Related in the face of God. The human-animal relationship from an interreligious perspective

Basic data for this project

Description

For some years now, the human-animal relationship has become a focal point of social and scientific discussions, prompted by ecological crises, species extinction, and a growing awareness of how humans interact with animals. The three monotheistic religions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam play an ambivalent role in this context: on one hand, their anthropocentric traditions entail significant responsibility for violent and exploitative human-animal relations; on the other hand, they involve strong traditions of appreciation of non-human creation, they critique violence, and envision peaceful coexistence. This leads to the question of whether the monotheistic religions can contribute to the transformation of the human-animal relationship that is socially and scientifically considered necessary - and in what sense. In recent times, Jewish, Christian, and Islamic theologies have increasingly grappled with this issue even though theological discussions on animals are still at the beginning. Our network seeks to deepen and advance these discussions from an interreligious standpoint, focusing on the relationality and the relations of God, humans, and animals. Our objective is to scrutinize disparities, parallels, and commonalities among theological traditions regarding the relationship between God, humans, and animals. We seek for a cohesive, inter-religiously viable animal-theological perspective. According to our hypothesis, such a perspective is based on the shared idea that humans and animals are closely related in the face of God. Thereby, our network aims to develop and advance the ethical and theological discourse on animals within the different religious traditions. Not at least, this requires a fundamental analysis of human beings' relationship with themselves and the world; we therefore also expect insights for anthropological-theological narratives. Furthermore, the network wants to show that theologies can significantly contribute to non-theological debates on animal ethics and human-animal studies and, in the end, to the necessary transformation of the human-animal relationship. In addition, the network will also promote the interreligious academic exchange on a fundamental level. The outcome of our network will be documented in an interreligious handbook on animal theology.