<p>In this thesis I intend to investigate the theme of Vedanta Siddnanta samarasam in the writings of Tayumanavar. Tayumanavar was a philosopher-poet, mystic and scholar of the Seventeenth century and represents a true landmark in the religious history of Tamil India. One dimension of his religious poetry is his creative response to the contesting creeds of his days, interpreting them in terms of his own intimate religious (sivanubhava). I and mystical experience will use his deeply of God, Siva reflective and philosophical hymns as the main basis for re-constructing an overall picture of his religious vision. Much of my discussion of that vision will be in terms of his understanding and appropriation of the term "advaita". Both the terms "advaita" and "vedanta", which Tayumanavar often uses, are not to be understood in the first instance as signifying monism or absolutism of scholastic Advaita Vedanta. understanding, refer primarily to as developed in the school These terms, in the poet's the unique and intimate mystical bond among God, Pa~a) which he explains man and the world (Pati, Pasu and in many places is an "inseparable union".</p> <p>The existing editions of Tayumanavar's hymns, and the commentaries and works on him produced by the Saiva tradition and other scholars are slanted toward an interpretation of Tayumanavar as an orthodox advocate of Saiva Siddhanta. In this tradition the problem for scholars has been how to interpret the meaning of samarasam within / the framework of Saiva Siddhanta. Writers like Muttiah Pillai, Nallaswami Pillai, K. Subramanya Pillai, Isaac Tambyah and others have not focused their attention on what appears to be the most significant theme in the whole of Tayumanavar's writings, namely Vedanta Siddhanta samarasam. My study will underline how Tayumanavar's work was intended / to liberalize the Saiva Siddhanta tradition. It will attempt to reopen the question of Vedanta Siddhanta samarasam and show that it has a different and deeper meaning than the one suggested by the above writers. My research thus will be an attempt to understand how Tayumanavar intended Vedanta Siddhanta samarasam to serve as part of an ecumenical and liberal approach towards the religious pluralism of Seventeenth century India.</p> <p>This study might prove useful in several ways: It can stimulate new interest in the hymns of Tayumanavar. The investigation hopes to provide new insights into the understanding of Vedanta Siddhanta samarasam in the , theological history of Saiva Siddhanta; it will show how Tayumanavar sought to bring about an encounter between two opposed traditions through a re-reading of his own tradition and a re-interpretation of scholastic Advaita in favour of a more religiously defined popular Advaita. Finally, this research will illustrate how a concern which is today identified with concepts such as ecumenism and religious dialogue was Hinduism as interpretation also early of a as the Hinduism will be seen as concern within the "household" of the Seventeenth century. If my spirit of samarasam is accepted, having offered as early as the Seventeenth century a basis for affirming its claim of tolerance in the context of a plurality of religions.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

<p>This dissertation is a study of a Buddhist monk, Zhiyuan, in the Song dynasty who was generally known as a leader of the Off-mountain (Shanwai) faction of the Tiantai school. The aim of the study is threefold: first, to investigate critically the nature and development of the Home-mountain/ Off-mountain (Shanjia/ Shanwai) debate of the Tiantai school in the Song dynasty; and second, to reconstruct the views of Zhiyuan on some of the issues involved in the Home-mountain/ Off-mountain debate; and third, to examine the life of Zhiyuan and what lies behind his label of a leader of the Off-mountain faction.</p> <p>This dissertation consists of four chapters. Chapter one challenges the traditional rigid division of the Tiantai school into the Home-mountain and Off-mountain factions and suggests that this division was closely related to the formation of an orthodox lineage of the school among different competing lineages.</p> <p>Chapter two reconstructs the views of Zhiyuan on various issues involved in the Home-mountain/ Off-mountain debate. Our study shows that many of the issues debated by Zhiyuan and his opponents have to do with a 'mind-only' persuasion which can be traced back to Zhanran's teaching. This provides a more sympathetic understanding of the Offmountain faction of the Tiantai school. Chapter three studies the image of Zhiyuan in his different surviving biographies written by both Buddhists and non-B~ddhists. The study shows that Zhiyuan was understood by his biographers, not as a leader of the Offmountain faction, but as a learned monk with remarkable literary skills.</p> <p>Chapter four examines Zhiyuan's self-portrait as found in his autobiographical essays which reveal other aspects of his life that lie behind his label of being a Off-mountain leader especially his involvement in the literary movement known as the Ancient Style (Guwen) of Writing which is Confucian in orientation, and his struggle with his illhealth.</p> <p>A translation of Zhiyuan's own prefaces to his ten commentaries on Buddhist canon written for his disciples is also provided at the end of this dissertation which provides a summary of his Buddhist thoughts.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

<p>This study is about the nature of two Tamil Saiva poems, "TiruppaUiyclucci" and "Tiruvempavai", their structure as text, the style in which they are interpreted, and the way in which they are used in ritual events. These two poems are narrative moments rather than longer narrative sequences. They are interpreted in commentarialliterature, and in ritual, by situating the utterance of them as events in different narrative worlds. The significance of the poem is the significance of the event in a particular world. The meaning therefore changes from narrative world to narrative world, and even within the same narrative world if the poem is situated as a number of different events. In this study, the poems were generally situated in one or more of six narrative worlds: the akam world of love, the putam world of heroism, the theological world of Saiva Siddhanta, the world of the hero's biography, the world of the poet-saint's (Mal)ikkavacakar) life, and the world viewed from the perspective of one's own life.</p> <p>This study contributes to scholarship firstly as an understanding of Tamil Saivism, by studying the interaction between the Tamil Saiva poems, their interpretation and their use in ritual, which illustrates a basic style of interpretation within which there is considerable interpretive freedom. Secondly, this research contributes to the wider area of "Tamil Studies" in that it shows links between this style of interpretation, and that of the classical Tamil akam and putam poems. Thirdly. this research contributes to performance and ritual studies by focusing on the "ritual text" as a text in itself, and by suggesting that the significance and principle of coherence of the "ritual text" lies in the specific situation in which it is created and interpreted, rather than in the nature of the source texts. Lastly, this study includes field research on two relatively new temples in the village of Nakamalai Putukkogai, west of the city of Madurai.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

<p>The fresh assessment of Luke's conception of prophets undertaken in this thesis is doubly warranted, both by recent scholarly debate about Second Temple Jewish beliefs concerning prophets and by ongoing discussion about Luke's terminology for prophets. The results of the thesis shed light not only on the role of prophets in Luke-Acts, but also on the author's familiarity with beliefs about prophets held by (other) Second Temple Jewish writers.</p> <p>The results also challenge contemporary scholarship regarding Luke's Christology and his conception of salvation history. Luke does not distinguish prophets according to the period of salvation history to which they belong, nor does he suggest that prophecy had ceased. Instead, the prophets in Luke's infancy narrative join with the biblical prophets as they anticipate the time of fulfillment initiated by Jesus' birth. Luke was aware of expectations concerning the return of Elijah, but there is little evidence in LukeActs or in Second Temple literature for a belief in the "prophet like Moses" understood as an independent eschatological figure. Luke limits Jesus' prophetic role to his earthly life, subsuming it under the all-encompassing category of royal Messiah.</p> <p>Luke attributes a fairly consistent but not unique range of characteristics to prophets. Though non-prophets sometimes "prophesy," the title "prophet" is reserved for individuals who served as prophets over an extended period of time. While the events of Pentecost led to an increase in prophetic activity among Jesus' followers, Luke does not portray all believers as prophets. That Luke does not identify members of the Twelve or the Seven as "prophets" points to a shift in focus: In Luke, Jesus is portrayed against the background of Scripture and first century Jewish life as one who functioned as a prophet and as the Messiah. In Acts, as exalted Messiah and Lord, Jesus becomes the primary background against which Luke's story of the church is told.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

<p>In this paper I have discussed books of spiritual guidance for children within their historical context. The authors were writing during the time of conflict between the Anglicans and Puritans in the mid-seventeenth century. Their most obvious aim is to secure converts for their particular denominational cause. I attempt to uncover the denominational ideals, as well as the more general ideals concerning man, his world, and his relation to others. These books have not previously been examined by scholars, nor by historians of children's books in this way. The books and authors are: A little book for little children (1660) by Thomas White, A choice manual (1669) by Jeremy Taylor, A token for children (1672) by James Janeway, and Of education (1687) by Obadiah Walker. The books can be found in their original state in the Osborne Room of the Toronto r1etropolitan Library.</p> / Master of Arts (MA)

<p>The purpose of this study is to offer a distinctive interpretation of the theology of Johann Baptist Metz, who is presently professor of fundamental theology at the University of Munster and the founder of European political theology. It argues that even though Metz I s theology has undergone significant changes over the past thirty years, it is nevertheless best understood as a unified attempt to understand and to correct the causes of Christian apathy. At each stage of development, Metz focuses on the inordinate privatizing influence that Greek and modern consciousness has had, and continues to have, on Christian self-understanding and practice.</p> <p>Previous interpretations have tended to discuss Metz exclusively in terms of his attempt to correct the a historical tendencies of scholastic and neo-scholastic theology, to develop a theology based on the priority of praxis over theory, and to develop a theological anthropology which is more socially concrete. In each case, what is missed is the deeper and more personal motivating impetus behind his theology: his desire to answer the question of why Christians remain apathetic in the face of suffering. This question arises out of his own personal experiences of Christian apathy in the face of past Holocaust suffering and present third world suffering.</p> <p>Furthermore, each fails to recognize how his theology is unified both in terms of intention and strategy. Throughout, his intention is to disengage Christianity from the apathy-producing effects of Greek and modern consciousness. To do so, he consistently distinguishes between the non-Christian types of consciousness in which Christians find themselves immersed (the form of thought), as well as the implicit certitudes about the human self and the world (the content of thought) which these produce. Each stage is therefore an attempt to understand, criticize, and offer alternatives to Christianity's captivity to non-Christian ways of being in the world which subvert the realization of the Gospel mandate of love and therefore produce apathy.</p> <p>In this way, this dissertation hopes to contribute to a fuller understanding of Metz's theology. It argues that even though there are significant changes in strategy from one stage to the next, Metz's theology is a unified attempt to disengage Christianity from the negative influences of Greek and modern consciousness in order to give birth to a new socially critical, action-oriented, post-Auschwitz Christianity.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

<p>Augustine's understanding of the knowledge of God being made manifest in a vision following the resurrection of the dead is consistent with, and an expansion of, his basic epistemological framework where certain knowledge is grounded in the intellectual perception of eternal realities in the light of truth. However, given the eschatological fulfillment of the vision, a considerable problem arises. If the knowledge of God as triune is postponed to eternity, we must ask on what basis Augustine is certain that God is triune, since what Augustine asserts to the true - that God is a trinity - can only be believed and is not yet seen. This thesis examines Augustine's solution to this problem through a close reading of De Trinitate, demonstrating that according to Augustine, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit both order and constitute all of man's thinking (and hence loving) activity. Accordingly, the claims made in faith by the church concerning the triune identification of God can be held to be true because these beliefs are the product of the action of the triune God on the mind of man. Thus the truth of the church's claim that God is triune is understood by Augustine to be guaranteed by the action of the Trinity itself</p> / Master of Arts (MA)

<p>The Tiruttontar Puranam is a late medieval Tamil , hagiography that is venerated as the last of the Saiva; Tirumurai(s) - the sacred literature of the Tamil Saivas. It was composed around the twelfth century by Cekkilar, who was minister in the court of Kulottunka II (1133 -1150). The hagiography narrates the stories of the sixty-three nayanmar , - Saiva saints, who lived between the sixth and the eighth centuries.</p> <p>This thesis examines the stories of five nayanmar who are drawn to our attention by the fact that their devotion expresses itself in unusual and violent forms. While all the stories revolve around the 'encounter' between the devotee and his Lord, these five exemplify encounters with God that seem to violate all normal human values. In the tension between human and divine ties, their bhakti in its extremity leads them towards acts of violence which raise serious moral questions for most readers.</p> <p>The concept of tontu (service) is identified as the over-arching principle used by Cekkilar to provide a rationale for these stories. This thesis centers on the way he uses that concept in the five stories in order to explain the occasionally violent or antinomian nature of bhakti. Recounting the stories in Cekkilar's words, this thesis traces the way in which he handles the story, and his skillful introduction of the idea of to~tu. The later tradition had to accommodate these antinomian saints within its system. Its attempt to corne to terms with these episodes of fers an interesting perspective on the tradition itself and so this thesis examines Tirukkalirrupatiyar's thirteenth century assessment of these saints as a concluding note.</p> / Master of Arts (MA)

<p>The Damascus Document, a foundational document amongst the Dead Sea Scrolls, is rich with references to women. Most of the passages that allude to women are part of the legal section of the document. This study offers an in-depth analysis of all passages relating to women, both in terms of understanding the content of the often fragmentary text, as well as deducing the implications of that information for the role and status of women, and attitudes towards women, in the societies behind the text. My detailed analysis offers, in several instances, new interpretative suggestions to the text, for example, concerning female purity laws and regarding difficult expressions ("embroidery" [rwqmh] and "established for her").</p> <p>The legal section can be divided into two main literary layers, a division I have adopted as a methodological framework. I examine the passages concerning women according to literary stratum. As a result of this method, it is possible to study texts relating to women chronologically and in their proper literary contexts. This method also allows for comparisons between the strata.</p> <p>My analysis reveals a mix of both positive and negative attitudes towards women reflected in the text. Amongst the earliest laws, there are laws that advocate humiliating treatments of women (laws about the Sotah and investigation concerning virginity). Yet, there is also a tendency to reinterpret biblical laws in a way that works in favour of women's interests (laws about oath and the Sotah). In the communal laws, the latest layer amongst the laws, the evidence suggests that women were full members in the community behind the Damascus Document and that they held strong positions within the family units. At the same time, some aspects of women's power have been undermined by the increasingly authoritarian sectarian leadership.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

<p>The purpose of this thesis is to develop an educational model for congregations that will help move the Church towards becoming more egalitarian. Recognizing a biblical mandate for egalitarianism, the author uses feminist theory to illustrate that true equality requires that all members of a community be allowed to exercise their giftedness in all forms of service. Unfortunately, many women continue to face oppression in their church communities, which is evidenced in particular when one considers the obstacles women continue to face in their journey to church leadership. Acknowledging the harm caused to community by such non-egalitarian practices, the author suggests that the best starting place for an educational model moving towards teaching egalitarianism is girls in the church. Such a model must include healthy modeling of egalitarian behaviours and intentional mentoring among women and girls. The author concludes that through such practices we can start a process whereby girls will grow to embrace church leadership roles as a step towards creating egalitarian church communities.</p> / Master of Divinity (M.Div)