Lessons for Religious Studies in Waco?

Abstract

Like Jonestown over a decade ago, the events at the Branch Davidian compound in Waco should unsettle the intellectual consciences of students of religion. Are there lessons to be learned about religion and the study of religion from both the events at Waco and the way religious studies academics have publicly responded to them? At the risk of seeming insensitive, let me begin with what I hesitate calling the good news for the study of religion in these otherwise sad and deathly events. As if the examples of Shi'a Iran, Hindu-Muslim strife in India, Catholic-Orthodox-Muslim war in Yugoslavia were not enough, after Waco, who can now doubt that we need to more about religion? And by know I do not of course mean increased personal piety and a more profound faith, as essential as these are for the vitality of religious communities themselves. I mean in the sense that passes under its various guises in the university. Sometimes quantitative, sometimes interpretive, sometimes philosophicalbut always public and open to critical scrutiny-this knowledge that the modem study of religion has sought to bring to the university is surely needed now more than ever. In this light, it is clear that over the past decade religious studies has