The objective of this project is to help religions create contemporary theologies regarding other world religions. It will be realized through the creation of multiple teams of scholars, each representing a different religious tradition. Scholarly work will be carried out to help religions recognize and bring to light their theological potential for developing interreligious dialogue. This will encourage the advancement of such work within each of the religions.

Several consultations and a conference have been held on the theme "Towards a Contemporary Jewith Theology of World Religions", in 2005 at Scranton University. Summaries of lectures at the Scranton Conference may be downloaded here.

In 2008, Election and Jewish Identity were the focus of the first year of reflection and research in what has become a multi-year research and education project. These conferences were held in the framework of a grant from the Henry Luce Foundation to Yeshiva Chovevei Torah, designed to create curricular materials for teaching about Judaism's views of world religions. Under the direction of Dr. Eugene Korn, the first conference took place in Boston, Dec. 14-16, 2008, hosted by Boston College's Center for Jewish-Christian Learning. The other took place in Jerusalem, Dec. 25, 2008, following a three day conference on this theme, held at the Institute for the Study of Rabbinic Thought, at Bet Morasha of Jerusalem. Close to 30 scholars from the United States, Europe and Israel took part in both Elijah conferences, and an additional 20 scholars explored the topic from the specifically rabbinical context.

The overall goal of the project is to raise awareness of the need to address issues related to Judaism and world religions as crucial for Judaism's own present day identity and vitality. Engaging a broad community of scholars and educators in the project increases the likelihood of the subject matter becoming an agenda item in future Jewish religious education.

The conferences identified the following specific goals, through which the broader goal may be achieved:

 

A. Creation of database of annotated texts, relevant to the project's concerns.

B. Creation of model classes, syllabi and course related materials, to be used in teaching, in seminary and other contexts.

C. Creation of theological and reflective essays, on the project's subject matter.

D. Creation of additional educational and learning materials, with community orientation, that could further advance project goals.

The project brings together scholars from different Jewish denominations and seeks to uphold a multiplicity of perspectives on issues relating to Judaism and world religions in general and to election in particular. The project seeks to capture the multivocality present in our traditional sources as well as the multivocality that characterizes present day Jewish theology. Accordingly, the project is planned in such a way as to offer multiple readings of core texts, and so as to capture the spirit of dialogue and exchange, so characteristic of traditional Jewish learning and so needed in our contemporary context. The project will engage our difficult texts, as well as bring to light oft forgotten texts, in an effort to broaden the range of sources and options that serve our current theological discussion.

More on the hermeneutics of the project can be found here.

More of the work of the scholars of the Jewish Theology project can be found here.