What might it look like to see Jerusalem, with its cross-hatched encounters between people of diverse faiths and cultures, as a city of the book? Merav Mack and Benjamin Balint share their forays into the city's most inaccessible reaches in the making of their recently published book, Jerusalem: City of the Book. Video and full transcript here: https://cswr.hds.harvard.edu/news/2019/11/11/video-jerusalem-city-book Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, an...
Nov 10, 2019•1 hr
Graham Harvey, professor of religious studies at The Open University (UK), discusses animism and how our relations are damaged by ongoing efforts to separate (human) culture from ‘nature’ and humans from other species. Engaging with Indigenous knowledges, Harvey seeks to replace ‘nature’ with more respectful relationships with the world. Graham Harvey is professor of religious studies at The Open University, UK. His research largely concerns “the new animism,” especially in the rituals and proto...
Nov 06, 2019•1 hr 7 min
On November 6, 2019, Harvard Divinity School hosted its annual Theological Education Day. The day featured many panel discussions, including this one with students and staff describing life at HDS. Full transcription here: https://hds.harvard.edu/files/hds/files/ted-community-2019.pdf Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at https://hds.harvard.edu/.
Nov 05, 2019•42 min
On November 6, 2019, Harvard Divinity School hosted its annual Theological Education Day. The day featured many panel discussions, including this one on ministry studies and field education program. Full transcript here: https://hds.harvard.edu/files/hds/files/ted-ministry-at-hds-2019.pdf Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at https://hds.harvard.edu/.
Nov 05, 2019•50 min
On November 6, 2019, Harvard Divinity School hosted its annual Theological Education Day. The day featured many panel discussions, including this one that introduced participants to the school's MDiv, MTS, ThM, and PhD degree programs. Full transcript here: https://hds.harvard.edu/files/hds/files/ted-mdiv-2019.pdf Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at https://hds.harvard.edu/.
Nov 05, 2019•48 min
On November 6, 2019, Harvard Divinity School hosted its annual Theological Education Day. Dean David N. Hempton and Angela Counts, Director of Admissions, welcomed participants. Full transcript here: https://hds.harvard.edu/files/hds/files/ted-welcome-2019.pdf Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at https://hds.harvard.edu/.
Nov 05, 2019•49 min
A conversation on Nov. 4 with the three Hindu monastics visiting HDS this year, each representing a different Hindu tradition: Swami Sarvapriyananda (Ramakrishna Mission), Brahmacharini Shweta Chaitanya (Chinmaya Mission), and Sadhak Akshar–Guru: Mahant Swami Maharaj (BAPS Swaminarayan Sanstha). They introduced the traditions to which they belong, explained why they joined the traditions, and what it has meant for their lives. Francis X. Clooney, S.J., Parkman Professor of Divinity, moderated th...
Nov 03, 2019•1 hr 48 min
Alicia Izharuddin (University of Malaya), Visiting Senior Lecturer on Women’s Studies and Islam, gives a lecture entitled “‘Bureaucratic Islam and the Romance Industry in Southeast Asia.” Video and full transcript: https://wsrp.hds.harvard.edu/news/2019/10/24/video-bureaucratic-islam-and-romance-industry-southeast-asia Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at http://hds.harvard.edu/.
Oct 30, 2019•1 hr 19 min
Anne E. Monius, Professor of South Asian Religions at Harvard Divinity School, passed away on August 3, 2019. A distinguished scholar and engaged as well as engaging teacher, Professor Monius taught for 17 years at Harvard Divinity School, where she specialized in the religious traditions of India. Her research examined the practices and products of literary culture to reconstruct the history of religions in South Asia. HDS faculty and friends remembered Professor Monius during a memorial servic...
Oct 10, 2019•1 hr 37 min
Jyoti Puri, Visiting Professor of Women’s Studies and South Asian Religions Colorado Scholar from Simmons University, presents on “Death in Transit: Cremation, Spectacle, and Looking Off-center.” Video and full transcript here: https://wsrp.hds.harvard.edu/news/2019/09/27/video-death-transit-cremation-spectacle-and-looking-off-center Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at hds.harvard.edu/.
Sep 28, 2019•1 hr 15 min
Marder formulates the paradox of “excessive heat” that, on the one hand, signals the ardency of faith and the love of God and, on the other, the effect of sin configured as ariditas (dryness), undoing viriditas (the greening green, a self-refreshing power of creation). The difference between the two kinds of excessive heat is folded into the material distinction between the woods and wood: while timber is dry and ready to go up in flames, living trees are anything but inert matter ready to be in...
Sep 25, 2019•40 min
In this lecture, Ruth Harris examines how Vivekananda conveyed the meaning of “guru-bakhti” to his female disciples, and the spiritual lens through which he sought to mold them in a male spiritual milieu. Ruth Harris is Professor of Modern History at the University of Oxford and Senior Research Fellow at All Souls’ College. She has published widely in the history of religion, science, women’s history, French history, and more recently, global history. The lecture took place at the Center for the...
Sep 22, 2019•1 hr 11 min
Author, activist, and farmer Leah Penniman discusses the movement for food sovereignty and building a food system based on justice, dignity, and abundance for all members of our community. The talk took place at the Center for the Center for the Study of World Religions (CSWR) at Harvard Divinity School on September 17, 2019. Leah Penniman is a Black Kreyol educator, farmer/peyizan, author, and food justice activist from Soul Fire Farm in Grafton, New York. She has been farming since 1996, and c...
Sep 16, 2019•1 hr 6 min
Professor Davíd Carrasco, Neil L. Rudenstine Professor for the Study of Latin America delivered the 2019 Convocation address "Toni Morrison Stories: Goodness and Mercy and Mexico," on September 5, 2019. Wampanoag elder Ramona Peters welcomed students to the location on the ancestral lands of the Massachuset, Nipmuc, and Wampanoag people. Actress, poet, songwriter, and educator Alexandria Danielle King performed and HDS Professor Cornel West provided a blessing. Jazz pianist Danilo Pérez performe...
Sep 12, 2019•1 hr 25 min
Today, mindfulness meditation courses can be found everywhere from schools to prisons to sports teams. The trendy fitness apparel company Lululemon is now advertising mindful clothing for men. There’s also Mindful Meats, Mindful Mints, and Sherwin-Williams sells a paint color they call Mindful Gray. There’s even Mindful Mayo, which you can buy at your local Whole Foods for $5.99. So why has mindfulness meditation suddenly become so popular? Well, for starters, recent studies show benefits agains...
Aug 08, 2019•21 min
Following the award ceremony on May 2, 2019 for the Peter J. Gomes STB '68 Memorial Honors, the alumni honorees spoke on the topic of “spiritual innovation.” The panelists were: Erik Martínez Resly, MDiv ’12, founder and co-director of The Sanctuaries in Washington D.C. Salma Kazmi, MTS ’09, founding executive director of the Boston Islamic Seminary, former associate director of the Islamic Society of Boston Cultural Center, and co-founder of the Center for Jewish-Muslim Relations Varun Soni, MT...
May 06, 2019•57 min
In Navajo worldview, thought creates the world, which is then spoken into being. This process places sacred value on the power of language. Sherwin Bitsui’s poetry attempts to connect Diné thought to a changed world by translating the present through an encoding rooted in his culture and language. In this excerpt from his talk at Harvard Divinity School, he offered insight into how Navajo thought and language can inform a poetics, thus opening possibilities for poetry. Sherwin Bitsui is the auth...
May 02, 2019•5 min
Award-winning American poet Susan Howe visited Harvard Divinity School on April 24 to speak about the binding together of freedom and law, spontaneity and habit, as occasions for awakening a reader to the exaltation of spirit in process. Crossing the guarded borders between image and word, individual and community, history and the present, poetry provides an opening to the transcendent order that chance makes possible. Susan Howe's collection of poems, That This, won the Bollingen Prize in 2011....
Apr 23, 2019•40 min
How is our lived experience of religion and spirituality changing? Where are the boundaries of religion being tested and transformed? How will scholars and practitioners define and understand religion in the future? A multi-generational panel conversation of scholars and practitioners explored the shifting structures of religious practice and identity, and shared insights about the emerging landscape of spiritual community. Panelists: Dr. Nancy Ammerman, Boston University Dr. Christopher White, ...
Apr 22, 2019•1 hr 55 min
In November of 2018, the FBI released its report on hate crimes in the U.S. for 2017. It wasn’t good news. Hate crimes on the basis of religious identity surged 23 percent, the biggest annual increase since 2001, the year of the 9/11 terror attacks. And one of the most startling statistics is that the number of hate crimes targeting Jewish people increased 37 percent from the previous year. So, why are hate crimes on the rise? Many have placed blame at the foot of political leaders and specifica...
Apr 18, 2019•17 min
How do you measure and govern for happiness? Harvard Divinity School hosted an international conference on April 13, 2019, inspired by the Gross National Happiness policies of the Kingdom of Bhutan. During this conference, academics, practitioners, politicians, corporate leaders and spiritual leaders sought answers to the question of universal happiness. The event was kicked off with a Keynote Address by Her Excellency, Doma Tshering, Permanent Representative of the Kingdom of Bhutan to the Unit...
Apr 12, 2019•35 min
How do you measure and govern for happiness? Harvard Divinity School hosted an international conference on April 13, 2019, inspired by the Gross National Happiness policies of the Kingdom of Bhutan. During this conference, academics, practitioners, politicians, corporate leaders and spiritual leaders sought answers to the question of universal happiness. This panel's topic was Scaling Happiness and Health: Translating Science to Application. Panelists included Kasisomayajula “Vish” Viswanath, Dr...
Apr 12, 2019•1 hr
How do you measure and govern for happiness? Harvard Divinity School hosted an international conference on April 13, 2019, inspired by the Gross National Happiness policies of the Kingdom of Bhutan. During this conference, academics, practitioners, politicians, corporate leaders and spiritual leaders sought answers to the question of universal happiness. This panel's topic was the Happiness Movement: Mobilizing Individuals, Communities and Hacking Happiness from Artificial to Heartificial Intell...
Apr 12, 2019•1 hr 8 min
How do you measure and govern for happiness? Harvard Divinity School hosted an international conference on April 13, 2019, inspired by the Gross National Happiness policies of the Kingdom of Bhutan. During this conference, academics, practitioners, politicians, corporate leaders and spiritual leaders sought answers to the question of universal happiness. The closing included the following: Documentary on Portraits of Bhutan gg by Robert X. Fogarty and Ben Reece of Dear World, USA Bhutanese Cultu...
Apr 12, 2019•19 min
How do you measure and govern for happiness? Harvard Divinity School hosted an international conference on April 13, 2019, inspired by the Gross National Happiness policies of the Kingdom of Bhutan. During this conference, academics, practitioners, politicians, corporate leaders and spiritual leaders sought answers to the question of universal happiness. This panel covered the Bhutanese statecraft on Economics and the Spirit of GNH. Panelists included Dasho Karma Tshiteem, Professor Sophus Reine...
Apr 11, 2019•1 hr 27 min
This monthly public series, convened by Dean David N. Hempton of HDS, brings together a cross-disciplinary RPP Working Group of faculty, experts, students, and alumni from across Harvard University and the local area to explore topics and cases in religions and the practice of peace. This meeting concerned indigenous guardianship and culture with intersections of nature and peace. Speakers • Margarita Mora, Director of Partnerships, Nia Tero • Indira S. Raimberdy, Executive Director, Peace Build...
Apr 10, 2019•2 hr 1 min
The ongoing destruction of Earth’s natural systems is the result of decisions, made daily, by billions of people. These decisions are voluntary and involuntary at once, collective and personal. The question must be asked: what is driving our actions? How do we reignite and reimagine a spiritual relationship with this beautiful planet we call home? From traditions around the world, and from within ourselves, how might we create different narratives that honor nature and acknowledge the sacred? Tw...
Apr 03, 2019•2 hr 12 min
This talk contradicts the longstanding reading of Emerson as invested in idealism and instead charts his obsession with matter both organic and inorganic, organized and unorganized. By attending to his interest in sciences of life, Branka Arsić reconstructs the geological and botanical theories that led him to formulate a genuinely vitalist ontology; and by outlining his vitalism through readings of both early and late essays and lectures, Arsić will ultimately be asking what the ethical and pol...
Apr 02, 2019•50 min
Damaris S. Parsitau, 2018-19 WSRP Visiting Associate Professor, delivers the lecture “The Kingdom of Holy Women: Pentecostalism, Sex and Women’s Bodies in an African Church,” which is based on five years of ethnographic research carried out at the Ministry of Repentance and Holiness, a new and controversial Pentecostal church based in Kenya. Her book-in-progress explores the Ministry’s aims to control, discipline and objectify women’s bodies as sites of tensions and erotic desires that make wome...
Apr 02, 2019•1 hr 22 min
The Harvard Divinity School Buddhist Community (HBC) hosted the Fifth Annual Buddhism and Race Conference: Centering Intersectionalities, on March 8, 2019 at Harvard Divinity School, Cambridge, MA. During this conference, scholars, sangha leaders, activists, and students from diverse backgrounds joined together to engage in conversations about issues at the intersection of Buddhism, race, and beyond. This panel discussed the intersections of Buddhism, Race, and Multiple Religious Belongings. Ful...
Mar 25, 2019•1 hr 50 min
