CIRCA News from the University of Chicago Divinity School I had intended to follow my last CirCa column with A view into some of the tasks (both expected and unexpected) that make their way with regularity into the inbox on my desk, now that July 1 is a distant memory and I am well underway in the deanship. But I expect that there will be more than ample time for that, and so instead would prefer today to give a better sense of what it means to be the ambassador for the Divinity School by recounting a not atypical set of three days in mid-November. On a Thursday evening in November, sophically. Arnold urged the audience “to I had the pleasure of a mid-week visit to the go beyond already established models of Art Institute of Chicago, to hear Professor intelligibility and habitual practices of the Wendy Doniger, Mircea Eliade Distin- Letter self … [in search of] new forms of self guished Service Professor of the History of and of social intelligibility, new modes of Religions, speak to a packed crowd under freedom” on the promise that “attentive the auspices of the Chicago Humanities from the improvisatory listening can transfigure Festival. Her lecture, with accompanying our lives.” slides, “The Lingam Made Flesh: Split- On Saturday morning I drove twenty Level Symbolism in Hindu Art,” was a Dean miles in a light rain out of the city to marvelous display of erudition, insight, Homewood, Illinois, to Faith Lutheran humor, and hermeneutical savvy. She Church (ELCA), to attend the ordination traced both the history of production of of one of our M.Div. graduates, Erin Bou- these “cylindrical votary objects” (as she man. I had taught Erin in several classes put it, with dry neutrality) representing during her time at Chicago, including a the god Shiva — from ancient Indian memorable seminar on the Gospel of Mark temples to the present — and the history with students who tended to stay on after of interpretation of these phallic images, class (one and even two hours) with Greek down to the present, demonstrating New Testaments in hand, debating such how the ambiguity inherent in much issues as whether the disciples in Mark ever religious symbolism may be incorporated “get it,” or whether the statement of the into various systems of commitments centurion in 15:39 is a straightforward, or and ongoing controversies. ironic, declaration. Rev. Cynthia Lindner, The next night, I joined a crowd of the Director of our Ministry Program, students, faculty, South Siders and music gave the sermon on the occasion of adepts in Mandel Hall to participate in an Rev. Bouman’s ordination, including extraordinary music improvisation event. a children’s message in which she asked This evening performance was part of a fall “...living religious and some dozen three- to ten-year-olds who quarter course, “Improvisation as a Way cultural traditions are critically came forward, “just what does it take to of Life,” co-taught by Professors George make a pastor?,” drawing on analogies Lewis (of Columbia University in New engaged with the best of about what it takes to train a dentist, York) and Arnold Davidson, Robert O. a plumber or a teacher. Anderson Distinguished Service Professor one’s mind and imagination, After Erin was duly ordained, she an- in Philosophy and in Divinity (in the areas eager for conversation.” nounced that in this same church, thirty- of Philosophy of Religions and History of eight years ago, Karen Knutson became Judaism). Davidson and Lewis, the great the first woman in the LCA (Lutheran trombonist, composer and scholar (and Church in America) ordained to a regular Chicago native), organized this electrifying and the European free-jazz pianist Alexan- parish position. Pastor Knutson, who evening around improv that included der von Schlippenbach, and an interlude was on hand for this occasion, is herself a performances by Lewis and his computer, conversation about what improv is, how graduate of the Divinity School. A native the AACM Great Black Music Ensemble, it happens and what it might mean philo- Continued on page 5 W inter 2 0 1 1 | N umber 3 5 Faculty News and Notes Festschrift for Mendes-Flohr Ashraf Noor and Julia Matveev have edited a Festschrift in honor of Paul Mendes-Flohr, Professor of Modern Jewish Thought in the Divinity School. The volume, entitled Zur Gegenwärtigkeit deutsch-jüdischen Denkens. Festschrift für Paul Mendes-Flohr (Munich: Wilhelm Fink verlag, forthcoming 2011), is appearing in the series “Makom,” directed by Noor under the auspices of the Franz Rosenzweig Minerva Research Centre for German-Jewish Literature and Cultural History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Schweiker Named Phi Beta Arnold and Wedemeyer The focus of his research has been the Kappa Visiting Scholar Awarded Tenure esoteric (Tantric) Buddhist traditions. He has written on the modern historiography of William Schweiker, Edward L. Ryerson Tantric Buddhism, the question of “antino- Professors Daniel A. Arnold and Christian Distinguished Service Professor of Theologi- mianism” in Indian K. Wedemeyer have been promoted to the cal Ethics and Director of the Marty Center, esoteric Buddhism, positions of Associate Professors of the has been named a Phi Beta Kappa visiting textual criticism Philosophy of Religions and the History of Scholar for 2011–2012. The dozen or so and strategies Religions, respectively, effective July 1, 2011. participants in the visiting Scholar Program of legitimating Professor Arnold is a scholar of Indian each year are distinguished scholars who are authority in classical Buddhist philosophy, which he engages in made available to visit approximately sixty Tibetan scholasticism, a constructive and comparative way. His colleges and universi- and the semiology particular interests are in Indian Buddhist ties, spending two of esoteric Buddhist Madhyamaka, and in the appreciation of days at each one, ritual and scripture. Indian Buddhist philosophy as an integral meeting informally He is a 2010 – 11 part of the broader tradition of Indian philo- with students and Fellow of the National Endowment of sophy. He is currently studying issues involv- faculty members, the Humanities, and was recently elected ing the intersection of Buddhist philosophy taking part in class- Co-chair of the Buddhism Section of the of mind, episte- room discussions, and American Academy of Religion. mology, and the giving a public lecture The tenure of these two scholars is category of open to the entire indicative of the Divinity School’s commit- intentionality. academic community. ment to the long tradition of the study of Professor Wede- The visits are designed primarily for under- Buddhism at the University of Chicago. meyer’s work addres- graduate participation. The purpose of the ses topics of history, For more information on the interdisci- program is to contribute to the intellectual literature, and ritual plinary study of Buddhism at the University life of the campus by making possible an in Indian and of Chicago, please see http://buddhist- exchange of ideas between the visiting Tibetan Buddhism. studies.uchicago.edu/. Scholars and the resident faculty and students. Roetzel in Residence Spring 2011 Calvin J. Roetzel, the Emeritus Sundet scholar of the Apostle Paul and has students to the itinerant Chair in New Testament and Christian written numerous books, articles, apostle. Other publica- Studies in the Department of Classical and and essays on the subject. His tions include abingdon Near Eastern Studies at the University of scholarship includes Paul’s reception NT Commentaries: 2 Minnesota, will be visiting Professor of New as a figure of authority in the early Corinthian; The World Testament in Spring quarter 2011. Professor Church, and related questions that Shaped the New Roetzel is an internationally recognized that can be asked of Paul’s Jewish Testament; and Paul: contemporaries, Philo The Man and the Myth, and Josephus. His which was selected introductory textbook as “Best Popular on Paul — The Letters Book Relating to the of Paul: Conversations in New Testament, 1997 – 98” by the Biblical Context (now in its fifth Archaeo-logy Society. He was a driving force edition) — has become the behind Minnesota’s recent adoption of a definitive manual used by Religious Studies major. Professor Roetzel instructors throughout the will be offering a course on Paul’s Letter country for introducing their to the Romans. ❑ 2 C irca Retirements Three senior faculty members—Martin Riesebrodt, Franklin I. Gamwell, on Purpose: Justice and the reality of God and Politics as a Christian Vocation: Faith and W. Clark Gilpin—are retiring from full-time teaching. and Democracy Today. Existence and the Good: Metaphysical Necessity in Morals and Martin Riesebrodt, Professor of the Politics is forthcoming in June 2011 from Sociology of Religion in the Divinity SUNY Press. School, and also appointed in the Depart- In the spring (May 19 and 20), the ment of Sociology, focuses in his research Divinity School will hold a lunch-to-lunch and teaching on social theory, the historical conference entitled “Writing Religion: and comparative sociology of religion, and Representation, Difference, and Authority the relationship between religion, politics, in American Culture” to honor W. Clark and secular culture. His most recent book, Gilpin at his retirement. Gilpin, the The Promise of Salvation: a Theory of Margaret E. Burton Distinguished Service religion, the culmination of two decades of Professor of the History of Christianity and research and teaching, offers an interpreta- Theology, is also a Divinity School alumnus tive theory of religion and builds on earlier (M.A. 1972, Ph.D. 1974). A historian of work, such as Die rückkehr der religionen. Christianity who studies the cultural history Fundamentalismus und der ‘Kampf der of theology in England and America since Kulturen,’ in which he explored the the seventeenth century, much of his unexpected regeneration of (often funda- research focuses on the cultural history of mentalist) religion in the modern world.