Author: N S S Raman
Publisher: Indian Institute of Advanced Study
Year: 1998
Language: English
Pages: 255
ISBN/UPC (if available): 818595254x
Description
This book examines the methods adopted by traditional scholars for the study of World's religions with a view to suggesting a more rigorous methodology for it.
While recognizing the pioneering efforts of Western scholars like the missionaries, academic men and civil servants, it has been found that most of their approaches suffer from parochialism, Eurocentrism and from what the author calls 'the elder brother complex'.
The author rejects the identification of comparative religion exclusively with comparative theology. The sociological and the anthropological approaches are also criticized for being too one-sided. Selecting Hinduism and Buddhism as examples, the author seeks to demonstrate the many colorful facets of the religious phenomenon, none of which can be neglected by the students of comparative religion.
The stress here is on what Mircea Eliade has called 'total hermeneutics', i.e.. a totality of perspective of world's religions in all their various aspects.