): 247–67. Dahl, Robert A. 1956. A Preface to Democratic Theory. Chicago: University Of Chicago Press. Donnelly, Jack. 2003. Universal Human Rights in Theory and Practice. Ithaca/London: Cornell University Press. Engels, Friedrich. 2010 [1884]. The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State. New York: Penguin Classics. Gibson, John Arthur. 1992. Concerning the League: The Iroquois League Tradition/As Dictated in Onondaga by John Arthur Gibson; newly elicited, edited and translated by Hanni Woodbury; in collaboration with Reg. Henry and Harry Webster; on the basis of A. A. Goldenweiser’s manuscript. Winnipeg, Manitoba.: Algonquian and Iroquoian Linguistics. Grinde, Donald A. 1992. “Iroquois Political Theory and the Roots of American Democracy.” In Exiled in the Land of the Free: Democracy, Indian Nations & the U.S. Constitution, edited by Oren R. Lyons and John Mohawk, 227–80. Santa Fe: Clear Light.

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Hassle, Hans. 2012. Business as Usual is Over. The Red Capitalist. Voice of Change. www. Plantagon.com. Held, David. 2006. Models of Democracy. Cambridge: Polity Press. Holmøyvik, Eirik. 2012. Maktfordeling og 1814. Bergen: Fagbokforlaget. Lyons, Oren R. 2010. “Introduction.” In Dignity: In Honor of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples edited by Dana Gluckstein, 3–4. PowerHouse Books. Lyons, Oren R. 1992. “The American Indian in the Past.” In Exiled in the Land of the Free: Democracy, Indian Nations & the U.S. Constitution, edited by Oren R. Lyons and John Mohawk, 13–42. Santa Fe: Clear Light. Lyons, Oren R., and John C. Mohawk, eds. 1992. Exiled in the Land of the Free: Democracy, Indian Nations & the U.S. Constitution. Santa Fe: Clear Light. Marx, Karl. 1972. The Ethnological Notebooks of Karl Marx: (Studies of Morgan, Phear, Maine, Lubbock) / transcribed and edited, with an introduction by Lawrence Krader. Assen: Van Gorcum. Miller, Robert J. 1993. “American Indian Influence on the United States Constitution and Its Framers.” American Indian Law Review 18 (1): 133–60. ———. 2015. “American Indian Constitutions and Their Influence on the United States constitution.” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 159 (1): 32–56. Mohawk, John C. 1992. “Indian and Democracy: No One Ever Told Us.” In Exiled in the Land of the Free: Democracy, Indian Nations & the U.S. Constitution, eds. Oren R. Lyons and John C. Mohawk, 43–72. Santa Fe: Clear Light. Mohawk, John C., and Oren R. Lyons. 1992. “Introduction.” In Exiled in the Land of the Free: Democracy, Indian Nations & the U.S. Constitution, edited by Oren R. Lyons and John C. Mohawk, 1–12. Santa Fe: Clear Light. Morgan, Lewis Henry. 1962 [1851]. League of the Iroquois. Secaucus, NJ: The Citadel Press. ———. 2000 [1877]. Ancient Society. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction. Onondaga Nation. People of the Hills. Homepage of the Onondaga Nation (http://www. onondaganation.org/) Parker, A. C. 2006 [1916]. The Constitution of the Five Nations or The Iroquois Book of the Great Law. Iroqrafts. Iroquois Reprints. Ontario: Iroquois Publications. Pharo, Lars Kirkhusmo. 2014. “The Concepts of Human Dignity in the Moral Philosophies of Indigenous Peoples of the Americas.” In Cambridge Handbook for Human Dignity: Historical Traditions, Philosophical Interpretations,Legal Implementation and Contemporary Challenges, edited by Marcus Düwell et al., 147–54. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ———. 2018. “Democracy of the ‘New World’. The Great Binding Law of Peace and The Haudenosaunee Confederacy.” In Conceptualizing the World: An Exploration across Disciplines, edited by Helge Jordheim and Erling Sandmo, 154–67. New York: Berghahn Books. Plantagon International Association (Plantagon.org) Roesch Wagner, Sally. 2001. Sisters in Spirit: Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) Influences on Early American Feminists. Tennessee: Book Publishing Company.

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Schaaf, Gregory. 2004. The U.S. Constitution and the Great Law of Peace: A Comparison of Two Founding Documents. Center for Indigenous Arts & Cultures. Stone, William Leete. 2003 [1838]. Life of Joseph Brant―Thayendanegea: Including the Border Wars of the American Revolution, and Sketches of the Indian Campaigns of Generals Harmar, St. Clair, and Wayne. 2 vols. Adamant Media Corporation. Tehanetorens, Ray Fadden. 1999. Wampum Belts of the Iroquois. Summertown, TN: Book Publishing Company. Thwaites, Reuben G. ed. 1896–1901. The Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents: Travels and Explorations of the Jesuit Missionaries in New France, 1610–1791; the Original French, Latin, and Italian Texts, with English Translations and Notes. Cleveland: Burrows Brothers. (Reprinted by Pageant 1959). Tooker, Elisabeth. 1978. “The League of the Iroquois: Its History, Politics and Ritual.” In Handbook of North American Indians, Vol. 15: Northeast, edited by Bruce Trigger, 418–41. Smithsonian Institution. ———, ed. 1985. An Iroquois Source Book. New York: Garland Publishing. Trigger, Bruce G. 1978. “Early Iroquoian Contacts with Europeans.” In Handbook of North American Indians, edited by Bruce Trigger, 344–356. Smithsonian Institution. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights. http://www.ohchr.org/EN/UDHR/ Pages/SearchByLang.aspx. Accessed 21 October 2018. Venables, Robert W. 1992. “American Indian Influences on the America of the Founding Fathers.” In Exiled in the Land of the Free: Democracy, Indian Nations & the U.S. Constitution, edited by Oren R. Lyons and John C. Mohawk, 73–124. Santa Fe: Clear Light Publishers. Wallace, Paul A. W. 1998 [1946]. The White Roots of Peace. Iroqrafts. Iroquois Reprints. Ontario: Iroquois Publications. Weatherford, Jack. 2010. Indian Givers: How Native Americans Transformed the World. Broadway, Portland, OR. Broadway Books. Woodbury, Hanni. 1992. “Introduction.” In Concerning the League: The Iroquois League TraditionAs Dictated in Onondaga by John Arthur Gibson, edited by Gibson, John Arthur and translated by Hanni Woodbury; in collaboration with Reginald Henry and Harry Webster; on the basis of A. A. Goldenweiser’s manuscript, xi–lxi. Winnipeg, Manitoba: Algonquian and Iroquoian Linguistics. Woodbury, Hanni. 2003. Onondaga-English/English-Onondaga Dictionary. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

4. Religious Education and Pluralism in Norwegian Kindergartens Gunnar Magnus Eidsvåg

Introduction Religious education1 in public pedagogical institutions is a contested subject (Durham 2013, 1). It stirs discussions on, at least, three topics. (1) Religious education involves legal questions connected to human rights. Who has the right to influence the child’s religiosity? (2) Religious education forms a part of the larger discussion of secularism. What role should religion play in educational institutions in a secular state? (3) Religious education involves issues of migration and growing pluralism in society. How can religious education contribute in increasingly plural societies? This article presents results from a study of religious education in Norwegian kindergartens. The study involved three kindergartens with different outlooks and different learning objectives concerning religion. I interviewed staff members in these kindergartens concerning their religious education. The conversations dealt with the three topics mentioned above. In order to avoid some convolutions, I have divided the scholarly discussion of the material thematically. In this article, I will focus on religious education as part of the plural society.2

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In Norway, as in many other countries in West-Europe, there is increasing plurality (Jacobsen 2018; Schmidt 2010). Pedagogical institutions struggle to find the right balance between preserving the old culture and costumes, while adopting and making space for new. Religious education in kindergarten deals with this dilemma (Andreassen 2011; Hovdelien 2017, 33–43; Sødal 2014, 11–38). However, since the early childhood education sector in Norway is diverse with a mix of public and private owners, kindergartens deal with this issue in different manners. The research question I brought with me to the kindergartens was “how do the staff members perceive the role of religious education in a pluralistic society?” In order to operationalize this question, I asked the staff concerning the usage of biblical stories. As I will point out below, kindergarten regulations encourage kindergartens, private or public, to engage with stories from religious traditions. Because Christianity is the majority religion, stories from this religious tradition are more common than from other faiths (Sødal 2014, 39–70).

Kindergarten in Norway In Norway, the kindergarten (barnehage) is the main provider of early childhood education.3 Children attend kindergarten from the age of one to six when they begin school. “Kindergarten” in a Norway therefore has a different reference than in it has in other countries, e.g., Sweden, USA, and Great Britain. Since the women’s liberation movement early 70s, the kindergarten has been a rapidly growing public institution in Norway. The growth can be seen in two areas: the increasing number of children attending a kindergarten, and the growing awareness of the importance of the kindergarten as a pedagogical institution. In 1975, the Parliament enacted the National Preschool Act (now The Kindergarten Act). This law made the municipality responsible for providing early childhood education to the inhabitants (Sagberg 2001, 4). It thereby formalized a development of making kindergartens part of the public welfare system (NOU 1972, 35; Skrunes 1990, 31). The precursors to the modern kindergarten, the crèches (asyl) and the Fröbel inspired kindergartens, were mainly provided by the church and philanthropic associations (Korsvold 2013, 140; Skrunes 1990, 24–29). In 1970, there were 12,400 children (2.4 percent) in kindergartens (St. Mld. 93 [1980–81] 8). Today (2017), 281,622 children attend kindergarten. That is 91.3 percent of all the children in that age in Norway. 97 percent of three to five-year-olds, and 82.5 percent of one to twoyear-olds.4 Around half (47 percent) of the kindergartens are publicly owned.

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The increase in importance is also reflected in the fact that the kindergarten gradually has come to be regarded as a pedagogical institution. The Ministry of Children, Equality, and Social Inclusion published in 1996 the first Framework plan, a plan that regulates the pedagogical activity in the kindergartens. In 2005, the governmental responsibility for the kindergartens was moved from this ministry to the Ministry of Education and Research. Today there are regulations concerning the staff, requiring that a certain number of them have formal pedagogical education.

The Kindergarten and Religion The Kindergarten Act opens with a statement of purpose. The statement expresses that the kindergartens shall base their activities on certain values rooted in human rights and found in Christian and humanist tradition as well as other religions. This statement has been an issue of debate. Following the inclusion of kindergartens in the public welfare system, politicians and voices in the public debate discussed whether such values should be mentioned in the statement of purpose and furthermore whether such values’ basis should be specified (Skrunes 1990). In 1975 the Act did not mention any values at all but made it possible for local owners, municipalities, and private organizations to decide whether they would specify any values. Following an emotional laden debate, the parliament voted for a revision of the statement of purpose in 1983. The new statement introduced values rooted in “Christian and humanist traditions” (Skrunes 1990). In 2008, a more consensus-seeking parliament made a revision of the statement attempting to adapt it to the growing plurality in the society. This statement is included in the current law. The Ministry of Education and Research publish a Framework Plan as a prescript to the law. The Framework Plan has binding legal status for all kindergartens, both private and public. It summarizes the Kindergarten Act in the following manner (2017, 11–12): All kindergartens, irrespective of ownership structure, are obliged to meet the objectives described in Section 1 of the Kindergarten Act and in the Framework Plan. Section 1 of the Kindergarten Act states that kindergartens shall build on fundamental values in the Christian and humanist traditions—values which exist in various religions and world views and which are entrenched in human rights law. Section 1a of the Kindergarten Act allows private kindergartens to decide that the values described in the objectives clause of the act should not be based on Christian and humanist traditions. Individual kindergartens may therefore adopt

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Gunnar Magnus Eidsvåg an ethos under this clause which is consistent with a different religious or philosophical belief. Section 1a of the Kindergarten Act also permits private kindergartens and kindergartens owned or run by parishes of the Church of Norway to adopt special objectives regarding their world view as a supplement to the objectives clause contained in the Kindergarten Act.

The Kindergarten Act in this manner opens for a variety of privately owned kindergartens. This is a compromise between different ideals of early childhood education with their respective historical traditions. It is also a compromise between political ideals of how to deal with religious pluralism. On the one hand, should religious plurality be met by a variety of different kindergartens attracting children each from its own religious tradition? In Norway there are kindergartens with “Christian,” “Muslim,” “Jewish,” and “non-religious”5 statements of purpose. On the other hand, should religious plurality be met by a variety of discourses in otherwise equal kindergartens in terms of statements of purpose? Although the Kindergarten Act seems to be a compromise, the Ministry of Education and Research expresses a certain view through the Framework Plan. In the Framework Plan, the ministry states the objectives for the kindergarten as a pedagogical arena. It describes seven learning areas which the kindergartens should focus on. One of these is “Ethics, religion, and philosophy.” By including religion among the learning objectives, the ministry expresses an understanding of secularism which several Official Norwegian Reports (Norges offentlige utredninger, or NOUs) voice (NOU 2007, 2013). This approach has been called “livssynsåpent samfunn” (open secularism) which emphasize people’s right to express and perform their religion in public places and public institutions (NOU 2013, 106). The learning objectives of “Ethics, religion, and philosophy” emphasize the dual aspect of the modern society as secular, multi-cultural and multi-religious, and the aspect of Christian heritage. The objectives are both personal, i.e., the staff should create opportunities for the children to realize that fundamental questions are important and communal, i.e., the staff must ensure that the children develop tolerance and interest in each other. The Framework Plan encourages pedagogical activities in relation to Christian holidays and to holidays of other religions that are represented in the group of children. Recent research has pointed out kindergartens struggle to realize these learning objectives (Hidle and Krogstad 2015; Krogstad and Hidle 2015; Nilsen 2012). The Kindergarten Act and the Framework Plan therefore balance between on the one side, concerns for the parental right to choose religious upbringing for their children (UN International covenant on civil and political rights,

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article 18 (d)) which may account for some of the plurality of religious kindergartens. On the other side, there are some ideals for coexistence between various religious and non-religious groups. These ideals may be termed “pluralism.” In the next paragraph, I will look at this terminology. Many scholars deal with religious pluralism. I have chosen some aspects presented by Peter Berger who has been a leading sociologist of religion since the 60s (Berger 1967).

Pluralisms In his latest book, The Many Altars of Modernity (2014), Peter Berger deals with the concept of religious pluralism. Berger, as many other sociologists, questioned the theory of secularization in its classic formulation (Berger 1999, 2), i.e., modernization of the society entails: (1) differentiation of state and religion, (2) decline of religion, (3) privatization of religion (Botvar 2010, 12). The theory may still have some explanatory force in Western Europe but not in a global perspective (Berger 1999, 9; Berger, Davie, and Fokas 2008; Davie 2002). Although, even for the development in Europe, scholars question some aspects of the theory (Botvar 2010, 23–24; Davie 2002, 65–83; Ziebertz and Riegel 2008, 9–41).6 Berger states that while secularization theory is less applicable as a description of modern societies, plurality is essential (2014, 52). Plurality—coexistence of different worldviews and values—is a defining characteristic of the globalized world. Plurality as a phenomenon is not new, according to Berger, but its global extension is. Modernity entails globalization of plurality, claims Berger (2014, 5). This has a profound impact on modern societies, according to Berger. Worldviews and values, either religious or not, have shifted from being more or less unchallenged or taken-for-granted to something that has to be argued for and negotiated. In the Western European context, one might object to Berger at this point by stating that modernity has already brought about this situation. The introduction of a secular discourse clearly challenged the religious discourses. Berger acknowledges this effect of modernity and does in fact not abandon the theory of secularization altogether (2014, 51). Modernity brought about the secular discourse as the foundation for society. But this discourse has not eradicated religion, not even in Western Europe. He therefore suggests a new meaning of the term “pluralism.” Pluralism may, in Berger’s usage, refer to a person’s ability to relate to various discourses (2014, 53). According to Berger, a religious person may engage in both secular and religious discourses. It is not either-or, it is both-and. A religious person may pray to God for healing, and at

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the same time, seek treatment from traditional physicians. Or, as Hugo Grotius (1583–1645)—Berger’s recurrent example—write a law “as if God does not exist” while retaining a religious worldview (2014, 52–53). Modernity with its introduction of a secular discourse brought about this change. Berger uses “pluralism” in both a descriptive and a normative way. In the normative sense he defines pluralism as a social situation where people with different ethnicities, worldviews, and morals live together and interact in a friendly manner (2014, 1). This kind of pluralism presupposes conversations that challenge the participants. In these conversations, the participants’ different views challenge the cognitive privilege of certainty (2014, 2, and 12). The pluralist society makes it difficult to take one’s own view for granted. Berger calls this “relativization” (2014). The participants have to argue for their positions in relation to those of the others (2014, 2). People will have to reflect on questions like “what makes my answer more true than their answer?” This process is, according to Berger, gradual yet not inevitable. People may also choose to disregard the possible legitimacy of other views and seek to restore the unchallenged place of their own. Berger borrows the expression “cognitive dissonance” from the psychologist, Leon Festinger (Berger 2014, 2), to describe a situation where a person is presented with information that contradicts the information she already relied on. One strategy to manage cognitive dissonance is to flatly disregard the credibility of the new information. However, this strategy is rather unproductive in the perspective of pluralism. Berger’s book is not a recipe for successful coexistence. However, he describes some mechanisms that may be applicable in a pedagogical setting. The novel reference of pluralism, that is the ability to engage in secular and religious discourses, appears, in Berger’s book, as a prerequisite for pluralism understood as peaceful interaction of people with different worldviews and values. Pluralism in this dual understanding is therefore not only a social situation, but also an individual ability. This ability is furthermore important for engagement in the public sphere. In relation to the research question posed in the introduction, I can now specify the question. Can kindergarten be a place where the seeds of this dual understanding of pluralism may be sown?

Material and Method Material I visited three different kindergartens, which I selected strategically in order to get insight into what approaches these kindergartens have to religious pluralism. Two of the kindergartens were private, while one was public. One of the private kindergartens is a so called “open kindergarten.” In many ways,

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this kindergarten functions as a community center. Parents, who for various reasons are home with their children, can bring them to the open kindergartens. These institutions do not look after the children for the parents; the parents will have to accompany their children in the kindergarten. Yet, the open kindergartens provide pedagogically founded activities for the children. In this article, I have not included material from the open kindergarten, since this kindergarten has a different pedagogical mandate given the fact that the parents are there with the children all the time.

Method I conducted a semi-structured interview with one staff member from each of the kindergartens. Since the kindergartens were of different character, the semi-structured interview enabled me to focus on common themes, while being flexible depending on the specific kindergarten. These interviews aim at collecting descriptions of the respondents’ life world, and then to analyze them (Kvale 2001, 21). The respondents had not received the interview guide before the interview, but I had given them the topic of the conversation. I met with the respondents once in the kindergartens where they worked during their working hours. In this manner, I attempted to reduce the awkwardness of the unusual situation. I met them on their home turf. I recorded the interviews and transcribed them in accordance with the respondents consent. I have analyzed the material following Askel Tjora’s qualitative content approach (2010). Qualitative interviews seek to cast light on parts of the informants’ horizon of understanding (Tjora, 2010, 91). The explanations the informants give and descriptions of events will be colored by this horizon. My aim was to interpret the informants’ perspectives on the basis of what they share of their horizon of understanding and analyze this material on relevant theories and regulations. Such a hermeneutical project will always involve the researcher. I have, in preparation of this paper, presented my readings and analysis of the material to other researchers. In this manner, I have attempted to increase the study’s communicative validity (Tjora 2010, 179). I will also underline the following distinction. In qualitative interviews, it is always the informants’ version of events and experiences that are studied, not the event themselves. In the interview, I ask the informants about their usage of biblical stories. My investigation is not so much of how biblical stories in fact are used, but rather on how the informants experience the use of biblical stories. I cannot eliminate the risk of the informants wishing to create a beneficial impression of themselves and their practices and downplay others sides (Schiefloe 2011, 84). During the interviews, I was aware of this aspect and attempted to pose the questions in a manner that was not compromising

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or invading. I, furthermore, underlined my duty to protect the information they shared and secure their anonymity.

Empirical Findings There was a difference between the private and the public kindergartens regarding the frequency in usage of biblical stories. “Birgit” in the public kindergarten (Kindergarten B) used biblical stories in connection with the celebration of Christmas and Easter. Other than that, they hardly mentioned these stories. The private kindergartens used biblical stories regularly every week. Both kindergartens referred to the Framework plan as the reason for their usage of the Bible. In addition, the private kindergarten referred to their own statements of purpose, which expressed that the institution should emphasize a Christian outlook. The staff member in the kindergarten owned by the mission organization (Kindergarten A), “Anna,” stated that teaching of biblical stories and Christian songs was one of the main reasons for existence for the kindergarten. She expressed a personal engagement in the issue and said that the Christian message was something they wanted to convey to the children. The owner organization had formulated in their own statement of purpose, which is common for all their kindergartens, that they aim to give the children in the kindergarten a Christian upbringing in a good and safe environment. In relation to the issue of pluralism, I asked the respondents how the children reacted to the stories. Did they have any questions? If so, what kind of questions? I also wanted to know if the staff perceived whether the stories had any impact on the children’s thinking. Were they affected by the stories?

Kindergarten A Interviewer: Do the children often have questions? Anna: Yes, I think so.… A: I remember someone ask “Who is God?” … It is not often we get that kind of philosophical questions. I: But, if there are miracle stories, do they dwell on what happened? A: No, they accept it.… A: …they start to tell about their grandfather, whose foot hurt.…that is what they associate with the story I: Did you experience the children coming after circle time and ask about what they heard in the stories? A: Sometimes we have nice conversations, but it is not always the children who takes the initiative. Sometimes I use the opportunities…

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Anna explained to me that she seized opportunities to present a Christian message to the children. In addition to these informal and spontaneous occasions, she presented the biblical stories with an aim to make them relevant for the children on a personal level. A: Yes. I present a sort of conclusion. I: Yes? A: Mhm. Like: What does this teach us?

I asked Anna whether she had reflected on the manner this pedagogy effected the children. What did she want to achieve? A: I do not know how much it affects them. But I think, and I hope that it (the message) can be something good to carry along. That summa summarum, from what we have told them, they are left with the message that God is our father, Jesus is our friend, and that we may turn to him with every issue. That he helps. That is what I hope will remain with them.

In the conversation, Anna reported that the group of children was relatively homogeneous. They might have had a Roman Catholic child, and some years ago a Muslim child went to the kindergarten. Given this information, I asked Anna whether she expected any form of response from the children: I:

A: I: A: A: I: A:

…You said that they [the children] believe in the stories. How much do you lay that upon them, or expect a kind of affirmation from the children? Is it open for the child to think what they want about the stories? Ye-es. Yes, or do you, in a way, lay the premises for what they should think and believe of the stories they hear. No, but I say, we are a Christian kindergarten, so I say that this is the Bible. What is in the Bible is true. But, I do not say more than that. So no one is corrected if they express that they did not accept the story? No, I have never experienced that, but I think everybody must be allowed to believe whatever they like.

Kindergarten B In the public kindergarten, Birgit states that the group of children is diverse. Children from families that are practicing Christians, atheists, or practicing Muslims seem to be common. Birgit reported that the biblical stories and the celebrations of the Christian holiday sometimes caused arguments among the children.

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I: B:

B:

B:

That is what I often see is a conflict between children. Some come from a Christian family, while others do not. And when they start almost to argue about what is true and not, and ask us. Then it is a difficult question. What shall we do? What do they disagree upon? Around Christmas typically, a child mentioned that we celebrate Christmas because Jesus was born. And then some other child said “But, Jesus does not exist.” Some years ago, I had a child who, a five year old girl, who when she got that [statement] slapped in her face. She started to cry. “Yes, Jesus does exist…” Again, I had to say that some believe so, other do not… Just like her [a Muslim girl], she believes in a different God. It happened to be Ramadan. That is why she has that beautiful [Henna] painting on her hands.

Birgit says that she tried to explain that people have different views concerning what constitutes reality. B:

Once at a group of older children (three to six years old) one of the staff automatically folded her hands before the meal. Some children said that they did that at their grandparents’ house. And there was a huge discussion about this tradition.

I asked Birgit whether she thought results like these could justify the use of religious stories. B:

Yes, absolutely. When I talk to the parents, for example Muslims, I explain that we do not preach anything, but we tell a story. And we say that we want as much from their religion as we can, in order to cultivate respect for their religion.

Conditions for Pluralism In accordance with their statement of purpose, Kindergarten A emphasizes a mono-religious discourse. The staff arranges circle time with biblical stories regularly. In addition Anna reports that she uses other opportunities to let the children get to know Jesus as a friend. The parents are informed of the kindergarten’s approach through their statement of purpose and through the reports they get from the staff. It appears that the Christian outlook affects the recruitment of the kindergarten. Anna reports that the group of children is relatively homogeneous,

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especially compared to the situation reported by Birgit in kindergarten B. Birgit describes a group of children that is much more heterogeneous. Birgit explains the need to inform the parents about the pedagogical activities they have in connection with Christian holidays, especially Christmas. The interviews of this study are of limited value as an indicator of the effect the statement of purpose has for the recruitment. Further studies of quantitative character may create a clearer picture. If the statements of purpose do in fact affect the recruiting, these kindergartens would create plurality, but apparently contribute less towards ideals of pluralism. A second effect is that the children are not presented with different discourses. On the one side, one may argue that continuity in what the children hear at home and in the kindergarten is a benefit for the children. The children at this age are young, and perhaps too young to have to struggle with what Berger called cognitive dissonance. Accordingly one may propose that kindergarten ought to be free from religion. However, the same idea is relevant in the case of kindergartens with a statement of purpose that differs from the Framework Plan. Parents may want their children to have a firm footing in one tradition, before they get acquainted with other traditions. On the other hand, does mono-religious pedagogy prepare children for life in a plural reality? According to Berger’s suggestion of what pluralism ought to aim at—peaceful interaction between people with different worldviews and values—mono-religious pedagogy does not train children in encountering others with different beliefs. Anna reports that children do not question whether the stories are true or relevant for their lives. She states that she has never experience that children do not accept the stories. There may be several reasons for this statement and the nature and scope of the material of this study do not permit a discussion of all. I have already mentioned the apparently homogeneous character of the children group. Perhaps the majority of children come from families where divergent religious views are seldom or never an issue. Either religion has a minor or prominent place in the home, it appears that the children come from families within a Christian cultural tradition. Another possibility is that the staff presents the stories in a manner that do not invite to those kinds of questions. When Anna says, “what is in the Bible is true,” it is clear that she thinks the Christian statement of purpose legitimates that the discussion of the story stays within a Christian discourse. Anna does not relativize statements of faith, placed in the context of pluralism. However, here Anna expresses a dilemma. She seems to balance between her mandate on behalf of the parents to teach the children Christianity and the child’s right to freedom of religion. Anna’s solution appears contradictory,

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but may be read as a combination of a religious discourse with a discourse of pluralism. It appears here that she has a both-and attitude towards these two discourses, rather than either-or. That she clearly lays the premises for what these stories convey and the relevance they have for the children, does not seem to contradict that everybody must be allowed to believe whatever they like. Kindergarten B appears to operate on a secular discourse most of the time. Issues of religious education are rare, according to Birgit. However, the biblical stories the kindergarten staffs do tell before Christmas and Easter create situations with high learning potential. Birgit described several situations where the involved parties’ beliefs are relativized. That is, the children have to place their view in relation to divergent views. When a boy and a girl bluntly throw their opposing opinions concerning Jesus’ existence at each other, Birgit directs the attention to a third option, a Muslim view of life. The question is not reduced to an either-or issue, but rather a matter of personal conviction. Berger claims that this process of relativization leads to an ability to think of your own point of view in relation to that of others (2014, 42). This may be disturbing; the bliss of ignorance is no longer present. Therefore, individuals who discuss their personal convictions with others may attempt to ignore the possibility of the other view’s legitimacy. The preference for one’s own view is no longer given, but has to be fought for. Others may choose to reflect upon and refine their own views based on the new information. The latter outcome is, according to Berger, a crucial point in creating societies of pluralism. In order to exemplify these phenomena further, I will briefly relay a case Katrine Giæver discusses (2017, 56–57).7 In this case, a group from a kindergarten visits a church. In the group there are children from Muslim background present. The priest in the church uses references familiar to the Muslims in order to explain what a church and a priest is. The church is a bit like a mosque, and the priest a bit like an imam. This encourages a Muslim boy (five years old) to start asking questions concerning death. When do people die? What happens when they die? How are they buried? Back in the kindergarten when the children and the staff reflect on the visit, the boy says that he thought the visit was nice. The priest saw that his role had parallels to the religious leaders with which the children were familiar. This inspired questions and trust in the boy who experienced that questions of death were also answered in a different religion.

Conclusion The Kindergarten Act allows owners of kindergartens to formulate their own statement of purpose. Norway therefore has kindergartens with specific

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religious outlooks. This is a reflection of the growing plurality in the society. This growing plurality may be handled in various manners. Plurality in itself does not lead towards the ideals of pluralism. In this article, I have studied how religious education in two different kindergartens creates different opportunities for pluralism. Although the research material in this study does not allow wide ranging conclusions, the respondents clearly attest to different approaches to growing religious pluralism. Anna in kindergarten A has a mono-religious approach where she introduces the children to a Christian discourse. We may see this as an extension of the parental right to choose education for the children. Training for pluralism, as Berger describes it, seems to be less prominent. Birgit in the public kindergarten (B) is an example of a different approach. Although the topic of the interviews was biblical stories, Birgit had to use a different pedagogy. She presented the stories, but framed it as part of one tradition among others. Birgit clearly expresses that she regards this approach as beneficial. According to her, the children learn that there are different opinions concerning questions of religious character. They experience that their view is only one among several possibilities. This is what Peter Berger call relativization. The children in Kindergarten B experienced that disagreement on these issues was acceptable. The material this study is based on, seems to confirm such a process in Kindergarten B in the story where children and staff members discuss the tradition of folding hands. The children who go to the kindergarten with a mono-religious approach appear to have fewer chances to experience disagreements on religious issues in the kindergarten.

Notes 1. I use religious education in a broad sense including both “teaching of” and “teaching about” religion. 2. I will present the other parts of the discussion in a different article. Since these articles discuss material from the same data-collection, the presentation of method and material, as well as basic information of the pedagogy in the kindergartens will naturally bear resemblances. 3. There are also institutions such as “barnepark” and “åpen barnehage,” but these are few in numbers. 4. Statistics Norway (ssb.no) retrieved august 2018. 5. In the sense that religion is not part of the statement of purpose or the pedagogical activities. 6. See Jon Skarpeid’s article in this anthology for further discussion of the secularization theory. 7. See also Fellah, 2014.

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Bibliography Andreassen, Bengt-Ove. 2011. “Perspektiver på hva en førskolelærer trenger å kunne om religion.” Nordisk Barnehageforskning 4 (1): 17–31.Botvar, Pål Ketil. 2010. “Endringer I nordmenns religiøse liv» in Religion I dagens Norge: mellom sekularisering og sakralisering, (eds.) Pål Ketil Botvar and Ulla Schmidt, Oslo: Universitetsforlaget, 11–24. Berger, Peter. 1967. The Sacred Canopy: Elements of a Sociological Theory of Religion. New York: Anchor Books. ———. 1999. “The Desecularization of the World: A Global Overview.” In The Desecularization of the World: Resurgent Religion and World Politics, edited by Peter Berger, 1–18. Grand Rapids, MI: Ethics and Public Policy Center. ———. 2014. The Many Altars of Modernity: Toward a Paradigm for Religion in a Pluralist Age. Berlin: De Gruyter. Berger, Peter, Grace Davie and Effie Fokas. 2008. Religious America, Secular Europe? A Theme and Variations. Farnham: Ashgate. Davie, Grace. 2002. Europe: The Exceptional Case. London: Darton, Longman and Todd Ltd. Durham, W. Cole. 2013. “Introduction.” In The Routledge International Handbook of Religious Education, edited by Derek H. Davis and Elena Miroshnikova, 1–12. London: Routledge. Fellah, Laila. 2014. “Rom for ulike religioner og livssyn i barnehagen.” Prismet 65 (1): 53–58. Giæver, Katrine. 2017. “Om å ta barns religiøsitet på alvor.” In Minoritetsreligioner i barnehagen, edited by Olav Hovdelien, 45–65. Bergen: Fagbokforlaget. Henriksen, Jan Olav. 2011. Religion: mellom troen isolasjon og uvitenhetens forakt. Kristiansand: Høyskoleforlaget. Hidle, Kari-Mette Walmann, and Kari Krogstad. 2015. “Er det mange måter å være norsk på?” Prismet 66 (3): 155–167. Hovdelien, Olav. 2017. “Religion og sekularisme i barnehagens verdiforankring.” In Minoritetsreligioner i barnehagen, edited by Olav Hovdelien, 33–43. Bergen: Fagbokforlaget. Jacobsen, Knut Axel. 2018. “En flerreligiøs verden og religionsmangfoldet i Norge.” In Verdensreligioner i Norge, edited by Knut Axel Jacobsen, 13–31. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget. Korsvold, Tora. 2013. “Danning i barnehagen i et historisk perspektiv.” In Danning i barnehagen, edited by Kjetil Steinsholdt, 45–68. Oslo: Cappelen Damm akademisk. Krogstad, Kari, and Kari-Mette Walmann Hidle. 2015. “Høytidsmarkering i religiøst mangfoldige barnehager.” Nordic Early Childhood Education Research Journal 9 (6): 1–17. Kulturdepartementet. 2013. NOU 2013: 1 Det livsynsåpne samfunn. En helhetlig tros- og livssynspolitikk. Oslo: Kulturdepartementet. Kultur- og kirkedepartementet. 2006. NOU 2006: 2 Staten og Den norske kirke. Oslo: Kultur- og kirkedepartementet.

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Kunnskapsdepartementet. 2007. NOU 2007: 6 Formål for framtida. Formål for barnehagen og opplæringa. Oslo: Kunnskapsdepartementet. Kvale, Steinar. 2001. Det kvalitative forskningsintervju. Oslo: Gyldendal akademisk. Nilsen, Tina Dykesteen. 2012. “Barnehagen—kultur for læring om religioner og livssyn?” In Læringskulturer i barnehagen: Flerfaglige forskningsperspektiver, edited by Torill Vist and Marit Alvestad, 239–60. Oslo: Cappelen Damm Akademisk. Nilsen, Silje Aaliya. 2017. “Hvordan møte barns religiøse undring og spørsmål i barnehagen.” Prismet 68 (4): 319–26. Sagberg, Sturla. 2001. Autentisitet og undring. En drøfting av kristendommens plass i norsk barnehage i institusjonsetisk og personetisk perspektiv. Trondheim: Tapir Akademisk Forlag. Schiefloe, Per M. 2011. Mennesker og samfunn. 2 utg. Bergen: Fagbokforlaget. Schmidt, Ulla. 2010. “Norge: et religiøst pluralistisk samfunn?” In Religion i dagens Norge: mellom sekularisering og sakralisering, edited by Pål Ketil Botvar and Ulla Schmidt, 24–43. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget. Skrunes, Njål. 1990. “Menighets- og organisasjonsbarnehagene i Norge, Finland, Sverige og Danmark. En komparativ undersøkelse.” In Barnehage—Kirke—Foreldre: Frihet og Ansvar, edited by Njål Skrunes and Einar Regstad, 13–234. Bergen: NLA-Forlaget. Stortingsmelding 93 (1980–81) Oslo: Departementenes servicesenter. Sødal, Helje Kringlebotn. 2009. Kristen tro og tradisjon i barnehagen. 4. Utgave. Kristiansand: Høyskoleforlaget. Tjora, Aksel. 2010. Kvalitative forskningsmetoder i praksis. Oslo: Gyldendal. Toft, Audun, and Kristine Toft Rosland. 2014. “Barnehager og høytidsmarkering.” Prismet 65 (4): 211–25. Walmann Hidle, Kari-Mette. 2017. “Barnehagens arbeid med religion—en arena for integrering og demokrati.” In Minoritetsreligioner i barnehagen, edited by Olav Hovdelien, 67–87. Bergen: Fagbokforlaget. Ziebertz, Hans-Georg, and Ulrich Riegel. 2008. “Post-secular Europe—a Concept Questioned.” In Europe: Secular or Post-Secular?, edited by Hans-Georg Ziebertz and Ulrich Riegel, 9–41. Berlin: Lit Verlag.

5. “I bring it with me everywhere”: The Materiality of the Bible in Critical Illness Marta Høyland Lavik

Introduction There are a variety of ways in which one can elaborate on how readers interact with classic religious texts in our contemporary world. This contribution deals with how the Bible interacts with readers who find themselves in the interpretative context of living with incurable cancer in Norway. The idea of this paper developed out of the observation that some of my interviewees in a research project on the significance of the Bible in cancer seemed to value the material side of the Bible just as much as its contents.1 After becoming incurably ill and receiving palliative care, they told me that they started practicing their religiosity different than before, and the material side of the Bible became more crucial compared to what was the case earlier. This dynamic interplay between biblical text and practice connected to it captivated my interest.2 Beliefs and practices connected to the materiality of the Bible have been performed in various ways throughout history.3 Such practices are however not confined to the past, but they continue to be performed around the globe. To understand the power and position that the Bible is given in the lifeworld of the interviewees addressed here,4 this paper will explore the following question: As an artefact, how is the Bible applied and experienced outside ceremonial settings for people living with incurable cancer in Norway?5 As the interviewees’ lifeworld includes performances or practices concerning the Bible, these will be seen in relationship with comparable practices in history, but first and foremost explored from the theoretical perspective of

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phenomenological hermeneutics. As a lifeworld approach is occupied with how texts, tools, and actions are to be understood and interpreted, the philosophical basis is phenomenological hermeneutics: “Lifeworld hermeneutics tries to understand texts and actions by the meaning that is expressed in the text and action respectively” (Bengtsson 2013, 9). The hermeneutical circle tells us that as human beings, we understand and interpret through being in the world. However, each human being has his/her own horizon of understanding (to use Gadamer’s word), or is embedded in his/her own “lifeworld” (Bengtsson 2013, 9). Although it is never possible to reach a full merging of the different horizons or lifeworlds, it is my contention that it is possible through encounters to achieve an understanding (though limited) by letting “the other lifeworlds speak in their otherness” (Bengtsson 2013, 9). Performance theory assists me in understanding how lifeless elements (such as the Bible) are apprehended as active agents for human beings.6 The term performance is used here regarding the informal scenarios of life, suggesting that the practices developed are performed in order to conjoin “… words, experiences, behaviors, imaginings, and bodies of the reader with those of the literary text” (Madison and Hamera 2006, xxiii).

The Materiality of the Bible in Critical Illness Many Western Protestant cultures have traditionally favored texts over rituals (Watts 2005, 401), and historical-critical biblical scholarship has attended to the content side of biblical texts, and to a lesser extent, to the Bible as an artefact: “The physical realities of the very literature that biblical scholars study… is to them, surprisingly, terra incognita for the most part” (Evans and Zacharias, 2009).7 Within Protestantism, this might be due to the “…tradition of anti-ritualism in Protestant Christianity that labels many revered material objects as idols” (Parmenter 2010a, 55). However, as religious books do have a distinct physical appearance, it is also vital to achieve an understanding of how people attend to, perform in relation to, and experience them. As the focus of the already mentioned research was more on the content side of the Bible, my interviewees were not asked about how they performed in relation to the Bible (compare one’s own focus based on prejudices, pre-judgements, and pre-understandings). Hence, the following is my interpretation of the practices they nevertheless told me about—looking at the interview material again with view to the materiality of the Bible. Notably, two of my interviewees, Rita and Otto, communicate that they engage with the Bible in physical and bodily ways, and only these two will be presented here. Rita’s situation of being a young mother diagnosed with incurable cancer immediately alters her relationship to the Bible:

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…all my strength comes from the Bible.…From day one I turned to the Bible…. Then [before the illness], the Bible was on a shelf somewhere. I was not acquainted with the word of God in any way.

She continues: The word of God is the most important. It is this [shows the Bible] which I carry with me everywhere.

“The Bible?” I ask. She responds: Yes, the Bible. It is number one.

When I follow up by asking what this means, and what the Bible is to her, she says: The Bible I regard as the word of God. God talks to one first and foremost through the word of God, but he also talks through prayer.

She continues: Yes, it [the Bible] is alpha and omega. And for sure, I have changed. My husband realizes this, and it can be too much sometimes.

I respond: “Yes?” You know, I have put Bible verses on the fridge, in the bathroom—all places in the house there are Bible verses on which I meditate.

Throughout the interview, Rita talks about the Bible in metaphorical terms, saying: It [the Bible] became my weapon straight away,

and the Bible is a treasure chest,

and reading in the Bible is like taking medicine.

These quotes demonstrate that the Bible is experienced by Rita as far more than an ordinary book. In addition, Otto, an interviewee in his sixties, regards the Bible as a source holding special abilities:

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Marta Høyland Lavik I am like this, and it has annoyed my wife: I can hardly be in the garden without having the Bible with me. I bring it with me at work—I bring it with me everywhere. It is a manual. It [the Bible] is where I receive comfort, support, help—everything!

When I ask: “But what if you do not have the Bible with you, what happens then?” Otto replies: Well, then I panic.

“You panic?” I ask, and he continues by explaining how he prevents the state of panicking by taking precautions: I make sure I always have it [the Bible] with me.

“But, your wife can become annoyed?” I ask. Otto says: I try not to provoke her, because I love her very much.…however, when I go to bed I have to have it [the Bible] with me on the pillow.

“On the pillow, beside your head?” I ask. Otto explains in a more detailed way: Yes, I have to hold it [the Bible]. It is as if God lives with his spirit in his word [Otto cries]. I get comfort, I get support, I get help.

“Of the book itself? Not only from reading in it?” I ask: Of the book as well. It is here [he points to the Bible]. It is good with books of devotion and the like, but the original you cannot move away from. That is where God lives with his spirit in his word.

These quotes from Rita and Otto exemplify how living bodies actualize a lifeless item (the Bible) by performing certain acts in relation to it. At the same time, the quotes also show how people can project certain qualities to the Bible, and how the book then can work as a transitional object (cf. Rizzuto 1979; Winnicott 1960), enabling people to find support in their endeavor to move from insecurity to security, from frailty to force. The Bible, as a transitional object, is in this sense applied by the interviewees to create a defense against anxiety and fear. The Bible is reported to give psychological strength and assistance in Rita and Otto’s ultimate transition between life and death, and as such, the book represents their emotional attachments to the divine (cf. Klein 1975; 1975 and her object relations theory). Rita and Otto’s performances originate and reside in the center of their lived experiences as cancer patients, and it is this life condition which seems to have transformed their relationship with the Bible. At the same time,

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their performances are also closely tied to the Christian contexts in which they belong. Otto belongs to a low-church Lutheran congregation, and Rita belongs to a Charismatic-Pentecostal congregation influenced by the so-called American Faith Movement. Their congregations’ understanding of the Bible and how it can operate in peoples’ lives is closely linked to how Otto and Rita perform around the Bible. They have slightly different desires of outcomes of the practices: When Otto performs the routine of holding his hand on the Bible when he goes to sleep he does this to calm down and gain a sense of security. When Rita surrounds herself and her family with Bible verses she does this to keep the thought of disease and death at a distance.

Excursus: Comparable Practices As already touched upon, throughout history and in many cultures around the globe, a variety of substances have been and are experienced to have power to make a difference for the individual, for instance musical instruments, food, plants and herbs, stones, treasures, vehicles, jewelry, clothing, weapons, armor, and books. In many contemporary countries in the Global South, for instance, the Bible is commonly viewed as an item which can protect people, often from disease (cf. Holter 2013, 146–59).

Ancient Practices It is understood that “the earliest Christians maintained that God’s revelation is a living gospel, with Christ as both message and messenger, and not a written text” (Parmenter 2010a, 56). This notion created standard practices of processions, for instance, when the gospel was read in the liturgy. But also, more private practices or performances are known from the early stages of the Christian religion. Christians in antiquity wore tiny books or parts of the Bible, for instance, around their neck as an amulet.8 For a Christian in antiquity, this practice was probably performed due to the instruction given in Deuteronomy 6:6–9: Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart. Recite them to your children and talk about them when you are at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you rise. Bind them as a sign on your hand, fix them as an emblem on your forehead, and write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.9

The practice among Christians of wearing amulets accorded with a widespread contemporary belief in the protective power of biblical words or phrases. Protective amulets contained words and symbols believed to have

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special powers, and often the carrier of an amulet sought protection from disease (cf. Solevåg and Lavik 2013, 164–67). The interviewees’ contemporary practice of always carrying the Bible with them is in line with the historically deep-rooted performance of carrying biblical verses or books for protection. Jews in antiquity had access to the holy through the sacred place of the temple in Jerusalem. After the temple was destroyed in year 70 C.E., the written text, the Torah, became the center for Jewish cultic activity. When the physical walls of the temple no longer drew the line between the sacred and the profane, between the purified and the contaminated, regulations around the treatment of the Torah scroll were developed to mark this boundary. In early Rabbinic Judaism, further specifications were made as “[t]he Torah scroll radiates holiness that demands a specific behaviour…” (Schleicher 2009a, 55). Such regulations inform the practices around the scroll up to this date in the Jewish tradition (Schleicher 2009a), and the function of the handling of the scroll as an artefact seems to be “…to help create transitivity between the individual, the community and the religious culture at large” (Schleicher 2009a, 49).

Contemporary Practices Rita and Otto are not theologically trained, and their pressing life situation does not give them the privilege of stepping back and reflect upon own interpretation and practice concerning the Bible. A lack of analytical distance is however not exclusive for non-academic readers of the Bible when traumatic life events happen. When the renowned Hebrew Bible scholar, Professor emeritus James L. Kugel, was diagnosed with cancer, he too approached the texts more or less as Rita and Otto do: in an existential, non-academic way. The words of the Psalmist became Kugel’s words, and his own situation as a cancer patient informed his understanding of the ancient texts—as will be evident in the following two examples. When he underwent chemotherapy, he recalls his colleagues saying nothing to him when they passed him in the hall, and he lets the psalmist (Psalm 38:12 [11]) express how he felt it (Kugel 2011, 19–20): My friends and companions stand aloof from my affliction, and my neighbours stand far off.

When Kugel reads the following line from Psalm 102:24, he imagines that the person who wrote them was “…very sick, perhaps in the last stages of some form of cancer” (Kugel 2011, 5): O my God, I say, do not take me away at the mid-point of my life, you whose years endure throughout all generations.

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As a cancer patient, Kugel does not mind the gap in time and setting but reads the texts straight into his own situation and brings his own experiences into the texts. He lets the two contexts—the ancient and the contemporary—interact with one another. The same applies to my interviewees. The situation of living on the edge of life creates a state of mind where analytical issues of a given text belong in the background and existential aspects in the foreground.10

Performative Functions of the Bible As already mentioned, the interviewees are incurably ill and find themselves in the ultimate transition—moving slowly or quickly from life to death. To them, the “transitional object” (Winnicott 1960), which can contain the experienced chaos, is the Bible. Their own practices and rituals around the Bible function to keep themselves together and to ensure they live in an atmosphere of divine restoration and healing. These practices are restored behavior and anchor them when everything is untethered, as “performing rituals help people get through difficult periods of transition and move from one life status to another” (Schechner 2013, 87; cf. also Frank 1995, 75–136 on the function of various “illness narratives”). The Bible is a companion with which Rita and Otto have established strong emotional bonds.11 From what Rita and Otto say, it becomes clear that the Bible serves far more purposes than what one can expect of an ordinary book.

The Bible as a Mediator of Divine Power and Authority To Rita and Otto, the Bible seems to bring together the human and non-human. They experience the Bible in order to mediate between the material and the spiritual world. Their performances with the Bible are, thus, examples of how the authority of the Bible is maintained by ritual practices (Watts 2005, 416). They report that the physical book—and not merely the message it contains—generates power and authority. This is why they both always carry the physical book with them in their bags. They are not content with internet versions of the Bible on their mobile phones only, as they believe “…the book of the Bible is a manifestation of Christ and its material substance acts as a mediator between the human and the divine” (Parmenter 2009, 300; Parmenter 2010b, 195). To them, the Bible seems to be experienced as “…a material object that invokes the presence of the divine” (Parmenter 2006, 160), therefore, as they carry the Bible, the Bible is experienced as carrying them. While Jewish tradition holds that there is a hierarchy between the Torah, the Prophets, and the Writings (Schleicher 2009a, 55), Rita and Otto perceive

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the Bible as a whole as radiating holiness. This perceived holiness does not demand a specific handling of the Bible from Rita and Otto’s side; its holiness is seen as inherent in the book regardless of human beings. Consequently, when, for instance, Otto touches the Bible when he goes to sleep, the Bible radiates holiness, and this functions to create in Otto a sense of being sheltered by the divine. Rita and Otto’s practices function to keep them inside God’s protective fences now as the disease has thrown them out of their safekeeping. Their practices infuse in them a sense of authority and divine power when they are becoming gradually powerless and left to the unpredictable developments of the disease. While Jewish tradition demonstrates that the Torah scroll is handled according to specific regulations, for instance, to demarcate the boundaries between holy and profane (Schleicher 2009a, 51–60), the Protestant traditions, in which Otto and Rita belong, does not make these distinctions. At least in their private understanding, the sacred space is where the Bible is, and this means they can carry the Bible with them anywhere (into the garden, among people), and put the Bible anyplace (in their bag, in bed, and in the bathroom); the location and the position of the book does not affect its holiness. When Otto and Rita, thus, bring the Bible with them in their bag, they carry with them divine power and authority, and display God’s presence for themselves and others.

The Bible as an Active Subject Not only is God present in the physical entity of the Bible as a mediator of divine power and authority, God lives in his word, according to Otto. Therefore, the Bible is not regarded an object, it is perceived as an active agent, a subject. For instance, this is visible when Otto brings the Bible with him to bed. Although it is not clear on which side of his head Otto keeps the Bible at night, it is evident that they are three subjects sharing the same bed (Otto, the Bible, and Otto’s wife). At least one part of Otto’s body (one of his hands) touches the book when he falls asleep. When he then brings the Bible with him, he does not only make sure God is beside him, in Otto’s view, God is touching him when he touches the Bible. He says: “It is God who lives with his spirit in his word.” This contrasts how he feels when he realizes the Bible is not with him: “I panic.” Although his wife sometimes becomes annoyed, Otto cannot leave the Bible behind as it has become an integral part of him— an extension of his body through which he experiences the world. Rita experiences much of the same when she puts up verses from the Bible on cupboards around the house, or when she proclaims Psalm 118:17 every day to take authority over the disease: “I shall not die, but I shall live, and

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recount the deeds of the Lord.” However, where Otto’s main focus is gaining a sense of comfort, Rita engages the Bible to protest against the disease, to keep death at a distance and to acquire a miraculous healing. She applies Psalm 117:18 in an artefactual way. Her daily recitation-ritual contributes to her process of denial of the disease—in which the Bible plays an important role. The exposure to biblical words (all over the house) is more important than anything else, as she believes the Bible has inherent power to ward off the attacks from what she perceives is the devil. Her performances can evoke powerful forces in her view, as the Bible is a subject which represents something larger than itself. For Rita and Otto, it is as if the Bible provides “…a protective covering, the sort of a cocoon that individuals …need for the structuring of experience” (Martin Marty quoted in Parmenter 2010a, 56, note 3. To this point, compare also the object relations theory from Klein 1975a&b). The interviewees’ language and actions connected to the Bible as a subject shows how they take part in an “intersubjective process,” where language and context are dependent on one another (Ricoeur 1973, 96). The biblical words meet an internalized and socially shared resonance in Rita and Otto. The concept of performance highlights this dynamic interaction between what Rita and Otto say about the Bible and what they do with it, between speech and act. Through sharing from their lived experiences, they exemplify what the British philosopher of language and the developer of “speech act theory,” J. L. Austin, emphasizes in his lectures about “words and deeds.” Language is performative, as “…to say something is to do something” (Austin 1976, 121). Language can be used not only to assert something, but also to create a particular reality: “‘I forgive you’; ‘You cannot enter’; ‘Guilty!’ all do something in the world” (Madison and Hamera 2006, xvi, their emphasis). In the case of Rita and Otto, their experience of the Bible as a subject works on two levels. First, the performances they do around the Bible bestow blessing, consolation, peace, and a fighter spirit within them. Second, the language of the Bible performs a reality: When they, for instance, read the words of Isaiah 41:10: “Do not be afraid, for I am with you,” these words perform a reality as they create what they express. As Rita and Otto perceive the Bible as “…simultaneously a story and an event” (Hamera 2006, 58), they make the biblical story a performed story, where the ancient and contemporary stories speak to each other. This dynamic relationship exchanges between the individual and the story and vice versa. Rita and Otto’s experiences of the Bible are coherent with how the Bible has been experienced by individuals around the globe throughout history, as “…a potent tool, a repository of power that not only provided the narrative of God’s revelation in Christ, but effectively acted as a representative of Christ

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himself” (Parmenter 2010a, 58). Both Rita and Otto experience the Bible as integrated with their lived body in a way which extends the experiences and actions of the lived body (cf. Bengtsson 2013, 6).

The Bible as a Mediator Between the Individual and the Collective This paper deals with individual experiences. Individual experiences are however never completely individual, as human beings always exist as part of something: a generation, a network, a community (Abrahams 1986). The interplay between the individual and the collective is visible in both Rita and Otto, for instance, when they always carry the Bible with them. In this act of public performance, they apply the Bible for “social display” as it is witnessed by people who meet them (Parmenter 2010a, 56). Their performances exemplify how the Bible as an artefact transmits “…personal and cultural representations in order to help create transitivity between the individual, the community and the religious culture at large” (Schleicher 2009a, 49). Their basic and visible performance does however not merely mark their identity as believers or contributes to “community cohesion” (Parmenter 2010a, 56), it is, as we have seen, just as much their private performance practiced to gain protection by God. Through their practices with the Bible, they engage “in the living process of reading the word of God,” and they demonstrate how “[t]he Bible is always read and analyzed and applied from a personal perspective” (Kahl 2000, 428). As “performativity is the interconnected triad of identity, experience, and social relations” (Madison and Hamera 2006, xix), I will (here and in the next paragraph) take Rita’s story as an example of how her being part of a specific community makes an impact on her way of thinking and acting concerning the Bible. When Rita became incurably ill, she actively searched for a Christian community where she could overcome her existential solitude and share her expectations and hopes for a miraculous healing. She found a charismaticPentecostal congregation and partakes regularly in services where she is prayed for. A possible outcome of rituals (such as a prayer) is that it can bring together particularity and uniqueness with the universal, giving the ritual a universalizing character (Kapferer 1986, 191). In Rita’s case, the witnesses to this prayer include both human beings and the supernatural, and when the ritual involves these groups, they have the possibility to “commune in the one experience” (Kapferer 1986, 191, his italics). This accords well with what Rita expresses: The communal prayer—and her connections with the congregation in general—gives her existential, spiritual, and social support, and as such, it reduces her feeling of existential solitude and supports her hopes for a miraculous healing.

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The Bible as a Link Between the Local and the Global The interviewees’ ways of interacting with the Bible in illness tell their specific, local story of how they rearrange and shape their behavior in order to endure the specific circumstances they experience. At the same time, their acting shows how local approaches are connected with global ideas. Earlier Rita did not have a close relationship to the Bible, but after she was diagnosed she started living with the Bible and created a strong bond to the book and its contents. Rita’s performances with the Bible show her contemporary private strategy, but historically, it is linked to individuals who have used parts of or the whole Bible to protect themselves from disease, evil, and death. Rita’s embodied acts of resistance towards her disease (and ultimately death) are linked to a specific global theology. She spends much time in a fellowship which is inspired by the already mentioned American Faith Movement, a branch of American Pentecostalism, which started developing in the US in the 1960s and has now spread globally. This congregation teaches Rita that everyone who believes in Jesus Christ basically has the same power as Jesus had, according to their view of New Testament teachings (Hebrews 11:1; John 11:40; Matthew 10:7–8). This means that Rita can pray to be healed, and believing that she will be healed, she will experience healing. If she takes authority over the disease and throws it out of the body, a miracle can happen, she tells me. Based on the theology presented in the fellowship, Rita hopes for an intervention from God, and she lives by what she is told in the congregation. The congregation’s theology seems to support Rita, but at the same time, it creates a tension as it does not help her coming to terms with her illness or mortality. The interview reveals that her husband finds her strategy of denial difficult, and as such, the theological drive behind her performances raises questions about imbalances of power between well and ill, between leaders and members of a congregation, and between a global theology and its local manifestations. Her local application of the global theology of the Faith Movement shows how complex the territory of critical illness is and how difficult it is for individuals and communities to find their way through the rough and strenuous terrain of terminal illness. Indeed, what at first glance can look as Rita’s private choice of coping strategy is closely linked to the social and congregational setting she is part of. Performing the act of resistance involves Rita’s deepest private sense of identity, while also being informed and determined by the global flows of Christianity.

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Conclusion In this essay, I documented some of the material complexity and emotional bonds connected to humans and the Bible. As Otto and Rita experienced critical times, they chose to anchor their lives in the Bible. In the lifeworld of the interviewees, the Bible functioned as a transitional object and a companion. The Bible receives, and it is also experienced as offering precious acts of love. At the same time, the loving relationship was disturbed as a tension was created, especially within Rita, when the congregation did not introduce her to the broader biblical stories of suffering and trauma as she approached death. Instead, her faith community merely provided short proclamatory, expectant lines about healing. Experiences and reflections as those shared by Rita and Otto are not commonly communicated publicly in Norway, but these are examples of how the Bible can become highly relevant within “…a context of existential questions” (Kahl 2000, 430). By bringing up these lived experiences and practices from contemporary times, this paper seeks to counter the tendency of portraying as exotic those who apply the Bible in comparable ways, as have been done by people globally throughout history. A bodily condition can change peoples’ attitudes and practices towards the Bible, and congregational contexts can provide interpretative tools for understanding new situations. Through repeated practices, many people around the globe engage in “a dynamic process of reception and transformation” (Schleicher 2009b, 141), and receive in return for their investment, an experienced sense of predictability and safety into a situation which is perceived as unpredictable and insecure.

Notes 1. Over the last years, I have studied issues pertaining to the reception and interpretation of the Bible by people who live with an incurable cancer disease. The quotes throughout the paper are taken from this research project in which I interviewed 14 adults individually in my contemporary Norwegian Protestant context about the eventual significance of the Bible in critical illness. The research followed the ethical standards of The Norwegian National Research Ethics Committees (www.etikkom.no). Before the data collection started, the project was approved by the regional committee for medical and health research ethics (www.helseforskning.etikkom.no). The names of the interviewees are fictitious. 2. Such an interplay can also be described as an “…interdependence of text and ritual” (cf. Watts 2005, 401–02). 3. “…in both formal liturgical rites and in private use, Gospel-books and Bibles were objects that mediated the power and authority of Christ” (Parmenter 2010b, 195).

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For a brief historical overview of a Christian liturgical use of the Bible, see Parmenter 2010a, 56–58. For a selected listing of works regarding early Christian texts, see Evans and Zacharias 2009, 2–3. 4. In order to grasp parts of the complex reality the interviewees experience in relation to the Bible, the term “lifeworld” is here used about “…the world in which we live and which appears to us in one way or another” (Bengtsson 2013, 7). Lifeworld ontology represents an understanding of reality which embraces a both-and instead of an either-or attitude to life. This accords well with the interviewees’ experiences of the interplay between life and world, outer and inner, object and subject, sensuous and cognitive (cf. Bengtsson 2013, 6). Although not speaking about the Bible as such, Bengtsson (2013, 6, note 3) points to some of what the interviewees share about their perceptions of the Bible: “…the book is always more than its experienced cover.” 5. Being diagnosed with cancer is by the interviewees experienced as traumatic, and they find resonance and comfort for their feelings in the Bible, they tell me. The American Professor of Old Testament, David Carr, suggests that human trauma was what in the first place gave birth to the Bible. According to the editor of his book, Holy Resilience: The Bible’s Traumatic Origins, “…the Bible’s ability to speak to the suffering is a major reason why the sacred texts have retained their relevance for thousands of years. The Jewish people and Christian community had to adapt to survive multiple catastrophes, and their holy scriptures both reflected and reinforced each religion’s resilient nature” (Carr 2014). 6. Performance theory is anchored in the broader development of postmodernism, and it is employed across disciplines to “…decipher the multiple operations of performance (performativity and the performative) within a written text, a life world, and in domains of cognitive and imaginary expressions” (Madison and Hamera 2006, xxiv). Within performance studies, culture is understood as a dynamic phenomenon, and the focus is often on human (everyday life) experiences, cf. Wikipedia, “Performative turn.” 7. Artefact is here defined as “an object made by a human being, typically one of cultural or historical interest” (Oxford Dictionaries). In the way the interviewees approach the Bible, the outer and inner side of the Bible melt together. Their underlying hermeneutical perspective can be linked to how the philosopher Ricoeur defines hermeneutics as connecting the discourses of the text and the interpretation in such a way that “…the world of the reader and the world of the text merge into one another” (Ricoeur 1973, 93). 8. Amulet: “An ornament or small piece of jewellery thought to give protection against evil, danger, or disease,” Oxford Dictionaries. 9. Bible quotations are taken from the New Revised Standard Version. 10. The interplay between analytical and existential reading of the Bible is more elaborated on in the article Lavik, Marta Høyland, “‘Do not be afraid, for I am with you’: The use of Isaiah 41:10 in Times of Incurable Illness,” New Studies in the Book of Isaiah. Essays in Honor of Hallvard Hagelia, ed. Markus Zehnder (Piscataway: Gorgias Press, 2014), 157–81 (Perspective on Hebrew Scriptures and Its Contexts, 21). 11. The word “companion” about the Bible-human relationship is inspired by D. Haraway 2003, 16, who uses the terminology “companion species” in a philosophical way about the dog-human relationship: “In sum, ‘companion species’ is about a four-part composition, in which co-constitution, finitude, impurity, historicity, and complexity are what is. The Companion Species Manifesto is, thus, about the implosion of nature and culture in the relentlessly historically specific, joint lives of dogs and people, who are bonded in significant otherness.” Haraway’s book shows relations in a wider sense

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Marta Høyland Lavik and how dogs and people “figure a universe,” and is as such about more than the relation of dogs and people. Her use of the word “companion” is therefore helpful. Rita and Otto have the Bible as a companion, and live with the Bible in the flesh (in life and towards death) in a multifaceted way which is not exhausted by this essay.

Bibliography Abrahams, Roger D. 1986. “Ordinary and Extraordinary Experience.” In The Anthropology of Experience, edited by Victor W. Turner and Edward M. Bruner, 45–72. Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press. Austin, John Langshaw. 1976. How to Do Things with Words. The William James Lectures Delivered at Harvard University in 1955, edited by J. O. Urmson and M. Sbisà. London: Oxford University Press. Bengtsson, Jan. 2013. “With the Lifeworld as Ground: A Research Approach for Empirical Research in Education: The Gothenburg Tradition.” Indo-Pacific Journal of Phenomenology 13 (1): 1–18. Carr, David M. 2014. Holy Resilience: The Bible’s Traumatic Origins. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Evans, Craig A., and H. Daniel Zacharias. 2009. “Introducing Jewish and Christian Scripture as Artifact and Canon.” In Jewish and Christian Scripture as Artifact and Canon, edited by Craig A. Evans and H. Daniel Zacharias, 1–8. New York: T&T Clark. Frank, Arthur W. 1995. The Wounded Storyteller: Body, Illness and Ethics. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Hamera, Judith. 2006. “Performance, Performativity, and Cultural Poiesis in Practices of Everyday Life.” In The SAGE Handbook of Performance Studies, edited by D. Soyini Madison and Judith Hamera, 46–64. Thousand Oaks/London/New Delhi: Sage Publications. Haraway, Donna Jeanne. 2003. The Companion Species Manifesto: Dogs, People, and Significant Otherness. Chicago: Prickly Paradigm Press. Holter, Knut. 2013. “Global tekst i lokal tapning.” Kirke og kultur 118 (2): 146–59. Kahl, Werner. 2000. “Intercultural Hermeneutics—Contextual Exegesis A Model for 21st-Century Exegesis.” International Review of Mission 89 (354): 421–33. Kapferer, Bruce. 1986. “Performance and the Structuring of Meaning and Experience.” In The Anthropology of Experience, edited by Victor W. Turner and Edward M. Bruner, 188–203. Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press. Klein, Melanie. 1975a. The Psycho-Analysis of Children. London: The Hogarth Press. ———. 1975b. Love, Guilt and Reparation and Other Works 1921–1945. New York: The Free Press. Kugel, James L., ed. 1997. The Bible As It Was. Cambridge/London: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. ———. 2011. In the Valley of the Shadow. On the Foundations of Religious Belief (and their connection to a certain, fleeting state of mind). New York: Free Press.

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Lavik, Marta Høyland. 2014. “‘Do not be Afraid, for I am with you’: The use of Isaiah 41:10 in Times of Incurable Illness.” In New Studies in the Book of Isaiah. Essays in Honor of Hallvard Hagelia, edited by Markus Zehnder, 157–81. Piscataway: Gorgias Press. Madison, D. Soyini, and Judith Hamera. 2006. “Performance Studies at the Intersections.” In The SAGE Handbook of Performance Studies, edited by D. Soyini Madison and Judith Hamera, xi–xxv. Thousand Oaks/London/New Delhi: Sage Publications. Oxford Dictionaries: “Amulet.” Parmenter, Dorina Miller, ed. 2006. “The Iconic Book: The Image of the Bible in Early Christian Rituals.” Postscripts: The Journal of Sacred Texts and Contemporary Worlds 2 (2–3): 160–89. ———, ed. 2009. “The Bible as Icon: Myths of the Divine Origins of Scripture.” In Jewish and Christian Scripture as Artifact and Canon, edited by Craig A. Evans and H. Daniel Zacharias, 298–309. New York: T&T Clark. ———. 2010a. “A Fitting Ceremony: Christian Concerns for Bible Disposal.” In Death of Sacred Texts: Ritual Disposal and Renovation of Texts in World Religions, edited by Kristina Myrvold, 55–70. Farnham: Ashgate. ———, ed. 2010b. “Iconic Books from Below: The Christian Bible and the Discourse of Duct Tape.” Equinox: Postscripts: The Journal of Sacred Texts and Contemporary Worlds 6 (1–3): 185–200. Ricoeur, Paul. 1973. “From Existentialism to the Philosophy of Language.” Philosophy Today 17 (2): 88–96. Rizzuto, Ana-Maria. 1979. The Birth of the Living God: A Psychoanalytic Study. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Schechner, Richard, ed. 2003. Performance Theory. London and New York: Routledge. ———. 2013. Performance Studies: An Introduction. London and New York: Routledge. Schleicher, Marianne. 2009a. “Artifactual and Hermeneutical Use of Scripture in Jewish Tradition.” In Jewish and Christian Scripture as Artifact and Canon, edited by Craig A. Evans and H. Daniel Zacharias, 48–65. New York: T&T Clark. ———, ed. 2009b. “The Many Faces of the Torah: Reception and Transformation of the Torah in Jewish Communities.” In Receptions and Transformations of the Bible, edited by Kirsten Nielsen, 141–58. Aarhus: Aarhus University Press. Solevåg, Anna Rebecca, and Marta Høyland Lavik. 2013. “Helse på kvar side? Bibel, sjukdom og funksjonshemming.” Kirke og kultur 118 (2): 150–63. Watts, James W. 2005. “Ritual Legitimacy and Scriptural Authority.” Journal of Biblical Literature 124 (3): 401–17. Wikipedia. “Performative Turn.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Performative_turn. Accessed 27 March 2018. Winnicott, Donald Woods. 1960. “The Theory of the Parent-Infant Relationship.” The International Journal of Psychoanalysis 41: 585–95.

Part Four: Diaspora: Group and Individual

6. Sacred Texts and Muslim Youth in Turkish-Norwegian Diaspora Communities Gerd Marie Ådna

Introduction That the Qur’an is read and memorized in Muslim communities all over the world is a well-documented fact. Still, there are local variations, language skills, and cultural and social contexts, which influence Muslims’ own usage and interpretation(s) of the Qur’an and the Hadith. Global social media might have an impact on how Muslims interpret the Qur’an. However, the gatherings the youth participate in mean more to them than transnational social media, at least, the two practices–in local and virtual space–play different roles in their identity building and in their ways of living the Islamic ethical and religious sunna. Hence, they seek spiritual, social, and ethical guidance mainly in their communities. This transmission of knowledge and values is based on the teachings by imams, leaders, and friends. Sometimes, such teaching practices are additionally connected to national Turkish places and artefacts. In this essay, I will discuss the role of local space for youth who read the Qur’an in their parents’ mother tongue, in English and in Arabic. They speak Turkish with each other, but also Norwegian when guests or converts to Islam attend the mosque. I refer to the research of Manuel A. Vásquez and Kim Knott (2014) and Christine M. Jacobsen (2011) on diaspora religion and transmission of religious and ethical values in my analysis of Muslim youth in a Norwegian town.

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Report of Research Among Muslim Youth Research for this article has been performed in a Norwegian town with approximately 120,000 inhabitants. In this town, there are six mosques, and they have several programs where children, male and female adults, and youth are educated in Arabic language and Islamic ethics in differentiated groups. In three of these mosques, which are predominantly Turkish, there is a medrese, where they study the Qur’an, Islamic narratives, and ethics in Turkish language. In two of the Turkish mosques, I have attended prayers, bazars, and religious feasts, and I have had talks and interviews with male and female leaders and three imams (2008–2018). Both mosques have for many years had youth groups that could be characterized as a continuation of the medrese. After some clarifications with the imam and one male leader in one of the mosques, questions were distributed by the leader and handed out to about fifteen male and female participants on March 2, 2018. They were informed about the right to withdraw from this research. They gave themselves fictive names, and the only identification to me was gender and age. When I returned to the mosque one week later and met with half of the group for thirty minutes, the male leader returned the papers to me, but I did not know who had written what answers. Afterwards, I could read their handwritten answers, but only nine were properly filled in.1 I had tried to do the same in the young men’s group in the other Turkish mosque, but due to some leaders’ doubt and fear that non-serious journalists or researchers could misuse their trust, I was not allowed to do the interviews there. Later, one of the leaders said that they had misunderstood one of my questions, and he was sorry for doubting my intentions. Later that month in a central place downtown, I spoke with two of the mosque members when they handed out red roses to people passing by on the Prophet’s Birthday, which is celebrated in the second half of April in the Turkish tradition. Similar public operations, like “Hello, I am a Muslim,” have been popular, especially after September 11, 2011, in order to show the grace of the Prophet and the non-violent attitude that Muslims in a diaspora community emphasize when encountering the majority community. By showing this gesture of beauty that has spread to many European and some major Turkish cities, they visualized the goodness of the Prophet Muhammad as a contradictory project to media’s criticism of Islam and Muslims (Ådna 2017).

Interactions Between Mosques and Islamic Teaching The Muslim Council, of the whole county to which the town belongs, sometimes arranges discussions or seminars for all Muslim communities. Sometimes, the Eid-prayers are organized in cooperation between the mosques for 2,000

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Muslims in big sports halls, but lately, the Turkish communities mostly pray for themselves due to language problems. The Turkish groups invite the other mosques and their old and young members to Qur’an recitals connected to the Prophet’s Birthday (Ådna 2017). Before I present and discuss the results from the two Turkish mosques referred to, I will look at a meeting for Muslim youth in April 2018, which was intended to be open for a wider community than the Turkish only. I was welcomed with a friendly gesture; most of the participants knew me and were aware that I was observing and writing about the Muslim communities in town. It took place in one of the communal houses (“bydelshus”). Representatives from Turkish, Pakistani, international, and Arab mosques participated together with two persons who were interested in Islam and had friends in the mosques. “Next year we will be many more,” the main Turkish spokesperson told me with a smile. The speaker of this afternoon was the main imam in the international Tabligh mosque. His background is Pakistani, but he grew up in this town and speaks Norwegian fluently and masters also Urdu, Arabic, and English. He is often invited to gatherings where people from many backgrounds attend, be it Muslims from many cultural and language milieus, or be it dialogue groups where Muslims meet Christians and people from other life stances. All participants use Norwegian on such occasions. The gathering started slowly. There were several tables where two and two were sitting with a sign in front of them, telling which work place or university they belonged to. Altogether there were nearly 30 males and females who either sat at a table or just strolled around to the representatives of those study or work places they were interested in. Afterwards, the leader in one of the Turkish youth groups officially said a word of welcome and then gave the floor to the imam. His speech was of special interest to me and coincides with the teaching I have listened to earlier and later in the two Turkish mosques. (1) Make the best out of your youth, health, richness, leisure time, and life. (2) Avoid procrastination. (3) Do not waste your time. (4) Confess your ignorance; do not be haughty. (5) Do not say what you do not do, rather practice what you preach. (6) Do not overlook your sins. (7) Give priority to your prayers. Especially, advice number four points to the fact that ignorance is something that one has to admit and fight. Ignorance, jahil, is the worst among sins. Since early Islam, the Muslim believer is reminded that jahiliyya, “the time of

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ignorance,” represents the time before the Prophet Muhammad preached his message. The Prophet was the one who brought the good news of one God to the Arabian Peninsula and started a new era on earth. Jahiliyya became the symbol of godlessness (shirk) and disbelief (kufr).2 Even if the time of Islam begins before the Prophet Muhammad—and is represented by for instance the acts of the prophets Ibrahim, Ishmael, Musa, and Isa (Jesus)— the real turn from disbelief to belief and Islam (“submission [to Allah]”) is the Prophet Muhammad and his sunna (“way”). Knowledge about and the following in the footsteps of the prophets is important for any Muslim, and it is vital for teachings in Qur’an schools and mosques (Ådna 2013). Therefore, in any Muslim community, it is crucial to learn more and to study the Qur’an, as well as the good examples of the Prophet, the sunna. In this lecture, the Qur’an was not absent but not mentioned as often as, for instance, in the teachings of the Turkish imam in the celebrations of the Prophet’s Birthday that I attended on another occasion (Ådna 2017). Time is another issue that the imam emphasized to the young Muslim community. Advice numbers two and three are occupied with time as the gift of Allah, the dearest he has given his followers (zaman means “time”; Ådna 2014b). Hence, for all Muslims, everything belongs to God. Time is costly and should be used for studies and prayers (advice number seven). Since procrastination is mentioned among “sins,” the virtues of studies and hard work are underlined by the imam that met with this group of young people. Combining advices and information for work place and higher education with religious and ethical advices was the aim of this gathering.

Teaching Islam to Muslim Young Men Nearly fifteen months prior to the gathering for males and females, I attended a small group only for Turkish young men (2016). The Turkish guest imam, who only spent three months in town, heartily welcomed me and my gatekeeper, the mother of one of the young men, in the mosque. The imam and I spoke Arabic, and he appreciated my knowledge and advice as a positive help for them to live in the Norwegian society. He realized his shortcomings as someone who did not speak Norwegian and did not know the Norwegian society and culture that is such an important part of the young men’s everyday lives (cf. Døving 2012).3 We sat together with the imam at the long table in the middle of the room. The twelve young men from age 16 to 25 sat in a L-formed sofa. On the table, there were chips, biscuits, and strong Turkish tea. One of them said nothing during the evening. Two men were, however, very talkative and took

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a leader’s position. All except one had Turkish or Kurdish background but he spoke Turkish.4 The evening’s topic was how to be a good Muslim and attend schools and work places in this county. His message was similar to the message the Tabligh imam preached for the mixed youth group. The classes for religion and ethics (“RLE”) that the youth attend during level 8 through 10, and mostly at level 13,5 are a mixture of history of religions and religious and humanistic standards of ethics. These school classes are sometimes felt as provocative regarding Islamic truth and values. Atheistic ideas are felt like a threat to some Turkish parents, the attending mother says. She is also worried about her son’s development and disenchantment (Norwegian “utenforskap”) in class. Later, this young man was sent to Turkey to study there, and, according to his mother speaking to me on a later occasion, “he is doing much better now,” but she still finds it “difficult to know how his future possibilities will be.” When I ask what Islam means for them, male 6 answers, “Islam means that you have brothers everywhere.” Male 7 says, “I am not sure,” and male 8 maintains, “I have always been a Muslim, and I will always be a Muslim. Never change for another religion.” Male 4 states, “Islam means to pass on. That which our parents started in and with and for us. And that we are obliged to pass on to our kids after marriage. That means that in two generations, we are still Muslims. And not ‘as-if-Muslims’” (Norwegian “lissom-muslimer”). Male 9 is a mature young man and states that he never has problems with his teachers. He is concerned about opposing his friends in the youth group, but he underlines that the school teachers have always inspired him, and a few months later, he starts his university studies. These young men show that they have a close relationship to the Muslim umma (“the Islamic world-wide fellowship”), locally and transnationally. They cannot imagine belonging to any other entity. One of them is also looking into the future and is considering the importance of transmission of Islamic values from parents to children. Since some of the men have difficulties at school, they have experienced that the fellowship in the mosque can make up for some of their deficiencies at school. However, a successful young man does not find the teaching in the mosque in vain but a support for his religious belonging. Most fathers pray here, and some mothers are active when it comes to organizing bazars twice annually and when practical work is needed. The women have also their own women’s group, where experienced women are teaching the more unexperienced, and daily and spiritual matters are discussed in privacy. The youth also come to the bazars, sell food and cakes, and contribute to the mosque’s economic stability but also to the feeling of being united to the fellowship in the mosque and the Islamic umma.

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They mention no direct link to the Qur’an nor anything about reciting of the sacred texts. Although this was not an issue of our talk, I know from other encounters with them that the leaders emphasize Qur’anic Arabic teaching and thorough knowledge of certain suras and ethical standards and values, like those we got to know in the first youth group referred to above. The source for the individuals’ good “intentions” (niyya) is the sacred word found in the Qur’an, all my informants try to explain to me. The seven virtues mentioned by the Pakistani imam in the first youth group are also emphasized by the 70-year-old guest imam from Turkey, who was teaching in the young men’s group at a gathering in 2016. “Work hard, be alert, be patient,” he said. The imams did not cite any verses from the Qur’an, but obviously, the sunna of the Prophet was the background of all the virtues for daily life that they explained briefly.

Merhata, 22, and Smiley, 30 We will now investigate more in detail information from a third youth group where I have picked out two representatives from the nine persons who answered properly: one woman, “Merhata,” and one man, “Smiley.” Merhata has Uighur6 background, and Smiley comes from a Turkish family. As mentioned above, one of the Turkish mosques had helped me getting nine valuable interviews about the reading of the Qur’an and the Hadith (2018). Merhata is 22, and not born in Norway but immigrated five years ago. She has a job and has come every Sunday to this mosque since she moved to town. In her home country, she went to medrese, but she neither speaks nor reads Arabic. She prefers speaking Uighur or Turkish in the mosque but says that she reads the Qur’an in Arabic, what, however, seems to be an exaggeration. Her father has recommended some Internet pages, but she does not remember which ones. She never reads any “bad” Internet pages, she emphasizes. Sometimes, she listens to Qur’an recitations, but she has forgotten names, but the reciter comes from Pakistan, she says.7 Merheta mentions that she has recited the Qur’an for her parents in the past. Surat Yasin is her favorite sura, but she does not know it by heart.8 Nevertheless, she thinks the sura is important and it sounds very nice. Sometimes, she searches for Hadith sayings in the Internet, but she has forgotten where, but it is always in Uighur language.9 She emphasizes that she needs help to interpret the Qur’an and the Hadith, and she loves the help the mosque provides, helping her live as a Muslim. She tells her friends that she goes to this mosque, and she recommends it gladly to others. The other person I will present more profoundly is a man who is now 30 years old. He calls himself “Smiley” and has full time job. He came to Norway in 1988 as a small baby. He underlines that his siblings mean a lot to

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him. Smiley has been in the mosque since 1992, participating in the medrese, but he can only a little Arabic. The youth group is important for him, and he comes daily in the mosque to attend prayers and talk with friends. He speaks both Turkish and Norwegian there. He says that he reads in the Qur’an in all four languages (he does not say whether he reads Arabic letters or Arabic in transcription). He also finds sources in Internet; and chooses YouTube in one of the four languages he understands. I listen to Qur’an in Turkish and Arabic in Internet, Abdul Basit and Ali Tel and others. I read the Qur’an at home, but I prefer to do it alone or together with siblings and parents. I like every one of God’s words, but I read some verses more often than others. I especially like Surat Baqqara, verses 285 and 286.10

Smiley can recite it partly by heart, and he likes it, “because of different reasons at the time being.” He also reads Hadith in Internet. When bad Internet pages show up, he closes them. Now and then he needs people to give him advice, and sometimes he has someone to ask. Like Merhata, Smiley enthusiastically tells his friends that he is going to this mosque.

Summary of Results When I summarize the information from Merhata and Smiley and from the other interviews, it appears that the belonging, fellowship, and practices of all these Uighur and Turkish-Norwegian youth are connected to the sacred texts. Generally, the fellowship in the mosque is essential for all of them. (1) Turkish is the main language, spoken and read. Some with Uighur background prefer this language but understand Turkish. (2) Arabic is the sacred and symbolic language that transmits values unanticipated and more valuable than any other language, but many informants are not able to read Arabic properly, and they read transcription in Latin letters. (3) They listen to Arabic recitations by several reciters, of whom most informants do not remember their names. The sound of Arabic recitation is comforting and strengthening even if the words are not fully understood. (4) Some suras are taken as favorite texts by many informants, al-Fatiha (1), Yasin (36), Baqqara (2), verses 285 and 286, and Ikhlas (112). (5) The knowledge about the Qur’an helps to live an ethical life and to avoid temptations. It changes one’s intention, niyya, and the aims they have in life.

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Gerd Marie Ådna (6) The mosque means almost everything to some of the informants. Some come every day, others once or twice a week. Especially for the male informants, the youth group is crucial. The mosque is like a second home where both males and females meet their friends. (7) All informants recommend the mosque to their friends, but they do not tell whether these acquaintances come to the mosque by invitation. (8) One of the informants is a convert to Islam and seems to have found his new home in this mosque. Every time I come, he attends prayer and acts as if he is the gatekeeper for the whole mosque, a role that the others appreciate.

Discussion The following three dimensions developed by Manuel A. Vásquez and Kim Knott (2014) can throw light on the practices in three youth groups in a Norwegian town, presented in section 2 above (Report of Research among Muslim Youth). Vásquez and Knott construct a discussion about religious migrant fellowships in London, Kuala Lumpur, and Johannesburg, all cities much larger than the town in question. The dimensions used to describe migrant religious communities and practices are called embodied performance, the spatial management of difference and belonging, and multiple embedding across networked spaces (Knott 2010). Vásquez and Knott conclude about the role of religion and space: …we can say that religion offers multiple practices of sacralization, purification, rectification, and conversion that link physical migrations with spiritual journeys, rendering them meaningful as part of moral maps and cosmic histories of redemption, salvation, or liberation. In the process, religion builds sanctioned places in which to be. This is what Hervieu-Legér (2000) describes as the construction of spaces within shared belief systems and what Tweed (1997) calls the supralocative aspect of religion, the intertwining of human and sacred histories, as well as home and cosmos. (Vásquez & Knott 2014, 18–19)11

In this study, we have seen that Muslim youth have access to a space in the mosque—for living out their spirituality and belonging. It is an embodied space where friendships grow and the troubles from school and work can be discussed and negotiated. You are just accepted for being the person you are. It is an embodied performance when it comes to the five daily prayers even if the informants in the three groups do not perform all prayers in the mosque. Some of them do not perform five daily prayers at all. But still they confirm their Muslim belonging and identity (cf. Fadil 2017). The Turkish mosques also organize weekend and summer holiday trips to cottages in the mountains or at the sea, where the youth have plenty of time

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to share life and discuss matters of religious and life relevance. More seldom, smaller groups travel to Turkey, where encounters with places of religious and national importance are in the program. When I met with some of the young men and two of their leaders in April 2018, they showed me photographs from Istanbul and Eastern Anatolia where the sacred places of prophet Nuh (Noah) are to be found near to the mountain of Ararat (also Ådna 2014b; 2018). The journey was financed by the Turkish Ministry of Religion, Diyanet, or by a second umbrella organization, Millî Görüş (“National Vision”).12 The pride and the self-confidence of this blessing was both visible and uncontested. Creating a milieu of belonging, where religious talks can be a natural part, is one of the main goals for the adult youth leaders. They visualize a multiple embedding across networked spaces while using Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram in connecting with each other, be it in Norway or in Turkey. But even more important is the cosmic history of Mecca that has become the center for the whole Muslim community (umma) and thus symbolizes Allah’s salvation for the believers. It is nurtured by dreams about once in the future going on hajj (pilgrimage). Sometimes, the extended family members’ narratives about Mecca enrich their visions and lives (Ådna 2018). Corresponding to the findings of Vásquez and Knott (2014) about the meaning of sacred places and religious encountering and transmission of values to children and youth in another context, the Turkish mosques, the imams, and local leaders create a space for these youth that strengthen their religious identity and belonging. “In fact, temples are increasingly important as contested spaces for the construction of identity, as the children of migrants seek to negotiate their parents’ expectations and the demands of their societies of birth” (Vásquez and Knott 2014, 14). The two newly renovated mosques in town are equipped for small gatherings for all age groups. The area around the mosques or in some cases, cheaply rented communal houses (“bydelshus”), are used for big bazars, where not only Turkish people but the wider Muslim community and Christian and secular neighbors show up and enjoy gözleme (“pancakes”), meat dishes, salads, and cakes and spend the afternoon in the tents or in the space of the communal house.

The Role of Arabic Language and the Internet Arabic is only partly understood by these Turkish youth who have sometimes studied in Qur’an schools. Only a few are fluent in Arabic, and none of the informants are “one who knows the Qur’an by heart” (hafiz singular; huffaz plural). In one of the mosques there is one young man who has won a competition in Qur’an reciting (Ådna 2017). Those Muslims who have a mother

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tongue like Uighur, Turkish, or Urdu, or are Norwegian converts to Islam, say they like the sound of the Arabic Qur’an, but they prefer reading it in their mother tongue. Hence, although these mosques have several classes for children learning Qur’anic Arabic (Ådna 2013), only a few understand what they are reciting. Some Qur’an passages are, however, more familiar than others and are often memorized by heart with the help of transcriptions in Latin letters and sound tracks from the Internet. The use of Internet sources for acquiring knowledge about the Qur’an is, however, secondary in my material. The community gatherings are the main place for Qur’an recitation and discussions on Islamic matters. Social media often play an important role in keeping the community together. Facebook groups—that also are open to the public—are used to inspire members and to invite newcomers and others to events. Here, they are using verses from the Qur’an and Hadith to remind about Islamic ideals and norms. Certainly, there are also secularized Muslims who do not attend any mosque or very seldom go to prayer, even at the two main religious feasts, Eid al-adha and Eid al-fitr. Bushra Ishaq (2017) in her quantitative study on Muslims in Norway, states that 25 percent consider themselves being “non-Muslims,”13 that means that the option for leaving Islam is at hand (cf. Marselis 2013).

The Life Sustaining Capacity of the Qur’an What the Muslim hospital chaplain and counsellor, Naveed Baig from Denmark, experiences in his job seems to apply to my informants as well. He “explains how Qur’anic verses may help people in pain and suffering to find coping mechanisms and outlines how tradition and orthopraxy are present in the way religious Muslim patients cope during times of crisis.”14 My impression from the youth group, with troublesome everyday life in Norwegian schools, is that there are similar ways of coping with difficult situations as Muslim patients who are hospitalized experience. The old Turkish guest imam represented what Naveed Baig states as “signs that traditional Muslim coping ideals are expressed in ways peculiar to the individual’s personal situation during times of suffering and need and a ‘talking with God’ that defines new ways of perceiving God and the images of God.”15 My exchange with the youth was not profound enough to see the details of their “trust in God” (tawakkul), but from other observations, I would say that they are on the way to experiencing this “belief” (iman) and trust within the youth fellowship by the help of their adult imams and advisors.

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Conclusion My findings show that these three groups of young first and second generations Norwegian Muslims of Turkish origin, are closely connected to the mosque; the role of the Internet in the transmission of knowledge about the Qur’an and the Hadith is secondary. The Qur’an is the main source for all Islamic embodied practices and rituals, but Arabic knowledge is weak, and the youth do not seem to understand what they read and listen to. Arabic language is a symbol of belonging to the Islamic umma but is contested by the fact that Turkish is the dominant language. Those who are first generation adults, who arrived in Norway late in their teens, mostly speak poor Norwegian at school and work places. The language skills among the first and second generations of young adults who grew up in Norway are much better but do not suffice for all (poor pronunciation and vocabulary). Obviously, acquiring the aspired competence in Norwegian suffers from the dominance of Turkish in the mosque and in the groups of friends, but fortunately, many improve their Norwegian and are able to study at university level. They have predominantly inherited their connection to the mosque from their parents but are redefining their practices according to two slightly opposite trends of belonging, loyalty towards their parents (collectivist family structures) and indicators of individualization. My research in these three youth groups does not show strong processes of individualization, like Christine M. Jacobsen indicates in her research on intellectual young adults in Oslo (2011, 40), but my examples indicate close-knit families and networks in the mosques between Turkish and Uighur youth, imams, and leaders.

Notes 1. All studies done by this author were registered in the NSD, the Norwegian Centre for Research Data. The new and additional interviews for this article were registered but the NSD answered that it was not necessary to apply for recognition. No recording was done for these latter interviews, and all informants are anonymized. It is still a challenge that people can easily be recognized within small communities. This means that information handled in this paper, is sometimes diffuse and handled with care. 2. Kafir from the same root means “a person who does not believe in God and who is ungrateful.” 3. I wrote in my notebook during the whole session but did no recordings. 4. In this town, there are Kurds who are very conscious about their ethnic and socio-political roots. Some of them are not religious at all and define themselves as “humanists” or “socialists.” They are fed up by religion and work politically and sometimes within Kurdish political party structures. Others have a vague belonging to their Kurdish identity; some have spoken Kurdish since their birth; others understand Kurdish but

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do not speak. Some of them are closely united to one of the Turkish mosques, and to my knowledge, there are seldom conflicts about Kurdish-Turkish issues in the two mosques I attend. 5. Grades 8 through 10 is called “ungdomsskolen” and is obligatory for all. Grades 11 through 13 is called “videregående skole” and is not obligatory and offers different emphases like handicrafts, art and music, and more theoretical issues of humanities and science that become preparatory for university studies. The issue of religion and ethics is taught in most schools but less in the classes with handicraft and art. 6. There are about 100 individuals with an Uighur belonging living around of the town where the research for this article was performed. Some came as early as 2000, others in 2007, and some in 2018 due to severe persecution by the Chinese national leaders of “East-Turkystan” that is five times the size of France. Early 2019, they started to establish cultural gatherings with food and information about their country and the political situation. Most of them are Muslims, and some go regularly to one of the Turkish mosques. (Information given to me by an Uighur woman in her twenties, January 2019). 7. This is quite special since most of the reciters’ pronunciation is colored by their mother tongue, and a Pakistani reciter will probably be colored by Urdu or Punjabi pronunciation. Seldom, I meet Muslims from Turkey who love reciters with a different pronunciation than the Turkish. The Malay reciters are often preferred by many language groups. This is no official teaching about reciting about the Qur’an, but my impression from 25 years observation and from today’s YouTube recitations. 8. Surat Yasin is the 36th sura and has 83 verses, the third and fourth verses begin, “Indeed you, [O Muhammad], are from among the messengers, On a straight path,” and it ends with, “So exalted is He in whose hand is the realm of all things, and to Him you will be returned.” See https://quran.com/36 (accessed January 20, 2019). 9. Even if the Qur’an is always recited in Arabic, the Hadith exists in many translations— also in Uighur—even if Hadith is originally transmitted in oral and written Arabic. 10. Surat Baqqara is the second sura, verses 285 and 286: “The Messenger has believed in what was revealed to him from his Lord, and [so have] the believers. All of them have believed in Allah and His angels and His books and His messengers, [saying], ‘We make no distinction between any of His messengers.’ And they say, ‘We hear and we obey. [We seek] Your forgiveness, our Lord, and to You is the [final] destination.’” See https://quran.com/2/285–286 (accessed January 19, 2019) 11. The references in the quoted text are to: Danièle Hervieu-Léger, Religion as a Chain of Memory (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 2000); Thomas A. Tweed, Retelling U.S. Religious History (Berkeley & Los Angeles: Berkeley University Press, 1997). 12. https://ismg.no/ (accessed February 19, 2019; Millî Görüş’ home page partly published in Norwegian). Diyanet in Norway publishes mostly in Turkish, like their member organization in Drammen; cf. http://www.diyanetdrammen.com/ (accessed February 19, 2019). 13. No similar study is undertaken about people with Muslim background in the county where this town is situated. 14. Transformative Readings of Sacred Scriptures 2017, 12. 15. Transformative Readings 2017, 12.

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Bibliography Ådna, Gerd Marie. 2013. “Rollemodeller blant muslimer i Stavanger.” Kirke og Kultur 118 (2): 202–14. ———. 2014a. “The Reception of Islamic Prophet Stories within Muslim Communities in Norway and Germany.” In Islamic Myths and Memories: Mediators of Globalization, edited by Itzchak Weismann, Mark Sedgwick, and Ulrika Mårtensson, 209–32. Farnham & Burlington: Ashgate. ———. 2014b. Muhammad and the Formation of Sacrifice. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang Academic Research. ———. 2015. “Troende, trøstende og kanskje tvilende—transnasjonal muslimsk hverdag.” In Levende religion: Globalt perspektiv—lokal praksis, edited by Anne Kalvig and Anna Rebecca Solevåg, 132–53. Stavanger: Hertevik. ———. 2017. “En rose for Profeten—religion og transnasjonale artefakter i Stavanger.” [A Rose for the Prophet—Religion and Transnational Artefacts in Stavanger]. CHAOS —Skandinavisk Tidsskrift for Religionshistoriske Studier 67: 159–84. ———. 2018. “‘Endelig var jeg hjemme.’ Transformative hajj-fortellinger fra Rogaland og Mekka.” [Home at last. Transformative hajj narratives from Rogaland and Mecca.] DIN 1: 11–34. Baig, Naveed. 2017. “Images of God in Crisis Situations.” In Transformative Readings of Sacred Scriptures. Christians and Muslims in Dialogue, edited by Simone Sinn, Dina El Omari & Anne Hege Grung, 133–41. LWF Documentation 62, Geneva: The Lutheran World Federation. Døving, Cora Alexa. 2012. “Pressens mørkemenn/troens tjenere—posisjon og selvforståelse blant sunni-muslimske imamer. [The Position and Self-understanding of Sunni Muslim Imams].” In Religiøse ledere: makt og avmakt i norske trossamfunn, edited by Cora Alexa Døving and Berit Thorbjørnsrud, 26–46. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget. Fadil, Nadia. 2017. “Recalling the ‘Islam of the Parents’ Liberal and Secular Muslims Redefining the Contours of Religious Authenticity.” Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power 24 (1): 82–99. Farstad, Mona Helen. 2013. “Lyden av Guds ord: Koranresitasjon som estetisk virksomhet og erfaring. [The Sound of God’s Word: Qur’an Recitation as Esthetical Practice and Experience].” In Religion i skrift. Mellom mystikk og materialitet, edited by Ingvild S. Gilhus & Lisbeth Mikaelsson, 110–32. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget. Jacobsen, Christine M. 2011. Islamic Traditions and Muslim Youth in Norway. Leiden & Boston: Brill. Knott, Kim. 2010. “Space and Movement.” In Diasporas: Concepts, Intersections, Identities, edited by Kim Knott & Seán McLoughlin, 79–83. London & New York: Zed Books. Marselis, Randi. 2013. “Migrant Life Stories and the Web: The Experience of Having Your Life Story Made Public.” Social Semiotics 23 (3): 368–84.

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McLoughlin, Seán. 2010. “Religion and Diaspora.” In The Routledge Companion to the Study of Religion, 2nd. ed., edited by John R. Hinnells, 558–80. London & New York: Routledge. Manuel A. Vásquez and Kim Knott. 2014. “Three Dimensions of Religious Place Making in Diaspora.” Global Networks 14 (3): 326–47. Transformative Readings of Sacred Scriptures: Christians and Muslims in Dialogue. 2017. Edited by Simone Sinn, Dina El Omari & Anne Hege Grung. LWF Documentation 62, Geneva: The Lutheran World Federation. https://www.lutheranworld.org/sites/default/ files/2017/transformative_readings_of_sacred_scriptures-en.pdf. Accessed July 13, 2018.

7. The Multifaceted Scripture: Patterns, Conflicts, and Ambiguities in Muslim Ways of Relating to the Qur’an Jonas Svensson

Introduction Take good care of the Qur’an. Look at how it is! [the student points to the classroom copy of a paperback English translation of the Qur’an]. The pages are falling out. Take good care of it. It is the word of God, and it is dirty! You will be held responsible if you do not look after the Qur’an.

The words belong to the chairperson of the Islamic club at a girls’ high school in Kenya. Why, indeed, did the girls let the classroom copy of the holy book get dirty? According to what we scholars in the study of religions think we know about Muslim religious beliefs and practices, they should not have. They all knew that it was not allowed, that the Qur’an—according to established tradition— should always be treated with respect, always be placed on top of other books, not be allowed to come into contact with polluting substances, etc. Still… Were these naughty girls and bad Muslims? In the present article, I will argue no. I will, instead, claim that they acted as quite ordinary human beings. This particular consideration carries a long way both in providing an explanation for this particular incident and also in explaining general features of Muslim perceptions and practices towards the Qur’an as written text in history and in the contemporary world.

Theoretical Foundation The diverse ways in which believing Muslims relate to the Qur’an as a sacred scripture is well mapped in previous research (see e.g., Ayoub 1987; Cornell

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1995; Meri 2001; Suit 2013; Svensson 2010). Less well mapped, however, is how beliefs and practices among Muslims in this context compare with attitudes among believers in other religious traditions towards their foundational texts. More recently, however, there have been some changes in this respect. In the introductory chapter to the edited volume Iconic books and texts (2013), that brings together scholars with expertise in diverse religious traditions, study of religions scholar, James Watts, makes a theoretical distinction between three dimensions in ways believers relate to their sacred scriptures. One dimension is the semantic. Scriptures here are used as sources for information, e.g., on dogma or norms. The underlying assumption is that superhuman agents or forces use scripture for communication with human beings. The second dimension is the performative. This refers to instances when sacred scriptures form part of ritual practice—either as scripts regulating performance or as part of that performance—for example, in recitation. The third dimension, lastly, Watts terms iconic. This covers “the rest,” that is, scriptures in the form of material objects being revered or protected, or scriptures—or part thereof—being used as sources of divine power, as talismans, or as props in public displays with claims to authority (Watts 2013b). Watts’ theoretical distinction aims at describing and naming patterns based on cross-cultural and cross-religious observations. The categorization of beliefs and behavior into three dimensions is not, however, in itself an explanation of how and why these patterns have emerged and stabilized culturally. In this sense, there is ample room for further elaboration. The present article is an attempt at such an elaboration. If, indeed, there are cross-cultural or cross-religious patterns in ways that believers relate to sacred scriptures, it would appear to be at least academically legitimate to search for explanations that transcend cultural—including religious—particularities. In the following, I will take as a starting point a limited set of pan-human psychological abilities, biases, and proclivities that have been proposed in previous research and that have been objects of empirical research. The approach is inspired an “epidemiology of representations,” introduced by anthropologist Dan Sperber. Sperber has called for an increased attention among fellow researchers on culture on basic human psychological abilities, biases, and proclivities which, according to him, constitute cognitive or more generally psychological “micro factors” that—in combination and interaction with societal, cultural, and environmental “macro factors”—can explain the spread and establishment of beliefs and practices in diverse cultural settings (Sperber 1996, 56–76).

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In pursuing this approach, I will focus here on Muslim beliefs and practices concerning the Qur’an that falls within to two of Watts’ three dimensions: the semantic and the iconic. The suggestion is, thus, that a theoretical elaboration on some Sperberian micro factors provides both support for Watts’ claim that his dimensions constitute cross-culturally recurring patterns and also has a potential to contribute to further distinctions within these dimensions.

Mentalizing the Divine It is a generally held view among believing Muslims that the Qur’anic text is authoritative divine speech, in the literal sense. According to the standard account, the Qur’anic text was revealed to the Prophet Muhammad over the course of 22 years, starting around the year 610 with the first revelation on mount Hira, and ending with his death in 632. For the most part, the angel Gabriel (Jibril) served as an intermediate in delivering, God’s (Allah’s) final message to humankind. This notion of a divinely revealed message falls within Watts’ semantic dimension. Through reading and interpreting the Qur’an, humans can learn about the will of God, but also receive information about the cosmos and about history. Behind this view lies an important assumption: that of the existence of a superhuman—but invisible—agent, God, with a mind—an “inner world” (Gärdenfors 2004, 238)—of knowledge, desires, intentions, and motives. Within the semantic dimension, it is this inner world of the godhead that is the actual focus of interest; the text is merely a medium through which God speaks his mind. The ability among humans, and probably some other species, to form beliefs or mental representations of other people’s inner worlds of beliefs, knowledge, intentions, desires, and motives is often referred to as a “theory of mind” (Baron-Cohen 1995; Premack and Woodruff 1978; Sodian and Kristen 2010). We can never directly observe the content of the inner worlds of others. We have to infer it from their behavior, from what they say or do, their body postures, or their facial expressions. Alternative designations for theory of mind are “mentalization” or “mind-reading.” In the following, I opt for “mentalization.” It appears as if humans share the ability to mentalize with other animal species. However, it is nowhere as advanced as among Homo sapiens. It is an ability that is closely tied up with social interaction and, not least, strategic social planning, or “Machiavellian intelligence” (de Waal and Morris 1982). In this intelligence, the ability to form beliefs about the inner worlds

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of persons not immediately present is particularly important. Even if individual X is not present at this moment, I can form beliefs about her inner world and plan for my future interaction with her on the basis of these beliefs. While being useful in social interaction, which is probably why it has developed in the first place, this ability is also a prerequisite for forming beliefs about invisible superhuman agents with minds of their own: gods, demons, ghosts, and ancestors. Thus, the semantic dimension is dependent upon certain key aspects of human mentalization abilities. While mentalization is a complicated psychological process, it comes naturally to most humans, and it makes the belief in the Qur’an as revelation from God intelligible, even to those who do not believe in that God. What, then, is the academic benefit of considering mentalization as a psychological process in exploring the semantic dimension of the Qur’an? I claim that research into the details of how this ability works in humans, which is extensive, can contribute with new insights into peculiarities in this dimension. I here limit myself to one example. In an article from 2004, anthropologist Maurice Bloch differentiates between two ways in which human beings mentally process social information, i.e., information gathered from others. Some information is accepted at face value and allowed to directly influence decision making and behavior. Other information becomes the object of further mental processing directly connected to the mentalization ability. In assessing the value of the information in this latter case, the recipient creates a model of the inner world of the sender, and then the recipient uses that model, rather than the actual content of the information, as a basis for decisions and actions. In the first case, the recipient defers to the information, without further considering the intentions, beliefs, and desires of the sender. In the second case, the recipient uses the information received, together with other cues, to infer something about the inner world of the sender. In everyday social interaction, human beings alternate between these two options, depending on a diversity of factors, including the nature of the information, the authority invested in the source of information, and whatever issue the information pertains to (Bloch 2004, 69–71). With Bloch’s general observation as the starting point, I have elsewhere (Svensson 2015, 143–49) suggested that in the history of Islamic thought pertaining to the interpretation of the divine will, one finds two recurring attitudes: deferentialism and inferentialism. The deferentialist attitude would correspond roughly to taking the literal wording of scriptures at face value, with little or no considerations regarding underlying divine intentions behind this wording. The inferentialist attitude, on the other hand, involves approaching the text while searching for cues to such intentions.

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The difference is visible in contemporary intra-Muslim discourses on how the text of the Qur’an should be understood, interpreted, and acted upon. The deferentialist attitude is most clearly represented by the current trend often referred to as Salafist (Meijer 2009). In theory, if not always in practice, Salafis reject attempts at interpreting the text of the Qur’an (and other sources) with recourse to simulations of the mind God and his underlying intentions (Duderija 2011). Obedience and deference to the text is a virtue. On the other hand, other participants in the contemporary intra-Muslim discourse claim, frequently in opposition to Salafi principles of tafsir, that in order to apply the norms contained in the Qur’an to the contemporary world, one must uncover the “spirit” or underlying “Weltanschauung” of the text, which is what should be the basis for constructing relevant norms and beliefs.1 This conflict between different approaches to Qur’an interpretation is well known to anyone studying contemporary intra-Muslim religious discourse. My claim, however, is that this conflict is by no means new. It is observable throughout Islamic history, and it is a direct consequence of the two ways in which humans in general process social information. Historical examples of a deferentialist attitude include for example the now extinct Zahiri school of law (Adang 2006). This school stressed strict literalism and rejected the notion within other schools of law that the Qur’anic text should serve as a source for uncovering divine intent, which should be the real foundation for norms and regulations (Weiss 1998, 38–65 ). A more concrete example would be legal discussions on the prohibition of wine contained in the Qur’an. The dominant view among scholars, mirroring an inferentialist attitude, has been that this is a prohibition on any kind of alcohol (and at times any drug), since God’s intention behind the ban was to prevent intoxication. Still, some scholars (e.g., in the Hanafi school of law) have pointed out that the ban in the Qur’an only refers to the liquid khamr, and thus the ban should be seen as covering only that particular substance (Kueny 2019). It is important to stress that I am here not suggesting that deferentialism and inferentialism in relation to the Qur’an are necessarily tied to particular groups or movements. Rather, I claim that individual interpreters, pondering particular topics or problems, may very well shift between the attitudes, just as humans do in everyday social interaction. This is the main point of the distinction. The attitudes of deferentialism and inferentialism are not features peculiar to Qur’an interpretation. They are general features in human thinking that when applied to the Qur’an, and perhaps any sacred scripture, contribute to the spread and establishment, on a cultural level, of particular interpretation approaches that can be said to form part of the semantic dimension.

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Protecting and Revering the Qur’an The semantic dimension of the Qur’an harbors beliefs and behaviors connected to the text as a medium for transmission of information. The iconic dimension, instead, concerns beliefs and behaviors related to the text as a material, physical object: as a codex, mushaf, or as textual excerpts. Throughout Islamic history, a set of diverse rules and regulations on how to handle such material manifestations of the text have developed. These norms form part of a larger tradition of adab al-Qur’an, or “etiquette (or good manners) of the Qur’an” (al-Nawawi 2003). These norms are often detailed. Hence, the codex should, for example, always be kept on top of other books, never underneath them. It is forbidden to use a mushaf as a pillow, to lick one’s fingers in order to turn the pages, etc. Most notable, however, is the demand for those handling it to be in a state of ritual purity, tahara, and, in general, that care should be taken so that the codex does not come into contact with polluting substances, persons, or objects. These precautions are often theologically motivated with reference to verses 56:77–79: “This is indeed a Qur’an most honourable. In a book [kitab] well-guarded, which none shall touch but those who are clean [mutahhirun].” Not all scholars, however, agree that the reference here is to human beings and “earthly Qur’ans.” Some claim that it is to angels being “the pure” and the book being the heavenly prototype, the “mother of the book,” umm al-qur’an (Meri 2001; Suit 2013; Svensson 2010). Nevertheless, there is a general norm that even “earthly Qur’ans” should be protected from contact with impurity. Here, again, there is a possibility to relate specific beliefs and practices regarding the Qur’an to pan-human proclivities and biases.2 The “psychology of disgust” is an area within which there has been plenty of research since the early 1990, spearheaded by psychologists Paul Rozin and associates (Kelly 2011; Nemeroff and Rozin 1994; Rozin and Fallon 1987; Rozin, Haidt, and McCauley 2008; Rozin, Millman, and Nemeroff 1986). An important focus of this study has been intuitive notions among humans of principles of contagion. Human beings faced with the prospect of coming into bodily contact with certain objects or substances experience strong emotions of disgust, anxiety, and display behavioral pattern of avoidance. Previous research has identified recurring structural similarities in implicit beliefs about contamination and contagion. It is the real or imagined physical contact with the object that is at the core. Something invisible, some “stuff,” is transmitted through contact, intentional or not, however brief. The contamination is, furthermore, total. There is no notion of a “safe dose” (Boyer 2001, 136–37). It is important to note that while the system of contagion avoidance and how it

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operates may be general, the substances and objects that serve as the original sources of pollution vary cross-culturally and also between individuals. Still, some appear more frequent than others in crosscultural studies. Among these are blood (not least, menstrual blood), sexual fluids, vomit, saliva, pus, feces, and urine (Curtis and Biran 2001; Curtis 2007). All of these are substances that—according to classical Islamic thought—should not, directly or indirectly, be allowed to come into contact with a mushaf. These sources of contamination are complemented by more culturally specific ones such as pigs, dogs and infidels. It is possible to view norms on how to protect a mushaf from contact with such sources of contamination as specific Islamic cultural exploitation of a more basic system of contagion avoidance. Such a perspective is revealing. The substances that potentially could pollute the Qur’an are the same that could potentially pollute a human being (Katz 2002). This indicates a particular, implicit conceptualization of physical copies of the Qur’anic text that I have explored at length elsewhere (Svensson, forthcoming): the mushaf as a person, or rather, as an individual belonging to a particular group of persons. Watts has noted something similar in his exploration of the iconic dimension of sacred scriptures. These, at times, acquire “personas more like people than like books” (Watts 2013b, 25). There are other elements within the tradition of “etiquette of the Qur’an” that point in the same direction. Believers should treat copies of the text should be with respect and reverence. In some traditions, kissing the mushaf is encouraged, as is adorning, beautifying, and perfuming it. The clearest example of this personification of the scripture is, perhaps, the discourse on how to dispose of worn out copies that are no longer fit for use. The most commonly preferred way is to respectfully burying it in a manner analogous to the burial of a human being (Svensson 2010). Elsewhere (Svensson 2017) I have explored this phenomenon of (partial) personification of copies of the Qur’anic text, and I suggested a connection to a more general process of sacralization of objects. The way in which most Muslims view copies of the text as in need of protection and as worthy of reverence display similarities not only with the way in which religious scriptures are treated in other religious traditions (see e.g., Myrvold 2010; Watts 2013a), but also, with how human beings generally relate to any object they considered sacred in the Durkheimian sense of being “set apart and forbidden.” I have claimed that a possible explanation to this phenomenon relates to a process of identifying an object as unique and set apart from other objects in the same category, or what religious studies scholar, Ann Taves, refers to as “singularization” (Taves 2013). In this process, human beings employ the possibly species-exclusive capacity for “conceptual blending” (Fauconnier and

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Turner 2002; Turner 2014). This is the process when humans new concepts through the blending of concepts that are already present in their minds. In this case, there is a blend between the concept of a physical object and the concept of a “person,” with the main characteristic of individual uniqueness. This results in a blended concept of a physical object with individual uniqueness, special, and “set apart” from other objects belonging to the same category of objects. A by-product of this process is that other aspects of the concept of a “person” besides individual uniqueness are transferred into the blend, among those, the notion of the sacred object being a potential target for pollution. I will not elaborate further on the details of sacralization as partial personification here. The point is to substantiate the claim that connecting specific Muslim beliefs and practices concerning how to relate to copies of the Qur’an as physical object to a wider theoretical framework can be beneficial. It provides the possibility here to make more fine-tuned distinctions within Watts’ iconic dimension. Certain beliefs and practices can be further grouped together as a sub-category: norms and practices that results from a partial personification of the scripture. Such would include not only norms on protection from pollution, but also ways of interacting with the text that are structurally similar to norms and emotions that one finds in human social interaction, for example, respect, love, and adoration, and corresponding appropriate behavior.

The Contagious Power of the Text It is commonly held among Muslims that the Qur’an, as a codex as well as excerpts of the text, contains “blessings,” baraka. Baraka is here understood as a substance-like force of divine origin, attached to objects, places, persons, events, and natural phenomena, that can affect human beings and bring them fortune and well-being in this world. Most importantly here, it is a substance that can be transmitted through physical contact with objects, persons, or places that harbor it (Colin 2019). There are abundant examples in history and contemporary times of therapeutic and talismanic use of Qur’anic texts. Verses from the Qur’an may be written on a piece of paper, which is then immersed in water in order to dissolve the ink. This, purportedly, turns the water into a powerful potion. Qur’anic verses are also written on amulets, embroidered onto clothes, used as decoration on dinner plates or cups. The latter transmits baraka to drinks and foodstuffs. Perceived results of such contact with and ingestion of the text are, for example, health, luck, protection, and general well-being (Meri 2001; Wilkens 2013; Zadeh 2009).

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There is a distinct similarity here with certain beliefs and practices discussed in the previous section: the notion of contagion through physical contact and, particularly, ingestion, which has been shown to be the most anxiety provoking action in the context of contagion avoidance (Kelly 2011, 17). However, there is an important difference. While norms concerning proper handling of a mushaf consider sources of potential pollution with the Qur’an as a potential victim of contamination, practices and beliefs relating to the text as a carrier of Baraka rests upon the notion of the text as a source of positive contagion. There is an inversion of value. Research on human implicit thinking concerning contagion cited above has, to a large extent, focused on disgust and avoidance behavior and one commonplace hypothesis is that a “contagion avoidance system” has evolved because it has offered a means of avoiding transmission of diseases. A less refined “behavioral immune system” exists in other species, indicating a long evolutionary history (Schaller and Park 2011). In the case of humans, however, the implicit thinking concerning contagion extends into the domains of morality. Experiments demonstrate a reluctance among participants of coming into contact with objects claimed having previously been in contact with morally blameworthy persons. One of the more famous experiments showed unease with the thought of wearing a sweater that had belonged to Adolf Hitler. The experiment also revealed that while the moral “pollution” of the sweater could not (in the participants implicit thinking) be removed through activities of cleaning or reknitting, it could be removed if the shirt was worn by someone they considered morally praiseworthy, in this particular case, Mother Theresa (Nemeroff and Rozin 1994; Rozin, Lowery, and Ebert 1994). The phenomenon of humans being considered sources of positive moral contagion, directly or indirectly, through objects that have been touched by them or having been parts of them (bodily remains), is of course well known in the study of religions. Most conspicuously, perhaps, is the phenomenon of relics. However, this phenomenon of positive contagion is by no means limited to religious contexts. Research on so-called “celebrity memorabilia,” i.e., the desirability of objects that have belonged to famous and often admired persons, demonstrates that the phenomenon relates to implicit notions of contagion and transfer of invisible substances (Newman, Diesendruck, and Bloom 2011). The desire of, for example, a Elvis Presley fan to own a pair of The King’s underwear can best be explained as a result of an implicit understanding that the piece of cloth, due to it having been in contact with Elvis, has been imbued with some unspecified “elvisness.” Other experiments have shown that implicit beliefs in the transmission of “something” from person to object,

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and further on, to other persons, may also have real measurable effects in terms of performance (Kramer and Block 2014; Lee et al. 2011). Psychologist Paul Bloom has discussed the possible mechanisms behind this form of person to person positive and negative contagion via physical objects. He postulates that humans, in identifying others as unique individuals, form the implicit belief these individuals possess unique “life force essences” (Bloom 2010, 18–22). In this, Bloom relies on the large body of research on a human proclivity for applying a thought heuristic of “psychological essentialism,” particularly in the field of categorization (Gelman 2003; Haslam, Holland, and Karasawa 2013; Medin and Ortony 1989). This research indicates that when humans sort objects in the surrounding world into categories, perceptual cues —such as appearance– play a role. More important, however—especially in the biological and social domains—is that individual exemplars are conceived of as belonging to a particular category because they share an invisible “something” with other members of that category. This thinking has been shown to extend also to, for example, social groups, and artefacts (Gelman 2013; Gelman and Hirschfeld 1999; Howell, Weikum, and Dyck 2011) Bloom’s “life force essentialism,” however, operates somewhat differently from category essentialism. It is not used to sort individual exemplars into categories, but rather, to conceptualize individual uniqueness and stability over time. The thinking makes it possible for humans to conceive of an individual (including themselves) as different from all other individuals, and also as remaining “the same” despite obvious change in appearance over time, from birth to old age. For the issue at hand here, however, there is a more important difference, according to Bloom, between life force essentialism and category essentialism. The former is contagious. It can be transmitted through contact. Elsewhere (Svensson 2018), I have suggested a possible evolutionary trajectory for the development of the notion of a contagious life force essence based on prestige psychology research and the extraordinary human ability for social learning. I will not iterate the whole argument here, but the main idea is that a proclivity to implicitly understand the individual essence of a person as transmittable through contact could have evolved as a human psychological trait, because the quest for physical proximity to a successful and admired individual increases the probability of successful social learning from that individual, and hence, increases the fitness of the seeker. Whether or not this particular suggestion is correct, it is enough for the current argument to postulate, following Bloom, that notions of a contagious life force essence is a common feature of human psychology. This forms a basis for understanding how the notion of the contagious baraka of the Qur’an could emerge and become culturally established.

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Belief in Qur’anic baraka is merely a cultural articulation of the implicit belief in a transmittable life force essence. It is possible to view the source of baraka in two ways. One connects to the discussion above on the personification of individual copies of the Qur’an. These, like human beings, can carry life force essence that is transmittable through contact. It is also possible to view baraka as connected to the godhead, as the life force essence of the superhuman agent, God. The Qur’anic text, conceived of as the speech of God, has once been part of him, and as such, harbors part of his life force, whether contained inside a mushaf or appearing outside of it in the form of an excerpt.

Dimensions in Conflict So far, the main point of this article has been to show that considerations of existing research on pan-human abilities, proclivities, and biases can enrichen the study of specific Muslim beliefs and practices relating to the Qur’an and provide additional support for claims of recurring structural features in those beliefs and practices. However, this perspective also has a prospect of contributing with something more novel. According to the dominant view within the study of the human mind, much of what takes place in terms of information processing is unconscious (Evans 2003), and it is handled by what the Nobel Prize laureate, Daniel Kahneman, has referred to as “System 1 thinking” (Kahneman 2011), fast, intuitive and rule based. In line with this, there is the notion that this fast and intuitive system is handled by a set of “functionally specialized systems” (Barrett and Kurzban 2006, 629) that operate more or less independently from one another. Such a model of how the human mind works can shed some further light on ways in which believing Muslims relate to the Qur’an within Watts’ dimensions. It is possible to view the three clusters of beliefs and practices that have been noted above as the result of output of three distinct and specialized systems, which can be termed a mentalization system, a contagion avoidance system, and a contagion aspiration system respectively. If these are, indeed, more or less independent from one another, one can expect that they would deliver different outputs from the same input (i.e., the Qur’anic text), resulting in contradictions and ambiguities. Translations of the Qur’an into other languages that the original Arabic, and the way in which believes relate to these translations may serve as an exemplification. Albeit far from an uncontroversial practice, translations of

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the Qur’an have been made throughout the history of Islam, and translations have increased enormously during the last century (Bobzin 2019). Starting with the semantic dimension, it is an oft-repeated claim that the Qur’anic text cannot be understood properly except in its original Arabic language. This is the main reason why translations carry titles such as The Message of the Holy Qur’an or The Qur’an Interpreted. In practice, however, it is clear that in a wider intra-Muslim religious discourse—which is more often than not carried out in other languages than Arabic—quotations from the text, for example in support of particular arguments, will be taken from translations. This is understandable. Such a use of the Qur’an pertains to the semantic dimension, employing mentalization. The meaning of the text is connected to the inner world of its perceived sender, God. The medium, in terms of language, becomes secondary. Hence, in the functionally specialized system of mentalization, translations are, in practice, equivalent to Qur’an’s in the original Arabic, perhaps particularly so when approached from an inferentialist standpoint. This (relative) equivalence between translations and Qur’ans in the original Arabic is not present when considering beliefs and practices related to the Qur’an as a source of positive baraka. As far as I am aware, there are no practices where Muslims use translated Qur’anic texts as ingredients in potions, as parts of amulets, or embroidered on clothes. This becomes understandable if such practices, and their underlying beliefs, are the result of outputs from the “contagion aspiration system,” Unlike the Arabic text, there is no direct connection with the godhead, and hence, no activation of the notion of “positive contagion.” In between, there is the output from the “contagion avoidance system.” Here, ambiguities emerge. How is one to relate to translations as physical objects? Which, if any, regulations of protection, respect, and adoration apply to them? These are topics that are the object of reflection among religious scholars, often as a result of direct questions posed by believers asking for “opinions” or fatwas on the issue.3 The responses vary. Some scholars will claim that translations merit the same treatment as originals. Others will claim that there are no regulations concerning handling them at all. Still other opinions fall in between, claiming that some rules apply while others do not. The ambiguities are understandable from the perspective I apply here. On the one hand, translations may have the same physical form and approximate semantic content as Arabic Qur’ans. They are delimited objects that could easily become “personified,” resulting in sacralization. On the other hand, words they contain are not in the same linguistic medium, which makes translations different. A translation of the Qur’an is a Qur’an in some respects (when

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focus is on the semantic dimension), but not a Qur’an in others (when focus is on it as potential carrier of contagious baraka). Apparent contradictory beliefs and practices can be understood in a similar way as a result of the workings of mostly independent functionally specialized systems. These conflicts are not necessarily conceived of as such in everyday life human–Qur’an interaction. They, however, become evident when they are made the object of conscious reflection. One can note this particularly in discussions on when, exactly, the regulations on protecting the Qur’an from contact with impurities, and in general on treating the Qur’an with respect, apply. Many scholars will insist that these regulations are directly related to the text as the word of God, and hence, apply to any part of the Qur’an being reproduced in any context. Above, however, it has been suggested that these practices of protection and respect—on a level of implicit, intuitive thought— is intimately connected to the scripture as a book, that is, a physical object. Everyday use of the Qur’anic text, contemporary and historical, would appear to support this latter suggestion. A cup or plate adorned with Qur’anic verses is difficult to protect from contact with saliva. A verse dissolved in water and ingested as medicine will inevitably come into contact with impurities in the digestive system. A necklace featuring the protective sura an-nas (114) will be in contact with a human in a state of ritual impurity or carried into places of impurity (such as the bathroom), as will amulets in the form of miniature Qur’ans (Svensson, in press). Religious scholars have noted this and have shunned some of these practices with reference to norms on protecting the Qur’an (Zadeh 2009). Still, the practices endure. From the perspective adopted in here, this makes sense. It is not that those individuals using copies of the Qur’an or excerpts from the Qur’anic text as sources of power or talismans are unaware of or consciously disregard norms of protecting the mushaf. It is just that in these particular practices, the functionally specialized system of “contagion aspiration” is the main one employed, overriding the system of “contagion avoidance.” This brings me back to the example in the introduction. Why did the girls at the Islamic Club meeting let the Qur’an get torn and dirty? One answer would be that since it was a translation, no one bothered with the regulations on purity. But that does not explain the sudden reaction of the chairperson, and why her accusation against the other students was not met with protests but, rather, with embarrassed silence. The suggestion here is that context is the key. The copy in question was used primarily in teaching, where its semantic content was sifted for meaning and the focus was on interpretation. The functionally specialized system mostly in force was that of mentalization. This use could have primed the students in

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the direction of employing this system at the expense of the others. This leads to an experimentally testable hypothesis that is possible to pursue in future research: The more stress that is put on the semantic dimension of the text in a given context, then the less concern there is for purity rules in handling, or the baraka of the text. —and conversely. In socio-cultural contexts or particular situations where the Qur’an’s role as a source for information on the divine will is less of an immediate concern (due to, for example illiteracy, lack of translations into the vernacular or low level of education), uses of the scripture connected to contagion (positive and negative) will come to the fore.

Conclusion Above, I have argued that within the study of the diverse ways in which Muslims conceptualize and relate to the Qur’an as a sacred text, and also of how these ways have stabilized as cultural beliefs and practices, there is room for a theoretical elaboration that takes into consideration contemporary research on the ways in which the human mind, in a general and wide sense, works. Such an elaboration could expand the study beyond the undoubtedly important work of description and systematization, and connect it to a wider scholarly discourse. The basic notion behind James Watts’ dimensions, which I have used as a recurring reference point in this article, is that there is diversity in beliefs and practices concerning sacred scriptures. This is clearly the case of Muslim beliefs and practices related to the Qur’an, where one also, as noted above, can see conflicts and ambiguities. This is not surprising. Given that human beings are complex creatures, with even more complex minds and that much of everyday thinking and behavior is regulated less by conscious reflection than by rather autonomous systems of information processing, we should not expect to find, or even attempt at constructing, any one systematic, logically consistent “Muslim view on the Qur’an.” Albeit the main argument for the approach adopted in this article is academic, it is also justifiable from another perspective. It may contribute to de-exotify Muslim beliefs and practices. A Muslim’s literalist reading of the Qur’an is no stranger than a literalist reading of an instruction manual for the installation of an electronic appliance. I both cases, a deferential attitude to the information contained in the script is employed, without much attention paid to the authors “inner world.” The notion that the Qur’an must be kept from coming into contact with impure substances rests upon same basic mental operations that make some people upset when a national flag, or anything they hold sacred, is defiled. There is an underlying principle that

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unites a Muslim drinking “Qur’an enriched” water and a devoted soccer fan’s promise never again to wash her hand after having shaken that of one of her favorite player. Highlighting such structural similarities and searching for their roots in a shared human nature, is, according to the present author, a basic enterprise within the humanistic academic study of religions.

Notes 1. For a book-length argument for this approach, against literalism, see (Saeed 2006). 2. This holds true also for attitudes towards sacred texts, and indeed sacred objects, in other religious traditions. For comparative studies, see e.g., Watts 2013a; Myrvold 2010. 3. For anyone interested in such fatwas, there are a multitude available on the Internet. For just one example of a collection, see http://www.islamweb.net/emainpage/index. php?page=fatwa&tab=1&vPart=290

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Cornell, Vincent J. 1995. “Qur’an: The Qur’an as Scripture.” In The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Modern Islamic World, edited by John L. Esposito, 387–94. New York: Oxford University Press. Curtis, Valerie A. 2007. “Dirt, Disgust and Disease: A Natural History of Hygiene.” Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health 61 (8): 660–64. Curtis, Valerie, and Adam Biran. 2001. “Dirt, Disgust, and Disease: Is Hygiene in Our Genes?” Perspectives in Biology and Medicine 44 (1): 17–31. de Waal, Frans, and Desmond Morris. 1982. Chimpanzee Politics: Power and Sex Among Apes. London: Cape. Duderija, Adis. 2011. “Neo-Traditional Salafi Qur’an-Sunna Hermeneutics and Its Interpretational Implications.” Religion Compass 5 (7): 314–25. Evans, Jonathan. 2003. “In Two Minds: Dual-Process Accounts of Reasoning.” Trends in Cognitive Sciences 7 (10): 454–59. Fauconnier, Gilles, and Mark Turner. 2002. The Way We Think: Conceptual Blending and the Mind’s Hidden Complexities. New York: Basic Books. Gade, Anna M. 2009. “Recitation.” In The Blackwell Companion to the Qur’an, edited by Andrew Rippin, 481–93. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell. Gelman, Susan A. 2003. The Essential Child: Origins of Essentialism in Everyday Thought. New York: Oxford University Press. ———. 2013. “Artifacts and Essentialism.” Review of Philosophy and Psychology 4 (3): 449–63. Gelman, Susan A., and Lawrence A. Hirschfeld. 1999. “How Biological Is Essentialism.” In Folk Biology, edited by Douglas L. Medin and Scott Atran, 403–46. Cambridge: The MIT Press. Gärdenfors, Peter. 2004. “Cooperation and the Evolution of Symbolic Communication.” In Evolution of Communication Systems: A Comparative Approach, edited by D. Kimbrough Oller and Ulrike Griebel, 237–56. Cambridge: MIT Press. Haslam, Nick, Elise Holland, and Minoru Karasawa. 2013. “Essentialism and Entitativity Across Cultures.” In Culture and Group Processes, edited by Masaki Yuki and Marilynn Brewer, 17–37. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Howell, Andrew J., Brittany A. Weikum, and Heather L. Dyck. 2011. “Psychological Essentialism and Its Association with Stigmatization.” Personality and Individual Differences 50 (1): 95–100. Kahneman, Daniel. 2011. Thinking, Fast and Slow. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Katz, Marion Holmes. 2002. Body of Text: The Emergence of the Sunni Law of Ritual Purity. Albany: State University of New York Press. Kelly, Daniel R. 2011. Yuck!: The Nature and Moral Significance of Disgust. Cambridge: MIT Press. Kramer, Thomas, and Lauren G. Block. 2014. “Like Mike: Ability Contagion Through Touched Objects Increases Confidence and Improves Performance.” Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes 124 (2): 215–28.

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Kueny, Kathrin. 2019. “Wine.” In Encyclopaedia of the Qur’an [on-line], edited by Jane Dammen McAuliffe. Leiden: Brill. Lee, Charles, Sally A. Linkenauger, Jonathan Z. Bakdash, Jennifer A. Joy-Gaba, and Dennis R. Profitt. 2011. “Putting Like a Pro: The Role of Positive Contagion in Golf Performance and Perception.” PLOS ONE 6 (10): e26016. Medin, Douglas L., and Andrew Ortony. 1989. “Psychological Essentialism.” In Similarity and Analogical Reasoning, edited by Stella Vosniadou and Andrew Ortony, 179–95. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Meijer, Roel, ed. 2009. Global Salafism: Islam’s New Religious Movement. New York: Columbia University Press. Meri, Josef W. 2001. “Ritual and the Qur’an.” In Encyclopaedia of the Qur’an, edited by Jane Dammen McAuliffe. Leiden: Brill. Myrvold, Kristina, ed. 2010. The Death of Sacred Texts: Ritual Disposal and Renovation of Texts in World Religions. London: Ashgate. Nemeroff, Carol, and Paul Rozin. 1994. “The Contagion Concept in Adult Thinking in the United States: Transmission of Germs and of Interpersonal Influence.” Ethos 22 (2): 158–86. Newman, George E., Gil Diesendruck, and Paul Bloom. 2011. “Celebrity Contagion and the Value of Objects.” Journal of Consumer Research 38 (2): 215–28. Premack, David, and Guy Woodruff. 1978. “Does the Chimpanzee Have a Theory of Mind.” Behavioral and Brain Sciences 1 (4): 515–26. Rozin, Paul, and April E. Fallon. 1987. “A Perspective on Disgust.” Psychological Review 94 (1): 23–41. Rozin, Paul, Jonthan Haidt, and Clark R. McCauley. 2008. “Disgust.” In Handbook of Emotions, edited by Lisa Feldman Barrett, Michael Lewis, and Jeannette M. Haviland-Jones, 757–76. New York: Guilford. Rozin, Paul, Laura Lowery, and Rhonda Ebert. 1994. “Varieties of Disgust Faces and the Structure of Disgust.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 66 (5): 870–81. Rozin, Paul, Linda Millman, and Carol Nemeroff. 1986. “Operation of the Laws of Sympathetic Magic in Disgust and Other Domains.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 50 (4): 703–12. Saeed, Abdullah. 2006. Interpreting the Quran: Towards a Contemporary Approach. New York: Routledge. Schaller, M., and J. H. Park. 2011. “The Behavioral Immune System (and Why It Matters).” Current Directions in Psychological Science 20 (2): 99–103. Sodian, Beate, and Susanne Kristen. 2010. “Theory of Mind.” In Towards a Theory off Thinking, edited by Britt Glatzeder, Vinod Goel, and Albrecht Von Müller, 189–201. Berlin: Springer. Sperber, Dan. 1996. Explaining Culture: A Naturalistic Approach. Cambridge: Blackwell. Suit, Natalia K. 2013. “Mushaf and the Material Boundaries of the Qur’an.” In Iconic Books and Texts, edited by James W. Watts, 189–206. Sheffield: Equinox.

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Svensson, Jonas. 2010. “Relating, Revering, and Removing. Muslim Views on the Use, Power, and Disposal of Divine Words.” In The Death of Sacred Texts: Ritual Disposal and Renovation of Texts in World Religions, edited by Kristina Myrvold, 31–54. London: Ashgate. ———. 2015. Människans Muhammed. Stockholm: Molin & Sorgenfrei. ———. 2017. “Hurting the Qur’an: Suggestions Concerning the Psychological Infrastructure of Desecration.” Temenos 53 (2): 243–64. ———. 2018. “Shaykher, sayyider och Zlatan Ibrahimovic: Prestigebaserad auktoritet, karisma och socialt lärande.” In Auktoritet, edited by Mats Trondman and Malin Lennartsson, 215–38. Göteborg: Daidalos. ———. In press. “Size Matters! Miniature Mushafs and the Landscape of Affordances.” Postscripts 9 (1): 152–71. ———. Forthcoming.“Ritualising Muslim Iconic Texts.” In Oxford Handbook on Ritual in the Bible, edited by Sam Balentine. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Taves, Ann. 2013. “Building Blocks of Sacralities.” In Handbook of the Psychology of Religion and Spirituality, edited by Raymond F. Paloutzian and Crystal L. Park, 138–61. New York: Guilford. Turner, Mark. 2014. The Origin of Ideas: Blending, Creativity, and the Human Spark. New York: Oxford University Press. Watts, James W., ed. 2013a. Iconic Books and Texts. Sheffield: Equinox. ———. 2013b. “The Three Dimensions of Scriptures.” In Iconic Books and Texts, edited by James W. Watts, 9–32. Sheffield: Equinox. Weiss, Bernard G. 1998. The Spirit of Islamic Law. Athens: University of Georgia Press. Wilkens, Katharina. 2013. “Drinking the Quran, Swallowing the Madonna.” Alternative Voices: A Plurality Approach for Religious Studies. Essays in Honor of Ulrich Berner, Vol. 4, edited by Afe Adogame, Magnus Echtler, and Oliver Freiberger, 243–59. Bristol: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Zadeh, Travis. 2009. “Touching and Ingesting: Early Debates over the Material Qur’an.” Journal of the American Oriental Society 129 (3): 443–66.

Part Five: Intercultural Bible Reading and Hermeneutics

8. Multi-Epistemological Exegesis: The Strength of Hybridity With a Case Study Analysis of Exod 20:4–6 Beth E. Elness-Hanson

Introduction In recent research on what motivates ISIS fighters, Scott Atran, a cognitive anthropologist from the University of Michigan and Oxford University, stated, “In our material world, we have underestimated or underplayed the spiritual dimension of human action” (Howard 2017). Atran has identified an intellectual blind spot through his years of qualitative research interviewing ISIS fighters and their opponents. What are the intellectual blind spots in our discipline of exegetical theology within the Western academy? In this essay, I argue that the scientist ethos from an Enlightenment-oriented epistemology is important and valid, but it is not wholly adequate, and, at times, it is overreaching. Indeed, there are other epistemologies—or ways of knowing—that are beneficial for developing a stronger, hybridized theological imagination and broader understanding in order to address today’s global realities. Not only is multi-epistemological exegesis an ethical path forward, it is a strategic way expand our exegetical toolbox in order to authentically engage the Majority Word and collaboratively speak into the challenges upon humanity today. I begin with definitions to clarify my use of terms. Then, I analyze two different general epistemologies, followed by the ethical and evaluation issues for the world today. Finally, I demonstrate insightful outcomes from multi-epistemological exegesis in a case study on Exod 20:4–6 from my PhD research, developed through dialogue with Maasai theologians from Tanzania, East Africa.

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Definitions Epistemology Simplified, epistemology asks, “How do we know what we know?” Matthias Steup clarifies this oversimplification, writing: Defined narrowly, epistemology is the study of knowledge and justified belief. As the study of knowledge, epistemology is concerned with the following questions: What are the necessary and sufficient conditions of knowledge? What are its sources? What is its structure, and what are its limits? As the study of justified belief, epistemology aims to answer questions such as: … What makes justified beliefs justified? … Understood more broadly, epistemology is about issues having to do with the creation and dissemination of knowledge in particular areas of inquiry. (Matthias 2017)

Also, epistemology is used generally as “way of knowing,” such that one can have an ontological epistemology, which is distinctly different—and in some regards complimentary, and in other regards contrasting with—the Enlightenment-oriented sense of epistemology.

Ontology Ontology deals with entities and their relationships. Oversimplified, ontology asks, “Who or what exists and what are the connections?” Thomas Hofweber begins his definition of ontology, writing: As a first approximation, ontology is the study of what there is. …We have at least two parts to the overall philosophical project of ontology: first, say what there is, what exists, what the stuff is reality is made out of, secondly, say what the most general features and relations of these things are. (Hofweber 2014)

Multi-Epistemological Exegesis Multi-epistemological exegesis (MEE) is my terminology for an exegetical approach that integrates different epistemologies for a stronger, hybridized theological knowledge. It moves beyond multi-dimensional exegesis (Jonker 1996) and develops scholarly approaches that integrate different epistemologies—or ways of knowing—within the discipline of biblical studies.

Hybridity or Hybridization Hybridity or hybridization means “something heterogeneous in origin or composition” and synonymous with “composite” (“Hybrid” 2017). Deepening

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this metaphor from my biological science background, hybrid offspring tend to be robust organisms that optimize the strong characteristics from both parents.

Only Part of the Picture Since the dawn of the Enlightenment, the Western Academy has reigned supreme with an epistemology that operated with the scientific method (de Sousa Santos 2015, 188). This Enlightenment-oriented worldview has validated an ethos where rationalism and empirical analysis rule as arbiters of knowledge (de Sousa Santos 2015, 119). There is so much to value from science, like developments in modern medicine and aeronautical engineering.1 However, philosophers such as Hans-Georg Gadamer, Thomas Kuhn, and Paul Feyerabend have discussed the limitations of science. For example, Gadamer was critical of the Enlightenment’s overreaching claim that asserts that knowledge is acquired through pure reason alone, as well as the resulting preoccupation with scientific methods (Gadamer 2004, 279–82). While not diminishing the value of science (Gadamer 2004, xxv), Gadamer held that the empiricalization of knowledge leads to false universal claims while dismissing important contextual particulars (Thiselton 1980, 294; 1992, 320, 322). Gadamer contended that understanding transcends method or is beyond “methodological knowledge,” such that method alone is not adequate for determining knowledge (Gadamer 2004, xx; Thiselton 1980, 294, 308; 1992, 320). Gadamer also challenged the Enlightenment principle of objectivity by arguing that impartiality is not attainable, because our understanding is inherently connected to how we question it (de Sousa Santos 2015, 194; Thiselton 1980, 305–07, 309; 1992, 321–22, 327). In reality, all of our questions are conditioned by our context and historic situatedness—all of which influence our understanding and even which questions we pursue (Gadamer 2004, 278– 82; Thiselton 1980, 12, 15, 22, 293, 304–05; 1992, 319, 327). Ergo, meaning depends upon the context (Thiselton 1980, 11, 17, 309). The philosophy of science and philosophical hermeneutics have raised these concerns, especially throughout the last half of the Twentieth Century, and the challenges have stimulated some strengthening of scientific disciplines through clarifying their limitations. The guild of biblical scholarship has similarly engaged in meta-critique. In her 1987 Society of Biblical Literature Presidential Address, Elizabeth Schüssler Fiorenza writes: The “scientist” ethos of biblical studies was shaped by the struggle of biblical scholarship to free itself from dogmatic and ecclesiastical controls. It corresponded to the professionalization of academic life and the rise of the university. Just as history as an academic discipline sought in the last quarter of the nineteenth century to

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prove itself as an objective science in analogy to the natural sciences, so also did biblical studies. (Schüssler Fiorenza 1988, 11)

Schüssler Fiorenza continues to state that a so-called “scientific” approach in biblical studies is a disservice, as it falsely states that interpreters are independent, objective researchers, instead of revealing that all interpretations are contextual. Indeed, all interpretations are influenced by the socio-location of the interpreter. She writes, “The pretension of biblical studies to ‘scientific’ modes of inquiry that deny their hermeneutical and theoretical character and mask their historical-social location prohibits a critical reflection on their rhetorical theological practices in their sociopolitical contexts.” Furthermore, Schüssler Fiorenza identifies the ethical issues of a “scientist” ethos, stating, “Scientist epistemologies covertly advocate an a-political reality without assuming responsibility for their political assumptions and interests” (Schüssler Fiorenza 1988, 11–13). In contrast, Schüssler Fiorenza advocates for a shift to a rhetorical paradigm in biblical studies. She writes: The reconceptualization of biblical studies in rhetorical rather than scientist terms would provide a research framework not only for integrating historical, archaeological, sociological, literary, and theological approaches as perspectival readings of texts but also for raising ethical-political and religious-theological questions as constitutive of the interpretive process. (Schüssler Fiorenza 1988, 13)

I align myself with Schüssler Fiorenza’s rhetorical paradigm, yet I currently live in the Swedish academic milieu where science is prescribed by educational authorities for many academic disciplines, including exegetical theology or biblical studies. Indeed, biblical scholarship in Sweden is engaged from mostly historic, linguistic, and literary-critical methods, which presume scientific approaches. However, one defining criterion in support of a rhetorical paradigm instead of a scientific paradigm is demonstrated by Naomi Oreskes, Professor of the History of Science and Affiliated Professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Harvard University. Oreskes states that knowledge is not scientific knowledge simply because of scientific methodology. Instead, she states, “Scientific knowledge is the consensus of the scientific experts who through this process of organized scrutiny have judged the evidence and have come to a conclusion about it” (Oreskes 2014). She describes the primary criterion of scientific knowledge is the “consensus of experts.” In contrast, little consensus is shared among biblical and theological scholars and perspectives in our guilds continue to diverge. The lack of consensus among the experts in exegetical theology is evidence in support of a rhetorical paradigm instead of a science paradigm. Certainly, biblical studies is not the only discipline challenged by this cogent criterion of consensus.

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More than a quarter of a century after Schüssler Fiorenza challenged the “scientist ethos” of biblical studies, the 2014 Society of Biblical Literature conference featured the first presidential address from a representative of the Global South, Fernando Segovia. In his message, Segovia criticizes the “cognitive injustice” which centers itself on only one way of knowing, “modern science,” which “is largely the product of the Global North” (Segovia 2015, 24). In contrast, he continues to state that the epistemologies of the South are much broader with “methods beyond the imagination of the West.” Segovia calls for engaging alternative theories from the Global South. He asserts that the plurality of knowledges from the Global South are needed to construct “a new paradigm in conversation with all others” (Segovia 2015, 29). Consequently, the guild would be better equipped to address various crises of globalization and other critical issues. Instead of a continued disinterest to the social-cultural context, Segovia calls for the members of the guild to be enmeshed in “a fusion of the critical and political, the biblical and the worldly” (Segovia 2015, 6). With Segovia, I agree that a plurality of epistemologies is needed to help fill in blind spots in the Western academy. Below, I discuss how other ways of knowing are valuable and strategic for merging with classical means of exegesis that end up expanding our exegetical toolbox and develop stronger, hybridized theological knowledge.

Other Ways of Knowing Even though the demographics of World Christianity demonstrate a population shift to the Global South, especially in Sub-Saharan Africa, the preponderance of biblical scholarship continues to be dominated by Western scholars in pursuit of their contextual questions that are influenced by an Enlightenment-oriented epistemology (Elness-Hanson 2017, 1). Currently, Sub-Sahara Africa alone represents almost one out of every four Christians (23.6 percent), though demographic trends indicate that by 2050, Sub-Saharan Africa alone will be home for more than one of every three of the world’s Christians (38.1 percent) (Hackett, Connor et al. 2015, 60). In a recent article, Andrew Mbuvi describes how African biblical studies identifies that traditional Western methods are too “narrow” and inadequate for providing meaningful responses to concerns that are appropriate for African communities (Mbuvi 2017, 149). Mbuvi summarizes: African Biblical Studies (ABS) can be characterized both as innovative and reactionary: Innovative, because it refuses to be confined by the methodologies, ancient concerns, and principles that govern biblical studies in the “west” (used throughout this article to refer to the majority Euro-American scholars while

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recognizing the presence of other groups), and instead charts a course that is more interested in making biblical interpretation relevant to present realities. Reactionary, because its driving force is partly a critique of the inadequacy of western biblical studies in providing meaningful responses to concerns that are pertinent to African communities. A genuine ABS is therefore an amalgamation of multiple interpretive methods, approaches and foci that reflect a creative engagement of the African cosmological reality and the Bible. (Mbuvi 2017, 149)

Currently, Western biblical scholarship is “sterile” with regard to African issues (Mbuvi 2017, 123). The crux of the issue is epistemological. When examining the epistemologies— or ways of knowing—in Africa, Munyaradzi Mawere states that in African knowledge systems, ontology is privileged (Mawere 2011, 37–41). The emphasis is on relationality, which is demonstrated in the African proverb, “I am because we are, and since we are, therefore I am” (Mbiti 1969, 110). The essence of one’s being is grounded in one’s relationships. Thus, ontological ways of knowing include the metaphysical realities and human connections with God and other entities. In contrast, a scientific epistemology within the academy has downplayed most aspects that are related to the supernatural, as well as human relationality with the divine and other principalities. This is consistent with the Enlightenment focus on human reason to analyze the mysteries of the cosmos and reinterpret Christianity without supernatural aspects (Netland 2008, 271–73). However, in scholarship, the nature of the question determines the methodology of research. The traditional exegetical methods are not adequate to engage questions beyond the historical, linguistic, and narrative issues; as Mbuvi described, they are too “narrow” for many questions in the Majority World (Mbuvi 2017, 149). Due to the demographic realities of World Christianity and increasing international conversations on moving beyond a scientist-only epistemology, there is an opportunity to now developing a stronger, hybridized theological knowledge and broader understanding. In his 2015 book, Epistemologies of the South: Justice Against Epistemicide, Portugese scholar, Boaventura de Sousa Santos, coins the word “epistemicide” to refer to “the murder of knowledge,” where, “Unequal exchanges among cultures have always implied the death of the knowledge of the subordinated culture” (de Sousa Santos 2015, 92). He claims that epistemicide is “perpetrated by hegemonic Eurocentric modernity,” such that the more uniform the practice of hermeneutical methods, the greater the evidence of epistemicidal destabilization (de Sousa Santos 2015, 92). de Sousa Santos warns that allowing modern science to hegemonically determine truth from falsehood results in the loss of two alternative means of knowledge: philosophy and theology (de Sousa Santos 2015, 119). He claims that the colonial ordering of the modern world developed “the

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blind spot upon which the modern conceptions of knowledge and law are built” (de Sousa Santos 2015, 122, 139). He argues that we in the West need to be attuned to our own blindness as we seek to point out the blindness of others, and this rigorous self-critique of one’s own epistemology is the critical position to hold while engaging “a plurality of knowledges and practices…” (de Sousa Santos 2015, 137). The endeavor for “cognitive justice” will not succeed if it is based solely upon a fair distribution of scientific knowledge (de Sousa Santos 2015, 189). Rather, de Sousa Santos calls for an ecology of knowledges, where he defines ecology as “sustainable diversity based on complex relationality,” (de Sousa Santos 2015, 175) in contrast to the “monoculture of scientific knowledge” (de Sousa Santos 2015, 188). de Sousa Santo’s approach does not demean scientific knowledge, but rather, implements it “in a broader context of dialogue with other knowledges” (de Sousa Santos 2015). In a plurality of epistemologies, scientific knowledge is no longer hegemonic nor dismissed, but follows what de Sousa Santos calls a “third-way” of engaging in dialogue to overcome limitations and inherent incompleteness in any one way (de Sousa Santos 2015, 189). Noting that the ecology of knowledges “focuses on the concrete relations among knowledges,” (de Sousa Santos 2015, 190) the ontological aspect of relationality is engaged in the analysis of epistemologies. This does not result in a radical relativism, as we will discuss more below (de Sousa Santos 2015, 190). Instead, third-way epistemologies have “a complex mix of science and non-science constructs” including a plurality of “selection of topics, problems, theoretical models, methodologies, languages, images, and forms of argument” that are all connected to their social and cultural contexts (de Sousa Santos 2015, 194). de Sousa Santos notes that “some of the most innovative breakthroughs in scientific knowledge in the last decades occurred precisely ‘in between frontiers’” that moved beyond respecting the boarders of interdisciplinary collaborations (de Sousa Santos 2015, 195). Instead, these third way epistemologies are creating new questions and new knowledges. Where de Sousa Santos speaks of third-way, I refer to hybridization, where a merging of parental information develops new and unique life. Not only is it short-sighted to restrain exegetical theology to the traditional methods, it is unwise not enlarge our epistemological tool box and build bridges to engage the Majority World. Otherwise, we will be left in our own echo-chamber of thought and left behind as the international conversation marches on. Not only are other ways of knowing strategic for merging with classical exegesis for stronger, hybridized theological knowledge and imagination, it is the ethical way forward.

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Ethical Implications There is a causal relationship between colonialism and the rise in hegemonic epistemologies (de Sousa Santos 2015, 198). In our post-colonial context, it is incumbent upon us privileged scholars in the West to intentionally and actively engage scholars with other ways of knowing. Daniel Patte, a French-born New Testament scholar teaching in the United States, has taken an ethical stand for intentional inclusion. He claims that continuing in critical biblical studies as usual contributes to the injustices of colonialism, racism, sexism, and other oppression (Patte 1995, 113). Katharine Doob Sakenfeld, in her Presidential Address at the 2007 Society of Biblical Literature conference, challenged her colleagues to show a “special generosity of spirit to those whose struggle to be heard is more difficult than our own.” (Sakenfeld 2008, 5, 18) She continues: Each text really does belong at least potentially to all of us, and to people across the world…. But text by text, each text will belong to different ones of us in vastly different and sometimes painfully different ways. Given this reality, let us not be content with a state of static tolerance in which we simply ignore one another. Rather, let us be on the move toward that ethical calling to become a company of scholars who rejoice in working with and learning from those least like ourselves. (Sakenfeld 2008, 18)

Henrikus Procee developed two “(meta) standards for transcultural morality.” The first principle is non-exclusion, which grows out of the idea of “human dignity” grounded, in principle, in the conviction that all people are equal (de Wit 2004, 479). I summarize this as “breaking down walls.” The second principle developed by Procee is the willingness to stimulate interactions. Procee writes, “It qualifies inter-human relations, policy measures, social processes, cultural convictions on the basis of their contribution, positive or otherwise, to the interactive possibilities of groups and individuals” (Procee 1991, 165). I summarize this as “building bridges.” Indeed, in addition to the exciting potential of developing new knowledges through hybridized epistemologies, it is the ethical path forward.

Valid, Legitimate, and Plausible Interpretations The question arises that as we listen to other voices: Are there are any boundaries for assessing interpretations? Do we move into an intellectual quagmire of cultural relativism or politically-correct ambivalence? My reponse is “no.” (de Sousa Santos 2015, 190, 196) Thus far, I have three scholars who shape my understanding: Hans de Wit, Daniel Patte, and Paul Hiebert.

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First, Hans de Wit applies Procee’s two principles of avoiding exclusion and stimulating interaction as minimally normative for intercultural hermeneutics and Bible reading projects (de Wit 2004, 479). Illustrating this point, Hans de Wit writes, “This means that people have the right to a minimum existence and have equal basic rights to their interactions. It also means that when power and making decisions is involved, everyone must have the right to participate” (de Wit, 2004, 479). Thus, interpretations are assessed as having a greater value if they, indeed, do not build walls but build bridges. Second, Daniel Patte’s efforts to foreground a multicultural and scholarly conversation has resulted in his conviction that he can no longer engage biblical interpretation as an individual, as he writes, “It became impossible to conceive of working/writing/interpreting by myself,” but that the interpretive process requires the “WE” of collaborative engagement (Patte 2015). Patte continues: After [writing] Ethics [of Biblical Interpretation and] (Patte, 1995) working with others WE discovered that we needed to recognized that ALL interpretations of Scripture necessarily involve (whether consciously or not) THREE types of interpretive choices that establish the VALIDITY (contextual choices), the LEGITIMACY (textual/analytical choices of what is most significant in the text) and PLAUSIBILITY (hermeneutical and theological choices). (2015)

Thus, Patte identifies that while a “thick” representation of the text increases the legitimacy of an interpretation, there needs to be willingness to err on the side of respectful consideration, because validity is related to contextual choices and “can only be discussed in terms of a specific receiver” or assessed as “appropriate in terms of a specific set of cultural, religious, or social values” (Jonker 1996, 50, 330). This may leave the traditional scholar unsettled, as previously, the criteria for evaluating an interpretation was heavily based upon the proficient use of historical- and/or literary-critical methods. However, I am not advocating for the dismissal of these classical methods of exegesis, as they are important tools for a legitimate “thick” reading of a text as we develop hybridized approaches. Indeed, Justin Ukpong affirmed the use of traditional Western methods in African biblical scholarship—but not uncritically. He wrote: The first reason is that in the contemporary post-Enlightenment age, it is no longer possible to return to an uncritical use of the Bible in the academy. Therefore, African academic reading of the Bible must be critical. The second reason is that the lack of historical critical use of the Bible has, in the past, led to many abuses of the Bible in Africa, as for example in the apartheid system in South Africa in which ideological meanings were read into the biblical text. Historical critical reading of the Bible is therefore required to avoid such abuses. The third reason is that African biblical scholarship, unlike its western counterpart, is contextual in nature, that is, it links the biblical text to the African context. (Ukpong 1999, 2–3)

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Indeed, traditional Western exegetical methods are important for ensuring the biblical context is not ignored in contemporary, contextual interpretations. Third, with potentially competing values involved with efforts to evaluate biblical interpretations, I appropriated Paul Hiebert’s conceptualizations of a bounded set and a centered set. Drawing upon mathematical set theory, Hiebert describes the typology of sets. Bounded sets are standard in Western cultures and “are fundamental to our understanding of order” (Hiebert 1994, 113). Grounded in a Greek worldview, the intrinsic natures of things are identified in well-defined categories (Hiebert 1994, 114). A well-formed intrinsic set has a clear boundary with a central reference point. Using this metaphor, the Western “scientific” ethos of exegetical theology is a bounded set; it has a clearly defined boundary with a reference point—the competent use of the traditional historical- and literary-critical methods. In contrast, non-critical interpretations are not considered scientific and excluded from the bounded set. See Figure 8.1.

Figure 8.1:  A bounded set model.

Source: Author; adapted from Paul Hiebert. Anthropological Reflections on Missiological Issues. Baker Academic, a division of Baker Publishing Group. 1994. Pages 122–24. Used by permission.

In a different paradigm, Hiebert describes that a ([an] extrinsic, well-formed) centered set “defines membership in a category…on the basis of how they relate to other things, not what they are in and of themselves” (Hiebert 1994, 122). This centered set is “created by a defining a center or reference point and the relationship of things to that center” (Hiebert 1994, 123). In a centered set

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model, the boundary may look like an amoeba that is drawn by identifying the center and including all the things that are moving toward the center because of a relationship with the center (Hiebert 1994, 124). See Figure 8.2.

Figure 8.2:  A centered set model has an “amoeba-like” boundary that is defined by the relationship of an element with a centered criterion. Applied to multi-epistemological exegesis, the center is defined by engagement of historical- and/or literary-critical methods. The other epistemological methods are evaluated with regard to having a relationship with the center reference point regardless of the distance to the center. Source: Author; adapted from Paul Hiebert. Anthropological Reflections on Missiological Issues. Baker Academic, a division of Baker Publishing Group. 1994. Pages 122–24. Used by permission.

In my application of this metaphor, I consider scholarly multi-epistemological exegesis to be a centered set where the reference point is still as historical- and/or literary-critical methods, but there also exists a relationship with another epistemological system; it is a foot in two different epistemologies. See Figure 8.2. Some ways of knowing may be “closer” in character to a Western epistemology, while others may be quite distinctly different, and “farther” from traditional Western sensibilities. However, that “farther” position does not make it inherently invalid. The inclusion within the centered set arises by merging classical Western exegetical methods with another way of knowing to form a hybridized epistemology. This concept can also be represented by Gadamer’s “fusion of horizons” as long as the conceptualization goes beyond a horizon of basic knowledge, as multi-epistemological exegetical partners also are fusing ways of knowing.

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Indeed, there are challenges to this as there is a requirement of collaboration and risk. de Sousa Santos writes there is an “assumption of specific risk: to put in question our convictions and our ignorance without reducing what one does know to what one already knows and without proclaiming the irrelevance of what we cannot describe because we do not know it” (de Sousa Santos 2015, 197). The anthropological protocol of “participatory inquiry” that I incorporated into my qualitative research was developed by Ellen Herda, which I chose because of her incorporation of Gadamer’s hermeneutical philosophy. She writes, “In participatory research we move from observing, interviewing, and categorizing our data to living in a relationship with the participants, placing our biases along with theirs in an attempt to hear each other and work out new contexts in which to live” (Herda 1999, 53). Poignantly, she continues, “It is in the risk that we have the opportunity to learn.” Herda’s protocol is a clear example of moving beyond epistemological data mining toward ontological knowing that is grounded in relationality (Herda 1999, 86, 126).

A Case Study of Exod 20:4–6 A case study on the generational curse in Exod 20:4–6 illustrates the dynamics of multi-epistemological exegesis. This portion is adapted from my PhD research with its fundamental question: How do we more fully understand the “generational curses” in the Pentateuch? (Elness-Hanson 2017). The generational curse phrase, “visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation,” appears four times in the Pentateuch: Exod 20:4–6; Exod 34:6–7; Num 14:18; and Deut 5:8–10. These four texts were studied in a “dialogical exegetical” approach, such that content from commentaries by American biblical scholars was intersected with transcriptional material from my conversations with Maasai Lutheran theologians of Tanzania, East Africa. The intersection of interpretations is facilitated by a contextual, conceptual paradigm. This is an intentional strategy to reduce the marginalization of these other voices. I wanted to avoid “measuring” a Maasai interpretation against my established interpretation “ruler” that was prepared with standard, Western exegetical methods. An excerpt from the analysis of Exod 20:4–6 highlights the value of multi-epistemological exegesis. In 2012, I engaged in conversations with seven Maasai theologians in Tanzania. With one theologian at a time, we read Exod 20 together and discussed interpretations of the Decalogue, with a focus on the inter-generational punishment. Analyzing the transcripts resulted in the identification of a contextual, conceptual paradigm, or lens, of reconciliation through which

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to view the generational curses in the biblical texts. This conceptual lens was confirmed during follow-up conversations in 2013 with all of the Maasai research participants. The paradigm of reconciliation is not simply theoretical for the Maasai theologian; it is ontological. The conversations were an expressed reality, manifestations of their worldview seen in life, death, life-giving relationships, and conflict. All informants affirm a loving, parental-like God who desires to bless; however, sin will thwart God’s blessings. Remarkably, the Maasai understand that such curses can be seen as a good thing. They are even viewed as “blessings in disguise,” put in place and enacted by a just God in order to deter wrongdoing (Elness-Hanson 2017, 112). However, if the threat of a curse fails in prevention, then the resulting afflictions are perceived to be a wake-up call to reconcile the wayward wrongdoer back into a right relationship with God and the community. Because the family members have “skin in the game”—or have a personal stake in the outcomes—they are incentivized to act for the communal good. This corporate responsibility—that is inherent within the Maasai conceptual paradigm of reconciliation—serves to provide both preventative and corrective impulses through societal accountability, mediation, and shared calamitous consequences. This intercultural biblical analysis demonstrates that the inter-generational curse is related only to flagrant disobedience to the core of the covenantal relationship with YHWH, a jealous God; literally, the trans-generational recompense in these texts applies only to rebellious apostasy, often manifested through idolatry. The dialogical exegesis demonstrated that the American scholars do not generally engage the metaphysical implications of the curse as it extends to the third and fourth generations. Their interpretations include: (1) silence, with only a mere paraphrase of the verse; (2) an identification of a primitive perspective in an evolutionary scheme, such that it is later “corrected”; (3) an interpretation of the “those who hate me” phrase (also Deut 5:8–10) that assigns culpability to the individual, regardless of the fact that most scholars identify this as being a later addition (without the phrase, the onus is shared by the community); (4) natural consequences of social ills, metaphorically described as children suffering in a broken home or pollution; and (5) a very small minority who hold the tension of the plurivocality as seen within the Hebrew Bible. The two predominant aspects of dismissing or denigrating corporate responsibility and supernatural aspects within the Bible by the Western scholars are representational of an Enlightenment-influenced epistemology. In contrast, the Maasai theologians hold a traditional Maasai metaphysical understanding of generational curses, which they overlaid upon the biblical texts. Instead of considering the texts’ apostasy/idolatry as being the cause of

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phenomenologically effective generational curses, the Maasai theologians refer the cause of the curses to the sins of the fourth through seventh commandments (in the traditional Lutheran numbering), which correlate to the traditional Maasai worldview. They assert that disrespect of parents, killing, adultery, and stealing are the causes of supernatural consequences for non-Christians, their families, and their livestock. They hold that Christians are freed from the curses through the redemptive work of Jesus Christ. In spite of overt influence from the traditional worldview, the Maasai understand that one’s harm of others has consequences for one’s relationship with God. This demonstrates that the Maasai have a more holistic and ontological worldview, as they do not separate the horizontal and vertical dimensions of life. In contrast, the Enlightenment-influenced individualistic interpretations in the American context tend to see “loving God” and “loving others” as distinct from each other. Consequently, the interpretations of communal accountability by the Maasai theologians more accurately represent the corporate responsibility as seen within the biblical texts. The engagement of the Maasai theologians’ perspectives transformed my understanding of this text. The lens of reconciliation unlocked the pre-judgment of curses as being exclusively negative. While not all aspects of the Maasai theologians’ interpretations were represented in the text, neither were the Western scholars, such as supplanting corporate responsibility with individualist views, as well as seeing pollution or divorce causing a broken home as results of the covenant curse. The Hiebert model of moving from a bounded set to a centered set allowed me to build a bridge between the epistemological and ontological. The center point was the biblical text engaged with a “thick” analysis through historical-critical methods. See Figure 8.2 above. Because of the unsettling aspect of trans-generational retribution, the focus has too often been on judgment. The Maasai theologians have restored my focus upon a loving and merciful YHWH, because the generational curse is really a blessing in disguise. The greatest corollary between the Maasai theologians’ and the American biblical scholars’ interpretations is the steadfast love of YHWH. While the American biblical scholars frequently dismiss the inter-generational curse as a way to affirm YHWH’s love and mercy, astoundingly, the Maasai hold these two aspects of accountability and mercy together with a focus on reconciliation which more closely reflects these Pentateuchal texts. The Maasai worldview and ontological epistemology accepts that God’s steadfast love and mercy can exist in harmony with supernatural discipline and communal responsibility. On one hand, phenomenological generational curses are prevalent within the Maasai worldview. On the other hand, the Enlightenment-influenced

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epistemology minimizes the attention of curses as a phenomenon, while still providing excellent historical-critical tools for a “thick reading” of the text. Accordingly, I argue that multi-epistemological exegesis with intercultural dialogue and the Maasai contextual conceptual paradigm of reconciliation is a fruitful approach for addressing the primary research question: How do we more fully understand the “generational curse” in the Pentateuch? The journey also results in my ontological “fusing of horizons” with Maasai theologians. This analysis of American and Maasai interpretations of the generational curse in Exod 20:4–6 demonstrates that multi-epistemological exegesis increases understandings, which otherwise would have been limited by one way of knowing.

Summary In summary, I affirm that scientific knowledge is not determined simply by engaging the scientific method, but rather is determined by the consensus of scholars. Thus, this excludes exegetic theology from the category of science as a discipline. A paradigm of rhetoric is a stronger description of the field of biblical studies, which then understands that ethical engagement is constitutive to the discipline. The ethical path forward is to engage the Majority World scholars and merge a traditional exegetical epistemology with other ways of knowing, such as ontology. Instead of missing out of the stronger, hybridized theological knowledge and be left in a Western echo chambers, we can incorporate more tools in our exegetical tool box and develop multi-epistemological exegesis in order to join the forward march of the international conversations. This does not leave us uncritical or without assessment criteria. Instead, we can engage a centered set analysis, while still tearing down walls and building bridges with scholarship in the Majority World.

Note 1. I earned a bachelor’s degree with a biology major and a chemistry minor from the University of Minnesota, and I highly value this learning.

Bibliography de Sousa Santos, Boaventura. 2015. Epistemologies of the South: Justice against Epistemicide. London; New York: Routledge. de Wit, Hans. 2004. “Intercultural Bible Reading and Hermeneutics.” In Through the Eyes of Another: Intercultural Reading of the Bible, edited by Hans de Wit, Louis Jonker, Marleen Kool, and Daniel Schipani, 477–92. Amsterdam: Institute of Mennonite Studies.

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Elness-Hanson, Beth. 2017. Generational Curses in the Pentateuch: An American and Maasai Intercultural Analysis. Bible and Theology in Africa. New York: Peter Lang. Gadamer, Hans-Georg. 2004. Truth and Method. New York: Continuum International. Hackett, Conrad et al. 2015. The Future of World Religions: Population Growth Projections, 2010–2050. Global Religious Futures Project. Pew Research Center. https://www. pewforum.org/2015/04/02/religious-projections-2010–2050/. Herda, Ellen. 1999. Research Conversations and Narrative: A Critical Hermeneutic Orientation in Participatory Inquiry. Westport, CT: Praeger. Hiebert, Paul. 1994. Anthropological Reflections on Missiological Issues. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic. Hofweber, Thomas. 2014. “Logic and Ontology.” In The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall Edition), edited by Edward N. Zalta. Stanford: Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University. https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2014/entries/ logic-ontology. Howard, Jacqueline. 2017. “What Motivates ISIS Fighters—and Those Who Fight Against Them.” CNN, September 4. http://edition.cnn.com/2017/09/04/health/isis-fightershuman-behavior-study/index.html. “Hybrid.” n.d. Merriam-Webster. Accessed August 2017. http://www.merriam-webster.com/ dictionary/hybrid. Jonker, Louis. 1996. Exclusivity and Variety: Perspectives on Multidimensional Exegesis. Kampen, Netherlands: Kok Pharos. Matthias, Steup. 2017. “Epistemology.” In The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall Edition), edited by Edward N. Zalta. Stanford: Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University. https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2017/entries/epistemology. Mawere, Munyaradzi. 2011. African Belief and Knowledge Systems. Bamenda, Cameroon: Langaa Research and Publishing Common Initiative Group. Mbiti, John. 1969. African Religions and Philosophy. 2nd revised and enl. edition. Oxford: Heinemann. Mbuvi, Andrew. 2017. “African Biblical Studies: An Introduction to an Emerging Discipline.” Currents in Biblical Research 15 (2): 149–78. Netland, Harold. 2008. “The Enlightenment.” In Global Dictionary of Theology: A Resource for the Worldwide Church, edited by William A. Dyrness, Veli-Matti Kärkkäinen, Juan Francisco Martinez, and Simon Chan, 270–74. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press Academic. Oreskes, Naomi. “Why We Should Trust Scientists.” TED.com. May 2014. https://www. ted.com/talks/naomi_oreskes_why_we_should_believe_in_science. Patte, Daniel. 1995. Ethics of Biblical Interpretation: A Reevaluation. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press. ———. 26 Aug 2015. Email. Nashville, Tenn. Procee, H. 1991. Over de Grenzen van Culturen: Voorbij Universalisme in Relativisme. Amsterdam: Boom. https://www.henkprocee.nl/wp-content/.…/Over-de-grenzenvan-culturen.pdf.

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Sakenfeld, Katharine D. 2008. “Whose Text Is It?” Journal of Biblical Literature 127: 5–18. Schüssler Fiorenza, Elisabeth. 1988. “The Ethics of Biblical Interpretation: Decentering Biblical Scholarship.” Journal of Biblical Literature 104: 3–17. Segovia, Fernando. F. 2015. “Criticism in Critical Times: Reflections on Vision and Task.” Journal of Biblical Literature 134: 6–29. http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.15699/ jbl.1341.2015.0002. Thiselton, Anthony C. 1980. The Two Horizons: New Testament Hermeneutics and Philosophical Description. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. ———. 1997. New Horizons in Hermeneutics: The Theory and Practice of Transforming Biblical Reading. Grand Rapids: Zondervan. Ukpong, Justin. 1999. “Can African Old Testament Scholarship Escape the Historical Critical Approach?” Newsletter on African Old Testament Scholarship 7: 2–5. https:// simb.africa/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/07-Newsletter.pdf

9. Malagasy, Thai, and Norwegian Youths Reading Luke 15 Together Knut Holter

Introduction What would happen if a youth group read a biblical text with other youth groups living in other geographical and sociological contexts? In what ways would the different contexts influence their understanding of the biblical text, and how would they reflect on their different reading experiences? This essay will present and discuss some intercultural experiences of a research project where three youth groups did exactly so, that is, reading a biblical text together. The youth groups consisted of 16–18-year-old girls and boys from Antananarivo (Madagascar), Bangkok (Thailand), and Stavanger (Norway). The biblical text they read together was the parable about the so-called prodigal son in Luke 15:11–32, and the joint reading took place in May to September 2014. The essay falls in four parts: (a) some words on the current research context; (b) an overview of the Bible study project; (c) the major bulk of the essay, an analysis of the reading reports from the three Bible study groups, and finally, (d) back to where I started, briefly reflecting on how the experiences of this project relate to the current research context.

A: Research Context The academic discipline of biblical studies has for more than two centuries systematically contextualized the “author” of the biblical text. The term “author” is then used in a broad sense, also referring to historical context, tradition, genre, textual growth, editorial activities, and so on. Traditionally, biblical studies has allowed this historically contextualized “author” to play a significant

140Knut Holter role in its establishing of a meaning of the text. As a consequence, however, the rather elitist emphasis of biblical studies on this “author” has led it to ignore the obvious role that the current reader—commonly referred to as “ordinary” readers of the Bible, that is, all those who are not trained in critical biblical interpretation—plays in the establishing of a meaning of the biblical text. Admittedly, in recent years we have seen a reaction to this. Partly because certain literary critical models focusing on the reader have been attempted in biblical studies. Partly also because some deliberately ideological strategies of interpretation—for example from feminist or queer perspectives, or from liberation hermeneutical or postcolonial perspectives—have been used in Bible interpretation (Segovia and Sugirtharajah 2009). However, in spite of all the valuable insights gained by these literary critical models and deliberate ideological strategies of interpretation, they still resemble quite traditional historical-critical approaches in the sense that they reflect the interpretive strategies of a critically-trained elite. Neither of them is able to catch what we might call popular biblical interpretation, that is, the way the texts are read by the so-called “ordinary” readers. Actually, we do not know very much about the interpretation and interpretive strategies of the “ordinary” readers of the Bible, in spite of the fact that they constitute at least 99.9 percent of its readers (Malley 2004). In recent years, however, the interpretation and interpretive strategies of “ordinary” readers of the Bible have gained some scholarly attention. An increasing number of studies have analyzed popular interpretation of the Bible (early examples are West and Dube, 1996, and Malley, 2004; more recent examples are Kinyua 2011, and Autero 2016). Of particular importance for the present essay and its intercultural focus are the studies resulting from a research network initiated by Hans de Wit, who, until 2015, occupied the Dom Helder Camara Chair for Peace and Justice at VU University in Amsterdam. In short, de Wit and his research network have developed a model where Bible study groups with different cultural, religious, social, economic, and geographical backgrounds read biblical texts together. That is, the groups read the text separately, then write a report which they share with the other group(s), and then they read the text over and over again, in the light of the reports from the other group(s) about how they experience the text (see more about the model below). De Wit and his network have managed to work with Bible study groups from various parts of the world to develop and test this model of reading the Bible “through the eyes of another,” but also to accumulate empirical data and establish a critical discourse on this kind of intercultural interpretation of the Bible. The first analysis that de Wit’s research network carried out used the narrative in John 4 about Jesus and a Samaritan woman as a case text. The

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text was read by Bible study groups in various cultural, religious, social, and economic contexts, and the result was a brick of a book, Hans de Wit and all (eds.), Through the Eyes of Another: Intercultural Reading of the Bible (2004), with documentation and analysis of the empirical material. Over the next years, de Wit and his research network organized new Bible study projects and made critical analysis of them. One outcome is a website (http://www. bible4all.org/) and several workshops on “Through the eyes of another: Intercultural reading of the Bible.” Another outcome is some essay collections furthering the discussion started in Through the Eyes of Another, such as Hans de Wit and Janet Dyk (eds.), Bible and Transformation: The Promise of Intercultural Bible Reading (2015), Hans Snoek (ed.), In Love with the Bible and its Ordinary Readers (2015), and Daniel M. Schipani and all (eds.), New Perspectives on Intercultural Reading of the Bible (2015). In addition, a third outcome is a book series, “Intercultural Biblical Hermeneutics Series,” with titles such as Hans de Wit, Empirical Hermeneutics, Interculturality, and Holy Scripture (2012), Charlene van der Walt, Toward a Communal Reading of 2 Samuel 13 (2014), and Eric Anum and Ebenezer Quaye, Intercultural Reading of John 10:1–21 (2016). Broadly speaking, the research discourse established by de Wit and his network is the research context of the present project on Luke 15. Towards the end of this essay, I will return to this research context to locate my project and its findings. Before that, however, I will briefly present the context and structure of the project, and then turn to the major bulk of the essay, an analysis of the reading reports from the three Bible study groups that were involved in this project.

B: Bible Study Project on Luke 15 Back in 2003, the Church of Norway—the Lutheran, majority church in Norway, with approximately 80 percent of the population as members— initiated a Catechumenical Program for children and youths up to eighteen. The program acknowledges the necessity of research related to the faith and life situation of the target group, and this focus is the immediate background of the present project. In the Church of Norway’s Plan for Christian Education, it is emphasized that the Bible has a potential of being a source for life interpretation and coping throughout the various age groups from birth to eighteen. Reading the Bible, however, changes throughout these age groups, with a gradual deepening of the hermeneutical challenges of reading the texts and constructing meaning in relation to actual life situations. The present project—which was partly funded by the Church of Norway Catechumanical

142Knut Holter Program—connects with the oldest age group, the 16-to-18-year-olds. Through an investigation of a dialogue between three groups of 16-to-18year-olds, coming from Norway, Thailand, and Madagascar, respectively, the project aims at analyzing a use of the Bible that is consciously contextual: • Partly from a local perspective, by analyzing the “creative potential” of

reading biblical texts and constructing meaning in relation to the contextual experiences and life situations of groups of 16-to-18-year-olds. • And partly from a global perspective, by analyzing the “interpretive corrective” brought up by the introduction of a socially and culturally “other” reader of the Bible, serving as a window to alternative interpretations and a mirror of one’s own contextuality. The project organized a dialogue on the relationship between the Bible and life challenges encountering the three groups of 16-to-18-year-olds. The reading reports of their dialogue form the empirical basis of the analysis of the present essay. The 16-to-18-year-olds read biblical texts in relation to the experiences and concerns of their own context. Two texts were particularly focused— Luke 15:11–32, with a theological focus: God’s love, and 2 Samuel 13:1–22, with an ethical focus: responses to sexual harassment and rape—of which the first one is followed up here. Each of the three groups of 16-to-18-year-olds devoted three meetings to each of the texts, and they worked according to the following procedure (inspired by de Wit et al. 2004:5 and passim): • In the first meeting, they read Luke 15 together and reflected about

its meaning in the light of their own experiences and life situation. The reflection of each group was then transcribed (main points written down, translated to English) and shared (via e-mail) with the other groups. • In the second meeting, they once again read Luke 15 together and reflected about its meaning, now in the light of the contextual readings of the two other groups. Again, the process included a transcription and sharing of the readings. • In the third meeting, they once again read Luke 15 together and reflected about its meaning, now in the light of the texts from the second meeting of the two other groups. The third reflection is particularly important, as the groups here were challenged to try to understand how the two other groups had understood their first, contextually informed reading of the text. Having facilitated a contextual reading of Luke 15:11–32 in the three youth groups, the next step was to challenge the contextuality of these

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readings. A general problem of this kind of contextual readings of the Bible is that “ordinary” readers often lack a critical distance to the encounter between text and context. As such, they may need an interpretive corrective that can help the grasp their own contextuality. In this project, such a corrective was brought up by the introduction of a socially and culturally “other” reader of the Bible, an “other” who serves both as a window to alternative interpretations and as a mirror of one’s own contextuality. The choice of dialogue partners in Thailand and Madagascar was partly to include the width of the global reading community of the Bible, and partly to include churches having a history of interaction with the Church of Norway. As mentioned above, the project was partly funded by the Church of Norway Catechumenical Program, and this funding enabled us to meet face to face after the dialogue through e-mail reports had come to an end. The Thai and Norwegian groups met with the Malagasy one in Madagascar for talking, praying, and playing together, and also for re-opening the dialogue on Luke 15 and clarifying interpretive experiences and problems that still were there.

C: Analysis Luke 15:11–32 tells a story about a father with two sons. One went abroad with his father’s money and wasted it all. Still, when he returned home he was forgiven and embraced by the father. The other remained at home all the time to work in his father’s fields. However, when he saw how the father celebrated the return of the brother who had wasted all his inheritance, he became envious. The three youth groups met three times to read this text, each time writing a reading report. In the following, I will approach the reading reports from three perspectives: their comprehension of genre, their cultural reflection, and their theological reflection. It must be admitted that the cultural and theological reflection overlap (which is actually a major point of mine). Still, as an analytical perspective, a distinction between the two may be useful. Let me start with their comprehension of genre. In the background material, I had prepared for the three groups and their first meeting, the Luke text was referred to as a “text” and “narrative.” The Malagasy group immediately identified it as a parable, whereas the two other groups did not use this interpretive term. Still, all three groups intuitively understood the genre and were able to see that the text has a message exceeding that of an everyday family tale. The Malagasy group reported that everyone knew the text, as it was regularly read in the Sunday school. The point of the text, they said, is to show us that God loves sinners. They noticed that the text describes the father

144Knut Holter as loving and patient, but they also understood the behavior of the sons. The Norwegian and Thai group said more or less the same, it is a text about God welcoming sinners. The parable’s potential for existential identification, primarily with the two sons, was soon noticed. The Malagasy group reported that they mainly identified with the prodigal son (Mad May 2014), and so did the Norwegian group, arguing “It is difficult to compare ourselves with the one who stayed at home, because we are not as kind as him.” (Nor May 2014). The report from Bangkok allows some individual voices to be heard (Thai May 2014): • I am the oldest brother, because I always obey my parents even though

they complain a lot and treat my siblings better. • I am the youngest brother, because I do things without thinking about

me and without caring about the consequences. • I am the oldest brother, because sometimes I am envious of the younger

brother. • I am the youngest brother, because there have been times when I have

gone away from God, just like him. But every time I come back, God is there for me and blesses me. • I am the father, because I am always ready to give a second chance to those who repent. The latter voice from Thailand may be somewhat surprising, but it shows the potential for new understandings of the text. Regardless of this last voice, the text is known to the groups from beforehand, and they have experience in terms of how it is interpreted within the teaching and preaching of the church. With this as a starting point, the analysis proceeds to consider how the three groups engage in reflection in relation to culture and theology. The project as a whole had a strong intercultural perspective, consisting of three groups from three geographical and cultural angles of the earth. However, it was clear to us all the time that in addition to the three groups, there was also a fourth actor, namely text. Reading the Bible is in itself an intercultural enterprise, in the sense that a reader more or less consciously relates two to three thousand years old texts to one’s contemporary context. Some readers are so familiar with the biblical texts that they ignore the cultural challenges of bridging the gap between their own context and those of Jerusalem or Galilee in biblical times. Others may have a sudden experience of cultural diversity, when the texts depict scenes that are experienced as foreign. An example of the latter was when the Norwegian group saw that the preceding text, Luke 15:8–10, depicts a woman who has lost a silver coin and then

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sweeps the whole house searching until she finds it. One in the Norwegian group asked rhetorically: “who would not sweep the whole house if he/she had lost a silver coin,” and the answer is simply “laughter.” The first and perhaps most obvious example of cultural difference between the three groups emerged around the question of “shame.” The Malagasy group raised the question in their first report, and they also kept the issue alive throughout the discussion. In Madagascar, they said, a behavior like that of the prodigal son would be perceived as shameful by the surrounding community, and the family would be blamed. If a young person would pursue something like the prodigal son, the parents would do everything in their power to prevent it. If this did not succeed, society around would consider the parents as weak (Mad May 2014). Against this, the Thai group argued that if there is a matter of shame, it is not for the parents, but rather for the prodigal son himself (Thai June 2014). The Norwegian group emphasized this perspective even more strongly: We do not think that people around would have thought that the parents had done a poor job, even though their son had run away. People around would have thought that this is stupid, but they would not have blamed the parents. The perspective of “honoring the parents” is not very strong in Norwegian culture; parents and society expect one to find one’s own path. It is up to each person to decide how one’s life should be lived; it does not have much to do with parents.…In a Norwegian context, most people would have thought negatively about the son who ran away, while they probably would have felt sorry for the parents. (Nor June 2014)

In the third and final round discussing this text, the Malagasy group made the question of shame their main point. Having heard from how the issue of parental shame is downplayed by the Norwegian and Thai groups, the Malagasy group wanted to give a definition of “shame.” “Shame,” they said, “is all that you do against the tradition of society, what we call ancestral traditions.” And, they provided some examples to illustrate their understanding of “shame”: It is a “shame” if the man who is asking a father for his daughter’s hand does not first pay what we call vodiondry (which literally means “the buttock of mutton”), which is considered as the best portion from mutton meat. You should also feel “shame” if you are not dressed properly. Elders should be respected—you should say sorry in case you trip over an elderly person, and you should give a seat to an elderly person—if not, it is a “shame.” (Mad Sept 2014)

This understanding of “shame” seems to reflect a society where collective concepts are valued more than what is typically experienced in a Norwegian context. Horizontally, in relation to the ones who surround us, the fear of

146Knut Holter being marginalized is very strong. And vertically, in relation to the ancestors, it “has never hurt anyone” to respect and honor those “we all come from.” Another example of cultural difference between the three groups and their interpretation of the Luke 15 text relates to the educational responsibility of the father and the older brother vis-à-vis the younger one. The Thai group emphasizes—in accordance with traditional Thai culture—that the father and the older brother should have taught the younger brother how to behave, in order to avoid the kind of problems the younger one got into: The father loves his son. He would give anything and do whatever for his son. And he is the one who forgives his son’s mistakes. I think it will be better if he can prevent his son from making mistakes by teaching him. (Thai May 2014)

The point that the older brother should be a kind of role model for the younger one came as a surprise to the Norwegian group. “It does not work like that in Norway,” they said. “We can look up to those who are older, but it is not particularly important” (Nor June 2014). In Madagascar, however, the Thai perspective makes sense: He should be a role model in a good way. This means that he must inspire the younger one to be obedient and he must take good care of the family estate while he is at home. However, he is no role model when it comes to his jealousy. (Mad June 2014)

A third example of cultural differences between the three groups and their interpretation of the Luke 15 text may be the tendency of the Norwegian group to give psychologizing explanations, and then the Malagasy team’s reaction to this. The Norwegian group argues that the reaction of the father when the son comes home is somewhat exaggerated. He is “crazy.” He gives his son a robe and a ring, and he slaughters a fattened calf. What the father instead should have done, the Norwegian group says, is to confront him with what he had done, and not just give him everything into his hands. Moreover, when it comes to the second son, he is then the one who has the sympathy of the Norwegian group: “His father had a lot of love. Yet it does not seem as if the son who stayed home got so much of this love” (Nor May 2014). Thus, the lack of being loved by the father explains why the son who had remained back home all the time behaves as he does, and “we understand him,” the Norwegian group concludes. The Malagasy group, however, thinks this went too far. The father has indeed not failed to show love to his older son. The son had all he needed, and a party—which is the example used by the older brother—is not the only way of showing love. In the end, the Malagasy group rejects the psychologizing explanation of the Norwegians,

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instead offering a Malagasy perspective on who owes anything to whom in the parent/child relationship: When it comes to the feeling of being appreciated—or not valued—in the family (ref. the Norwegian group), then it is so we generally do what we can to bring joy to our parents, and not necessarily to get some recognition back. (Mad June 2014)

I now turn to their theological reflection. The Luke 15 text has an obvious potential as an invitation to theological reflection, given its genre—as a parable—and its focus on key topics such as father/child and love. A question which then arises is how and to what extent the groups are able to build text and interpretation into larger theological structures. An example that can illustrate this is the fact that the groups so quickly identify the father in the text with God. The question is what kind of consequences this identification has for the understanding of the text. One consequence could have been that it would restrict the freedom to criticize the father. Though, this was not reflected in all groups. As mentioned above, the Norwegian group expresses a psychologizing perspective, arguing that the father “should have confronted the [youngest] son with ​​ what he had done” (Nor May 2014), and when it comes to the oldest son, they argue that he had hardly experienced as much love (Nor May 2014). The Thai group is a bit more reluctant to criticize the father. They think that he should have taught his sons to avoid this kind of situations, and they suggest that he is a little unfair in relation to the sons (Thai May 2014). The Malagasy group is provoked by this last hint, and they answer: Some of the group members said that if we really are Christians, we know that God does everything is a righteous way, as he is righteous. Others said that even though we are Christians, such a response [as that of the Thai group] is quite natural because of our human nature. (Mad June 2014)

Here, the interpretation of the father as God is taken for granted. Although the Thai group had only suggested that the father in the text was a bit unfair, the Malagasy group immediately takes this as a somewhat illegitimate criticism of God. And when they said “if we really are Christians, we know,” it was the sharpest exchange of viewpoints between the groups during their interaction, which was a reaction that the group in Thailand politely choose to ignore. The Malagasy group continued to discuss the question of whether God is righteous, and in their third and last report on this text, they argued that God indeed is righteous, but that our perceptions of “righteousness” may be different from the perceptions we find in the Bible. Nevertheless, they

148Knut Holter said, the father in Luke 15 treated his two sons in the same way. The youngest received what he needed, and the eldest already had what he needed. When the groups intuitively identify the father of the text as God, it had another consequence for the understanding of the text, namely that God’s attributes as omniscient and omnipotent are read into the text and transferred to the father. The Thai group put it this way: The father was conscious and gave freedom to his children and would not force them to do what he himself wanted. According to Scripture, he knew—as he shared the legacy—how it would go. Yet, he let his children take a free decision. (Thai May 2014)

A possible consequence of this understanding of the father is that he is allowed to ignore what would be considered the traditional responsibilities of being a father. He “knew” that his son would squander the inheritance, still, for pedagogical reasons, he allowed the son to do so and then face the consequences of his choice. Perhaps one can say that this understanding takes away some of the sting of the text, that the son who “came to himself” and then without deserving it, he meets a forgiving father. The under-communication of the sting becomes quite evident in the second report from the Malagasy group, when it is said that we do not need to feel shame as long as we regret, because when we regret our sins, we can safely return home and rejoice, knowing that that God will accept us (Mad June 2014). In conclusion, the preceding analysis shows that the youths intuitively understand the genre of the text, and they are able to illustrate and—to some extent—reflect on cultural and theological questions emerging from their different readings and repeated interaction.

D: Localizing the Experiences of the Bible Study Project I started the essay with a survey of the research context of this project on youth groups reading Luke 15 together, and now I will return to where I started and briefly reflect on how the experiences of this project relate to the current research context. Reading it backwards, that is, reflecting upon the literature I referred to above, there is one particular tendency that sticks out: a gradually increasing focus on the transformative potential of intercultural Bible reading. The perspective is admittedly present already in the first major empirical study in the field, the now classical essay collection Through the Eyes of Another (de Wit and all 2004:30–32). Still, a decade later it has become the major perspective on intercultural Bible reading, as demonstrated by Schipani and all

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2015, where the first half of the book focuses on “transformation” (from case studies as well as more theoretically oriented studies) and further by de Wit and Dyk 2015, where the concept of “transformation” has become the main focus in the title (and in most of the essays). Many of the essays in these two collected volumes address questions of how to understand the transformative potential of intercultural Bible reading. One that is particularly interesting in the present context is an essay by Taggert E. Wolverton (Wolverton 2015). He conducted a PhD project (supervised by Hans de Wit) on “our” text, Luke 15:11–32, with youth groups in various parts of the world (Wolverton 2014). In his essay, he discusses how this transformative potential can be measured, and, focusing on spiritual growth, he points to three characteristics of the expected transformation: “learning to read the Bible differently,” “learning to see oneself differently,” and “learning to see others differently.” I tend to think that the intercultural Bible reading project that is being discussed in the present essay confirms and illustrates Wolverton’s three characteristics. There is a deepening of the understanding of the three actors in the project—“I,” “you,” and the Bible— and I will try to demonstrate this through a case. I asked the groups whether the text they were reading is appropriate to express the gospel about Jesus, and the responses point in slightly different directions. The Norwegian group responded that the text “is not particularly well suited” to express the gospel, and they let one of its members justify the answer by saying: “I would choose a story that is about Jesus, what he did and not just what he said” (Nor June 2014). The answer is pragmatic, but underneath is a theological focus arguing that the life and death of Jesus is more important than his words. The Thai group, too, emphasized a pragmatic aspect, but with the opposite conclusion when it comes to whether the text is appropriate to express the gospel about Jesus: In Thailand, people who hear the gospel about Jesus will have a stronger experience if everyday situations and examples can be dragged into the gospel. They will then in a way to be able to relate to the situation of the father or one of the brothers. (Thai Sept 2014)

The Malagasy group argued in a different direction than the Norwegian and Thai groups. They did not focus on the text’s more or less pragmatic potential, but rather on the potential of expressing key aspects of the gospel: The text expresses the gospel about Jesus in the sense that Father is still willing to forgive us our sins, and he showed this by sacrificing his only son to save us. We

150Knut Holter can here refer to the fatted calf—the best in the flock—which the father sacrificed to celebrate that the prodigal son had returned home. (Mad June 2014)

What we see in the Malagasy report, is that the central, Christian doctrine of God giving his son as a sacrifice for our sins is read into the parable. In this way, the concept of the father—that is God—loving his children is elaborated. God’s love for his children—although they are sinners—is not something abstract; it is very concrete. The ultimate expression of this is when he gave his only son as a sacrifice for our sin. The Malagasy group elaborated on this in their third report, pointing to biblical texts like Matthew 11:28 (“Come to me… and I will give you rest”) and John 14:27 (“My peace I give you”), and they conclude that “The father’s home is a place for peace. There is no peace anywhere else than with him” (Mad Sept 2014). The question of the suitability of the parable about the prodigal son to express the gospel about Jesus came up again when the three groups came together in Madagascar after a year of joint Bible studies. On one of the days, we had a round of personal faith stories. The Thai youths then pointed out a major challenge of minority churches, namely that people around them do not have any idea of what Christianity means. In such a context, the point of the genre becomes evident. Everyday situations have the ability of creating intelligible images of what the gospel is about. In Malagasy and Norwegian folk church contexts, however, the situation is different in the sense that at least parts of the people around them have some knowledge about the Bible and Christianity. Regarding the Norwegian group’s lack of faith in the suitability of the genre of the parable in relation to a more comprehensive understanding of the Christian faith, it may be that this, too, is culturally determined. With the danger of generalizing on a thin empirical foundation, it could be argued that the concept of God as an always attentive and loving father is not experienced particularly radical in a Norwegian context. Perhaps, it is a kind of intuitive theological reflection from the Norwegian youths’ side that allows them to emphasize a need to say something more specific about what Jesus actually did and not “just” what he said. Similarly, when it comes to the Malagasy group’s ability to read central doctrine into the text, it is tempting to think that this reflects a preaching tradition and preparation for confirmation that focuses on doctrine and catechism, and perhaps also a cultural context where ritual sacrifices are less distant and exotic than what it is, for example, in a Norwegian context. Nevertheless, as we sat down together in Madagascar, jumping back and forth between personal faith stories and the question whether the parable of the prodigal son is suitable for expressing the gospel about Jesus, the youths realized, I think—and to some extent even verbalized—what the current research context refers to as transformation. This reflects what Wolverton

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defines as key characteristics of such a transformation: the text has a many-faceted potential, and reading it means a constant negotiation between the text and its very different readers, such as the ones of our three groups.

Bibliography Mad May 2014 = Reading report from the Malagasy group, first meeting, May 2014. Mad June 2014 = Reading report from the Malagasy group, second meeting, June 2014. Mad Sept 2014 = Reading report from the Malagasy group, third meeting, September 2014. Nor May 2014 = Reading report from the Norwegian group, first meeting, May 2014. Nor June 2014 = Reading report from the Norwegian group, second meeting, June 2014. Nor Sept 2014 = Reading report from the Norwegian group, third meeting, September 2014. Thai May 2014 = Reading report from the Thai group, first meeting, May 2014. Thai June 2014 = Reading report from the Thai group, second meeting, June 2014. Thai Sept 2014 = Reading report from the Thai group, third meeting, September 2014. Autero, Esa J. 2016. Reading the Bible Across Contexts: Luke’s Gospel, Socio-Economic Marginality, and Latin American Biblical Hermeneutics. Leiden: Brill. de Wit, Hans. 2012. Empirical Hermeneutics, Interculturality, and Holy Scripture. Elkhart: Institute of Mennonite Studies. de Wit, Hans, and Janet Dyk, eds. 2015. Bible and Transformation: The Promise of Intercultural Bible Reading. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature de Wit, Hans, Louis Jonker, Marleen Kool, and Daniel Schipani, eds. 2004. Through the Eyes of Another: Intercultural Reading of the Bible. Elkhart: Institute of Mennonite Studies. Kinyua, Johnson Kiriaku. 2011. Introducing Ordinary African Readers’ Hermeneutics: A Case Study of the Agikuyu Encounter with the Bible. Oxford: Peter Lang. Malley, Brian. 2004. How the Bible Works: An Anthropological Study of Evangelical Biblicism. Walnut Creek: Altamira Press. Schipani, Daniel S., M. E. Brinkman, and Hans Snoek, eds. 2015. New Perspectives on Intercultural Reading of the Bible. Elkhart: Institute of Mennonite Studies. Segovia, Fernando F., and Rasiah S. Sugirtharajah, eds. 2009. A Postcolonial Commentary on the New Testament Writings. New York: T & T Clark. Snoek, Hans, ed. 2015. In Love with the Bible and Its Ordinary Readers: Hans de Wit and the Intercultural Bible Reading Project. Elkhart: Institute of Mennonite Studies. van der Walt, Charlene. 2014. Toward a Communal Reading of 2 Samuel 13: Ideology and Power within the Intercultural Bible Reading Process. Elkhart: Institute of Mennonite Studies. West, Gerald O., and Musa W. Dube, eds. 1996. “Reading With”: An Exploration of the Interface Between Critical and Ordinary Readings of the Bible: African Overtures. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature.

152Knut Holter Wolverton, Taggert Erin. 2014. An Intimate Revelation: Intercultural Bible Reading with Adolescents. Unpublished PhD thesis, Amsterdam: Vrije Universiteit. ———. 2015. “An Intimate Revelation: Reading Luke 15:11–32 with Adolescents.” In Bible and Transformation: The Promise of Intercultural Bible Reading, edited by Hans de Wit and Janet Dyk, 415–31. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature.

10. Occult Scriptural Exegesis: Theosophical Readings of the Bible Olav Hammer

Introduction In many parts of the Western world, the nineteenth century was a challenging time for the mainline churches. Broad changes in religious authority structures were under way, and the traditional actors on the religious scene were joined by new competitors. Science became the arbiter of truth for many, and religions arose that attempted to present their doctrines as being in tune with the latest scientific discoveries.1 Knowledge about other religions and cultures spread, and “the Orient” in particular became a focus of positive interest.2 Older currents outside the theological mainstream, including such diverse phenomena as Gnostic forms of religion, astrology, and ritual magic, were either revived or became familiar to a broader segment of the population, often filtered through an occultist perspective.3 Some people at this time hung on to the view of Christianity as an exclusive path to salvation and the biblical canon as revealed truth. Others, presumably far fewer, rejected the Christian tradition entirely and opted for a vague and noncommittal religiosity, or for no religion at all. Yet another option was to construct new forms of religion that appeared to combine the scientific, the multicultural, and the occult in one, attractive package. The most successful new religious current of the late nineteenth century, Theosophy, was created in the 1870s and 1880s around precisely this triple topos.4 The chief ideologue of the movement, Helena Blavatsky (1831– 1891), held that Theosophy was in full accordance with the latest advances of science, that it contained the truths common to various religions, and insisted that the historical churches had lost touch with spiritual verities that heterodox currents and writers had retained. She lambasted church-based

154Olav Hammer Christianity for entailing a blind belief in the irrational: its miracles, in her view, fly in the face of both modern science and common sense.5 Although late nineteenth-century atheists, agnostics, and rationalist critics of religion might have concurred with this critique, Blavatsky’s conclusion was a very different one from theirs. Christianity, in her view, was not to be rejected. Its texts and tenets just needed to be cleared of various misunderstandings. Under the dross, a universal spiritual truth could be detected. Other religions, especially Buddhism, provide clearer reflections of that truth, making them, rather than Christianity, ideal points of entry into the perennial wisdom tradition. Nevertheless, in the eyes of Blavatsky and her successors it was possible to arrive at an accurate view of the spiritual core of Christianity that the mainline churches failed to transmit. In particular, the canonical texts of Christianity needed to be read in ways that differed radically from those of the supposedly corrupt clerical institutions. Constructing a universal wisdom religion from available historically attested traditions and their scriptures comes with a set of challenges, given the easily observable fact that there are significant differences between, for example, the doctrines presented in the Buddhist sutras and the tenets proposed in the gospels or the Pauline letters. Blavatsky’s solution to the problem of rampant religious diversity was a version of a hermeneutic presupposition that readers of biblical texts have accepted since antiquity: that the sacred text holds a literal, surface reading, and one or more layers of meaning that are not immediately discernible to the casual reader. This conviction meshed with a fundamental Theosophical doctrine, namely that religions present two faces: there is an exterior or exoteric aspect, that anybody can observe, and a hidden or esoteric aspect, available only to those who have been initiated into deeper levels of understanding.6 Universal truth had over many millennia been kept pure by a small number of initiates. Over time, it had spread to various parts of the world and, in the process, it had become distorted to various degrees. Theosophical writers insisted that they held an interpretive key to determining which exoteric religions were closer to the esoteric core, which had departed the most from it, and how the esoteric truth of religious texts could be retrieved from beneath the exoteric layers. Blavatsky mediated this view of the dual nature of religion to her followers, and over time numerous religious innovators developed their own, post-Theosophical variations on the shared theme that Christianity in general and the Bible specifically contain a core of profound spiritual truth buried under an avalanche of exoteric nonsense perpetrated by the churches.

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The First Generation of Theosophists Spanning an active writing career of eighteen years, Blavatsky’s works consist of several books and fourteen volumes of collected articles. This massive corpus is furthermore often thematically rather haphazardly organized, making it a challenge to collate information on any given topic, including her view of Christianity and of the Bible.7 A fundamental suggestion underlying much of her written output is that she was not the creator of her concepts, but received them from a group of spiritually highly evolved beings, the Mahatmas or Masters, who held the key to the eternal truth.8 These Masters were by Blavatsky given a central role in the production of two fundamental texts. The first of these, the two-volume Isis Unveiled, published in 1877, is understood by many Theosophists to be dependent on dictation by several of these august beings (Goodrick-Clarke 2010, 127). They were also said to be involved in her later magnum opus, The Secret Doctrine (1888): the book is structured as a series of lengthy commentaries on terse verses purportedly found in an ancient palm-leaf manuscript written in the mysterious Senzar language, elucidated by means of the insights presented by her presumed Masters. Both of her major books and many of her articles discuss the two forms of Christianity that she distinguished between. Blavatsky’s writings on “exoteric” Christianity are permeated with polemics. Much of the Judeo-Christian tradition, if read literally, is said to be a particularly debased and distorted part of the universal heritage. A key element in Blavatsky’s reinterpretation is her insistence that mainline churches have radically misunderstood Jesus.9 This, she explains, was almost inevitable: the first adherents of Jesus were poor and ignorant, hardly fit to understand his true message (Blavatsky 1877, vol. II: 158). The key sources relating the course of his life, the books of the New Testament, were corrupted by their compilers (Blavatsky 1877, vol. II: 152). In other words, in order to find the valid, esoteric core of the gospels, these texts need to be read through an appropriate hermeneutic perspective. Since the messages from the Masters have epistemological priority over the letter of the text, their insights can reveal when a biblical passage can be accepted as true, when it is to be reinterpreted symbolically in order to find the underlying sense behind the corrupt surface, and when it is to be eschewed entirely. A reading carried out according to these principles will, according to Blavatsky, reveal that Jesus was not divine but a human being, albeit one who through various initiations had achieved a particularly high degree of spiritual insight.10 The concept of Christ, with which Jesus is almost universally associated in other interpretations of the Christian tradition, is in her works presented as something quite distinct. Referring to the similarly-sounding Greek

156Olav Hammer word chrēstos, “good, excellent,” Blavatsky reinterprets christos, “Christ,” as an end-point of the spiritual evolution of anybody who is chrēstos, a spiritual adept (Santucci 2009, 197–199). Christ is for her not a title that identifies a unique messianic figure, but a designation for a status that not only Jesus had attained, but is potentially attainable by any spiritual seeker. What can be known about the human, historical Jesus? Again, the gospels are seen as unreliable sources. In a suggestion prefigured in the anti-Christian critique of Celsus (and reported by Origen in Contra Celsus I.28), Blavatsky claims that the nativity story is a myth and that Jesus was born under very different circumstances than claimed in the gospel accounts. In reality, he was a Jehoshua ben Pandira who was born around 120 BCE in Lydda rather than Bethlehem (Blavatsky 1888b, 204). This theme was to be explored in much more detail by other Theosophical writers, and in particular the Cambridge-educated classics scholar G.R.S. Mead (1863–1933). An interpretation of religious history that had hitherto been largely based on claims of accessing the superior insights of the Masters now became grounded in the more mundane world of scholarship. Mead pursued a skeptical reading of New Testament sources. His issue with the traditional story is a familiar problem: it is impossible for Jesus to be born while Quirinius was governor of Syria (as stated in Luke 1:5) and under the reign of Herod (cf. Matthew 2:1–23), since the former became governor ca. 6 CE, and the latter died in 4 BCE (see Mead 1903, 34–35). Having determined that the gospels are untrustworthy, he proceeded to mine the texts of other traditions for what he saw as more trustworthy information. Most controversially, Mead also endorsed the clairvoyant investigations of the Theosophical leaders (Mead 1903, 18–26). According to the biographical account pieced together by such untraditional means, Jesus attained his exalted insights by means not documented in the extant biblical texts, namely through his contacts with spiritual luminaries from other traditions, and via the initiations he received. According to Blavatsky, Buddhist missionaries had travelled to the ancient Near East, and their legacy was carried on by the Essenes. Jesus had studied among these Essenes, and when he began to preach, his message was therefore essentially the same as that of the Buddha.11 Hence, cultural diffusion explains how Christianity—at least in its esoteric form—is a reflex of the same universal truth as Buddhism. If Jesus and the Buddha presented the same teachings, it should be possible to harmonize concepts found in Buddhist and Christian canonical texts. A symbolic reading can go a long way toward that goal, but there are doctrines of (“exoteric”) Christianity that seem to clash dramatically with the universal wisdom tradition as understood by Blavatsky. A particularly thorny issue is the

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description of life after death in the two religions. According to Theosophical understanding, reincarnation is a central component of the ageless wisdom.12 Since the New Testament in its “exoteric” guise does not seem to mention the idea that death of the physical body is followed by the rebirth of the same person in a new body, an “esoteric” Christian afterlife doctrine had to be uncovered from the canonical text via a radical reinterpretation. Edward Dwight Walker (1859–1890) provided precisely such a re-reading in his Reincarnation: A Study of Forgotten Truth (1888). He found traces of a suppressed belief in reincarnation in the Bible (ch. VII) as well as in patristic literature (ch. VIII) and presented a series of claims that have become staples of occultist literature up to the present day and have been reproduced countless times in New Age literature. He suggested that John the Baptist is portrayed in Matthew 11:14 as a reincarnation of Elijah (Walker 1888, 218), and stated that Origen was the main exponent of Christian reincarnation belief (Walker 1888, 233) until his writings were declared to be heretical at the Council of Constantinople in 551 (Walker 1888, 237). Aware, perhaps, that the evidence for reincarnation in the New Testament hardly is decisive, Walker (on p. 220) concluded that “more important than any separate quotations is the general tone of the Scriptures, which points directly toward reincarnation.” The biblical message of reintegration with the divine implicitly presupposes that we continue to exist in life after life, since one single life span is insufficient for that task. Blavatsky’s abundant use of Hindu and Buddhist concepts clothed in Sanskrit terminology is symptomatic of the fact that her sympathies lay outside the Christian tradition. Her contemporaries attempted to integrate particular aspects of Christianity and its texts into the pan-religious tapestry of a universal truth. It would be up to a new generation of Theosophical leaders to systematically harmonize readings of the Christian canon with the Theosophical world view.

A Second Theosophical Generation After the death of Blavatsky in 1891, two leaders of the new generation came to dominate the way in which Theosophical doctrines were formulated: Annie Besant (1847–1933), and former Anglican priest Charles W. Leadbeater (1854–1934). They gave a more central and positive role to Christianity by reinterpreting select passages from the Bible, deducing new meanings from Christian rituals and symbols, and commenting on historical Christian doctrines. Leadbeater’s fascination with Christianity ultimately led him to becoming the bishop of his own ecclesiastical organization, the liberal Catholic Church.

158Olav Hammer

Annie Besant’s Esoteric Christianity In 1901, Besant published a widely-read book on the true nature of Christianity, Esoteric Christianity: the Lesser Mysteries, revised in a second edition that appeared in 1905. Whereas Blavatsky’s works combine information purportedly relayed to her by her Masters with abundant supporting references to more mundane sources, Besant’s rhetorical focus is on rational inquiry. The force of reason and the weight of the historical evidence, Besant asserts, will convince her readers that Christianity is, in essence, a religion very different from that presented by the churches. Rather than a simple dichotomy of exoteric versus esoteric, Besant suggests that there are three forms of religion, of which only two can be presented in print. The first form is the by now familiar exoteric one, the version of Christianity that is available to the masses. The second is the version known to those who are initiated up to a certain degree. This understanding of Christianity can be characterized as a set of lower mysteries, because there is yet another level of secrecy, a set of highest mysteries that can only be communicated via oral teachings to the most advanced spiritual adepts. Besant’s book is therefore self-styled as a revelation of the lesser of these mysteries, those of which one may speak in public. How did Christianity and other religions acquire such multiple aspects? Besant’s answer combines nineteenth-century evolutionism with its opposite, a tale of successive spiritual degeneration (Besant 1905, 7–8). There are traces of noble ideas even among “savages” who are ostensibly incapable of producing such ideas (Besant 1905, 10). Thus, some individuals with a higher spiritual level must have imparted their wisdom to these “primitive” peoples. Ever since the savage stage of humanity, but also in modern, more developed societies, lower and elite forms of religion have coexisted. Revealing the higher forms implies going back in time and uncovering the intentions of those ancient initiates who did possess a high spiritual understanding. This is certainly the case for Christianity: the exoteric form of the religion offends the intelligence of modern people (Besant 1905, 38), and it is therefore Besant’s self-imposed task to reveal and revive what is latently already there, namely the truths that can be found via a careful reading of the New Testament and the texts of the Church fathers. Paul’s letters, in particular, are in Besant’s reading replete with references to the earliest Christian tradition being a mystery school with hidden layers of “esoteric” truth. Thus, on pp. 56–57 she refers to Ephesians 3, which she interprets in this sense. In verses 3–5, here quoted in the English Standard Version, Paul speaks of “how the mystery was made known to me by revelation, as I have written briefly. When you read this, you can perceive my insight into the mystery of Christ,

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which was not made known to the sons of men in other generations as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit.” What is not immediately apparent from Besant’s reading of the text is that Paul then writes that his mission is to make the mystery apparent to all. Her point is rather that the symbolic truth that lies underneath the literal meaning of the text has only been detected by the few who are spiritually enlightened. Besant attempts to find allies in her quest for a hidden core of Christianity by separating two strands of that tradition. One group of authors, she feels, has perceived the esoteric truths lurking behind the letter of the foundational texts and traditions. The other, much larger group represents a Christian mainstream that has succumbed to a “mass of ignorance” (p. 141). She thus spends a whole chapter (ch. 3) tracing a lineage of mystery-based or esoteric Christianity, from Clemens of Alexandria, to Origen, pseudo-Dionysius, Maximus the Confessor, Eriugena, several mystics of the Middle Ages, and from there on to the main characters of what is today generally referred to as Western esotericism. Only after roughly one hundred pages of arguments for the position that the concept of an esoteric Christianity is legitimate do we get to the issue of what Besant understands by the term, and what an esoteric reading of biblical texts will reveal. Her presentation is close to that found in Blavatsky, but with a new emphasis on how an investigation of this core of Christianity should proceed. While conventional researchers are limited by their reliance on publicly available historical records, including, of course, the canonical texts, the occultist can develop means of spiritual perception that uncover facts that remain hidden to others. Hence, Besant asserts, for an occultist the story of the “real” Jesus is easy to get at (Besant 1905, 127). Using clairvoyant means, it is possible to confirm Blavatsky’s and Mead’s claims that the hints found in the New Testament regarding Jesus’ birth and upbringing are incomplete or simply wrong. Paranormal investigation confirms that he was born a century before the date usually assumed (Besant 1905, 129–30), and that as a youth, he was trained in an Essene community. He there consulted a library with many books from India, and proceeded to travel on to Egypt, “one of the world-centres of the true Mysteries” (Besant 1905, 131). Like her predecessor, Blavatsky, Besant distinguishes between Jesus and the Christ: At age 29, when the baptism in the river Jordan took place, Jesus became the vessel of Christ, a “glorious Being belonging to the great spiritual hierarchy that guides the spiritual evolution of humanity” (Besant 1905, 140). Despite the apparently supernatural spark that ignites Jesus’ ministry, the healing miracles are due to “magnetic energies” (Besant 1905, 135), a concept that Besant does not comment upon, but surely echoes mesmerist ideas. His miracles are thus not supernatural, but were produced by means of

160Olav Hammer powers that all initiates above a certain level possess (Besant 1905, 145–46). After Jesus’ physical death, his subtle spiritual body continued to visit the disciples for the next fifty years, and it was particularly during this time that the “mysteries” of Christianity became unveiled to them (Besant 1905, 137). The main events in Jesus’ life alluded to in Besant’s retelling are clearly recognizable from the gospels, but it is equally clear that Besant takes the gospel narratives as mere points of departure for a symbolic reading. The Jesus story is a myth, but this term should not be read as designating merely an imaginative tale, but on the contrary a story that is even truer than history read literally (Besant 1905, 151). The key question is thus how the myth should be interpreted in order to find that deeper truth. Readers of myth tend to either focus on cross-cultural similarities, or insist that myths are firmly grounded in their local context. Besant’s approach is the former: Myths, in her perspective, are universal or nearly so, and “comparative mythology” can therefore enlighten us as to the true import of the story of Jesus’ life.13 Besant affirms (in ch. 5) that the New Testament accounts, taken as a whole, are versions of a sun myth, since the sun is a symbol of the logos. The Jesus myth can therefore be decoded according to a simple, universal schema that applies to solar myths generally. Sun gods or heroes are born at the winter solstice, and they are said to be born of virgins since Virgo is rising at that time. Roughly around the spring equinox the sun hero enters a new part of his life cycle, constituting both a higher level of maturity and a (symbolic?) crucifixion, in which he sacrifices himself as sustenance to his followers. The gospel accounts of the life of Jesus are, of course, easy for Besant to fit into this pattern, and similarities with other Near Eastern myths are equally easy to explain as reflexes of this universal Sun Hero myth: the birth of Horus, Mithras legends, and others all conform to this general outline. Essentially, the story of Jesus (as) Christ is that of the solar logos descending into matter. This, in turn, is symbolic of how Christ is a principle potentially awakened in all of us when we have advanced spiritually. Each main event of the gospel narratives matches a new step—a further initiation—of the individual’s spiritual progress. This kind of symbolic interpretation is also used to make sense of central Christian doctrines. The atonement is not the vicarious death of Jesus for the sins of humanity (which, for Besant, would be a crude understanding), but the principle of sacrifice that everybody can undertake. To summarize, in her reading of the Bible, Besant takes over and elaborates on themes that are familiar from her Theosophical predecessors but mediates them to her readers with a distinct message. Rather than emphasizing the perceived divergence of Christianity from a primeval, spiritual tradition, she explains that a correct understanding, one that is based on the supposedly

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secure dual footing of historical inquiry and clairvoyant investigation, fully supports the truth of the Christian heritage.

Charles W. Leadbeater’s Clairvoyant Investigations Charles W. Leadbeater (1854–1934), close collaborator of Annie Besant, was a prolific writer. His written output includes roughly forty titles on a range of topics that to various extents are relevant to our discussion. Leadbeater’s first major work on Christianity, The Christian Creed (1904), was published close in time to Besant’s volume on esoteric Christianity. As the title suggests, the book deals with a quite specialized topic, namely the major creedal formulations (the Apostles’ creed, the Nicene and Athanasian formulations). Leadbeater nevertheless manages to draw broader conclusions from these creeds, that confirm once again the fundamental Theosophical doctrine that religions have a double aspect, and that a symbolic reading is necessary in order to understand the “true” or “deeper” layers of a religious tradition. Leadbeater joins the diffusionist chorus of Theosophical historiography, and tentatively suggests that the creeds he investigates are garbled versions of initiations also found in Egypt, among Buddhists, and in the Essene community, and more tentatively suggests that the teachings of Jesus were inspired by Buddhism.14 In short, “real” Christianity as perceived by Leadbeater, as by other Theosophical writers, is something very different than Church doctrine. The latter suffers from “the fatal identification of the Christ with Jesus,” and had its central doctrines formulated by “ignorant and turbulent fanatics” (Leadbeater 1904, 28). Much of Leadbeater’s interpretation is thus very close to Besant’s. What sets his retelling of the by now familiar narrative apart from his Theosophical colleagues and predecessors is the lack of any specific references to the biblical text. Leadbeater explicitly eschews “evidence such as will appeal to the mind of the scholar and the antiquarian,” and rhetorically positions himself as the purveyor of “extremely interesting information which clairvoyant investigation has given to us” (Leadbeater 1904, 12). Another topic, directly relevant to his approach to Christianity, to which Leadbeater devoted a substantial volume, is that of the Masters, the group of advanced beings that purportedly instructed Blavatsky. Leadbeater’s book The Masters and the Path, published in 1925, presents these beings in terms that are both exalted and thoroughly this-worldly. Detailed descriptions of their place in a multi-layered cosmic bureaucracy, and of the many initiations they have undergone, are interlaced with floor-plans of their living quarters in the Shigatse valley of Tibet15, their worldly education at Western universities (Leadbeater n.d. [1925], 35), and their physical appearance (Leadbeater n.d.

162Olav Hammer [1925], 31–34). In this way, a fine-grained mythological representation of the Masters is constructed, a mythology that includes Christ. Specific elements in Leadbeater’s description of Christ and Jesus are recognizable from the writers we have already met. Jesus and Christ are, in typically Theosophical fashion, distinct. Jesus is a vessel, whose brain is prepared for the connection with Christ during his forty days in the wilderness (Leadbeater n.d. [1925], 205). Each major stage in the life of this double figure corresponds to an initiation in a kind of Masonic progression of levels projected onto a cosmic scale: the mysterious transfiguration, for instance, is the third initiation. The true events at that moment are explained in terms that are comprehensible only to readers steeped in Theosophy. For instance, “[A]t this stage the causal body is especially developed. The ego is brought more closely into touch with the Monad, and is thus transfigured in very truth” (Leadbeater n.d. [1925], 207). Similarly, the events surrounding the crucifixion and resurrection are interpreted as symbolic accounts of the fourth initiation (Leadbeater n.d. [1925], 209–10), while the ascension and descent of the Holy Ghost are equivalent to the fifth initiation (Leadbeater n.d. [1925], 223).

The Consolidation of an Interpretive Community Leadbeater, in his book on the Masters, remarks that “when we know these things from behind [that is, through clairvoyant methods], we find sudden and curious illumination thrown upon the various texts of the Bible” (Leadbeater n.d. [1925], 204–05). Yet, Leadbeater does not seem to feel the need to refer to any of the specific biblical passages that are the point of departure of his interpretive efforts. In that respect, his works are composed in a style that is strikingly different from that of Blavatsky or Besant. Blavatsky’s two major works, Isis Unveiled and The Secret Doctrine, besides being poorly organized and often bewildering, are characterized by their insistent polemics with others, and by their innumerable quotes and references. Besant, in her more accessible works, attempts to convince her audience, involves careful argumentation and, again, frequent references to other writers. Leadbeater’s books, by contrast, only infrequent acknowledge any historical predecessors, a stylistic feature that goes hand in hand with his claim that he had the occult faculties necessary to carry out clairvoyant investigation, and thus could perceive the truth of his claims at first hand. Leadbeater’s authorial voice presupposes a distinct and well-established interpretive community16 that takes the Theosophical perspective, carefully eked out by other writers, as selfevident. This is a style of authoritative discourse that would be adopted by many Theosophically-inspired writers who expounded on the core message

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of Christianity and its canon, from the founder of Anthroposophy, Rudolf Steiner, to the American psychic and harbinger of the New Age, Edgar Cayce, to an array of modern-day occultists, who in their own distinct ways are members of this interpretive community. Pursuing that historical lineage would, however, take us outside the boundaries of what a short chapter such as this can accomplish.

Notes 1. For case studies of how science is used as a legitimation for religion, see the contributions in Lewis and Hammer 2011. 2. On the role of the Orient in Western intellectual culture, see Schwab 1984, Clarke 1997. 3. For a definition and brief history of occultism, see Hanegraaff 2005. 4. Histories of early Theosophy include book-length surveys such as Campbell 1980 and brief introductions such as Godwin 2013. 5. Such sentiments are ubiquitous in Blavatsky’s voluminous writings. For a characteristic sample of such polemics, see Blavatsky 1883. 6. The idea that religions have this double aspect was not an innovation crafted by Blavatsky. The concept of a shared core of perennial truth underlying the diverse surface manifestations of various religious traditions has a long and complex history, for which see Hanegraaff 2012, especially for the role of this idea in Western esoteric currents. See Figl 1993 for the similar sentiment, held by many modern religious movements, that the major religious traditions point at the same ultimate truth. Among Blavatsky’s most immediate predecessors, one finds Godfrey Higgins (1772–1833), who combined the idea of religious monogenesis and diffusion with the notion that religions had a public and a hidden side. Higgins’ posthumously published magnum opus, Anacalypsis, a source that Blavatsky quoted with much approval, linked Christianity to this universal truth in ways that foreshadow later Theosophical speculation; see especially Higgins 1836, vol II: 367. 7. On the chaotic process of writing and editing that resulted in Blavatsky’s main works, see Hanegraaff 2017. The task of identifying her opinions on various subjects is made less arduous thanks to the very thorough indexes to her books and to the set of collected works. Nevertheless, the reader still needs to piece together a picture of Blavatsky’s views from many snippets of text spread over many volumes. 8. On the history of the concept of the Masters, see Goodrick-Clarke 2010. A truly in-depth analysis of the Theosophical Masters mythology is found in French 2000. 9. For a helpful introduction to Blavatsky’s take on Jesus and Christ, see Santucci 2009. 10. Blavatsky 1887, 182; 1888a, 19–20; For Blavatsky’s view on who Jesus was actually, see Blavatsky 1883, 361–62; 1887, 204; 1887a, 362; 1888a, 19–20 fn., 1888b, 204. 11. Blavatsky 1877 vol II: 130, 132–33; cf. Hammer and Snoek 2005 for a survey of such “alternative” beliefs about the Essenes. 12. Theosophists insist that Blavatsky’s writings from the very beginning of her career described and defended reincarnation, whereas scholars have concluded that this is a teaching that entered Theosophy around 1880, after having been vehemently rejected in Isis Unveiled. The concept became an established part of Theosophical

164Olav Hammer teachings not least by being treated extensively albeit unsystematically in The Secret Doctrine. For a summary of the widely divergent opinions regarding the doctrine of reincarnation in the early and later phases of the Theosophical Society, see Zander 1999, 477–99. 13. The term “comparative mythology” is here put in quotation marks, since Besant’s examples of the proponents of this discipline are rather idiosyncratic, comprising people such as the polymath Jacques-Antoine Dulaure (1755–1835), who wrote extensively on the cross-cultural prevalence of phallic cults; Charles-François Dupuis (1742–1809), one of the originators of the idea that Jesus was not a historical character but a mythic figure; the amateur scholar and hyperdiffusionist Godfrey Higgins mentioned above (n. 6); and the arguably more academic early scholar of Hinduism, Edward Moor (1771–1848). 14. Leadbeater 1904, 14–15. This idea, typical of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, is found also in books such as Grimm 1877, von Bunsen 1880, Seydel 1882, 1884, and Lillie 1887, 1893. In esoteric circles and in revisionist literature, the idea has survived into contemporary times. A number of such works can be located in the copious bibliography in Jongeneel 2009. 15. A substantial section of The Masters and the Path describes Kuthumi’s house and provides such a drawing of his living quarters (Leadbeater n.d. [1925], 22). 16. The term is here used broadly in the sense established by Stanley Fish (1976), as a group of people who share culturally constructed presuppositions about what a text “really means.” Fish’s contention (p. 465) that “every position taken is supported by wholly convincing evidence” is, of course, less relevant in the case of the interpretation of religious texts.

Bibliography Besant, Annie. 1905. Esoteric Christianity: The Lesser Mysteries. Revised 2nd ed. London: J. Lane (with numerous reprints). Blavatsky, Helena. 1877. Isis Unveiled. Facsimile ed. Pasadena: Theosophical University Press (with numerous reprints). Blavatsky, Helena. 1883. “A word with ‘Zero.’” In Collected Writings, edited by Boris de Zirkoff, vol IV, 358–65. (Blavatsky’s Collected Writings are available online at http:// blavatskyarchives.com/collectedwritings.htm) ———. 1887. “The Esoteric Character of the Gospels.” In Collected Writings, edited by Boris de Zirkoff, vol. VIII, 172–217. Adyar: Philosophical Research Society. ———. 1887a. “Notes sur ’L’ésoterisme du dogme Chrétien’ de M. l’Abbé Roca.” In Collected Writings, edited by Boris de Zirkoff, vol. VIII, 355–78. Adyar: Philosophical Research Society. ———. 1888. The Secret Doctrine. New York: Theosophical University Press (with numerous reprints). ———. 1888a. “A Note of Explanation.” In Collected Writings, edited by Boris de Zirkoff, vol. IX, 18–23. Adyar: Philosophical Research Society.

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———. 1888b. “Réponse aux fausses conceptions de M. l’Abbé Roca relatives à mes observations sur l’ésotérisme chrétien.” In Collected Writings, edited by Boris de Zirkoff, vol. IX, 194–215. Adyar: Philosophical Research Society. Campbell, Bruce. 1980. A History of the Theosophical Movement. Berkeley: University of California Press. Clarke, J. J. 1997. Oriental Enlightenment: The Encounter between Western and Asian Thought. London: Routledge. Figl, Johann. 1993. Die Mitte der Religionen: Idee und Praxis universalreligiöser Bewegungen. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. Fish, Stanley. 1976. “Interpreting the Variorum.” Critical Inquiry 2: 465–485. French, Brendan. 2000. “The Theosophical Masters: An Investigation into the Conceptual Domains of H.P. Blavatsky and C.W. Leadbeater.” Ph.D. dissertation, University of Sydney. Godwin, Joscelyn. 2013. “Blavatsky and the First Generation of Theosophy.” In Handbook of the Theosophical Current, edited by Olav Hammer and Mikael Rothstein, 15–31. Leiden & Boston: Brill. Goodrick-Clarke, Nicholas. 2010. “The Coming of the Masters: The Evolutionary Reformulation of Spiritual Intermediaries in Modern Theosophy.” In Constructing Tradition: Means and Myths of Transmission in Western Esotericism, edited by Andreas Kilcher, 113–160. Leiden & Boston: Brill. Grimm, Eduard. 1877. Die Lehre über Buddha und das Dogma von Jesus Christus. Berlin: Habel. Hammer, Olav, and Jan Snoek. 2005. “Essenes, Esoteric legends about.” In Dictionary of Gnosis and Western Esotericism, edited by Wouter J. Hanegraaff et al., 340–343. Leiden & Boston: Brill. Hanegraaff, Wouter J. 2005. “Occult/Occultism.” In Dictionary of Gnosis and Western Esotericism, edited by Wouter J. Hanegraaff et al., 884–889. Leiden & Boston: Brill. ———. 2012. Esotericism and the Academy: Rejected Knowledge in Western Culture. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hanegraaff, Wouter J. 2017. “The Theosophical Imagination.” Correspondences 5: 1–37. Higgins, Godfrey. 1836. Anacalypsis: An Attempt to Draw Aside the Veil of the Saitic Isis. London: Longman, Rees, Orme, Brown, Green, and Longman (with several reprints). Jongeneel, J. 2009. Jesus Christ in World History. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang. Leadbeater, Charles W. 1904. The Christian Creed: Its Origins and Signification. 2nd ed. London: Theosophical Publishing Society. ———. n.d. [1925]. The Masters and the Path. Online reproduction of the original text at www.theosophy.world/sites/default/files/ebooks/MastersandthePath.pdf [Orig.: Adyar: The Theosophical Publishing House.] Lewis, James R., and Olav Hammer, eds. 2011. Religion and the Authority of Science. Leiden, Boston: Brill. Lillie, Arthur. 1887. Buddhism in Christendom, or, Jesus the Essene. London: Kegan, Paul, Trench & co.

166Olav Hammer ———. 1893. The Influence of Buddhism on Early Christianity. London: Swan Sonnenschein & Co. Mead, G. R. S. 1903. Did Jesus Live 100 BC? London: Theosophical Publishing Society. Santucci, James. 2009. “The Conception of Christ in the Theosophical Tradition.” In Alternative Christs, edited by Olav Hammer, 190–211. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Schwab, Raymond. 1984. The Oriental Renaissance: Europe’s Rediscovery of India and the East, 1680–1880. New York: Columbia University Press. Seydel, Rudolf. 1882. Das Evangelium Jesu in seinen Verhältnissen zur Buddha-Sage. Leipzig: Breitkopf & Härtel. ———. 1884. Buddha und Christus. Breslau: Schottländer. von Bunsen, Ernst. 1880. The Angel-Messiah of Buddhists, Essenes and Christians. London: Longmans, Green and Co. Walker, E. D. 1888. Reincarnation: A Study of a Forgotten Truth. New York: John W. Lowell Company. Zander, Helmut. 1999. Geschichte der Seelenwanderung in Europa. Alternative religiöse Traditionen von der Antike bis heute. Darmstadt: Primus Verlag.



Contributor Biographies

Gerd Marie Ådna is Associate Professor at VID Specialized University in Stavanger, Norway, where she teaches religious studies. She works on Islam, rituals, and the transmission of narratives and values in Muslim communities in Norway and Germany. Her recent works include a monography, Muhammad and the Formation of Sacrifice (2014), and papers on pilgrimage and suffering in Muslim theology and communities (2018 and 19). Gunnar Magnus Eidsvåg is Postdoctoral Fellow at the Department of Early Childhood Education, University of Stavanger, Norway. He teaches topics in religion and ethics, and his research interests are Jewish and Christian holy texts, secularism, and pluralism in Norwegian kindergartens, as well as professional ethics among early childhood teachers. Beth Elness-Hanson is a lecturer in Old Testament at Johannelund School of Theology in Uppsala, Sweden. Her intercultural approach seeks to build bridges of understanding of the ancient Scriptures across contemporary cultural contexts. An interest with the Maasai began as a volunteer teacher for three years in Tanzania. Numerous visits to East Africa and ongoing research continue to deepen her understanding and collaboration. Olav Hammer is Professor of the Study of Religions, University of Southern Denmark. His research areas include religious innovation in Europe, New Age religiosity, and new religious movements, especially in the Theosophical tradition. His publications include Claiming Knowledge: Strategies of Epistemology from Theosophy to the New Age (2001), Alternative Christs (edited volume, 2009), and Western Esotericism in Scandinavia (edited with Henrik Bogdan, 2016).

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Contributor Biographies

Knut Holter is professor of Old Testament Studies at VID Specialized University in Stavanger, Norway. He has authored and edited a number of books on Old Testament interpretation and African biblical hermeneutics, and he has directed several international projects on African interpretive strategies to the Bible, cf. his website “SIMBA: The Stavanger Initiative on Method, Bible, and Africa,” https://simb.africa/. Marta Høyland Lavik is Professor of Biblical Studies at Stavanger University Hospital/VID Specialized University, Stavanger, Norway, and Research Fellow at Stellenbosch University, South-Africa. Her recent research deals with existential themes within the fields of theology/religion/health, and she has, in particular, investigated whether or not personal and religious narratives can be experienced as carrying meaning for people living with incurable cancer. Lars Kirkhusmo Pharo is Professor in Religion and Ethics at Nord University, Norway. He is Research Associate and Advisor at Moses Mesoamerica Archive and Research Project at Harvard University, as well as Research Partner at Max-Planck-Institut für Wissenschaftsgeschichte in Berlin. Pharo is author of publications on epistemologies, religions, ideas, concepts, languages, and semiotics of the Americas. Jon Skarpeid is Associate Professor in Religious Studies at the University of Stavanger, Norway. His research includes the importance of music in world religions, and his PhD compared narrative structures in Indian religions and Hindustani music. In recent years, his focus is how globalization has an impact on the reception of sacred texts. Jonas Svensson is Professor in the Study of Religions at Linnaeus University, Sweden, specializing in comparative Islamic studies. He has published in research areas such as human rights and Islam, Islam, gender and sexuality, as well as Islamic education. In recent years, his research focus has been on applying theories from the cognitive science of religion in the academic study of Islam. 

A Critical Study of Classical Religious Texts in Global Contexts: Challenges of a Changing World challenges toxic stereotypes of world religions by providing scholarly investigations into classic sacred texts in global contexts. By engaging more perspectives, important connections, and more, complex and humanizing “stories” are developed, inviting the reader to see the face of the “Other” and, perhaps, to see a bit of oneself in that face. In today’s world of increasing polarization and the rise of nationalism, the contributors to this volume welcome the reader to join them in a shared humanity that seeks understanding. A red thread that runs through each chapter relates to the challenges that globalization brings to the sacred texts in various contextual settings. The contributors describe various circumstances related to reading and interpreting sacred writings—whether historical or more recent—which continue to have an influence today. The essays in this volume view these religious texts in relation to four dichotomies: minority-majority, diaspora-homeland, center-periphery of the globalized world, and secular-religious. These elements by no means exhaust the issues, but they serve as a starting point for a discussion of relevant contexts in which sacred texts are read. The breadth of research represented stimulates a deeper understanding that is vital if we are to move beyond stereotypes and religious illiteracy to meaningfully engage the “Other” with wisdom and empathy—important virtues in today’s world. A Critical Study of Classical Religious Texts in Global Contexts will appeal to scholars and graduate students of religious studies, sacred scriptures, and post-colonial studies, as well as informed and inquisitive general readers interested in exploring interfaith dialogue and broadening their religious literacy.

Beth E. Elness-Hanson is Lecturer in the Old Testament at Johannelund School of Theology in Uppsala, Sweden. She received her PhD in the Old Testament at VID Specialized University in Stavanger, Norway. Jon Skarpeid is Associate Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Stavanger in Stavanger, Norway. He received his PhD in religious studies at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim, Norway. www.peterlang.com

Cover image: NASA. Used with permission.