S1 E8 Graham Oppy on Atheism and Agnosticism
Are you a theist, an atheist, an agnostic, or an innocent?
Christianity
S1 E6 Donald Lopez on A Jesuit’s Quest for the Soul of Tibet
In 1712 Italian Jesuit priest Ippolito Desideri set off an dangerous mission to Tibet, his goal to win souls to Roman Catholic Christianity. But his plan was not to merely preach the gospel, or to combine preaching and charitable works. He would learn Tibetan, familiarize himself with Tibetan paganism, and seek to persuade them to convert through a series of rational arguments, put forth in a learned treatise in the style of Tibetan Buddhism.
What happened when he got there? In this episode Dr. Donald S. Lopez Jr. discuss his recent book, co-authored with Dr. Thupten Jinpa, Dispelling the Darkness: A Jesuit’s Quest for the Soul of Tibet. In this book they not only tell Desideri’s major-motion-picture-worthy story, but they also translate some of his writings. Dr. Lopez discusses both the stories and some of the central ideas of Desideri’s works. Boldly, Desideri tries to refute the central Buddhist doctrines of rebirth and of emptiness.
- Dr. Lopez’s home page
- Dr. Thupten Jinpa
- “The White Lama Ippolito: An Italian Jesuit in Tibet“
- “Dispatches from Nirvana: 45 Years of Buddhist Studies”
- other talks by Dr. Lopez on YouTube
- Curators of the Buddha
- From Stone to Flesh: A Short History of the Buddha
- Elaboration on Emptiness
- The Story of Buddhism
- Prisoners of Shangri-La: Tibetan Buddhism and the West
- The Lotus Sutra: A Biography
- Buddhism and Science: A Guide for the Perplexed
- Burnouf, Introduction to the History of Indian Buddhism
- The Gelukpa (or Geluk) tradition of Tibetan Buddhist philosophy
- The Rites Controversy
Mission to Tibet: The Extraordinary Eighteenth-Century Account of Father Ippolito Desideri S. J.- Theories of Religious Diversity
- Thomas Aquinas
- emptiness
- Nāgārjuna
- no self
- The Questions of Milinda
- The Apostles’ Creed
- This episode’s thinking music is “Nitynitya Vastu Viveka” by Ars Sonor.
S1 E3 Amy-Jill Levine on The Jewish Annotated New Testament
Typically religious scholars will comment on the scriptures of their own religion. But sometimes, bold scholars will go where others fear to tread, commenting the scriptures of another religion. The situation is all the more sensitive when historically, one religion branched off of the other.
This episode of Thinking About Religion is a wide-ranging conversation with Dr. Amy-Jill Levine, co-editor of The Jewish Annotated New Testament, a “study Bible” edition of the New Testament featuring lengthy commentary and essays by (non-Christian) Jewish scholars.
Among other things we discuss faith, clashing interpretations of scripture, misconceptions about Judaism, conversion, humor in the Bible, and the theological significance of local thunder during the interview.
To get new episodes subscribe to Thinking About Religion wherever you get your podcasts or by email.
- Amy-Jill Levine
- Marc Zvi Brettler
- The Jewish Annotated New Testament, 2nd ed.
- The Meaning of the Bible: What the Jewish Scriptures and Christian Old Testament Can Teach Us
- The Misunderstood Jew: The Church and the Scandal of the Jewish Jesus
- trinities podcast 236 – Levine and Witherington on Luke – Part 1
- trinities podcast 237 – Levine and Witherington on Luke – Part 2
- The Jewish Study Bible, 2nd ed.
- The Babylonian Talmud
- Jesus in the Talmud
- “Trinity“
- Daniel Boyarin
- Paula Fredriksen
- Some of the biblical texts mentioned: Isaiah 7:10-17; Isaiah 53; Matthew 27:24-26; Matthew 28:19; Mark 4:1-20; Luke 14:26; John 1; 1 Corinthians 15:21-28; Philippians 2:1-17; Jude 1:3
- trinities podcast 48 – 2 interpretations of Philippians 2 – part 1
- trinities podcast 49 – 2 interpretations of Philippians 2 – part 2
- trinities podcast 146 – Jesus as an Exemplar of Faith in the New Testament
- This episode’s thinking music is “Readers! Do You Read?” by Chris Zabriskie.
S1 E2: Richard Weikart on Hitler’s Religion
The ghost of Hitler has been drafted into the culture wars – for the other team. Christian leaders have suggested that Nazism was a variety of “atheist extremism.” Atheist champion Richard Dawkins retorted that “Hitler was a Roman Catholic.“
Is either side correct? After analyzing thousands of primary sources, historian Dr. Richard Weikart has written the definitive book on Hitler’s own religious views. In this episode we discuss his findings in Hitler’s Religion: The Twisted Beliefs that Drove the Third Reich.
To get new episodes subscribe to Thinking About Religion wherever you get your podcasts, or by email.
Dr. Weikart’s home page- Hitler’s Religion: The Twisted Beliefs that Drove the Third Reich
- Harry Frankfurt, On Bullshit
- The Aryan Jesus: Christian Theologians and the Bible in Nazi Germany
- John 2:13-25
- Great Minds with Michael Medved: Hitler’s Religion
- Richard Weikart “Hitler Was Very Careful Not To Alienate People Over Their Religious Views”
- What Motivated Hitler to Commit Genocide?
- The Truth about Adolf Hitler’s Religion with Richard Weikart
- Debate: Adolf Hitler – Christian, Atheist, or Neither? | Richard Carrier vs Richard Weikart
- Debate: Hector Avalos vs Richard Weikart Nazism Darwinism or AntiSemitism
- trinities 164 – On Counting Gods
- This episode’s thinking music is “Your Pulse” by Little Glass Men.
S1 E1: David McMahon on Buddhist Modernism
Before recent times, most Buddhists, and even most Buddhist monks, did not meditate. Yet today, many consider sitting meditation to be the essence of Buddhist practice. How does the Buddhism one encounters in the religious marketplace today differ from what was taught by its ancient Indian founder?
According to Dr. David McMahan, author of The Making of Buddhist Modernism, both Asian and Western Buddhists have significantly adapted its teachings in modern times, incorporating several themes from modern Western cultures, including Transcendentalism, Scientific Rationalism, Perennialism, and Romanticism.
In this wide-ranging discussion we discuss Dr. McMahan’s evolving understanding of and experience of Buddhism, the different sorts of Buddhist sutras, how competition with Christianity has shaped Buddhist modernism, the appeal of spirituality without a personal god, Buddhism as both spiritual and scientific, rebirth, samsara, mindfulness meditation, the Buddha as “just a man,” worship of the Buddha and other beings, the issue of whether or not these new ideas constitute authentic Buddhism, the political implications of Buddhist modernism, and the future of Buddhism in the U.S.
To get new episodes subscribe to Thinking About Religion wherever you get your podcasts, or on YouTube or by email.
- Dr. McMahan’s home page
- David L. McMahan. The Making of Buddhist Modernism. New York: Oxford University Press, 2008.
- McMahan, David L. and Erik Braun, eds. Meditation, Buddhism, and Science. New York: Oxford University Press, 2017.
- David L. McMahan, ed. Buddhism in the Modern World. New York and London: Routledge, 2012.
- David L. McMahan. Empty Vision: Metaphor and Visionary Imagery in Mahayana Buddhism. New York and London: RoutlegeCurzon, 2002.
- Aldous Huxley
- Huston Smith
- The Pali Canon
- Mahayana Buddhism
- Major Mahayana Sutras
- The Lotus Sutra
- Pew Research Center Religious Landscape Study
- Pew on Buddhists in the USA
- D.T. Suzuki
- Paul Carus
- Jon Kabat-Zinn
- Erik Braun, The Birth of Insight Meditation: Modern Buddhism, and the Burmese Monk Ledi Sayadaw (Interview at The Secular Buddhist podcast.)
Ledi Sayadaw- The Mystical Arts of Tibet
- upaya
- Avalokiteshvara (Guan Yin) movie
- three bodies of the Buddha (trikaya)
- Dale Tuggy: “Why I am not a Buddhist“
- This episode’s thinking music is our mashup of “The Renaissance Man” by Little Glass Men and this recording of Buddhist monks at Osaka Shitennoji Temple in Japan.
S1 E5 – Andrei Buckareff on Alternative Concepts of God
Dr. Andrei Buckareff and some of his co-authors are convinced that in recent times philosophers of religion have been too traditional, focusing too much of their attention on an understanding of God as a perfect creator of the cosmos who is distinct from that cosmos, someone who created it out of nothing.
To remedy this many of them propose that God just is the cosmos (pantheism) or that God is like a soul and the cosmos is God’s body (panentheism).
As it’s philosophy, though, intellectual diversity is on display; other authors criticize such views, or explore alternatives within or outside of traditional theistic theologies.
In this wide-ranging interview, we hear about this ongoing research project, some of these alternative concepts of God (i.e. the unique, ultimate reality), and what motivates such explorations.
Alternative Concepts of God: Essays on the Metaphysics of the Divine, edited by Andrei Buckareff and Yujin Nagasawa.
- The Pantheism and Panentheism Project
- interviews with Dr. Buckareff at Closer to Truth
- papers by Dr. Buckareff
- Charles Hartshorne
- William L. Rowe
- Linda Zagzebski, “Omnisubjectivity“
- tian
- Mark Johnston, Saving God: Religion after Idolatry
- John Hick’s “religious pluralism”
- Advaita Vedanta
- “God is love” in the Bible
- John B. Cobb
- Robert Oakes
- Baruch Spinoza
- Richard Swinburne, The Coherence of Theism, 2nd ed.
- omnipresence
- podcast 111 – Dr. Joseph Jedwab on divine omnipresence – Part 1
- Paul Tillich
- J.A.T. Robinson, Honest to God
- Shūsaku Endō
- This week’s thinking music is “Procreation,” by Little Glass Men.
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