Scriptural Reasoning as a Method of Interreligious Dialogue in China

Abstract

In the past two decades, scriptural reasoning (SR) has gained wide acceptance as a promising new method of interreligious dialogue among Jews, Christians, and Muslims and is rapidly gaining attention all over the world. SR as interfaith dialogue between the Abrahamic religions emerged in an Anglo-American context in the early 1990s. The first long-term experiment of SR in China was carried out in Beijing from December 2014 to September 2015 as a cooperative project between the Minzu University of China and the University of Helsinki. This SR included the sacred texts of the Chinese traditions of Taoism, Confucianism, and Buddhism alongside the canonical texts of Christianity (both Catholic and Protestant) and Islam. All the scriptural faith traditions of China were represented in this dialogue. The process of SR was carefully researched by Dr Li Huawei; the results show that it is justified to say that SR seems well-suited as a method of interfaith dialogue between the main faith traditions of China. We may assume that SR in China will have far-reaching influence in the future.