This article describes Gandhi’s view on Judaism and Zionism and places it in the framework of an interreligious theology. In such a theology, the notion of “trans-difference” appreciates the differences between cultures and religions with the aim of building bridges between them. It is argued that Gandhi’s understanding of Judaism was limited, mainly because he looked at Judaism through a Christian lenses. He reduced Judaism to a religion without considering its peoplehood dimension. This reduction, together with his political endeavors in favor of the Hindu–Muslim unity and with his advice of satyagraha to the Jews in the 1930s determined his view on Zionism. Notwithstanding Gandhi’s problematic views on Judaism and Zionism, his satyagraha opens a wide-open window to possibilities and challenges in the Near East. In the spirit of an interreligious theology, bridges are built between Gandhi’s satyagraha and Jewish transformational dialogical thinking.

Mahatma Gandhi and Emmanuel Levinas have much in common. They interpret religion in a radical ethical way and develop an ethical hermeneutics of religious sources. Levinas’s thoughts on a holy history, not to be confused with history, are comparable with Gandhi’s swaraj as the spiritual independence and self-transformation of India. Escaping war logics, they maintain a “beyond the state” in the state and insert ethics in politics. Yet, Gandhi’s ethico-politics works with radical interrelatedness, whereas Levinas differentiates more between the self and the other. Gandhi trusted that, in the end, the good would vanquish evil. Levinas, in turn, did not venture into the future: the present was under “eschatological judgment.” Gandhi’s love of the enemy and his attempt to soften the opponent’s heart are absent in Levinas’s metaphysics. In addition, Levinas does not radically deconstruct the term self-defense, although Gandhi notoriously made also exceptions to his ahimsa. A dialogue can be established between Levinas’s ethical metaphysics and Gandhi’s ahimsa and satyagraha. Both thinkers make a radical critique of a peace based on rational contracts and equate peace with universal brother- and sisterhood. Without underestimating the many similarities between Levinas and Gandhi, I also highlight their dissimilarities. I argue that precisely the differences between both thinkers allow for a “trans-different” dialogue, which respects specificities and promotes communication, in a movement of hospitality and mutual learning.

This article focuses on the relationship between religions and dialogue, considering its current relevance. It shows how interreligious dialogue forms the basis for a pluralised theology. Against the backdrop of the established research project ‘Religions and Dialogue in Modern Societies’ (ReDi), we find an integrative approach to interreligious dialogue desirable, as it offers a means of linking three different research strands: religious studies, social sciences and education. In explaining their concept of a Dialogical Theology, the authors offer an answer to developments of global religious pluralisation. An important impulse of this approach lies in the concept of “trans-difference”, anchored in Jewish philosophy. Dialogical Theology requires the counterbalance of analyses related to interreligious dialogue at the grassroot level. This endeavour, carried out with sociological methods, is called “Dialogical Practice”. The article relates general ideas of a Dialogical Theology to concrete analyses of Dialogical Practice. In an imagined interreligious dialogue between the activists Abraham Joshua Heschel and Mahatma Gandhi, it shows how interreligious dialogue can contribute to a practice-oriented Dialogical Theology. Concluding remarks point to perspectives that underscore the need for further development of a Dialogical Theology with reference to Dialogical Practice. Keywords: Dialogical Theology, Trans-difference, Dialogical Practice, Interreligious Dialogue, Heschel, Gandhi

This article explores how Gandhi and Heschel developed a liberation theology that was rooted in their religious praxis, which implied an active, non-violent struggle for the rights of the oppressed. A first section discusses what separates the two spiritual giants. A second section describes the affinities between them. The third, main section describes how they formulated a non-violent liberation theology that aims at the liberation of all.