INTRODUCTION

• Louis C Jonker Stellenbosch University

DOI : https://doi.org/10.7833/119-2-1918

Résumé

The collection of essays offered here – except the articles of Van den Heever and Mapfeka – was first presented at an international conference that was held in Stellenbosch during September 2019. The conference took place within the confines of a pilot project to establish a Centre for the Interpretation of Authoritative Scriptures (CIAS) at Stellenbosch University. Scholars from various disciplines took part in this conference: Hebrew Bible, New Testament, Comparative Religious Studies, Education, and Qur’an / Arabic Studies. The conference aimed at exploring certain theoretical backgrounds, but also offered some practical reading exercises from the authoritative scriptural traditions from Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The contribution of Van den Heever responds to the theoretical underpinnings offered at the initial workshop in September 2018 where the proposed CIAS was first introduced. The papers being referred to by Van den Heever, were later published in Religion & Theology (volume 26 nrs. 1–2 of 2019).One further contribution offered here (that of TK Mapfeka) reports on the results of a small empirical pilot project that was conducted during the international conference in September 2019. It forms part of the postdoctoral research on the topic of interreligious hermeneutics which was supposed to be developed further during 2020. Unfortunately, the Covid-19 crisis also impacted heavily on this empirical project, and the data gathering in the main project could nog be completed.