Call for Papers: Reading Is Believing? Sacred Texts in a Scientific Age

This Academic Colloquium is facilitated by the Faraday Institute for Science and Religion in collaboration with the Faculty of Divinity, University of Cambridge.

This multi-disciplinary colloquium will examine ways in which the modern world has posed challenges to the scriptural traditions of Islam and Christianity, and will explore how exegetes and believers within each religious have responded. Although the focus is on the relationship of modern science to scripture, it is intended that the colloquium will also address wider themes and issues in the area of contemporary culture and exegesis. Placing the scientific questions within a broader framework in this way will enable fruitful cross-disciplinary conversations to emerge, and will future scholarly understandings of scriptural exegesis and its engagement with the modern world.

Abstracts for short papers from any academic discipline are invited for this multi-disciplinary colloquium at the university of Cambridge. Funding for UK travel and conference accommodation is available for successful submissions.

Abstract should submitted to Dr. Caroline Tee at ct500@cam.as.uk by the deadline of 12:00 on 31 December 2017. Decisions on acceptance will be given by  the end of January 2018. Travel (within the UK) and accommodation costs for two nights in Cambridge for presenters will be covered. Submitting scholars should indicate whether they wish their paper to be considered for inclusion in a volume of proceedings, or journal special issue, that will be co-edited by dr. Hilary Marlow and Dr. Caroline Tee and prepared for publication in 2018.

Important Date

Venue: Clare College, Cambridge

Deadline for Abstract Submissions: 31 December 2017

Conference Date: 26-28 March 2018

The Colloquium will address the following core questions:

1. How are the challenges posed by the current scientific age reflected in the hermeneutical strategies adopted in the two traditions, Christianity and Islam?
2. In what ways does scriptural exegesis inform and shape responses to modernity in Islam and Christianity?

      3.What epistemological questions arise from attempts to relate contemporary science to the scriptural traditions of the two faiths?

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