The Elephant in Religion: Metaphors of Diversity

Friend of the podcast and theological super-star John Thatamanil is back on the podcast to talk about his ohhh sooo good new book Circling the Elephant. We had a bunch of nerdy fun and discussed...

• the task of comparative theology and its relation to constructive theology
• why the category of religion is problematic
• the patronizing skills of Radical Orthodoxy
• the story of the blind elephant
• JT throws shade at those Process peeps with multiple ultimates
• moving beyond the mono-logics of Barthian revelation and Rahner's Trinity
• a fun excurses into Paul Tillich on Pluralism
•  "If God can speak through a dead dog, then God can surely speak through a Hindu"
• pre-validating the mystery of the other
• "There is no way of moving towards the mystery of God without moving towards the mystery of your Neighbor"
• the Father Bracken book I mention The Divine Matrix: Creativity as Link Between East and West
• "You cannot know what you do not love."
• How the market is dreaming its dreams within us and tutoring our desire.
• the possibility of a comparative theology of culture
• the Judith Butler we both mentioned: The Force of Nonviolence: An Ethico-Political Bind
• religions may have the possibility of making us heretics to economism... good news.
• the Joseph Henrich I am a bit obsessed with The WEIRDest People in the World: How the West Became Psychologically Peculiar and Particularly Prosperous
• our conversation ends up on one of my favorite books How Forests Think: Toward an Anthropology Beyond the Human... not sure how many episodes this book has come up, but if John, Willie Jennings, and Jacob Erickson bring it up it must be good. 
• I tell a story about the religious agenda of the World Bank
• If Christian theology has conformed itself to University modes of knowing, as a kind of academic discipline, but theology within Hinduism and Buddhism remain a practice

Previous Visits of John on the podcast

• Theology Without Walls with John Thatamanil
• John Thatamanil on Non-duality, Polydoxy, and Christian Identity

Check out these books by John

• Circling the Elephant: A Comparative Theology of Religious Diversity
• The Immanent Divine: God, Creation And the Human Predicament: God, Creation, and the Human Predicament
• Theology Without Walls: The Transreligious Imperative 

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