Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies

Volume 25 Article 14

November 2012

A Collection of Book Reviews

Edward Ulrich

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Recommended Citation Ulrich, Edward (2012) "A Collection of Book Reviews," Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies: Vol. 25, Article 14. Available at: https://doi.org/10.7825/2164-6279.1520

The Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies is a publication of the Society for Hindu-Christian Studies. The digital version is made available by Digital Commons @ Butler University. For questions about the Journal or the Society, please contact [email protected]. For more information about Digital Commons @ Butler University, please contact [email protected]. Ulrich: A Collection of Book Reviews

62 Book Reviews

takes on the challenge of creatively which sought (and still seeks) to maintain a reconstructing directions for Dalit theology feigned notion of auspiciousness, purity and that are practical, biblical, inclusionary and pollution.” (p. 19). liberative. These creative moves represent the Second, I am not convinced that “practical most substantial and enriching section of the efficacy” of Dalit theology ought to be the book. Moreover, in this contribution the vistas single criterion by which one evaluates the of theology are opened up to address concerns discipline. Surely meaningfulness and that include Dalits and non-Dalits. A more metaphysical plausibility can be added to the universal role is carved out for Dalit visions. All effectiveness of theology. But even if one lets human beings and their eventual liberation Rajkumar have his praxiological cake alone one matter to Dalit communities. In this sense Dalit must ask the question as to whether the people theology is not merely an assertion of one eating the cake have had much to say on the human particularity but an aspiration for the matter of whether it is satisfactory as their liberation of all human beings. meal? Perhaps what has emerged as Dalit There are a couple of critical comments I theology in academe-produced texts does not wish to register. First, Rajkumar’s get transferred to aid Dalit Christian practice interpretation of the caste system replicates on the ground. However, I am not so sure that the same weakness that he identifies with Dalit another imaginative, even if praxis-committed, theology: robust in churning out convincing text that is founded in Jesus’ healing stories has theory but ineffectual when accounting for a better chance of success. All this talk of actual practice. His interpretation maps out the bridging the gap between thought and practice stringent divisions and blatant discriminations seems to presuppose that individual Christian that underpin the rationale of caste system. Dalits and grass root Christian communities are This is no doubt an effective way of not living their theological aspirations. I am maintaining great distance between the Dalit’s convinced that local communities have micro- world of pollution and the Caste community’s scripts of liberative praxis that are operative, world of purity. Yet Rajkumar turns a blind eye even of partially and tentatively. One may need towards the incalculable and boundless to see liberation praxis as a collection of micro- practices of Dalit subversions, Caste-Dalit actions, micro-rituals and micro-beliefs that negotiations, and Caste resignations that live work tacitly and cryptically. Liberative and proliferate in the space in-between such narratives may emerge when such sources are theoretical formulations of purity and correlated with biblical speech-acts of Jesus pollution. An uncritical inflation of fixity and including healing stories. Sourcing of Dalit negligent disregard of fluidity in the theology must take place on the ground rather functioning of purity and pollution reinforces a than for the ground. Our vocation as Dalit stereotype of the power of caste communities theologians thus may lie in construing in contrast to the powerlessness of the Dalit. theoretical validity for what is pragmatically Thus, even if useful for valorizing a bridging already extant even of not fully effectual. After role for Jesus in the theoretical caste-Dalit all, magnificent bridges of stone and steel that divide, one is left with the unhelpful erasure of are constructed without the earthy canals of overt and covert manifestations of the mud and straw may be conceptually stable but calculating practices of Dalit agency. No concretely irrelevant. wonder then that Rajkumar is stuck with the language of “victims” in referencing Dalits: Sathianathan Clarke “The Dalits are the victims of a social system, Wesley Theological Seminary, Washington D. C.

A Christian Pilgrim in : The Spiritual Journey of Swami (Henri Le Saux). Harry Oldmeadow. Bloomington, IN: World Wisdom, 2008, xvi + 316 pp.

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God’s Harp String: The Life and Legacy of the Benedictine Monk Swami Abhishiktananda. William Skudlarek, editor. New York, NY: Lantern Books, 2010, x + 140 pp.

Jesus Christ: Quest and Context of Abhishikānanda (Henri Le Saux OSB). Santhosh Sebastian Cheruvally. New Delhi: ISPCK, 2011, xv + 246 pp.

Witness to the Fullness of Light: The Vision and Relevance of the Benedictine Monk Swami Abhishiktananda. William Skudlarek and Bettina Bäumer, editors. New York, NY: Lantern, 2011, 177.

A few years ago, a suggestion went out on the Abhishiktananda (1910-1973), originally listserv of the Society of Hindu-Christian known as Henri Le Saux, was a monk and a Studies that proposed a panel on Swami priest at St. Anne’s Abbey in Kergonan, France. Abhishiktananda at the annual meeting of the In 1948 he settled in India and in 1950 he and Society, given his birth centenary in 2010. The Fr. Jules Monchanin established the general response was lackadaisical and a major Benedictine monastery of Shantivanam, near scholar commented that the area was Trichinopoly, with plans that it would conform exhausted. However, in the space of four years to Hindu customs of renunciation as much as four books have been published on was permitted by Christian faith. Benedictine Abhishiktananda. Two of them came out in monasticism, historically, has taken on conjunction with the one hundredth different forms in different countries, so anniversary of Abhishiktananda’s birth: God’s Abhishiktananda and Monchanin concluded Harp String and Witness to the Fullness of Light, that it should take on a distinctively Indian both edited by William Skudlarek, with the form. In order to learn more about Indian second edited also by Bettina Bäumer. The monastic traditions, Abhishiktananda visited former book is a collection of previously many institutions in south India, and thereby published essays and the latter a collection of came to meet Ramana Maharshi in 1949. He essays presented at a recent conference. The made many subsequent visits to Ramana’s other two books are by Harry Oldmeadow and ashram and he became deeply enamored with Santhosh Cheruvally. Oldmeadow explores Advaita. Abhishiktananda spent the next two parallels between Abhishiktananda’s thought decades of his life, until his death, seeking and the “perennial philosophy” of Frithjof immersion in Advaitic mysticism and relating it Schuon. Cheruvally’s is an analysis, from a to Christianity. Roman Catholic perspective, of Skudlarek’s first book, God’s Harp String, is a Abhishiktananda’s theological views of Christ. valuable work in that it draws together eleven All four books are worthwhile and should be a previously published essays from the bulletins part of the library of all Abhishiktananda of the American Commission of Interreligious scholars. Dialogue and the now defunct Abhishiktananda Society. This review will discuss two of these https://digitalcommons.butler.edu/jhcs/vol25/iss1/14 DOI: 10.7825/2164-6279.1520 2 Ulrich: A Collection of Book Reviews

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essays. Bettina Bäumer’s “Pilgrim and Hermit” Abhishiktananda’s life, not included in James gives a good summary of the main conclusions Stuart’s otherwise comprehensive biography, Abhishiktananda reached in the final years of Swami Abhishiktānanda: His Life Told through His his life. During his two decades in India he Letters (Delhi: ISPCK, 1989). These details experienced great strain standing between concern the relationship between Advaita and Christianity as he did, for the first Abhishiktananda, Dupuis, Stuart, Vidyajyoti beckons one beyond names and forms whilst College of Theology, and Brotherhood House in the second is firmly rooted in the world of New Delhi. In so doing, it gives the context for manifest reality. Abhishiktananda tried to some of the essays Abhishiktananda wrote in reconcile theologically the two traditions, but the final years of his life, found in Intériorité et found them too disparate to do so. Hence, in his Révélation, (Sisteron: Presence, 1982). final years he took solace in a mystical Scholars writing on Abhishiktananda experience which he believed to be common to generally appreciate the influence of the both Advaita and Christianity, but which Upanishads and Ramana Maharishi on him transcends the doctrinal expressions of both. running consistently through his life, but there As Bäumer explains, “Abhishiktananda did not were also other Hindu influences on him. deny anything of what he previously believed; Bäumer, who is a scholar of Kashmiri Shaivism, but everything was elevated to a level where gives extracts from Abhishiktananda’s writing the ‘names and forms’ became insignificant” which shows the influence of Kashmiri (Skudlarek 2010, 56). Shaivism. For instance, Abhishiktananda Those who write on Abhishiktananda often criticized the dualism between nirguṇa and tend to be very accepting of his conclusions, saguṇa Brahman found in some versions of especially as articulated by Bäumer. James Advaita. He rejected that in favor of the idea Wiseman’s essay is an exception. While giving that the entirety of Brahman is present in all an overall positive assessment, Wiseman aspects of reality, even “the smallest mite, the identifies a bifurcation in Abhishiktananda’s grain of sand, the electron” (Abhishiktananda, thought between language and experience, by quoted in Skudlarek and Bäumer 2011, 43). which he dismisses concepts and doctrines in Gianfreda’s essay concerns favor of mystical experience. Why assume, he Abhishiktananda and the Eucharist. It is well wonders, that the doctrines of the great known that in his first decade in India, theologians of the past did not arise out of deep Abhishiktananda experienced much tension in spiritual experiences? “How, after all, could celebrating the Eucharist. The issue is that the anyone be so certain that the speculations of Eucharist is a rite which takes place in the theologians like Saint Athanasius, Saint Basil, world of names and forms, whereas Advaita Saint Augustine, or Saint Thomas Aquinas on involves the renunciation of rituals and calls the Incarnation or the Trinity did not arise out one beyond names and forms. In spite of this of their own deep experience of these tension, Abhishiktananda persisted with both mysteries?” Skudlarek 2010, 99). his immersion in Advaita and his duties as a Skudlarek’s second book, Witness, edited Catholic priest. Eventually the tension subsided also by Bettina Bäumer, is a collection of papers and the Eucharist became a great joy to him presented at a 2010 symposium at (Skudlarek and Bäumer 2011, 103). This change Shantivanam, in honor of Abhishiktananda’s came around 1964 in conjunction with one hundredth birth anniversary. Of the eight Abhishiktananda’s development of an essays, this review will discuss those by George indigenous version of the liturgy, involving Gispert-Sauch, Bettina Bäumer, and Fausto Hindu texts and forms of worship (105ff). He Gianfreda. Gispert-Sauch’s essay covers the reinterpreted it from an Advaitic perspective. influence of Abhishiktananda on the late For instance, he wrote that the Advaitic Jacques Dupuis, one of the best known Catholic Christian has the potential to deeply appreciate theologians in the area of the theology of the Eucharist, for he or she is the one who is . The essay gives some important aware of the presence of God behind details from the final years of

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everything, including every word and gesture are simply stepping stones to the ultimate of the liturgy (110). mystery and are not themselves ultimate. Oldmeadow gives a comprehensive account Second, the ultimate mystery is esoteric or of Abhishiktananda life and thought. Most such hidden in that most religious believers are not studies take a chronological approach, but attuned to it, being wrapped up instead in Oldmeadow takes a thematic one. This makes outward beliefs and practices, not in an interior the book helpful and valuable. Oldmeadow mystery. Although Abhishiktananda’s thought gives a very fair portrayal of Abhishiktananda’s conforms in these two ways to Traditionalism, life and thought, but he has a particular Oldmeadow points out that he was not a agenda. His prior work has not been on, Traditionalist like Schuon. Schuon was primarily, either Asian religions or clarifying the groundwork of the Traditionalist Abhishiktananda, but “Traditionalism.” This is position and exploring its intellectual more commonly known as the “perennial ramifications. Abhishiktananda, in contrast, did philosophy,” advocated in the past century by not identify himself with a Traditionalist school , Rene Guénon, and but was instead developed some Traditionalist . Oldmeadow spends the insights in his struggle to resolve the tension majority of the book laying out various aspects between Christianity and Advaita (262-68). of Abhishiktananda’s life and thought and then Cheruvally’s book began as his doctoral goes on to argue that his thought fits within dissertation at the Gregorian University in the mold of “Traditionalism.” Rome. The book surveys Abhishiktananda’s Traditionalism teaches that there is a writings to identify his theological consistent common strain of spirituality understanding of Christ. Cheruvally identifies running through all traditions. Because there two main understandings, which he identifies are many contradictions between religions, this as the “Trinitarian-Saccidānanda Christology” may seem like a difficult thesis to argue. or “TSC” and the “Self-Awakening Christology” However, by positing a distinction between or “SAC” (Cheruvally 2011, 128). The TSC, which exoteric and esoteric dimensions of religion, Abhishiktananda gradually developed in his one can bypass these contradictions first decade in India, combines Christian and (Oldmeadow 2008, 251-58). On the exoteric Advaitic doctrines. Abhishiktananda identified level, which is the level of the outward the Son of the Holy Trinity with the Atman of observables of belief and practice, there are the Upanishads, believing him to dwell deep clear differences between religions. On the within all human beings. This means that the deeper, inward level, reached by aspirants, Christian and the Advaitin both have there are no contradictions. On this level divine something to learn from the other. The reality is directly experienced, without the Advaitin experiences the ultimate reality as intermediary of beliefs and practices (19). one, as the mystery of sat-cit-ānanda, but However, one should not disparage the exoteric through Christianity he or she can awaken to level, for it is only through dedication to it that an experience of the communion which one can arrive at the esoteric. Oldmeadow Abhishiktananda believes to lie at the heart of considers this approach to questions of sat-cit-ānanda, the communion between the religious pluralism as highly satisfactory, for it Father and the Son of the Holy Trinity. gives one a way to be loyal to one’s tradition Likewise, through Advaita the Christian can while also not considering its beliefs and realize Christ not simply as an external reality practices as ultimate, which would entail but as a presence deep in the soul, experiencing devaluing other religions (259). the mystery of sat-cit-ānanda (129-46). Oldmeadow argues that Abhishiktananda’s In Abhishiktananda’s final years, with some thought, especially in his final years, conforms deep Advaitic mystical experiences taking place to Traditionalism. There are two features of in his life, he developed the SAC (146-47). The Abhishiktananda’s thought, in particular, that Bible states that at Jesus’ baptism the voice of he focuses on. First, Abhishiktananda argued God from heaven declared him to be his son. that all religious forms are relative, that they Abhishiktananda identified this experience of

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Jesus as identical to the Advaitic realization of abandonment of doctrine. Wiseman implies unity with Brahman, and considered that that doctrine is, in fact, based in some ways experience to be the summit of all spirituality upon experience, whereas Cheruvally argues (147-50). He considered the potential for this that the content of Christianity must respond realization to lie within all human beings, and to the context, which in this case is Advaita, hence within all religions: “The Christ I might rather than the context altering the content present will be simply the I AM of my (every) (Skudlarek 2010, 99; Cheruvally 2011, 167). deep heart, who can show himself in the It might be worthwhile to play these dancing Shiva or the amorous Krishna!” contrasting perspectives off of each other. On (Abhishiktananda, quoted in Cheruvally 2011, what does Cheruvally base his claim that in 152). Whilst the earlier TSC conjoins some Christianity the content should shape the Christian and Advaitic concepts, the SAC context, not the reverse? Does he base this on involves dropping Christian dogmatic concepts tradition and authority? If so, Oldmeadow in favor of Advaitic experience. “I feel too would respond that Cheruvally is bound up much, more and more, the blazing fire of this I with the externals of religion, not looking to its AM, in which all notions about Christ’s inner depth. But one may ask, in turn, on what personality, ontology, history, etc. have does Oldmeadow base his claim that there is a disappeared” (Abhishiktananda, quoted in common esoteric level beyond the doctrinal Cheruvally 2011, 152). level? This question is pertinent, given that the Scholars who write on Abhishiktananda are many contradictions between religions are generally accepting of these later conclusions evidence to the contrary. In fact, Oldmeadow as a natural outcome of a deep encounter seems to suggest that the insights of Guénon between Advaita and Christianity. However, and Schuon about religious pluralism rest upon unlike many other scholars in this area, an intuition rather than a reasoned argument: Cheruvally refuses to cast aside two thousand “Their grasp of metaphysical and cosmological years of doctrinal tradition in the face of principles seems to be more or less Abhishiktananda’s encounter with Advaita. He spontaneous, rather like the sudden argues that the content of Christian revelation solidification of certain crystalline structures” cannot be altered simply because of a new (Oldmeadow 2008, 266). context, which in this case is Advaita: “The It would seem that Cheruvally would have unicity of Christ is primarily and essentially us accept his perspective on the basis of content specific in terms of God’ saving and full tradition and Oldmeadow his perspective on revelation in Christ transmitted and preserved the basis of an intuition. Both of these bases by the Church in Scripture and Tradition, and seem to be equally matters of faith, rather than secondarily is context specific in terms of other necessary conclusions. This issue merits more cultural and religious experiences. . . . it is the exploration. Is there something inherent to content that responds to the context and not Christianity that makes it inappropriate to the context which decides and alters the treat doctrines and rites as merely symbolic, or content” (167). Cheruvally general assessment can they be regarded as merely provisional? of Abhishiktananda’s life and thought was that Thinkers like Oldmeadow, Abhishiktananda, it was a valuable experiment which shows valid and John Hick give different arguments to directions for Christian theology to take in support the view that the doctrines and rites of India, like the TSC, and directions that it should all religions should be treated as provisional. Is avoid, like the SAC. there a way in which Christianity, perhaps Among these four recent books two because of the implications of the doctrine of opposing perspectives are identifiable. On the the Incarnation, cannot be appropriately fitted one hand, scholars like Bäumer and Oldmeadow into this mold? are approving of Abhishiktananda’s movement As mentioned at the outset of this review, beyond the doctrinal specifics of religions to a an email on the SHCS listserv in recent years mystical experience of unity. On the other stated that the area of Abhishiktananda studies hand, Wiseman and Cheruvally protest this is about exhausted. The publication of four

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books in four years on Abhishiktananda’s life whether or not the area of Abhishiktananda and thought challenges this, and also points to studies is exhausted. Abhishiktananda was a possibilities for future research. For instance, representative of an era in the encounter Bäumer’s essay (Skudlarek 2011, 31-46) leaves between Hinduism and Christianity when one wondering how the Kashmiri Shaivite Advaita was considered by many scholars to be influence on Abhishiktananda developed and the summit and essence of Hinduism. Advaita how it intermingled with other influences on was thus a main focus of efforts at comparison him. Similarly, Gianfreda’s essay leaves the and dialogue. However, while Advaita reader wanting to know more about the continues to be a central interest the field of specifics of Abhishiktananda’s changing Hindu-Christian studies has expanded approaches to Christian liturgy (Skudlarek considerably. This is seen, for instance, in 2011, 103-29). Likewise, Cheruvally’s book leads Francis Clooney’s steady output on Śrī one to want to know the specifics of how Vaiṣṇavism and Michelle Voss Robert’s recent Abhishiktananda developed the TSC and how it comparative study of Kashmiri Śaivism. was eclipsed by the SAC. Finally, the However, before dismissing the area of contrasting perspectives found among these Abhishiktananda studies, one should ask not four books show that Abhishiktananda’s only the question of whether the area has been experiences and conclusions point to exhausted but the question of whether the fundamental issues that go far beyond his life lessons of his life have been integrated by the and example, and that these diverse churches. While Abhishiktananda’s life has perspectives need to be met head on and generally been mapped out, the process of wrestled with. Still, although further research integrating the lessons of his life into the remains to be done, it is true that the area has churches has only just begun. been generally mapped out—the four books spend a lot of space covering material that has Edward Ulrich been covered in many earlier studies. University of St. Thomas The lackadaisical response on the SHCS listserv may point to a different issue than

Bringing the Sacred Down to Earth: Adventures in Comparative Religion. Corinne G. Dempsey. New York: Oxford University Press, 2012, 199 pages.

IN Bringing the Sacred Down to Earth, Dempsey, instances in which concepts and performances former president of the society that publishes of the sacred, when brought down to earth, can this journal, and author or editor of some of the dismantle impositions and abstractions” (5). most important recent works on Indian The latter part of this quotation prefigures Christianity and American Hinduism, enters the author’s emphasis, in each of the book’s directly and explicitly into the project of four comparative chapters, on the “dialogue” comparative religion, as well as into scholarly between “established hegemonic systems debates about its utility and legitimacy. While (asserted through colonialism, nationalism, the author acknowledges that comparative scientism, and institutional religion) and projects tend often towards essentialism and localized religious expressions (found in involve the scholarly imposition of foreign or folklore figures, democratizing theologies, and anachronistic terms on contextualized, lived embodied and landed sacrality),” that, Dempsey religious phenomena, she yet maintains hope argues, “talk back” (11). Put another way, that “by working contextually—and perhaps Dempsey aims to diminish the danger that brazenly—across religious and cultural divides, comparison will lead to unhelpful essentialisms the [chapters in the book] demonstrate and impositions by focusing “upon the ways https://digitalcommons.butler.edu/jhcs/vol25/iss1/14 DOI: 10.7825/2164-6279.1520 6