Pluralism, Dissent, and Peace: A Subaltern View

In this article the author argues that religious pluralism cannot be grasped deeply in a-historical manner; it needs, on the other hand, a context-specific exploration in order to make meaningful statements upon it.  It has to be anchored context-sensitively on social reality as it obtains in different instances of situatedness, the sitz-im-leben of life.  Accordingly, this reflection would like to pursue a socio-religious approach, anchoring on a subaltern location.

This agonistic experience of religious pluralism takes place in a dialectics of dissent and ascent.  It is a dissent to the dominating other, and an ascent to the dominated self; it is an acute moment of experiencing distinction and identity, in an on-going process of negotiation with the other.  This negotiation takes place within a deeper experience of the divine dialectics of transcendence and immanence, a spiritual experience which transcends the historical experience of domination, even while affirming and assuring a new emancipatory identity to the dominated.