Introduction to the Discussion of A Primal Perspective on the Philosophy of Religion/Toward a Scholarship of Liberation: Arvind Sharma's A Primal Perspective on the Philosophy of Religion/The Urgency of Widening the Discourse of Philosophy of Religion: A Discussion of A Primal Perspective on the Philosophy of Religion by Arvind Sharma/The Primitive, the Primal, and the Indigenous in the Study of Religion/Primal Religious Experience as Philosophical Evidence: A Response to Arvind Sharma's A Prima

A roundtable discussion about Arvind Sharma's book, A Primal Perspective on the Philosophy of Religion, featuring Mary C. Churchill, Laura S. Grillo, Mary N. MacDonald, and Jeremy H. Smith, with the moderation of Jacob K. Olupona, is presented. Churchill considers the political implications of Sharma's book and examines the paradoxes and ironies inherent in a study of the scope and ambition of Sharma's. Grillo underscores the urgency of taking up questions implicit in Sharma's work: considering how the terms, concepts, and conclusions of the discipline might be forced to change if the philosophy of religion were to seriously engage the insights of non-Western traditions. MacDonald evaluates the significance of this book to the greater comparative enterprise and takes up the central problem of translation--its appeal and its danger. Smith offers an appraisal of Sharma's work as the beginning of a rich exploration of the categories of the philosophy of religion that will transform and reshape them and the field.