Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Interfaith Relations'

Religion was regarded as a marginal factor by scholars of International Relations for a long time. The main reason for this ignorance is that the discipline of International Relations has followed the major paradigm - secularization thesis - in social sciences until recently. This resulted in ignorance of religion as an explanatory factor in International Relations. However, this situation has recently started to change. Beginning from 1990s, the role of religion in international relations has started to be reexamined
and secularization theory has started to be criticized. On the other hand, religion has started to be regarded as a tool for peacebuilding, at the same time. In addition to its contribution to conflicts and wars, religion is increasingly seen as a potential tool for peaceful cooperation
and inter-religious dialogue is becoming a part of diplomacy and conflict resolution policies. Within this context, interfaith dialogue is a case which shows the extent of the change in the discipline of IR regarding the role of religion. This thesis aims to make a comprehensive discussion on the historical and contemporary relation between religion and international relations by focusing on the role of interfaith dialogue, specifically dialogue initiatives within the EU and the UN. The dialogue projects of these institutions and their relation with security-driven policies are examined. Thus, the main concern of this study is to raise a question about the role of interfaith dialogue, especially the one proposed by the institutions above, in transforming the role of religion in international relations.

The social space of interaith relations in India is commonly represented in the academia, the media and the everyday discourse through the paradigm of communalism. This thesis considers it an analytical and socio-political discursive space, grounded on reified religious communities and their mutual relations. Thus, similar to ethnicity and ethnic conflict, communalism tends to reproduce the discourse of Hindu vs. Muslim as a given of social relations, configuring the very conflict narrative it attempts to explain. This study proposes a shift in perspective, trying to situate the paradigm of communalism in the social space and processes in which it is articulated and that it contributes to reproduce. By relying on existing critical literature on Indian nationalism, secularism, caste and communalism and on feminist perspectives on power, conflict and identity this thesis focuses on the interconnectedness of gender and socio-economic dimensions in nalTatives of interfaith relations. It elaborates an argument of communalism as a discourse of domination and social polarisation, reproducing social boundaries of a majoritarian, patriarchal and socioeconomically asymmetric order and veiling social tensions over the positioning of different sections of society and relations of super/subordination among them. The conflict nalTative of communalism is located within the discursive landscape of Indian colonial and post-colonial society, structuring and naturalising forms of domination and social polarisation across gender and socio-economic dimensions. By exploring the urban space of Hyderabad (Deccan), this research de constructs the conflict nalTative of communalism in its different themes and articulations, conceiving of gender and socio-economic differentials as organising principles for social relations, participating in the configuration of social boundaries but also of the possibilities for transcending them. In fact, while providing a perspective on the naturalisation of relations of super/subordination through the narrative of Hindu-Muslim conflict/harmony, this study P9ints at possibilities to imagine alternatives to the dominant paradigm. Multiple tensions over forms of domination and social polarisation find expression in the discourses and practices of interfaith relations, questioning the relative positionings assigned to different sections of society within and between religious communities' boundaries. In that sense, they expose and challenge the dominant language, meaning and practice of social relations. This study aims at reflecting on conflicts as socio-political and analytical paradigms reproducing discourses of and about power. It then proposes to look within and beyond dominant conflict narratives, at the social tensions articulating possibilities for a change in the discourse and practice of social relations and their representation.

Interfaith peace-building is an important step toward increased economic development in Kenya. The use of conflict resolution strategies as components of an international effort for development has become an important topic of research and debate over the past two decades. Within the category of interfaith relations, Christian-Muslim interactions may represent some of the most relevant to development in the world today. Since both focus on expansion through conversion, Christianity and Islam often seem to be in direct "competition for souls," socio-political power, or spheres of influence. The unique history and geographical situation of Kenya is also analyzed, as well as some of the underlying psychological causes of interfaith tensions and distrust. Information collected in Nairobi and Mombasa Kenya in the Fall of 2011 is examined as a case study of Christian-Muslim relations in coastal Kenya. Possible peace-building solutions are suggested from the academic literature on the topic.

Prior to September 11, 2001, a calculated image problem related to America’s defence strategy in the Near East and its foreign policy of exceptionalism culminated in its unfavourable perception in the Muslim world. To counter this setback, leading think-tanks recommended that US public diplomacy must lead the way in order for America to reclaim its positive image. During the Bush administration, this guidance was applied through the expansion of public diplomacy measures such as the State Department’s “Brand America” campaign and the “Shared Values Initiative”. Whilst they were successful at applying secular approaches to engaging international Muslim audiences, both campaigns failed to reach the core of Islamic society. This study contends that to reach this core, the crucial requirement must be to apply direct communicative engagement with local networks in order to restore trusted relations. In defining a new way forward, this study breaks new ground by examining the origin of this problem for America from the angle of communication. By acknowledging the many setbacks caused by various public diplomacy measures, we examine the prospects for the State Department in applying the post-secular communication strategy, Interfaith Diplomacy, to enrich political communication between US diplomats and key religious players in the Muslim world. Findings reveal that communication training under an Obama administration is essential for improving US-Muslim world relations, and this requires the recruitment of a Religion Attaché Officer Corps within the United States Foreign Service. A new Religion Attaché, equipped with a background in broad religious affairs and communication training in Interfaith Diplomacy, is likely to make significant headway in counteracting the tension caused by the US-Muslim world communication problem.

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This research argues that public preaching by Muslims and Christians reflects their positions in the public sphere, and indicative of the competition between them. From a perceived marginalized position, Muslims want to prove that Christians err on the basis of Biblical and Qur'anic texts. Pentecostal Christian preachers, on the other hand, extend their religious spaces into the public sphere and invite Kenyans in general, and mainline Christians in particular, to recommit themselves to Jesus. The preaching of both Muslims and Christians has potential and real negative effects for public order.

The question of who is participating in today’s debate around theologies of other religions is important. Religious difference and the many ways of dealing with it are issues in political, social and theological initiatives. The reality of religious plurality in daily life leaves some Christians wondering about the best way to relate to non-Christian neighbors. In light of this, a series of questions emerges about who is shaping conversations with people of other faiths and what priorities they reflect. A Lutheran voice is lacking in this debate. Despite this, there has been a wide response from other Christian traditions. In some cases denominations have raised questions of religious pluralism as a theological issue, while elsewhere individual theologians have contributed to the debate. The project that follows will examine such contributions from three ecclesial traditions (Roman Catholic, Evangelical and Protestant) and individual theologians in order to chart some common concerns in the theology of religions debate. In an effort to highlight a tradition-constituted approach to the other, connections will also be made between individuals’ positions and their ecclesial traditions. This thesis will also propose a distinctively Lutheran theology of religions first by using the works of Martin Luther to introduce the Lutheran history of engagement with non-Christians. Then, Lutheran statements and resources, partnerships and institutions will be examined to discover the ways in which the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America engages non-Christians. Finally, this project will propose crucial elements for a specifically Lutheran theology of religions. These elements will be put in conversation with individual Lutheran theologians who have made contributions to the debate. Ultimately a theology of kinship will emerge. Using distinctively Lutheran themes, this theology recognizes a connection between all people and calls Lutherans to live in kinship with the religious other.

This thesis examines how women negotiate their identification within and as a group when engaging in interreligious dialogue. It is an in-depth case study of the women’s interfaith book groups, the Daughters of Abraham, located in the Greater Boston Area. This focus facilitates an in-depth understanding of the dynamics of relationships within one group, between different groups, and as situated in the American sociocultural context. I explore the tensions arising from religious diversity, and the consequences of participating in an interreligious dialogue group for understandings of religious self and others. Categories such as boundary, power, sameness, difference, self and other serve to explore the complexities and fluidity of identity constructions. I answer the following questions: How do members of the Daughters of Abraham engage with the group’s religious diversity? How does their participation in the Daughters of Abraham affect their self-understanding and understanding of the “other?” What can we learn about power dynamics and boundary drawing from the women’s accounts of their participation in the Daughters of Abraham and from their group interactions? Two interrelated arguments guide this thesis. One, I show that Daughters members arrive at complex and fluid understandings of what it means to identify as an American Jewish, Christian, and Muslim woman by negotiating various power dynamics arising from ideas of sameness and difference of religion, gender, and sociopolitical values. Two, I contend that the collective emphasis on commonalities in the Daughters of Abraham is a double-edged sword. Explicitly, this stress intends to encourage engagement with the group’s religious diversity by excluding those deemed too different. However, whilst this emphasis can generate nuanced understandings of religious identity categories, at times it highlights differences detrimental to facilitating such understanding. Moreover, this stress on commonalities illuminates the power dynamics and tensions characterizing this women’s interfaith book group. Scholarship has by and large overlooked women’s interreligious engagements with explicit ethnographic studies of such being virtually non-existent. This thesis addresses this gap by using ethnographic methods to advance knowledge about women’s interreligious dialogue. Furthermore, it pushes disciplinary discourses by speaking to the following interlinked areas: Jewish-Christian-Muslim relations, formalized interreligious dialogue, interreligious encounters on the grassroots level, women’s interreligious dialogue, a book group approach to engaging with religious diversity, and interreligious encounters in the American context post-September 11th 2001.

This thesis focuses on two issues among the many comprising the broad subject of the relationship between Jews and non-Jews according to Jewish law. The issues are: (1) the prohibition against selling real estate in the land of Israel to non-Jews; and (2) the prohibition against intermarriage.
The prohibition against selling real estate in the land of Israel to non-Jews is based upon a Rabbinic interpretation of the phrase "lo Tehanem" from Deut. 7:2. In the period of the "Rishonim" (from Maimonides till Radbaz) the general view was that this prohibition was still in force and applied to contemporary non-Jews. From the beginning of the modern era, however, this prohibition, as a result of the new reality facing the struggling Jewish settlement in the land of Israel, became problematic.
The prohibition against intermarriage underwent a reverse development. During the Talmudic period most of the Rabbis, guided by the context of the Biblical text, argued that the Biblical prohibition only concerned the "Seven Nations" who used to live in Canaan at the time of the conquest and the settlement. But at the beginning of the modern era a rabbinic consensus gradually emerged that this Biblical prohibition related not only to the "Seven Nations" or "Ancient Pagans", but to all non-Jews at all times. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)

Cette thèse de doctorat retrace les trajectoires personnelles, scolaires et professionnelles des jeunes musulmans, étant nés et ayant grandi en France et en Allemagne, qui partent en Turquie pour étudier la théologie, à travers un programme interétatique, destiné à la formation des cadres religieux musulmans natifs et appelé « théologie internationale ». Retournant dans les pays de leur naissance avec un diplôme d’État, ces jeunes sont engagés par les associations religieuses en tant qu’imam-khatib, prédicateur, enseignant du Coran ou responsable des mosquées. Notre travail inscrit ces trajectoires dans un contexte européen marqué par un « problème de l’imam », dont la solution serait une « formation adéquate » sous le contrôle des États séculiers, qui cherchent à réguler la « nouvelle religion de l’Europe ». Sur la base d’une recherche empirique réalisée en France, Allemagne et Turquie, la thèse analyse ce processus, à l’échelle nationale, en tant que moyen d’intégrer les musulmans à la société globale par une reconnaissance de leurs revendications religieuses, les renvoyant dans le même temps à leurs communautés spécifiques. Dans la mesure où l’État séculier requiert un interlocuteur bien délimité afin de pouvoir nationaliser l’islam et « naturaliser » les musulmans, le cadre des structures juridico-politiques existantes les oblige à se définir comme des communautés religieuses. Ce processus dévoile les soubassements éminemment chrétiens de la laïcité française et de la sécularité allemande, deux modèles différents de sécularisme européen ayant des difficultés à accommoder les structures historiquement établies régissant les relations État-Église afin d’y inclure l’islam. À l’échelle de la subjectivité, cette thèse explore les manières dont les politiques gouvernementales assujettissent ces « imams-théologiens natifs », dans les deux sens du mot : à la fois en faisant d’eux des sujets tout en les soumettant aux nouvelles techniques de gouvernementalité, dont le but est de fabriquer des acteurs musulmans « compatibles » avec les démocraties européennes . Ces jeunes cadres religieux musulmans exercent leur capacité d’agir dans les interstices de nouveaux désirs et d’anciens liens : la volonté de servir l’islam en français et en allemand, d’une part, et la nécessité de reconfigurer leurs relations complexes avec la langue turque et la Turquie, d’autre part, mais aussi avec les institutions religieuses appartenant aux premières générations d’immigrés. Leurs engagements au sein des mosquées européennes et des centres de dialogue interreligieux créent également de nouveaux espaces, dans lesquels l’islam turc en Europe ainsi que les frontières entre les trois monothéismes européens sont en cours d’être redéfinies par des élaborations théologiques comparatives. De manière plus générale, ce travail aborde les enjeux que la nouvelle pluralité religieuse pose à la fois aux États séculiers et aux acteurs religieux, conduisant les uns vers une désabsolutisation de la laïcité ou de la sécularité comme la norme hégémonique régissant les relations États-religions, et incitant les autres à une redéfinition théologique de leur religion respective à pied d’égalité
This Ph.D. dissertation describes personal, academic and professional trajectories of young Muslims, born and raised in France and Germany, who attend Turkish universities through an interstate program for the training of native Muslim religious personnel called “International Theology.” Returning to their countries of birth, after having a B.A. degree in theology, these young Muslims are employed by religious associations as imam-khatib, preacher, Coran teacher or representative of mosques. This work places their trajectories within a European context in which imams or religious leaders have come to be regarded as a problem even a threat, whose solution is to be found in “proper training” under the control of the secular states seeking to regulate “Europe’s new religion” more efficiently. Based on empirical research in France, Germany and Turkey, the dissertation analyzes this process as a means of integrating Muslims to the larger society by recognizing some of their religious claims while at the same time sending them back to their particular community. Since the secular state needs a well-defined representative body as an interlocutor for the nationalization of Islam and “naturalization” of Muslims, integration to the larger society requires defining Islam as a religion and Muslims as a “religious community” within the framework of existing legal-political structures. This process reveals the well-entrenched Christian underpinnings of French laicity and German secularity, which represent two different systems of European secularism. Both have difficulties adapting Islam to fit within long established structures that have historically managed State-Church relations. At the subjective level, the dissertation explores the ways in which governmental policies empower young Muslims as the “native imams-theologians” while at the same time subjecting them to new techniques of governmentality, which aim at constituting Muslim subjects “compatible” with European democracies. The main argument of the dissertation is two-fold. First, these young Muslim religious personnel exercise their agency in the interstices of new desires and old ties: to serve Islam in French or in German, on the one hand, and, on the other, to reconfigure their complex relations with the Turkish language, with Turkey, and with the institutions built by the first generations of Turkish migrants in Europe. Second, their engagements in the European mosques and at the centers of interfaith dialogue create new spaces in which Turkish Islam in Europe is being redefined along with the boundaries between the three monotheisms. At a more theoretical level, this work broaches the stakes of religious plurality in the twenty-first century, driving European governments to de-absolutize their secular norms in dealing with religions and ushering in new religious social actors, Muslim as well as Christian, to re-theologize interfaith relations on more equal terms

D.Litt et Phil. (Semitic Languages and Cultures)
This thesis is an examination of “interfaith praxis” in the South African struggle for liberation, with particular emphasis on Muslim-Christian relations. We begin with an overview of the epistemological and theological contribution of “praxis” in European and subaltern contexts of liberation theology as well as the key dynamics of representation, conditionality and transformative activism in the history of Muslim-Christian relations. We then analyze and contrast “two histories” of Muslim-Christian relations in South Africa: one of Orientalism and the other of interfaith praxis. Through a close examination of two organizations - the Call of Islam (est. 1984) and the South African Chapter of the World Conference on Religion and Peace (est. 1984) - we argue that interfaith praxis changed how Muslims and Christians in the struggle approached interfaith dialogue and theological reflections on the religious other. It was this interfaith praxis that contributed to the importance of religious pluralism in contemporary South Africa. Following through from the history and reflections on interfaith praxis, we suggest here the possibility for a new framework for Muslim-Christian relations called a Liberatio-Political Framework.

Interfaith dialogue is no luxury for Christians living in a pluralistic~ effervescent world of intenningling, multi-religious realities. Many Christians take seriously their responsibility towards interfaith dialogue. However, different Christians understand this responsibility in different ways, which often leads to acrimonious accusations of unchristian dialogical approaches. The question is whether there is any means of ordering and assessing the Christian responsibility towards other religions in a mutually uplifting and increasingly holistic way? Ken Wilber provides an integral, or All-Quadrant, All-Level hermeneutics that may assist us with an answer. All holonswhich means everything in the "Kosmos" - emerge or arise in holarchical fashion. On one level, it is a whole, on the next transcendent level it is a part of the whole. This process is infinite and is only ever released in One Taste/salvation/Nirvana/the Kingdom of God, or simply unqualifiable Suchness. Wilber provides an integrated methodology for understanding the process by which holons find their release in One Taste. The holon of Christian responsibility towards interfaith dialogue also emerges through discreet, recognizable stages. Each stage is integrated into the next higher level. The lower levels are more fundamental since they exist as a part of the higher levels. However, the higher levels are more significant, since they have an increased capacity to explore aspects of dialogue previously hidden. The levels we explore are the mythic rational, the rational and the centauric. 'lbese levels emerge through four interrelated dimensions or Quadrants: the Upper Left or spiritual/faith dimension of the person entering into dialogue, the Upper Right Quadrant or theology of dialogue that emerges, the Lower Left or communal and interpretive realm, and Lower Right which covers the social organizational patterns with which the person in dialogue chooses to associate him or herself. We define responsibility in tenns of these four Quadrants: The response or theology (UR) of the person is dependent upon her response-ability, or interior faith development (UL), which is informed by the worldview (LL) of her faith community to whom she feels responsible, with the sociological patterns of her community (LR), to some extent, offers clues as to her stage of development.
Religious Studies and Arabic
D.Th.(Religious Studies)

This thesis is a study within the international master program “Religion in Peace and Conflict” at the department of theology at Uppsala University. The study should be seen as a microstudy over the role gastronomy plays as a tool for peace and resistance in the Holy Land. Jerusalem represent Israel and Tabye and Bethlehem represent Palestine in the study. The method used is the so-called abductive method or reasoning, where I am the one who is observing and analysing data from an ethnographical standpoint. The study is interdisciplinary in the way that cookbooks, interviews, personal observations and photographs are used as primary sources.  The theory “The gastronomic man” are the theoretical framework. The theory deals with the factors that are of importance for the choices humans make when it comes to food and beverage. The results of the study indicates that gastronomy is present at least on two levels in society in the Holy Land, on a high political level manifested via diplomatic gastronomy and on a more personal level where the informants works with gastronomy both as a tool for peace, and for the Palestinians also a way to overcome the effects of the occupation. The results also indicates that education within the culinary arts are of great importance in order to understand other groups’ cuisines than one’s own. The cuisines that falls back on heritage, culture and nations. It is suggested that gastronomy can take the part of religion itself for its practitioners since themselves constructs what is sacred.

This thesis covers the concepts of God in the traditional faith of Meru people but the background goes back to African traditional religion in general. Meru is located at the eastern part of Mount Kenya. The work begins with a literature review and field based on oral tradition, which indicates that Meru people came from northern Africa, moved to Canaan, Meroe, (south of Egypt) Meru-Arusha, Mombasa, and finally through Tana River to their present land. The Meru people also claim that they came along with all Bantus speaking communities in Eastern, Southern, and Central Africa. The thesis has seven chapters. The first one covers introduction and background, followed by the research plan and methodology (chapter two) Literature review (chapter three). The fourth chapter outlines the geography, migration and the various stages of becoming a human being. That fifth chapter consists of Meru traditional government and specialists. The sixth one describes the concepts of the Supreme Being in Meru traditional religion. The seventh chapter discusses the interaction of Meru traditional religion with Christianity and its implications.
Systematic Theology and Theological Ethics
M.Th. (Systematic Theology)

This study which is the product of library research and fieldwork seeks, on account of the persistent marginalisation of African Traditional Religion (ATR) in Sierra Leone by Islam and Christianity, to investigate the place of ATR in inter-religious encounters in the country since the advent of Islam and Christianity. As in most of sub-Saharan Africa, ATR is the indigenous religion of Sierra Leone. When the early forebears and later progenitors of Islam and Christianity arrived, they met Sierra Leone indigenes with a remarkable knowledge of God and a structured religious system. Successive Muslim clerics, traders, and missionaries were respectful of and sensitive to the culture and religion of the indigenes who accommodated them and offered them hospitality. This approach resulted in a syncretistic brand of Islam. In contrast, most Christian missionaries adopted an exclusive and insensitive approach to African culture and religiosity. Christianity, especially Protestantism, demanded a complete abandonment of African culture and religion, and a total dedication to Christianity. This attitude has continued by some indigenous clerics and religious leaders to the extent that Sierra Leone Indigenous Religion (SLIR) and it practitioners continue to be marginalised in Sierra Leone's inter-religious dialogue and cooperation. Although the indigenes of Sierra Leone were and continue to be hospitable to Islam and Christianity, and in spite of the fact that SLIR shares affinity with Islam and Christianity in many theological and practical issues, and even though there are many Muslims and Christians who still hold on to traditional spirituality and culture, Muslim and Christian leaders of these immigrant religions are reluctant to include Traditionalists in interfaith issues in the country. The formation and constitution of the Inter-Religious Council of Sierra Leone (IRCSL) which has local and international recognition did not include ATR. These considerations, then beg the questions: * Why have Muslim and Christian leaders long marginalised ATR, its practices and practitioners from interfaith dialogue and cooperation in Sierra Leone? * What is lacking in ATR that continues to prevent practitioners of Christianity and Islam from officially involving Traditionalists in the socio-religious development of the country? Muslim and Christians have given several factors that are responsible for this exclusion: * The prejudices that they inherited from their forebears * ATR lacks the hallmarks of a true religion * ATR is primitive and economically weak * The fear that the accommodation of ATR will result in syncretism and nominalism * Muslims see no need to dialogue with ATR practitioners, most of whom they considered to be already Muslims Considering the commonalities ATR shares with Islam and Christianity, and the number of Muslims and Christians who still hold on to traditional spirituality, these factors are not justifiable. Although Islam and Christianity are finding it hard to recognise and include ATR in interfaith dialogue and cooperation in Sierra Leone, ATR continues to play a vital role in Sierra Leone's national politics, in the search and maintenance of employment, and in the judicial sector. ATR played a crucial part during and after the civil war. The national government in its Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) report acknowledged the importance and contribution of traditional culture and spirituality during and after the war. Outside of Sierra Leone, the progress in the place and level of the recognition of ATR continues. At varying degrees, the Sociétié Africaine de Culture (SAC) in France, the All Africa Conference of Churches (AACC), the Vatican, and the World Council of Churches, have taken positive steps to recognise and find a place for ATR in their structures. Much about the necessity for dialogue and cooperation with ATR can be learnt in the works and efforts of these secular and religious bodies. If nothing else, there are two main reasons why Islam and Christianity in Sierra Leone must be in dialogue with ATR: * Dialogue of life or in community. People living side-by-side meet and interact personally and communally on a regular basis. They share common resources and communal benefits. These factors compel people to be in dialogue * Dual religiosity. As many Muslims and Christians in Sierra Leone are still holding on to ATR practices, it is crucial for Muslims and Christians to dialogue with ATR practitioners. If Muslims and Christians are serious about meeting and starting a process of dialogue with Traditionalists, certain practical issues have to be considered: * Islam and Christianity have to validate and accept ATR as a true religion and a viable partner in the socio-religious landscape of Sierra Leone * Muslims and Christians must educate themselves about ATR, and the scriptures and teachings of their respective religious traditions in order to relate well with Traditionalists These are starting points that can produce successful results. Although at present Muslims and Christians in Sierra Leone are finding it difficult to initiate dialogue and cooperation with Traditionalists, all hope is not lost. It is now the task of the established IRCSL to ensure the inclusion of ATR. Islam and Christianity must remember that when they came as strangers, ATR, played host to them and has played and continues to play a vital role in providing hospitality, and allowing them to blossom on African soil.
Religious Studies and Arabic
D.Litt. et Phil. (Religious Studies)