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Wednesday, November 5 and
Thursday, November 6, 2014
Pyle Center, Room DE335
702 Langdon St.
University of Wisconsin–Madison

Rudolf Otto, author of the classic The Idea of the Holy (org. 1917; Eng. trans., 1923), is best known today for his analysis of numinous experience — he coined the word “numinous” — as a mysterium tremendum et fascinans. He was also one of the most important and sophisticated European thinkers of the last century to broach topics of religious diversity. This conference will examine Otto’s theoretical and practical legacy with regard to religious pluralism, with special emphasis on Abrahamic religions, a topic relatively neglected in Otto studies. Our goals are both to understand Otto in his context and to examine his potential significance today for interreligious relations as well as the academic understanding of religions.

The conference will consist of an evening keynote address, five panels (three or four papers in each session plus extensive discussion), and a concluding discussion. It is collaboratively organized by Prof. Gregory Alles, McDaniel College, and Dr. Ulrich Rosenhagen, University of Wisconsin–Madison. The plenary address will be given by Prof. Robert Orsi, Northwestern University: “The Problem of the Holy in a World of Religious Pluralism.”

SCHEDULE

Wednesday, November 5, 2014

9:00 am–9:15 am | Welcome by Prof. Charles L. Cohen, Director of the Lubar Institute for the Study of the Abrahamic Religions, University of Wisconsin–Madison

9:15 am–11:15 am | Panel 1: Philosophical and Theological Foundations

• Prof. Todd Gooch, Professor of Philosophy and Religion, Eastern Kentucky University:
  “Rudolf Otto as Platonist”
• Prof. Robert Neville, Professor of Philosophy, Religion, and Theology, Boston University:
  “Rudolf Otto and the Theory of Religion”
• Prof. Dr. Claus-Dieter Osthövener, Professor of Systematic Theology, Bergische Universität Wuppertal:
  “‘The Idea of the Holy’ as a Work in Progress”

1:15 pm–3:15 pm | Panel 2: Contextual and Historical Considerations

• Prof. Kris Manjapra, Associate Professor of History, Tufts University:
  “Rudolf Otto, Buddhist Universalism, and the Indic Orient”
• Prof. Jennifer Ratner-Rosenhagen, Associate Professor of History, University of Wisconsin–Madison
  “The Holy’s Atlantic Crossings: Otto and Mid-Twentieth-Century American ‘Spirituality’”
• Dr. Peter Schüz, Lecturer in Systematic Theology, Philipps Universität Marburg:
  “Between Piety and Science: Rudolf Otto and the Protestant Liberal Theology of His Age”

3:30 pm–5:30 pm | Panel 3: Reception within Abrahamic Religions

• Prof. Irfan Omar, Associate Professor of Theology, Marquette University:
  “The Idea of the Holy in Islam: A Dialogue with Rudolf Otto”
• Prof. Melissa Raphael, Professor of Jewish Theology, University of Gloucestershire:
  “The Reception of Otto’s Das Heilige in Modern Jewish Thought”
• Dr. Ulrich Rosenhagen, Lecturer in Religious Studies, University of Wisconsin–Madison:
  “Rudolf Otto and the Ecumenical Movement”

7:30 pm–9:00 pm (Gale VandeBerg Auditorium, Pyle Center)
Plenary address by Prof. Robert Orsi, Professor of Religious Studies and History, Northwestern University:
“The Problem of the Holy in a World of Religious Pluralism”
The revival of interest in Rudolf Otto and the holy is one of the great improbabilities of contemporary scholarship in religion. For years Otto has been reviled in the study of religion for proposing an approach to religious experience that lifted it out of history and culture. Yet recent scholars, rereading Otto though various contemporary theoretical lenses, find precisely in his concept of the holy a powerful opening towards new approaches to the study of religion, within particular times and places. How is this? Offering an Otto read in relation to Catholic sacramental theology and contemporary object-relations theory, this lecture explores an encounter with the holy in dreadful circumstances at the borders of cultures and languages and its enduring aftermath.

Thursday, November 6

9:15 am–11:45 am | Panel 4: Reception within Indigenous and Dharmic Traditions

• Prof. Gregory D. Alles, Professor of Religious Studies, McDaniel College:
  “Rudolf Otto and the Problem of Religious Categories”
• Prof. Robert Baum, Associate Professor in Religion and African & African American Studies, Dartmouth College:
  “Rudolf Otto and African Religions”
• Prof. Tulasi Srinivas, Associate Professor of Anthropology, Emerson College:
  “Otto Revisited: Ritual Creativity, Devotion and Wonder”
• Prof. Dr. Katja Triplett, Professor for the Study of Religions, Georg-August-Universität Göttingen:
  “Looking Bodhidharma in the Eye: Beginnings of Otto’s Interreligious Encounters with Japanese Buddhists”
  

1:15 pm–3:45 pm | Panel 5: Possibilities and Influences

• Dr. Karla Britton, Lecturer in Architecture, Yale University:
  “Beyond Transcendence: The Holy and the Ineffable in Contemporary Architecture”
• Prof. Constance Furey, Associate Professor of Religious Studies, Indiana University:
  “Blurring the Boundaries? Mysterium Tremendum and Intimacy in Devotional Poetry”
• Dr. Michael Jerryson, Assistant Professor of Religious Studies, Youngstown State University:
  “The Holy Other: Rudolf Otto and the Study of Religion and Violence”
• Prof. Dr. Jörg Lauster, Professor of Systematic Theology, Philipps Universität Marburg:
  “Why the Work of Rudolf Otto Continues to Matter in Theology and the Study of Religion”

4:00 pm–5:30 pm | Concluding discussion (organizational session for the conference publication)