Abstract

The dissertation explores what key perspectives within the fields of comparative history of religions, philosophy, and science and religion can contribute to the understanding of a central, self-identity issue in the study of religion and interreligious dialogue: How does one deal with universal truth claims---often emerging from within religious and spiritual traditions themselves---about what religion/spirituality legitimately is, especially those asserted in situations of interreligious dialogue where such claims often cause tension? For example, a Buddhist may say all things dependently arise, while a Muslim may say God does not dependently arise. In both cases there is often implied a universal truth for all people and cultures which often then becomes the basis for what is asserted to be the legitimate nature of religion. The first chapter situates the problem by considering the thought of five theologians . A second chapter describes a new framework for comparing approaches to interreligious dialogue, a framework based on the different options for dealing with universal truth claims in interreligious dialogue. The dissertation next employs philosophical resources in order to clarify and intensify the issue stated above. Using Ludwig Wittgenstein's notion of family resemblance as a clue, I describe a postmodern approach to this issue which brackets out universal truth claims about the nature of religion. I deepen this non-universal approach by showing how the postmodern affirmation that all truth is historically contingent is supported by Martin Heidegger's philosophical method of formale Anzeige developed in the 1920s. The dissertation further articulates the advantages and disadvantages of three responses to the Heideggerian and postmodern challenge, one already described which supports postmodernism's rejection of universal truth claims by adopting and modifying Wittgenstein's notion of family resemblance; two other responses minimally support the possibility of universal truth claims, one through the use of a new scientifically sophisticated design argument, and another through the use of pragmatic principles