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Book Reviews Table Of Contents

Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies

A listing of the book reviews available in this issue.

Some Recent Developments In Hindu Understandings Of Jesus, Bradley Malkovsky

Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies

Hindu reflection on the person and work of Jesus Christ, what we might call "Hindu christology," is an enterprise that has slowly evolved since the early nineteenth century and is still very much in the making. It has undergone some significant changes since the middle of the twentieth century with some surprising additional perspectives emerging in recent years.

A Report On The "Sri Iesu Sahasranama" Of K. U. Chacko, Francis X. Clooney

Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies

In 1987 K.U. Chacko, a Professor of Sanskrit at Nirmala College in Muvattupuzha in Kerala, published in a small booklet the Sri Iesu Sahasranama, a thousand names of Jesus in Sanskrit, written down in Malyalam script; in 1995 it was reprinted in Devanagari script. The cover indicates that it was edited by Professor M H. Sastri.

Viewpoint: What I See: Little Indias, Caste, And The Church In The West, Rachel Fell Mcdermott

Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies

Recently a New York Times article, "From Untouchable to Businesswoman" (July 22, 2010), carried the story of Kakuben Lalabhai Parmar, an illiterate Scheduled Caste woman from Gujarat who was selling her patchwork embroideries at New York's posh Asia Society. Thanks to intervention in India twenty years ago from SEWA, the Self-Employed Women's Association, she came out of seclusion in her house to participate in society, while helping to preserve the traditional handicrafts of her village. The result is a globe-trotting artisan-businesswoman who exchanges hugs with her clients, buys shampoos at CVS for her daughters back home in the village, and …

"He Is Our Master": Jesus In The Thought Of Swami Prabhupada, Ravi M. Gupta

Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies

"Now that steam, electricity, and the printing press have brought into closer communication the different races that inhabit the earth, and have expanded the minds of men, tending to dispel the illusion that God Almighty especially favours any particular people, it is time to proclaim to the world, that if a messenger of God appeared in Judea about nineteen hundred years ago, it is no less true that a messenger from the same God appeared in the quiet town of Navadweep (popularly known as Nadia) in Bengal, some fifteen centuries later. The former is known by the name of Jesus …

A World Filled With Grace: Conceptualizing The Divine In Hindu Devotionalism And Karl Rahner, Ankur Barua

Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies

In recent decades, a substantial body of scholarly work in the field of Hindu-Christian studies has been produced, which has not only done much to dispel earlier stereotypes of Hindu life-worlds as steeped in 'pantheism', 'world-negation' and the like, but also urged Christian thinkers to reflect on their own foundational beliefs through Hindu motifs. A relatively unexplored theme remains that of whether, and in what ways, the divine reality can be conceptualized as 'gracious' in Hindu devotionalism, especially given that the Christian doctrine of 'grace is related to a constellation of other notions such as creation out of nothing, justification …

Adieu Raimon, A Dieu, Joseph Prabhu

Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies

Raimon Panikkar, known to many in this Society of Hindu-Christian Studies as a teacher, scholar, mentor or friend, died at his home in Tavertet, near Barcelona, on August 26, 2010. He was ninety-one and had been in poor health for some time, but he did live to see the day when his Gifford Lectures, originally delivered in Edinburgh in 1989, and over which he had agonized ever since [he produced some nineteen different versions of parts of the texts], finally saw the light of day in June of this year as The Rhythm of Being (Orbis Books).

Book Review: "Jesus As Guru: The Images Of Christ Among Hindus And Christians In India", Swasti Bhattacharyya

Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies

A review of Jesus as Guru: The Images of Christ Among Hindus and Christians in India by Jan Peter Schouten.

Book Review: "Transcendent In America: Hindu-Inspired Meditation Movements As New Religion", Eliza F. Kent

Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies

A review of Transcendent in America: Hindu-Inspired Meditation Movements as New Religion by Lola Williamson.

Book Review: "South Asian Christian Diaspora", Catherine Cornille

Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies

A review of South Asian Christian Diaspora edited by Knut Jacobsen and Selva Raj.

Book Review: "India And The Indianness Of Christianity: Essays On Understanding", George Pati

Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies

A review of India and the Indianness of Christianity: Essays on Understanding edited by Richard Fox Young.

Book Review: "Beyond Boundaries: Hindu-Christian Relationship And Basic Christian Communities", Chad M. Bauman

Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies

A review of Beyond Boundaries: Hindu-Christian Relationship and Basic Christian Communities by A. Maria David.

Book Review: "Jesus In The Lotus: The Mystical Doorway Between Christianity And Yogic Spirituality", Bradley Malkovsky

Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies

A review of Jesus in the Lotus: The Mystical Doorway between Christianity and Yogic Spirituality by Russill Paul.

Recent Articles Of Interest 2010

Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies

A listing of recent articles of interest from the 2010 year.

Ovid Butler And The Founding Of Butler University, Sally Childs-Helton

Scholarship and Professional Work

Without Ovid Butler, there would be no Butler University today. The history of the man and the university are intimately and inextricably entwined; without Ovid Butler's vision, leadership, and financial support, the university may not have come into being, or survived its early years. One hundred and sixty years after it was chartered, Butler University today is a private, not-for-profit, comprehensive university located in Indianapolis, Indiana. Butler offers more than 65 majors from six colleges: Liberal Arts and Sciences, Education, Pharmacy, Business, Fine Arts, and Communication. The unofficial fall semester 2010 enrollment is 4,051 full-time undergraduates and 4,575 total students …

Mechanisms, Causes, And The Layered Model Of The World, Stuart Glennan

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

Most philosophical accounts of causation take causal relations to obtain between individuals and events in virtue of nomological relations between properties of these individuals and events. Such views fail to take into account the consequences of the fact that in general the properties of individuals and events will depend upon mechanisms that realize those properties. In this paper I attempt to rectify this failure, and in so doing to provide an account of the causal relevance of higher-level properties. I do this by critiquing one prominent model of higher-level properties – Kim’s functional model of reduction – and contrasting it …

Review Of Contemporary Christologies: A Fortress Introduction, By Don Schweitzer., Brent Hege

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

Review of Contemporary Christologies: A Fortress Introduction, by Don Schweitzer.

Book Review: "Ousmane Sembène: The Making Of A Militant Artist," Gadjigo, Samba., Sylvie Vanbaelen

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

A book review for Samba Gadjigo's "Ousmane Sembène: the making of a militant artist."

In Front Of The Black Sea, Matthew Batt

On Earth As It Is

Dear God,

Ali and Sema have a daughter!

It’s raining in St. Paul but

there was a spot right in front

of the Black Sea and I wasn’t going

to go—it was already almost three

and I thought I could just plow through

till dinner but then I saw the sign—

the sign! in the window! Ali and Sema

have a daughter!

Three Prayers, Melissa Broder

On Earth As It Is

Pennsylvania Prayer

Bless me I was once myself and couldn't read

a thermostat. My mother's breasts were long

inside her bathrobe. Sometimes we were Polish.

I believe god knows these things about me

so I needn’t say them with heart. I'm afraid

to say anything with heart.

Lord, Ken Baumann

On Earth As It Is

ConAgra, bread-keeper; save us from our misery.
The stores dried up, people float in and out as if in a dream, wandering empty aisles and pushing imagined carts, checking out their bounty, self-scanning.
May you please render us saved.
And the farmers in Portland and Studio City and Brooklyn, with their small hands and meager yields, their rooftop stalks, they have been taken and put up in cages.
Make them free.

How To Become A Prayer, Giancarlo Ditrapano

On Earth As It Is

Attention is the very essence of prayer. I am the bread of only my life. I look at prayers on the page. I read them and I lay my voice on top of the prayers. I drape them with my voice and make them mine. I put on my jacket and go out into the night to meet other prayers. I was nine when the Lord wasn’t watching over my family as I had prayed he would for all of those nights. The fuck, he smashed my brother’s car into a utility pole on a south Florida interstate, killing him …

An Open Letter Of Prayer To The Country Of Russia, Sean Carman

On Earth As It Is

Russia!

I know you only through your

quirky and enigmatic literature,

full of ranting underground lunatics,

characters who bustle and fly,

and noses that roam St. Petersburg.

Ecclesiastes Ii: Son Of The Philosopher, Bryan Furuness

On Earth As It Is

Some days I think the clouds are your eyes. Some days I think the birds are your voice. You laugh, chide, scatter thistle all over my lawn and screw up my grass as some kind of lesson I'll never understand because I don't speak bird.

Dear God, Kirsty Logan

On Earth As It Is

I call you god but you know I don't believe. I never have. well, maybe I did once, for a few months, when I was nine. remember that little book of bible stories, the one with the mustard-yellow cover and shiny red letters? of course you know. you know everything. or you would, if I believed.

A Prayer For Lack Of You, Kyle Minor

On Earth As It Is

When I was a child I feared all the Old Testament curses—dogs, frogs, being struck down by forked lightning? Which were Old Testament curses and which were the talk of the traveling preachers in their white suits and black slickback hair? Either way, it doesn't matter. One was You and the other was You. You let anyone who wants to speak for You speak for You, so what is left for the children of the world to do but see You in the ones who speak for You? If You are You, shame on You, for sparing those who speak …

A Statement From The Defense, Erin Mcgraw

On Earth As It Is

Because you promised to be with me even to the end of time. Because you told me to be still and know who you are. Because it was said you would lead me through the shadow of the valley of death and take away my fear, but I still have my fear. Because you promised me repose.

Something To Be Desired, Diana Joseph

On Earth As It Is

Maynard Prine of Reynold's Creek, West Virginia was fierce in his faith, an obedient servant of You, Lord, Your miracles, Your Mysterious Ways. It was Your mandate that my father take up the serpent, that he handle the flame. This man was not afraid.

Prayer For Amniocentesis, David Mcglynn

On Earth As It Is

We have been debating names for weeks, but now we choose one, Hayden, aware it’s a name we might have to bury. I sit on the edge of the bed and think about the vial of amniotic fluid—Katherine’s water—traveling by van to the lab in Milwaukee. I think of its soft amber color, its protective viscosity, its blizzard of DNA, the helix of Hayden’s existence a braid of Katherine’s alleles and mine.

For A Recently Discovered Shipwreck At The Bottom Of Lake Michigan, Matthew Olzmann

On Earth As It Is

4/2/2010

Dear Shipwreck,

Even though you’re over a century old, they say that everything inside you is still intact. Even the crew? Must be lonely. I’ll write again.