PDF Religious Nationalism: Hindus and Muslims in India by Peter van der Veer in History

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Daniel Boyarin turns to the Epistles of Paul as the spiritual autobiography of a first-century Jewish cultural critic. What led Paul—in his dramatic conversion to Christianity—to such a radical critique of Jewish culture?Paul's famous formulation; "There is neither Jew nor Greek; no male and female in Christ;" demonstrates the genius of Christianity: its concern for all people. The genius of Judaism is its validation of genealogy and cultural; ethnic difference. But the evils of these two thought systems are the obverse of their geniuses: Christianity has threatened to coerce universality; while ethnic difference is one of the most troubled issues in modern history.Boyarin posits a "diaspora identity" as a way to negotiate the pitfalls inherent in either position. Jewishness disrupts categories of identity because it is not national; genealogical; or even religious; but all of these; in dialectical tension with one another. It is analogous with gender: gender identity makes us different in some ways but not in others.An exploration of these tensions in the Pauline corpus; argues Boyarin; will lead us to a richer appreciation of our own cultural quandaries as male and female; gay and straight; Jew and Palestinian—and as human beings.