The comparative theological discourse has been largely conceptualized and shaped by Roman Catholic theologians in the Western hemisphere. A significant strand of this discourse defines comparative theology as a theological, and perhaps even confessional, enterprise in which the individual comparative theologian brings into fruitful dialogue texts of another tradition with their own for the purposes of theological learning. Within these parameters, Christian theology has been regarded with much singularity. This panel considers Protestant contributions to the comparative theological field by addressing hermeneutical and theological questions from diverse Protestant backgrounds, including Anglican, Lutheran, and various traditions rooted in Wesleyan and Calvinist thought in North America, Europe, and Asia.
Anglican theological method, as represented in the concepts of comprehensiveness and provisionality, reveals a useful compatibility with comparative theological methods and approaches. This paper will show how provisionality and comprehensiveness are constituent elements of Anglican theological method by examining Richard Hooker’s extension of the category of church to Jewish and Roman Catholic context. This analysis will illustrate how comprehensiveness and provisionality resonates with comparative theological methods in contemporary contexts.
Comparative theology as a discipline is identified not only as a Western but also as a Catholic enterprise. Such an assumption is not unfounded given that many of the pioneers and notable figures of the field came from the Catholic tradition and Catholic universities located in North America and Europe. It is essential to discuss comparative theology works that integrate specific socio-cultural locations to challenge the assumption and open up more conversations on the development of the field. This paper aims to review the methodologies used in three recent works on comparative theology from Asian perspectives: Joshua Samuel (India), Satanun Bonyakiat (Thailand), and Hans Harmakaputra (Indonesia). The analysis focuses on how their Protestant identity and social location shaped their comparative works. Such an analysis contributes to the ongoing discussion concerning using the denominational lens in comparative theology, particularly identifying distinctive Protestant elements that set them apart from their Catholic counterparts.
This paper considers the task of comparative theology from the perspective of Uniting denominations in North America. It first describes the principles of “reformed and always reforming” in the United Church of Christ and “united and uniting” at work in the United Church of Canada, as motivations to engage in comparative work. It then considers how these impulses can contribute to reforming a Reformed doctrine of sin via comparative conversation with non-dual Saiva theology.
Samuel Zwemer famously compared Calvinism to Islam, noting how Sunni Islam and Reformed Christianity shared commitments to divine sovereignty, revelation, and a critique of idolatry. Despite these broad conceptual similarities, Western Reformed systematic theologians such as Schleiermacher, Barth, and Moltmann rarely engage in depth with Islamic thought. Instead, they use Muslims and Islam as brief examples to reinforce Christian theological superiority. This paper draws from Jennifer Lackey’s philosophical study of testimony and courts to argue that Reformed Christian views on Islam are shaped in part by a form of epistemic superiority that she calls hearer excess. To counter this hearer excess, I propose a model of comparative theology carried out as witness and counter-witness - an approach for deepening Christian-Muslim theological exchange and for advancing internal Reformed dogmatic arguments about the nature of divine speech and revelation, theologies of religion, the doctrine of God, and other theological loci.