Protestant Comparative Theologies from Asia: Methodological Reflections on Recent Works

As a discipline, comparative theology has been growing exponentially in North America and Europe. The field’s growth reflects the growing religious diversity in the continents. Many of these figures belong to the Catholic tradition and teach at Catholic institutions. There are prominent non-Catholic comparative theologians, but a quick observation of Protestant and other non-Catholic seminaries and divinity schools in North America will support the assumption that comparative theology is a Western and Catholic enterprise. To challenge such assumptions and open up more conversations on the current development of comparative theology, it is essential to discuss comparative theologians who integrate their specific socio-cultural location in their works.

In 2020, Francis X. Clooney edited a special issue for the International Journal of Asian Christianity titled “Comparative Theology in Asia and Australia.” The issue’s publication demonstrates that comparative theology has gained more traction among Asian and Australian scholars, mainly since the last decade (Clooney 2020, 131). Clooney recognizes that comparative theology is still identified with the West and the Western notion of religions, which is also a problem for theology in general. However, the stake is higher for comparative theology because the field is geared toward venturing forth to different religious traditions and cultures to broaden and enrich one’s position. In this regard, attachment to the Western assumptions of religion, such as positioning the textual as superior to practices and arts, could hamper the development of the discipline (Clooney 2020, 136–37). Other contributors to the issue argue that comparative theology in the Asian and Australian context is not limited to academic exercise but must serve the practical needs of people at the grassroots. For instance, Yesudasan Remias from India and Albertus Bagus Laksana from Indonesia explore how comparative theology can support interreligious learning for the common good in society (Remias 2020; Laksana 2020).

While Asia is not a monolith entity, Asian theologians have highlighted several particularities of the Asian context. Aloysius Pieris, a Sri Lankan theologian, argued more than thirty years ago that Asian theology must deal with two realities: poverty and multireligiosity (Pieris 1988). Supplementing Pieris’ statement, J.B. Banawiratma, an Indonesian theologian, adds the third reality of cultural diversity that reflects the challenge faced by some Asian countries such as Indonesia (Banawiratma 2000, 109–11). These statements underline why a theology constructed from an Asian perspective will always have practical implications and cannot become an exclusively intellectual exercise, including a comparative theology. Comparative theology works from Asian perspectives remind comparative theology of its ideal as a form of theology that deals with the reality of religious and cultural diversity, as stated by Clooney. Thus, it is imperative to take Asian comparative theology works, or other works coming from the Two-Third World contexts, seriously and consider how their unique methodology and perspective can enrich or even amend the current comparative theology discourse. 

This paper aims to analyze three recent works on comparative theology from Protestant and Asian perspectives, more specifically, India, Thailand, and Indonesia. The first work is Joshua Samuel’s Untouchable Bodies, Resistance, and Liberation: A Comparative Theology of Divine Possessions (Samuel 2020). Samuel tackles the dominant text-centrism in comparative theology by centering the theology of body from Dalit perspectives, particularly the Paraiyars, one of the prominent Dalit communities in Tamilnadu. Integrating feminist and womanist scholarship on the body with the experience of “divine possessions” in Hindu and Christian Paraiyar Dalit communities, Samuel argues that the “bodies of the oppressed (like Dalits) are sacramental by virtue of their brokeness” (Samuel 2000, 28). This comparative project cannot fit neatly into the “crossing over coming back” paradigm because Christian and Hindu Dalits are not two mutually exclusive identities.

The second work is A Christian Theology of Suffering in the Context of Theravada Buddhism in Thailand by Satanun Boonyakiat. As religious minorities, Thai Christians are shaped by Buddhist’s concept of suffering, particularly from the state’s sponsored Theravadan perspective. On the other hand, the existing theology of suffering derived from the West primarily deals with suffering with the framework of theodicy that lacks practical, concrete insights. Thus, a theology of suffering remains only an academic exercise that fails to address the contextual needs of Thai people. Boonyakiat tries to develop a Christian theology of suffering that is relevant to the context of Theravada Buddhism in Thailand by engaging and learning from the Buddhist concept of suffering (Boonyakiat 2000).

The third work is Hans Harmakaputra’s A Christian-Muslim Comparative Theology of Saints: The Community of God’s Friends. Although the book does not focus solely on Indonesia, he brought his experience as an Indonesian to this comparative work. As a Protestant, Harmakaputra is intrigued by the lack of robust theological understanding of saints and the exclusive understanding of the communion of saints in popular Christian perceptions. The problem is such reality amplifies the “us and them” paradigm among Christians at the grassroots, especially in countries where Christians live side-by-side with people of other faiths. The project aims to construct an inclusive theology of saints where non-Christians can potentially belong to the communion of saints. Through comparison between Muslim, Catholic, and Protestant thinkers such as Ibn ‘Arabi, Karl Rahner, Elizabeth Johnson, and Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the author argues for three theological constructs as features of a more inclusive theology of saints: (1) saints as manifestations and revealers of God’s self-communication, (2) the hiddenness of saints, and (3) saints as companions (Harmakaputra 2022, 9). The last chapter focuses on two saintly figures, Father Frans van der Lugt and Abdurrahman Wahid, who attract Christians and Muslims alike in Syria and Indonesia, highlighting this work’s practical dimension.

The paper will analyze how each author utilizes comparative theology in their work and how their Protestant and Asian identity inform, modify, or even subvert the dominant Western assumptions of doing comparative theology. The result will highlight how these three books feature (1) non-textual comparison, (2) subvert the rigid religious boundaries, (3) incorporate contextual consciousness and practicability of comparative theology, and (4) adherence to the ‘Protestant principle’ that constantly critiquing and disrupting the dominant theological paradigms deem as irrelevant.