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List of contents
Preface
Acknowledgments
Introduction: The History of Religions and Otto’s Perspectives on Religion
1. Otto’s Lifetime as a Christian Theologian
2. Journeys to the East: India as the Foundation of Otto’s Comparative Religion
3. Comparative Religious Perspectives on the Holy
4. Influences of the History-of-Religions School on Otto’s Religious Theory
5. Parallelism of Mysticism in Religions East and West
6. The Concept of the “Wholly Other” and the Experience of the Depth
7. Vedanta Philosophy as the Discourse of Mystic Experience
8. Toward the Semantic Understanding of Religions
Conclusion
Notes
Bibliography
Index
About the author
Yoshitsugu Sawai is Professor Emeritus in the History of Religions at Tenri University, Japan.
Summary
This book provides an up-to-date treatment of Rudolf Otto and his work, placing him in the context of comparative religion, theology, and the philosophy of religion.
Yoshitsugu Sawai shows how Otto has “three faces”: the Lutheran Theologian, the Philosopher of Religion, and the Comparative Religionist. The book also shows how, of these, Otto saw himself primarily as a Lutheran Theologian, and provides an account of Otto’s engagement with India and the centrality that Hindu theology had on his thinking.
In Otto’s theory of religion, his well-known concepts including “wholly other” and “numinous” constitute a multiple structure of meaning. For example, his concept of the “wholly other” (das ganz Andere) no doubt has the meaning of “God” in his Christian theological studies. At the same time, however, from the perspective of comparative religion or the phenomenology of religion, this same term semantically implies the “ultimate reality” of other religious traditions; “Brahman” and “God” (Isvara) in Hindu religious tradition as well as “God” in Christianity.
Foreword
An important study of the life and work of Rudolf Otto which pays particular attention to his study of Indian religions.
Additional text
In this perceptive study, Yoshitsugu Sawai suggests that we reframe Otto’s ideas in terms of the semantic analysis of the Japanese philosopher and scholar of religions, Toshihiko Izutsu. As a bonus, he draws attention to the work of Japanese scholars that are not generally accessible to English speakers.
