Deciphering, interpreting, and getting lost: A genealogical reflection on the texts of Bibhuti S. Yadav

Bibhuti S. Yadav (1943--1999), a highly respected scholar and recipient of the ATTIC Distinguished Teaching Award (1992), was the original head of my dissertation committee and a personal friend. Before his death, the most important incarnation of Yadav's concerns for social and traditional egalitarianism was himself. He was the force that made people in classrooms, conferences, and communities across America, India and Japan become self-critical. Having a record of Yadav's thoughts and methods at the time was not a priority because Yadav the human being embodied them. After his death, I decided that gathering the various articles and chapters he wrote had become an appropriate choice for one who believed, as I did, in Yadav's project. The texts were now the lone embodiment of Yadav's pedagogy and concerns. I also sensed that in the contemporary world where powerful nations are responding to discontent and extremism with military force and baseless truth claims, Yadav's literature would be better forgotten than carelessly preserved. In writing this dissertation, I used methods appropriated from hermeneutics and genealogy to open space through which Yadav, embodied by his texts, might participate in the formation of his legacy.;Yadav's self-critical methodology and emphasis on meaningful dialogue is a rare gem not often found in Philosophy or Religious Studies. Throughout his career, he addressed his concerns in categorial traditions and sub-traditions such as Roman Catholicism, Liberation Theology, Judaism, Advaita Vedanta, Hinayana and Mahayana Buddhism, Neo-Vedanta, and Postcolonialism, often doing so comparatively by using analogous categories as channels for communication. I discovered that his choice to thematically interpret texts while respecting the categories and concerns of the tradition from which those texts emerged gave new life and meaning to interreligious dialogue, philosophical discourse, and the arts of interpretation and translation. Yadav's methodology helped to expose the hidden social agendas of texts by pointing out conscious contradictions, indefensible claims, and meaningful choices. I also uncovered a religious theme driving Yadav's choice of methodology. Simply put, Yadav believed that to walk differently with others on the path of self-criticism and faith leads to a more just and egalitarian society. He affirmed theological and philosophical texts that supported such a commitment.;Yadav, having come from a rural Vaisnava 'backward caste' community in Uttar Pradesh to the metropolis of Varanasi intent on studying Buddhist epistemology with T.R.V. Murti at BHU, provided a critical analysis of hegemonic texts, indigenous to India, from an unusual perspective. He was well versed in the Sanskrit tradition, but also experienced oppressive effects of the tradition first hand. Despite Yadav's personal experiences, I argue that his criticism sprung from compassion, not anger. Yadav never made sweeping and general condemnations of traditions without very specific criticisms that by association implicated the traditions. This approach gave members of traditions a chance to choose to reject hegemonic practices and texts without developing an aversion to their heritage.