Events

2020 Annual Meeting

Your AAR staff continues to work toward holding the Annual Meeting in Boston, Nov. 21-24, 2020. We are aware of the uncertainty and contradictory projections related to the COVID-19 pandemic and with health and safety as a priority, we will continue monitoring the guidance of governments and health experts as we plan and make decisions. Should any changes need to be made related to the 2020 Annual Meeting, we will promptly notify you.

2020 Regional Meetings

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All remaining regional meetings for 2020 have been canceled

Longing and Letting Go: Christian and Hindu Practices of Passionate Non-Attachment

Hillgardner, Holly

Book cover

Description

Mirabai, a sixteenth-century Indian princess, wrote passionate love songs to Lord Krishna. Hadewijch, a thirteenth-century European Beguine, wrote of her yearning to become Love itself, to be "God with God." Each woman practiced a full-bodied, sensuously-imaged longing for love; at the same time, each also practiced certain ascetic disciplines. Spanning centuries, continents, and religious traditions, this book juxtaposes Hadewijch's and Mirabai's inextricable energies of longing and letting go as resources for a comparative theology of passionate non-attachment. Within both Hinduism and Christianity, desire and renunciation are often presented as opposites; yet, both Mirabai and Hadewijch, in their own distinct ways, illuminate the integral, tensile relationship between these concepts. Rather than choosing one or the other, each woman's dual practices of longing and letting go not only take her on an inward spiritual journey but also deeply involve her in the beauty and suffering of the wider world. Drawing out crucial differences and intriguing resonances between these two women of faith, Hillgardner develops a Hindu-Christian comparative theology that argues for an interreligious ethic of passionate non-attachment, one capacious and brave enough to hold together our own longings with the desires of others in an interconnected, fragile world.

Additional Information

  • Hardback
  • 192 Pages
  • Published: December 2016
  • ISBN: 9780190455538
  • Series: Academy

Ordering Information

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