Abstract
In the present-day multicultural context, religious pluralism continues to be a contentious issue. This chapter focuses on two eminent thinkers whose perspectives on religious pluralism have attracted much attention: Mohandas K. Gandhi (1869–1948), known to the world for his non-violent campaign against British rule, and John Hick (1922–),1 a renowned British theologian and philosopher of religion. These two important personalities have been studied apart but not, to my knowledge, together. No scholarly attention has been paid to the striking resonances in their approaches to religious pluralism. My primary aim is to identify and explore significant correspondences in their thinking on religious pluralism, rather than engaging with the contentious debate their positions on religious pluralism have ignited in Western Christian theological discourse.2 The debate has been well documented, and the intention is not to repeat it here. Situating them in their respective contexts, this chapter attempts to draw attention to concurrences in their notion of religion, concept of Truth/Real, and approach to conflicting truth claims.
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Notes
For a critical appreciation and defence of Hick’s religious pluralism, see Alan Race, Christians and Religious Pluralism: Patterns in the Christian Theology of Religions. London: SCM Press, 1983. For critics of Hick’s religious pluralism, see Gavin D’Costa, ed., Christian Uniqueness Reconsidered: The Myth of a Pluralistic Theology of Religions, Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1990.
John Hick, God Has Many Names, Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, (1982 [1980]), p. 14.
Hick has great admiration for Gandhi. In a recent personal conversation John Hick said: ‘Had I been born in India, I would have been a follower of Gandhi’. See Hick ‘Introduction to Part I’ in John Hick and Lamont C. Hempel, eds, Gandhi’s Significance for Today, London: Macmillan, 1989, pp. 21–23. See also Hick ‘The Significance of Mahatma Gandhi for Today’, Occasional Paper No. 19. Birmingham: The Institute for Advanced Research in Arts and Social Sciences, University of Birmingham, 1999.
M.K. Gandhi, The Selected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, ed., Shriman Narayan, vol. 4 (6 volumes), Ahmedabad: Navajivan Publishing House. 1969 [1968], p. 213.
John Hick, The New Frontier of Religion and Science: Religious Experience, Neuroscience and the Transcendent, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006, p. 36.
Gandhi, The Selected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, vol. 6, 1969, pp. 107–108.
Gandhi, An Autobiography or the Story of My Experiments with Truth, trans., Mahadev Desai, Ahmedabad: Navajivan Publishing House, 1969 [1927], p. xi.
Gandhi, The Selected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, vol. 6, 1969, p. 268.
Gandhi, All Men Are Brothers: Autobiographical Reflections, comp. and ed., Krishna Kripalani, New York: Continuum, 2005 [1980], p. 75.
Margaret Chatterjee, Gandhi’s Religious Thought. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 1985 [1983], p. 105 (emphasis in original).
For a discussion of Gandhi’s change in attitude, see J. F. T. Jordens, ‘Gandhi and Religious Pluralism’ in Harold G. Coward, ed., Modern Indian Responses to Religious Pluralism, Albany: State University of New York Press, 1987, pp. 7–13.
For a critique of Gandhi’s approach to Sikhism, Nikky-Guninder Kaur Singh, ‘The Mahatma and the Sikhs’ in Harold Coward, ed., Indian Critiques of Gandhi, Albany: State University of New York Press, 2003, pp. 171–191.
Hick, ‘The Copernican Revolution in Theology’ in John Hick, ed., God and the Universe of Faith, London: Macmillan, 1988 [1973], pp. 121–132.
Gandhi, The Mind of Mahatma Gandhi, comp. and ed. R. K. Prabhu and U. R. Rao, Ahmedabad: Navajivan Publishing House, 1967 [1945], p. 67.
Gandhi, In Search of the Supreme, comp. and ed. V. B. Kher, Vol. 1 (3 volumes) Ahmedabad: Navajivan Publishing House, 1961, p. 12.
Raghavan Iyer, The Moral and Political Thought of Mahatma Gandhi. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1978 [1973], p. 228.
Robert Ellsberg, ed., Gandhi on Christianity, Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1991, p. 28.
Gandhi, M. K., What Jesus Means to Me, comp. R. K. Prabhu, Ahmedabad: Navajivan Publishing House 1959, p. 8.
For a detailed and succinct discussion of postmodern critique of religious pluralism, see John Hick, The Rainbow of Faiths, London: SCM Press, 1995, pp. 31–56.
Hick, ‘The Non-Absoluteness of Christianity’ in John Hick and Paul F. Knitter, eds, The Myth of Christian Uniqueness, London: SCM Press, 1987, pp. 17–20.
For a detailed discussion of multiple religious ends and religious pluralism, see Mark Heim, The Depth of the Riches: A Trinitarian Theology of Religious Ends, B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2000.
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© 2012 Sharada Sugirtharajah
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Sugirtharajah, S. (2012). The Mahatma and the Philosopher: Mohandas Gandhi and John Hick and Their Search for Truth. In: Sugirtharajah, S. (eds) Religious Pluralism and the Modern World. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230360136_10
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230360136_10
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