Comparing Religions : Possibilities and Perils?

Idinopulos, Thomas Athanasius, and Brian C Wilson, and James Constantine Hanges (editors). Comparing Religions : Possibilities and Perils?
. Leiden: Brill, 2006. First edition. Octavo. xvii, (1), 320pp. Index and 18 page bibliography. Pictorial buckram, lavender spine lettered in white & black. A near fine, but ex-library copy with a minimal rubber library stamp on title page and at bottom edge of text block.

Given the fact that today’s university students are far more culturally sophisticated than ever before, “Comparing Religions: Possibilities and Perils” brings together a distinguished group of professors of religion with years of teaching experience to address the central question of how comparison of religions should be pursued in today’s classroom. Covering topics such as recent theoretical approaches to comparison, case studies of comparing religions in the classroom, and the impact of postcolonialism and postmodernism on the modernist assumptions of comparitivism, the volume seeks to problematize and interrogate the field, especially as it relates to emerging models of pedagogy at the university level. “Comparing Religions” will be of especial interest to those who teach in religious studies departments, or who teach courses on religion in departments of anthropology, sociology, and history. (OCLC)

Contents: Comparison as a theoretical exercise /; Anthony J. Blasi –; Questions of judgment in comparative religious studies /; George Weckman –; The role of the authoritative in the comparative process /; David Cave –; The mothering principle in the comparison of religions /; Thomas Athanasius Idinopulos –; Theaters of worldmaking behaviors : panhuman contexts for comparative religion /; William E. Paden –; Comparing religious ideas : there’s method in the mob’s madness /; Wesley J. Wildman –; Comparative religion for undergraduates : what next? /; John Stratton Hawley –; Socrates and Jesus : comparing founder-figures in the classroom /; James Constantine Hanges –; Christianity’s emergence from Judaism : the plus and minus of Joseph Klausner’s comparative analysis /; Thomas Athanasius Idinopulos –; Interpreting glossolalia and the comparison of comparisons /; James Constantine Hanges –; Towards a post-colonial comparative religion? : comparing Hinduism and Islam as Orientalist constructions /; Arvind Sharma –; Circling the wagons : the problem with the insider/outsider in the comparative study of religions /; Russell T. McCutcheon –; The postmodernist challenge to the comparative method /; Robert A. Segal –; The only kind of comparison worth doing : history, epistemology, and the “strong program” of comparative study /; Ivan Strenski. (OCLC)

Volume 113 of Brill’s “Numen Book Series: Studies in the History of Religions.” near fine. Hardcover. (52846) $75