June 22,23 -Upstate New York - Sacred Texts and Human Contexts:
Sacred Texts and Human Contexts:
A Symposium on the Role of the Sacred Texts of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam in Uniting and Dividing Humanity
June 23-25 2013
Hickey Center for Interfaith Studies and Dialogue
Nazareth College of Rochester
4245 East Ave, Rochester, NY 14618
At a time of division and hostility, do Jews, Christians, and Muslims interpret their religious traditions - in particular, their sacred texts - in ways that intensify or reduce hostility and division? This symposium will bring together scholars to explore this question.
We encourage papers and panels that deal with the general theme of the symposium - the role of sacred texts in uniting and dividing people. This general theme may be subdivided into these three questions:
- What features of these sacred texts and their interpretations divide or unite humanity?
- What social, political, national, tribal, economic, and colonial contexts have affected the hermeneutics and rhetoric associated with these texts? Might levels of literacy, conceptions of gender roles, and notions of sexuality play a part?
- What elements of these interpretations nourished times when Jews, Christians, and Muslims lived as good neighbors or provided a context for conflict resolution? How might those times suggest models for the future? For example, do the texts have interpretations that nourish the current interfaith movement?
On the next page we suggest some questions conference participants might address. We invite you to submit other questions to this evolving list, either as parts of your proposals for a presentation or panel, or as questions you hope to see the symposium address. We encourage submissions from anthropologists, sociologists, and historians as well as scholars in religious studies.
Plans are underway to continue our discussion in a follow-up conference in Turkey in the summer of 2014, with the generous support of the Peace Islands Institute. Details about the 2014 conference will be added to this site as they become available.
Below find links to pages describing more fully the topics we propose, the process for submitting proposed presentations and panels, details of registration, housing, and food options, a very preliminary schedule, descriptions of the sponsoring groups, and an account of what to see and do in the Rochester area, which abounds in attractions for families - in addition to the included trip to Niagara Falls at the end of the conference.
Conference Topics and Process for Submitting Proposals
Registration, Housing, and Meals
Who We Are - The sponsoring entities
The conference is administered by the Brian and Jean Hickey Center for Interfaith Studies and Dialogue in coordination with the Center for International Education, the College of Arts and Sciences, the Department of Religious Studies, all at Nazareth College, and the Center for Interfaith Affairs of the Peace Islands Institute.
Institutional partners include: Catholic-Muslim Studies Program at Catholic Theological Union (Chicago), Department of Religious Studies at Hobart and William Smith Colleges, International Institute of Islamic Thought - the Fairfax Institute, Department of Theology of the University of Notre Dame, Dialogue Institute at Temple University, Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, Northeastern Seminary at Roberts Wesleyan College, Department of Religion and Classics at the University of Rochester, Department of Religious Studies at St. John Fisher College, the Department of Religion in the College of Arts and Sciences at Syracuse University, and the Religion and Conflict Transformation Program of Boston University School of Theology.
