Toward a Global Covenant of Peaceable Neighborhood: Introducing the Philosophy of Covenantal Pluralism

Abstract

The global challenge of living together peacefully and constructively in the context of deep religious/worldview differences will not be met through bumper-sticker slogans about “tolerance.” This essay provides an introductory overview of a richer approach called covenantal pluralism, which has been developed over the last few years at the Templeton Religion Trust. The philosophy of covenantal pluralism is a robust, relational, and non-relativistic paradigm of citizenship that emphasizes both legal equality and neighborly solidarity. It calls not only for a constitutional order characterized by equal rights and responsibilities but also a culture of engagement characterized by relationships of mutual respect and protection.

Keywords:

• pluralism
• relativism
• covenant
• engagement
• religious freedom
• religious literacy
• tolerance

Acknowledgements

This article is part of a larger project sponsored by the Covenantal Pluralism Initiative at the Templeton Religion Trust.

Notes

1 Quoted in Barry 2012, 220.

2 In the increasingly commonplace “COEXIST” and “TOLERANCE” bumper stickers, each letter is artfully rendered as a symbol of a different group or concept. In the “COEXIST” bumper sticker, typically the “C” is the Islamic crescent, the “O” is a peace sign, the “E” is a gender symbol, the “X” is a Star of David, dot of the "I" is a pagan pentagram, the “S” is a yin-yang symbol, and the "T" is a Christian cross. The “TOLERANCE” version—which for good measure includes the tagline “Believe in it”—adds Native American and Baha’i symbols, and even a nod to science (the last “e” is Einstein's formula e=mc²).

3 The Templeton Religion Trust (https://templetonreligiontrust.org/), headquartered in The Bahamas, is a global charitable trust established by Sir John Templeton (d. 2008) to support research and public engagement worldwide at the intersection of theology, philosophy, and the sciences, and to promote human flourishing by funding projects in the areas of individual freedom, free markets, and character development, and through its support of the Templeton Prize.

4 Portions of this section are adapted from Seiple 2012.

5 It’s worth noting that the theme of neighborliness would emerge in powerfully analogous ways centuries later in the thought of Halford John Mackinder, who argued in early 1919 as he tried to influence the Versailles Peace Treaty: “That grand old word neighbor has fallen almost into desuetude. It is for neighborliness that the world today calls aloud … Let us recover possession of ourselves, lest we become the mere slaves of the world’s geography … Neighborliness or fraternal duty to those who are our fellow-dwellers, is the only sure foundation of a happy citizenship” (Mackinder 1919).

6 Williams’ ideas about religious tolerance influenced John Locke, who in turn was a major influence on key founders of the United States. For an illuminating comparison of Williams, Locke, and Hobbes, see Bejan 2017.

7 For related resources see Singha 2017.

8 For the full text of this letter see the Founders Online section of the National Archives website: https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/05-06-02-0135.

9 However it is important not to assume a clean binary contrast between pre-modern conditions of taken-for-granted religious “fate” and modern conditions of uncertainty and “choice.” As Robert Hefner (2016, 16) has argued, it is a mistake to “see all premodern actors as inhabiting densely religious worlds in which the natural and supernatural are so interwoven that there is little room for uncertainty or agnostic doubt.” See also Douglas (1970) on the “myth of the pious primitive.”

10 While there are insights that can be drawn from particularist covenantal theologies and applied generically by analogy, the philosophy of covenantal pluralism is secular.

11 The notion of “conditions of possibility” is adapted from the thought of German philosopher Immanuel Kant, who changed the course of philosophy in the West by focusing not on whether it is possible for humanity to know anything at all but rather on the conditions of possibility for human knowledge.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

W. Christopher Stewart

W. Christopher Stewart (Ph.D., Philosophy, University of Notre Dame) is the Vice President, Grant Programs and Chief Grants Officer of the Templeton Religion Trust, headquartered in The Bahamas. He joined the Trust in 2013, after 20 years on the faculty of Houghton College, where he served as Professor of Philosophy and Associate Dean of Biblical Studies, Theology, and Philosophy.

Chris Seiple

Chris Seiple (Ph.D., The Fletcher School of Law & Diplomacy) is President Emeritus of the Institute for Global Engagement and Principal Advisor to the Templeton Religion Trust’s Covenantal Pluralism Initiative. A former U.S. Marine infantry officer, he is Senior Fellow for Comparative Religion at the University of Washington’s Jackson School of International Studies, and Senior Advisor to the U.S. Agency for International Development’s Center for Faith and Opportunity Initiatives.

Dennis R. Hoover

Dennis R. Hoover (D.Phil. Politics, University of Oxford) is Editor of The Review of Faith & International Affairs, Research Advisor for the Templeton Religion Trust’s Covenantal Pluralism Initiative, and Senior Fellow at the Institute for Global Engagement. He is editor of Religion and American Exceptionalism (2014), as well as co-editor of Religion and Foreign Affairs (2012) and two Routledge Handbooks: Routledge Handbook of Religion and Security (2012), and a forthcoming handbook on religious literacy, pluralism, and engagement.