Meaning and Method in Comparative Theology

Catherine Cornille

• Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN: 9781119535225
• eBook ISBN: 9781119535249
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Comparative Religion

The first systematic overview of the field of comparative theology

Meaning and Method in Comparative Theology offers a synthesis of and a blueprint for the emerging field of comparative theology. It discusses various approaches to the field, the impact of religious views of other religions on the way in which comparative theology is conducted, and the particularities of comparative theological hermeneutics. It also provides an overview of the types of learning and of the importance of comparative theology for traditional confessional theology. Though drawing mainly from examples of Christian comparative theology, the book presents a methodological framework that may be applied to any religious tradition.

Meaning and Method in Comparative Theology begins with an elaboration on the basic distinction between confessional and meta-confessional approaches to comparative theology. The book also identifies and examines six possible types of comparative theological learning and addresses various questions regarding the relationship between comparative and confessional theology. 

• Provides a unique and objective look at the field of comparative theology for scholars of religion and theologians who want to understand or situate their work within the broader field
• Contains methodological questions and approaches that apply to comparative theologians from any religious tradition
• Recognizes and affirms the diversity within the field, while advancing unique perspectives that might be the object of continued discussions among theologians

Meaning and Method in Comparative Theology offers an important basis for scholars to position their own work within the broader field of comparative theology and is an essential resource for anyone interested in theology conducted in dialogue with other religious traditions. 

2021 PROSE Finalist in the Theology & Religious Studies category.

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Types of Comparative Theology

In the centuries since its first use – which has been traced back to 1700¹ – the term “comparative theology” has been used in various ways, or applied to different types of engagement with religious plurality. It has been put forth as a counterpart to apologetic approaches to other religions, as proto‐comparative religion, as a means to develop a universal or world theology, and as a new form of constructive systematic theology. It may involve any two or more religions and any schools or denominations within larger traditions. There is thus a natural proliferation of different types and expressions of comparative theology.

In one of the early systematic discussions of the modern field of comparative theology, David Tracy developed a basic distinction between comparative theology as “a comparative enterprise within the secular study of the history of religions in which different ‘theologies’ from different traditions are being compared” and comparative theology as “a more strictly theological enterprise (sometimes named ‘world theology’ or ‘global theology’) which ordinarily studies not one tradition alone but two or more, compared on theological grounds.”² Though the difference between the secular or historical and the normative or theological approaches to the discipline seems clear, there is in the actual practice of comparative theology often less of a marked differentiation between the two. Historians of religions have come to duly recognize their own normative biases, while comparative theologians at times refrain from explicit normative statements or conclusions.

There are, nevertheless, still important differences between historical and theological approaches to the comparison of religions. These differences are manifest in both the starting point and the goal of the comparativist. While the comparative theologian and the scholar of comparative religion alike may declare their particular historical and religious or other identity and location, scholars in the history and comparative study of religions generally disclose their personal biases in order to minimize their impact. In contrast, comparative theologians fully embrace their religious presuppositions as constitutive of their work. Though recognizing the continuity between comparative theology and comparative religion, Reid Locklin and Hugh Nicholson highlight this important difference:

Comparative theology can therefore be regarded less as an alternative to comparative religion, running alongside the latter in a parallel track, than as one of a range of critically self‐conscious approaches to the study of religion after “religion,” albeit with at least one important difference: whereas the recognition of normative commitment remains a methodological problem for most scholars in religious studies even today, it belongs to the very nature of the comparative theological project.³

In addition to its starting point, comparative theology is also distinguished from the comparative study of religion by its goal. While the scholar of comparative religion may be driven primarily by intellectual curiosity and the desire to understand a particular phenomenon in light of a larger whole, the comparative theologian seeks to deepen and advance theological truth. The ultimate goal of comparative theology thus involves comparison not for its own sake or only for the sake of greater scholarly insight, but for the purpose of enriching and enhancing the self‐understanding of a particular religion, or theological truth more broadly conceived. While comparative religion is oriented to a deeper understanding of the nature of religion or the meaning of a particular religious idea or phenomenon, comparative theology is more interested in their meaningfulness or validity. It is this normative question which ultimately separates comparative theology from comparative religion.

Within the field of comparative theology itself, different types or approaches to comparative theology have developed rooted in varying conceptions of theology and of theological truth. While some view theology as a reflection on the faith and practice of a particular community, others view it more generically as a discourse on the gods, or as the study of divine realities. And while some conceive of theological truth as based on a body of revealed or received teachings and practices, others do not limit theological truth to any particular religion. I mark the difference between these two approaches by distinguishing between confessional and meta‐confessional comparative theology. The term confessional is here thus used to denote a tradition‐specific type of comparative theology. It may be practiced from within any religion and it is oriented to advancing the self‐understanding of that particular tradition. Meta‐confessional comparative theology, on the other hand, uses the teachings of different religious traditions to pursue a more encompassing or universal truth. The difference between confessional and meta‐confessional comparative theology is at times only a matter of degree. Meta‐confessional comparative theologians are often still shaped primarily by a particular religious tradition, and confessional comparative theologians often test and push the boundaries of the revealed teachings of a particular religion. But the two approaches still use slightly different methods that also warrant different nomenclatures.

Both confessional and meta‐confessional comparative theology themselves arose from the checkered history of the comparative study of religions, and remain grounded in some of its basic methodological principles. The term comparative theology was originally used to designate an attempt at a more neutral and scientific approach of religious differences and as a counterpart to the apologetic and normative approaches to other religions. Adding to the confusion about terms is the occasional discrepancy between the stated and the actually apparent goals of the work of some comparative theologians. Whereas early forms of comparative theology claimed to offer a neutral and scientific comparison of religions while being in reality profoundly biased, more recent forms readily admit their normative and religious presuppositions without always drawing out the normative conclusions of their work. In basic terms, comparative theology involves comparing theologies from a normative starting point and/or with a normative goal.

1.1 Comparing Theologies

The origins of comparative theology and the comparative study of religions are intimately intertwined. Early attempts to develop a more historical and descriptive approach to other religions often used the term comparative theology to distinguish it from the explicitly normative and apologetic approaches to other religions. As Louis Jordan points out in his early history of comparative religion (1905), there was some debate among scholars about what to call the new science of religion. Historians of religions such as Friedrich Max Müller and James Freeman Clarke favored the term comparative theology, but since “the designation in question would cover only a part of the field which has to be surveyed” and since “it would limit inquiry to the purely dogmatic teaching of the several Faiths that chanced to be compared,” it was decided that the designation comparative religion was “decidedly to be preferred to that of Comparative Theology.”⁴ Within this framework, comparative theology was thus to be seen as “only a department of Comparative Religion.”⁵ Clarke spoke of the “science of Comparative Theology” and stated that “It may be called a science, since it consists in the study of the facts of human history, and their relation to each other,” adding that “It does not dogmatize: it observes.”⁶ He also took aim at Christian apologetics and its tendency to denigrate religious others, writ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Table of Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• 1 Types of Comparative Theology
• 2 The Status of Other Religions in Comparative Theology
• 3 Comparative Theological Hermeneutics
• 4 Types of Learning in Comparative Theology
• 5 Comparative Theology and Confessional Theology
• Conclusion
• Bibliography
• Index
• End User License Agreement