Raimon Panikkar
Encyclopedia
Raimon Panikkar-Alemany was a Spanish
Roman Catholic priest and a proponent of inter-religious dialogue. As a scholar, he specialized in comparative religion
.
India
n father in Barcelona
. His mother was well-educated and from the Catalan
bourgeoisie. His father belonged to an upper caste Malabar
Nair
family from South India
. Panikkar's father was a freedom fighter during British colonial rule in India
and escaped from Britain and married into a Catalan family. Panikkar's father studied in England and was the representative of a German chemical company in Barcelona.
Educated at a Jesuit school, Panikkar studied chemistry and philosophy at the universities of Barcelona
, Bonn
and Madrid
, and Catholic Theology in Madrid and Rome. He earned a doctorate in philosophy at the University of Madrid
in 1946 and a doctorate in chemistry in 1958. He earned a third doctorate in theology at the Pontifical Lateran University
in Rome in 1961.He compared St. Thomas Aquinas's Philosophy with the eighth-century Hindu philosopher Ādi Śańkara's Interpretation of the Brahma Sutras.
organization in 1940. He was ordained a Catholic priest in 1946, and was a professor of philosophy at the University of Madrid
. He made his first trip to India in 1954 where he studied Indian philosophy
and religion at the University of Mysore
and Banaras Hindu University
, where he met several Western monks seeking Eastern forms for the expression of their Christian beliefs. "I left Europe [for India] as a Christian, I discovered I was a Hindu and returned as a Buddhist without ever having ceased to be Christian," he later wrote. While in Jerusalem during 1962, he was summoned to Rome by Opus Dei founder and director, Saint
Josemaría Escrivá, who expelled him after a brief trial where he was charged with disobedience to the organization. He became a visiting professor at Harvard Divinity School
. in 1966 and a professor of religious studies at University of California, Santa Barbara
in 1972. For many years he taught in the spring and spent the rest of the year doing research in India. In 1987 he moved to Tavertet, in the hills north of Barcelona, where he founded the Raimon Panikkar Vivarium Foundation, a center for intercultural studies.
He last lived in Tavertet
, in the mountains of Catalonia
outside Barcelona. Panikkar authored more than 40 books and 900 articles. His complete works are being published in Italian. His 1989 Gifford Lectures are being published in English by Orbis.
In a statement from his residence in Tavertet dated January 26, 2010 he wrote: "Dear Friends . . . I would like to communicate with you that I believe the moment has come, (put off time and again), to withdraw from all public activity, both the direct and the intellectual participation, to which I have dedicated all my life as a way of sharing my reflections. I will continue to be close to you in a deeper way, through silence and prayer, and in the same way I would ask you to be close to me in this last period of my existence. You have often heard me say that a person is a knot in a network of relationships; in taking my leave from you I would like to thank you from the bottom of my heart for having enriched me with the relationship I have had with each of you. I am also grateful to all of those who, either in person or through association, continue working to spread my message and the sharing of my ideals, even without me. Thankful for the gift of life which is only such if lived in communion with others: it is with this spirit that I have lived out my ministry."
Spanish people
The Spanish are citizens of the Kingdom of Spain. Within Spain, there are also a number of vigorous nationalisms and regionalisms, reflecting the country's complex history....
Roman Catholic priest and a proponent of inter-religious dialogue. As a scholar, he specialized in comparative religion
Comparative religion
Comparative religion is a field of religious studies that analyzes the similarities and differences of themes, myths, rituals and concepts among the world's religions...
.
Early life and education
Raimundo Pannikar was born as the son of a Spanish Roman Catholic mother and a HinduHindu
Hindu refers to an identity associated with the philosophical, religious and cultural systems that are indigenous to the Indian subcontinent. As used in the Constitution of India, the word "Hindu" is also attributed to all persons professing any Indian religion...
India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
n father in Barcelona
Barcelona
Barcelona is the second largest city in Spain after Madrid, and the capital of Catalonia, with a population of 1,621,537 within its administrative limits on a land area of...
. His mother was well-educated and from the Catalan
Catalan people
The Catalans or Catalonians are the people from, or with origins in, Catalonia that form a historical nationality in Spain. The inhabitants of the adjacent portion of southern France are sometimes included in this definition...
bourgeoisie. His father belonged to an upper caste Malabar
Malabar District
Malabar District was an administrative district of Madras Presidency in British India and independent India's Madras State. The British district included the present-day districts of Kannur, Kozhikode, Wayanad, Malappuram, Palakkad , and Chavakad Taluk of Thrissur District in the northern part of...
Nair
Nair
Nair , also known as Nayar , refers to "not a unitary group but a named category of castes", which historically embody several castes and many subdivisions, not all of whom bore the Nair title. These people historically live in the present-day Indian state of Kerala...
family from South India
South India
South India is the area encompassing India's states of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu as well as the union territories of Lakshadweep and Pondicherry, occupying 19.31% of India's area...
. Panikkar's father was a freedom fighter during British colonial rule in India
British Raj
British Raj was the British rule in the Indian subcontinent between 1858 and 1947; The term can also refer to the period of dominion...
and escaped from Britain and married into a Catalan family. Panikkar's father studied in England and was the representative of a German chemical company in Barcelona.
Educated at a Jesuit school, Panikkar studied chemistry and philosophy at the universities of Barcelona
University of Barcelona
The University of Barcelona is a public university located in the city of Barcelona, Catalonia in Spain. It is a member of the Coimbra Group, LERU, European University Association, Mediterranean Universities Union, International Research Universities Network and Vives Network...
, Bonn
University of Bonn
The University of Bonn is a public research university located in Bonn, Germany. Founded in its present form in 1818, as the linear successor of earlier academic institutions, the University of Bonn is today one of the leading universities in Germany. The University of Bonn offers a large number...
and Madrid
Complutense University of Madrid
The Complutense University of Madrid is a university in Madrid, and one of the oldest universities in the world. It is located on a sprawling campus that occupies the entirety of the Ciudad Universitaria district of Madrid, with annexes in the district of Somosaguas in the neighboring city of...
, and Catholic Theology in Madrid and Rome. He earned a doctorate in philosophy at the University of Madrid
University of Madrid
The Complutense University of Madrid is a public university in Madrid, Spain, and one of the oldest universities in the world.The University of Madrid may also refer to:* The Autonomous University of Madrid, a public university founded in 1968...
in 1946 and a doctorate in chemistry in 1958. He earned a third doctorate in theology at the Pontifical Lateran University
Pontifical Lateran University
The Pontifical Lateran University is a university by pontifical right based in Rome, Italy. The university also hosts the central session of the Pontifical John Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage and Family...
in Rome in 1961.He compared St. Thomas Aquinas's Philosophy with the eighth-century Hindu philosopher Ādi Śańkara's Interpretation of the Brahma Sutras.
Career
He entered the Opus DeiOpus Dei
Opus Dei, formally known as The Prelature of the Holy Cross and Opus Dei , is an organization of the Catholic Church that teaches that everyone is called to holiness and that ordinary life is a path to sanctity. The majority of its membership are lay people, with secular priests under the...
organization in 1940. He was ordained a Catholic priest in 1946, and was a professor of philosophy at the University of Madrid
University of Madrid
The Complutense University of Madrid is a public university in Madrid, Spain, and one of the oldest universities in the world.The University of Madrid may also refer to:* The Autonomous University of Madrid, a public university founded in 1968...
. He made his first trip to India in 1954 where he studied Indian philosophy
Indian philosophy
India has a rich and diverse philosophical tradition dating back to ancient times. According to Radhakrishnan, the earlier Upanisads constitute "...the earliest philosophical compositions of the world."...
and religion at the University of Mysore
University of Mysore
The University of Mysore , is a public university in India. The University founded during the reign of Krishnaraja Wodeyar IV, the Maharaja of Mysore, and was conceptualized on the basis of a report on educational progress in the United States and Australia, submitted by Messrs Thomas Denham and...
and Banaras Hindu University
Banaras Hindu University
Banaras Hindu University is a public university located in Varanasi, India and is one of the Central Universities of India. It is the largest residential university in Asia, with over 24,000 students in its campus. BHU was founded in 1916 by Pandit Madan Mohan Malviya under the Parliamentary...
, where he met several Western monks seeking Eastern forms for the expression of their Christian beliefs. "I left Europe [for India] as a Christian, I discovered I was a Hindu and returned as a Buddhist without ever having ceased to be Christian," he later wrote. While in Jerusalem during 1962, he was summoned to Rome by Opus Dei founder and director, Saint
Saint
A saint is a holy person. In various religions, saints are people who are believed to have exceptional holiness.In Christian usage, "saint" refers to any believer who is "in Christ", and in whom Christ dwells, whether in heaven or in earth...
Josemaría Escrivá, who expelled him after a brief trial where he was charged with disobedience to the organization. He became a visiting professor at Harvard Divinity School
Harvard Divinity School
Harvard Divinity School is one of the constituent schools of Harvard University, located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in the United States. The School's mission is to train and educate its students either in the academic study of religion, or for the practice of a religious ministry or other public...
. in 1966 and a professor of religious studies at University of California, Santa Barbara
University of California, Santa Barbara
The University of California, Santa Barbara, commonly known as UCSB or UC Santa Barbara, is a public research university and one of the 10 general campuses of the University of California system. The main campus is located on a site in Goleta, California, from Santa Barbara and northwest of Los...
in 1972. For many years he taught in the spring and spent the rest of the year doing research in India. In 1987 he moved to Tavertet, in the hills north of Barcelona, where he founded the Raimon Panikkar Vivarium Foundation, a center for intercultural studies.
He last lived in Tavertet
Tavertet
Tavertet is a small town located above some cliffs, 900m above sea level, in the area known as Collsacabra, north of the Guilleries, in the comarca of Osona in Catalonia....
, in the mountains of Catalonia
Catalonia
Catalonia is an autonomous community in northeastern Spain, with the official status of a "nationality" of Spain. Catalonia comprises four provinces: Barcelona, Girona, Lleida, and Tarragona. Its capital and largest city is Barcelona. Catalonia covers an area of 32,114 km² and has an...
outside Barcelona. Panikkar authored more than 40 books and 900 articles. His complete works are being published in Italian. His 1989 Gifford Lectures are being published in English by Orbis.
In a statement from his residence in Tavertet dated January 26, 2010 he wrote: "Dear Friends . . . I would like to communicate with you that I believe the moment has come, (put off time and again), to withdraw from all public activity, both the direct and the intellectual participation, to which I have dedicated all my life as a way of sharing my reflections. I will continue to be close to you in a deeper way, through silence and prayer, and in the same way I would ask you to be close to me in this last period of my existence. You have often heard me say that a person is a knot in a network of relationships; in taking my leave from you I would like to thank you from the bottom of my heart for having enriched me with the relationship I have had with each of you. I am also grateful to all of those who, either in person or through association, continue working to spread my message and the sharing of my ideals, even without me. Thankful for the gift of life which is only such if lived in communion with others: it is with this spirit that I have lived out my ministry."
By Panikkar
- The "crisis" of Madhyamika and Indian philosophy today. University of HawaiiUniversity of HawaiiThe University of Hawaii System, formally the University of Hawaii and popularly known as UH, is a public, co-educational college and university system that confers associate, bachelor, master, and doctoral degrees through three university campuses, seven community college campuses, an employment...
Press (1966) - Cometas: Fragmentos de un diario espiritual de la postguerra. Euramerica, S.A. (first edition; 1972)
- Worship and secular man: An essay on the liturgical nature of man, considering secularization as a major phenomenon of our time and worship as an apparent fact of all times; A study towards an integral anthropologyAnthropologyAnthropology is the study of humanity. It has origins in the humanities, the natural sciences, and the social sciences. The term "anthropology" is from the Greek anthrōpos , "man", understood to mean mankind or humanity, and -logia , "discourse" or "study", and was first used in 1501 by German...
. Orbis Books, 1973 - The Trinity and the religious experience of man: Icon-person-mystery. Orbis Books, 1973 ISBN 0-88344-495-X
- The Vedic Experience: Mantramañjari: An Anthology Of The Vedas For Modern Man. Berkeley: University of CaliforniaUniversity of CaliforniaThe University of California is a public university system in the U.S. state of California. Under the California Master Plan for Higher Education, the University of California is a part of the state's three-tier public higher education system, which also includes the California State University...
Press, 1977. - Colligite fragmenta: For an integration of reality. Villanova UniversityVillanova UniversityVillanova University is a private university located in Radnor Township, a suburb northwest of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in the United States...
Press, 1978 - Myth, Faith and Hermeneutics: Cross Cultural Studies. Paulist Press, 1979. ISBN 0-8091-0232-3
- "Aporias in the comparative philosophy of religion", Man and World, vol 13, 1980, pp. 357–83.
- The Unknown Christ Of Hinduism: Towards An Ecumenical Christophany. Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1981. ISBN 0-88344-523-9
- Blessed Simplicity: The Monk as a Universal Archetype. San Francisco, CA: HarperSanFrancisco, 1984. ISBN 0-8164-0531-X
- The Silence of God: The Answer of the BuddhaGautama BuddhaSiddhārtha Gautama was a spiritual teacher from the Indian subcontinent, on whose teachings Buddhism was founded. In most Buddhist traditions, he is regarded as the Supreme Buddha Siddhārtha Gautama (Sanskrit: सिद्धार्थ गौतम; Pali: Siddhattha Gotama) was a spiritual teacher from the Indian...
. Orbis Books; revised edition (June 1989) ISBN 0-88344-446-1 - The Cosmotheandric Experience: Emerging Religious Consciousness. Orbis Books, June 1993. ISBN 0-88344-862-9
- A Dwelling Place for Wisdom. Westminster John Knox Press, November 1993 ISBN 0-664-25362-8
- Invisible Harmony: Essays on ContemplationContemplationThe word contemplation comes from the Latin word contemplatio. Its root is also that of the Latin word templum, a piece of ground consecrated for the taking of auspices, or a building for worship, derived either from Proto-Indo-European base *tem- "to cut", and so a "place reserved or cut out" or...
and Responsibility edited by Harry James Cargas. Augsburg FortressAugsburg FortressAugsburg Fortress is the official publishing house of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and also publishes for the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada as Augsburg Fortress Canada...
Publishers, June 1995 ISBN 0-8006-2609-5 - Pluralism and oppression: theology in world perspective (co-authored with Paul F. KnitterPaul F. KnitterPaul F. Knitter is the Paul Tillich Professor of Theology, World Religions and Culture at Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York. He was formerly Emeritus Professor of Theology at Xavier University in Cincinnati, Ohio. Since publishing his acclaimed book, No Other Name? , Knitter has...
). College Theology Society. Lanham, Md.: University Press of America, 1991. - Cultural Disarmament: The Way to Peace. Westminster John Knox Press; September 1, 1995 ISBN 0-664-25549-3
- The Intrareligious Dialogue. Paulist Press; revised edition, July 1999. ISBN 0-8091-3763-1
- Christophany: The Fullness Of Man. Orbis Books, November 30, 2004. ISBN 1-57075-564-7
- Foreword to The Cave of the Heart: The Life of Swami Abhishiktananda by Shirley Du Boulay. Orbis, 2005. ISBN 1-57075-610-4
- Espiritualidad Hindu: Sanatana Dharma. Kairos, 2006 ISBN 84-7245-577-7
- The Experience of God: Icons of the Mystery (trans. by Joseph Cunneen). Fortress Press, 2006. ISBN 0-8006-3825-5
- Initiation to the Vedas. Motilal BanarsidassMotilal BanarsidassMotilal Banarsidass is a leading Indian publishing house on Sanskrit and Indology since 1903, located in Delhi, India. It publishes and distributes serials, monographs, and scholarly publications on Asian religion, philosophy, history, culture, arts, architecture, archaeology, language,...
, July 15, 2006 ISBN 81-208-2954-9 - Human RightsHuman rightsHuman rights are "commonly understood as inalienable fundamental rights to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being." Human rights are thus conceived as universal and egalitarian . These rights may exist as natural rights or as legal rights, in both national...
as A Western Concept (co-authored with Arvind SharmaArvind SharmaArvind Sharma is the Birks Professor of Comparative Religion at McGill University. Sharma's works focus on comparative religion, Hinduism, and the role of women in religion. Some of his more famous works include Our Religions and Women in World Religions...
). D.K. Printworld, 2007, New Delhi. ISBN 81-246-0429-0 - The Rhythm of Being. The Gifford LecturesGifford LecturesThe Gifford Lectures were established by the will of Adam Lord Gifford . They were established to "promote and diffuse the study of Natural Theology in the widest sense of the term — in other words, the knowledge of God." The term natural theology as used by Gifford means theology supported...
. Orbis Books, June 20, 2009. ISBN 978-1570758553
About Panikkar
- Theological approach and understanding of religions: Jean Danielou and Raimundo Panikkar: a study in contrast by Dominic Veliath. Kristu Jyoti College (1988)
- Emerging Trends in Indian Christology: A Critical Study of the Development, Context and Contemporary Catholic Attempts of R.Panikkar and S.Kappen to Articulate a Relevant Christology in Indian Context. (1992) by Jacob Parappally,MSFS, ISBN: 81-85812-12-8
- Christ: The Mystery in History: A Critical Study on the Christology of Raymond Panikkar by Cheriyan Menacherry. Peter Lang Publ Inc. (June 1996) ISBN 3-631-48369-4
- The Intercultural Challenge of Raimon Panikkar, edited by Joseph Prabhu. Orbis Books, November 1996. ISBN 1-57075-056-4
- A New Hermenteutic of Reality: Raimon Panikkar's Cosmotheandric Vision by Anthony Savari Raj. Peter Lang Publishing (August 1998) ISBN 0-8204-3445-0
- An Emerging Cosmotheandric Religion?: Raimon Panikkar's Pluralistic Theology Of Religions by Jyri Komulainen. Brill Academic Publishers (January 30, 2005) ISBN 90-04-13893-5
- D'Sa, Francis X. "Panikkar, Raimon (1918-2010)." ACPI Encyclopedia of PhilosophyACPI Encyclopedia of PhilosophyThe ACPI Encyclopedia of Philosophy is an encyclopedia of philosophy produced by the Association of Christian Philosophers of India , with Johnson J. Puthenpurackal as Editor-in-Chief and George Panthanmackel as Associate Editor...
. Ed. Johnson J. Puthenpurackal. Bangalore: ATC (2010). 2:1005-1009. - Gispert-Sauch, G. "Raimon Panikkar." Vidyajyoti: Journal of Theological ReflectionVidyajyoti College of TheologyVidyajyoti College of Theology , Delhi, India, is a institute and faculty of theology run by the Jesuits. It was started in 1879 in Asansol, West Bengal, as a modest 'Saint Joseph’s Seminary'. From 1889 to 1971 it developed in the mountains of Kurseong, near Darjeeling, where it was renamed Saint...
(November 2010).