Emerging Religious Consciousness—A Cosmotheandric Understanding of Reality in the Light of Sophiology of Some Russian Theologians towards an Eco-Theology

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

An excellent and stimulating piece!

Eastern Orthodox theology seems to have many congruent contact points with East Asian traditions for fruitful stimulating dialogue, especially between Sophia and Dao (道).

However, from an East Asian perspective, this paper is inter-culturally and inter-religiously still Western, as India (Panikkar) is still Western for people in the real East (East Asia).

For further consideration: Western theologians need to be careful with claims like “theology without walls” (and meta-theology) in the global context beyond the West. For it was the imperialist mission of Western Christianity that built rigid walls and raised conflicts among religions in East Asia where multiple religions co-existed harmoniously without walls before Western Christianity came in for millennia. This antagonistic reality in the Non-Western world requires Western theologians, first and foremost, serious reflection on the deep metanoia for the tragic missiological errors of Western Christianity, especially in the 19^th-century, before saying any new theological idea for interreligious and intercultural peace and cooperation. Particularly on the issues of eco-theology, as all East Asian religions are deeply eco-friendly (Dao). Since all theology is contextual, a theologian must adequately recognize the theologizing limits of one’s socio-cultural location.

Author Response

1. Thank you for a thorough (and appreciative!) review of the article! I totally concur with the critique against Western imperialistic religious thought and the way to overcome it. At least Panikkar (with the Russian theologians) is a step to open new vistas.
2. I used your concern in footnote 3 to address this caveat. Thank you!

Reviewer 2 Report

Thisis an excellent review article of 3 Russian sophiologists which situates them in relation to mainstream theology, the thought of Raimon Pannikar, and eco-theology. It is original in that it is a expository comparison for Solovyev, Bulgakov & Florensky but to those who know these three well the article does not add to scholarly knowledge. My only request for a change is to excise the unexplained mention of ecodomy in the abstract and the associated sentence as the concept and other matters in that sentence - ‘global justice’ etc - are not discussed at all in the article. An abstract should summarise an argument not make claims or introduce concepts not discussed in the body of the paper. 

Author Response

1. Thank you for a thorough reading of the manuscript and your appreciation. I concurred with your recommendations and explained the concept of 'ecodomy'  better.
2. I deleted the sentence in the abstract because it could come across as out of context (although it does hypostasize the idea).
3. I have added two references (Kok and Rossing) and expanded footnote 11. The two references are added to the bibliography.