By Raymond Brady Williams
After reading my articles or books, devout followers of Indian religions occasionally remark: ‘You know more about our religion than we do.’ My immediate response is: ‘Oh no! An academic scholar knows only a small portion of what a devout follower knows.’1 In the complex relation between those two polite propositions extended as compliments reside the analysis of boundaries between an academic scholar and a devout practitioner and complementary relationships as well. Academic scholars cannot understand or analyse a sacred thread ceremony in the same manner as a practitioner. A sermon differs from a scholar’s lecture or essay. The focus, methods, contexts, discourse, goals and procedures of each differ from the other, which is not a judgement regarding relative value or appropriateness or a judgement that the two are antithetical. A scholar might preach without abrogating her scholarly commitments. A preacher might write a scholarly article without abrogating his faith commitments. But they are not the same. These issues relate to discussions in the network about inviting practitioners to participate in academic sessions and to the general, more contentious issues regarding representations of religions (see Warrier, Chapter 3 in this volume). Who has the authority to represent a religion, an academic scholar or a practitioner? Both! But in different contexts, in different discourses to different primary audiences.
It is possible to be a devout and active follower of a religious path without much knowledge about history, philosophy, anthropology or other disciplines that are a scholar’s lens for analysing devotion and practice. It is possible to be a good scholar with only partial knowledge of the affective aspect of a religion or about some elements essential to a particular person’s practice or commitments. Nevertheless, one need not be an agnostic to be a good scholar of religion, even of the religion one practises. Warrier is correct in saying that the boundaries between ideal types have often been wrongly drawn, though my conclusions are somewhat different (Warrier, Chapter 3 in this volume).
An academic scholar is the heir and custodian of a distinctive tradition of study. Although we study human traditions from ages past and from around the world, we study them with methods and sciences developed in the Western tradition, what the Germans call Wissenschaft, honed through the centuries, a genealogy of disciplines, mansions of human creativity and our intellectual heritage. The academy has its own culturally defined Sitz im Leben (situation in life) and the scholar’s work is to preserve, criticise and create a tradition of learning and an array of disciplines: history, anthropology, psychology, hermeneutics, biology, etc. These involve languages of discourse in fields, ways to learn and important things to think about—a discipline that transcends our individual knowledge, commitments, biases and ideologies. If a scientist in biology or chemistry fudges data or pollutes an experiment to get desired results, he or she is not just a bad scientist, he or she ceases to be a scientist at all. That is what ‘discipline’ means. Religious studies are interdisciplinary, engaging several disciplines and, indeed, many nascent disciplines ‘honed their teeth’ on the study and critique of religion(s). Several disciplines are ‘at the table’ in the study of religion, which makes religious studies a valuable liberal arts academic study (Williams, 2004: 7–17).
The academy is experiencing severe critiques of the ‘assured results of scholarship’, especially that of old, dead, white, colonialist males. Critique is essential to developing scholarship in any discipline, even in the hard sciences. In fact, a necessary presupposition of any academic research is the incompleteness and imperfection of past research. That is what propels academic work towards the future—preparing students to understand past research and pushing them and ourselves towards new discoveries and theories. Current critiques go farther and deconstruct not only the results of scholarship (that is, the imperfection of our analyses) but also the foundations of disciplines as well (that is, dismantling of disciplines). Nietzsche fathered the critique that truth is a matter of power and that the only way to establish something as true is to have enough power to impose one’s idea of truth. As he noted, truth is the lie socially agreed upon (see Warrier, Chapter 3 in this volume). Michel Foucault and Richard Rorty continued the deconstruction, albeit with different results. My experience in the academy is that only the hard sciences still stand with firm theoretical bases and methodologies. Elsewhere, sociology of knowledge runs amuck with the disciplines resembling snakes eating their own tails. Not only is the question whether there is any truth, but also if there is any way to make progress towards truth. A risk is that we deconstruct our own disciplines—a form of academic masochism—so that academic research has no special value in relation to other types of discourse or that no distinction exists between our disciplined research and our biases and ideologies, either religious or secular. Then we run the risk of acting as hypocrites when we pose (and make our livings) as academic scholars. If claiming to be a historian or an anthropologist is simply a license, how can one with integrity call himself or herself an academic scholar? We would seem to argue relative merits of his despised story (‘history’) and my valued story (‘mistory’) from whatever perspective and power. Some in the religious studies academy despise religions and religious people; some love them to one degree or another. The academic scholar may be a ‘participant observer’ or an ‘observing participant’ to use anthropological categories. The question is not insider/outsider, secular/religious, public/private, but disciplined or not and how? Hence, the argument is to maintain the boundaries of academic discipline—not blurring the boundaries between the scholar qua scholar and the practitioner qua practitioner—and to preserve the particular value of academic scholarship in the face of attacks from practitioners and others.
Religious studies is a fertile field for raising these issues because the study of religion mediates between these bipolar divisions and because so many have heavy emotional investments either in favour or against all religions or specific religions. Commitment to a religious tradition is suspect in some circles because it is believed to taint some presumed personal objectivity. Objectivity is not a personal trait, because all have biases; rather, objectivity is the result of adherence to a discipline or set of disciplines. Moreover, religious studies constitute a fertile field because it is by nature multidisciplinary, so that it benefits from and enriches several disciplines.
The distinction is not to devalue the knowledge or perspective of practitioners, because many have deep knowledge based on personal experience and wisdom based on traditional sources and research. When I began study of Indian religions, it was common in anthropological circles to refer to ‘informants’ and even to read about ‘native informants’. That seemed demeaning to me, so that I always referred to my colleagues as ‘tutors’. Dr K. K. A. Venkatachari on Srivaishnava rituals, Dr T. M. P. Mahadevan on Advaita philosophy and Mr H. T. Dave on Swaminarayan philosophy/theology were tutors, as have been hundreds of devout Hindus, Muslims and Christians. Few of them were trained in Western academic disciplines. Hence, I learned from them as well-informed, wise practitioners and attempted to translate what I learned into sound academic research and publications to be judged, in the first instance, by other academic scholars. Indeed, an intimate relationship exists between academic scholars and practitioners except in the most reified abstractions far removed from life on the ground, as in some discourse regarding academic method and theory.
I regularly checked portions of what I wrote with those who were kind enough to permit and assist my research and was glad to learn from their response as practitioners, but never gave them a veto on the results based on their religious commitments. For example, writing about several branches of Swaminarayan Hinduism, or any religious tradition, requires careful attention to detail and a reticence to make normative judgements about which group is a better, truer, more authentic form. So, devout practitioners of one group or the other often said that they wished that I had taken their side, but they trusted me and usually ended by saying, ‘but you are conducting academic research’. Only once was the possibility of a libel lawsuit raised indirectly by a leader who took exception to my description of the origin of his group, but his lawyer advised that the description was accurate and not actionable (Williams, 1984: 55). I took some satisfaction when a prepublication anonymous reviewer for one of my books at Cambridge University Press affirmed my scholarly work, but indicated that he or she could not determine whether the author was a follower of Swaminarayan Hinduism or not (Williams, 1984). Such striving for and satisfaction in objectivity in academic research is not meant as a shield from the results of the sociology of knowledge or from critiques that colleagues might make that biases have affected the results, only that there are ways developed in our academic heritage for establishing better scholarship from less good.
A practitioner once described the final act of opening the eyes of a Hindu image. The first glance was so powerful that it cracked the mirror; moreover, he pointed to the cracked mirror attached to the platform below the image and reported that he personally had observed the event. How was an academic researcher to evaluate his report? Did it happen? Was the mirror already cracked? Did the emotional intensity of the priest in that instant cause him unwittingly to twist the mirror? Was he wittingly deceitful? I did not have the means to impose a normative judgement. In fact, far more important to a scholar was why the practitioner told the story and its significance in his context. The practitioner operated under the discipline of faith.
Any practitioner writing or speaking as an academic scholar submits to restraints and disciplines that may not be restraints for other scholars. An academic essay is different from a sermon. Any academic scholar is placed apart by the discipline that may not be valuable to or valued by others. Early in my study of Indian religions, I attempted to apply to the Quran the historical-critical methods common in the Western academy (see Williams, 1969, 1970). A Western-trained Islamic scholar read it and commented: ‘You can’t do that to the Quran.’ I replied: ‘Christian and Jewish scholars apply these methods to their religious texts.’ His immediate response was: ‘That’s the problem with Judaism and Christianity.’ He operated under some restraints that he accepted as a practitioner, which was a valid position for him as a Muslim, but not incumbent upon me as a scholar.
The academy as academy does not impose a position as insider or outsider, only a set of disciplines. That is wise because everyone is a minority of one. The question then becomes, ‘insider to what?’ Everyone, including an academic scholar, has a complex, peculiar relationship to a tradition, secular or religious. No one is a member of an entire religion. Moreover, the academic scholar may change religious affiliation and remain a good scholar insofar as he or she maintains the discipline. That preserves academic freedom for both the academic scholar as teacher and, one must say, for students in the study of religion, as it should in all fields. Moreover, scholars and practitioners change their positions in relation to religion and religions as a result of their research and much else. Academic integrity, required in addition to academic freedom, implies that academic researchers will be honest with those they study regarding their academic commitments. Some researchers assume a false stance as a seeker, thinking that will give them more intense, valid and wider experience of the religion. At the other extreme, I would find it difficult to study and write about a religion I despise or people I do not respect, not because academic disciplines would be unable to restrain my biased opinions, but because I would find it personally unpleasant to interact with them in ways good field research requires. That is a personal limitation, not an academic limitation. But when engaged in research, I do not pretend to be something I am not.
In fact, devout followers of a tradition have the right to query an academic scholar about her or his commitments prior to giving permission to conduct research among them. I have undergone extensive interviews by leaders of a Hindu group and an Islamic group. They had the right to deny access to people, sites and written resources which would have terminated my research before it was begun. Integrity as an academic researcher requires honesty in dealing with those inevitably involved in and affected by research.
The study of religion is being strengthened by younger academic scholars undertaking research on Indian religions, many as practitioners, others not. Some were raised in England or the US and study at the most prestigious universities. They bring many gifts to their studies and will help shape the future. I am currently co-authoring a journal article with a devout practitioner who is also a fine academic scholar—reared in the UK, holding a graduate degree in religion from a prestigious university and writing a doctoral dissertation with a prominent academic scholar. He is a Hindu sadhu, and brings to our study of British–Hindu relations in Gujarat in the 1820s an intimate knowledge of the early history of the religious group, access to traditionally trained scholars, ability with archaic forms of Gujarati and superb academic training. It is one of the most satisfying academic undertakings of my career. We are aware that the resulting publication could influence understanding of the history of Gujarat and of his religious group, both among practitioners and in the academy. Working together requires that we adhere very carefully to academic scholarly disciplines. Our work will not be definitive, but it will be formative of ways others view that period. We attempt to be sensitive to our varied responsibilities. He has one set of relationships and responsibilities as a sadhu within his group, and I have a very different set of relationships. Both of us are academic scholars. When he questions facts, biases and misinterpretations in my drafts, we have to adjudicate those on the bases of academic judgments and, we trust, not on bases relating to power. Our agreement is that the article will only be published if both of us approve of the result of our collaboration. A larger question is whether our colleagues in the academy will find our work academically acceptable.
I was asked to provide personal reflections about scholars and practitioners based on my research. A conclusion is: it is essential we value the ways of interpreting and modes of discourse of practitioners, especially those traditionally trained, and of academic scholars. It is also wise to maintain differences and assert relative value in various contacts. Practitioners have contributed to my research more than they know. One tutor commented after reading my acknowledgements, ‘He pays his debts’, but that can be only partially correct. Nevertheless, good scholarship requires that we do not blur the lines between their callings or dharma and mine as an academic scholar.
Williams, Raymond Brady. 1969. ‘Historical Criticism of the Koran’, Encounter, XXX (1): 32–42.
———. 1970. ‘Historical Criticism of a Buddhist Scripture: The Mahaparinibbana Sutta’, Journal of the American Academy of Religion, XXXVIII (2): 156–67.
———. 1984. A New Face of Hinduism: The Swaminarayan Religion. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
———. 2004. ‘What Has Athens to Do with Jerusalem or Bombay? Tradition and the Liberal Arts’, in Raymond Brady Williams (ed.), Williams on South Asian Religions and Immigration: Collected Works. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate.
1 ‘Academic scholar’ is a scholar trained in and following a discipline of academic study developed in the Western academy (for example, history, sociology, hermeneutics, biology and psychology). ‘Practitioner’ refers to a devout participant in a religious tradition, writing or speaking from that tradition outside the orbit of an academic discipline. This distinction does not imply that a practitioner cannot be an academic scholar or that an academic scholar cannot be a practitioner. It only establishes two realms of discourse.