Gabriel, Theodore (Theodore P.C. Gabriel)

PERSONAL:

Education: University of Madras, Chennai, India, B.A.; University of Kerala, India, B.Ed.; Shivaji University, Kolhapur, India, M.A.; University of Aberdeen, Scotland, M.Litt., Ph.D.

ADDRESSES:

Office—Department of Humanities, University of Gloucestershire, Francis Close Hall Campus, Swindon Rd., Cheltenham GL50 4AZ, England. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER:

Writer and educator. University of Gloucestershire, Cheltenha, England, honorary research fellow and emeritus lecturer in theology and religious studies.

WRITINGS:

Mysticisms East and West: Studies in Medieval Experience, Paternoster (Carlisle, England), 2003.

(Editor, with Ronald Geaves, Yvonne Haddad, and Jan Idleman Smith) Islam and the West Post-9/11, Ashgate (Burlington, VT), 2004.

Christian Citizens in an Islamic State: The Pakistan Experience, Ashgate (Burlington, VT), 2007.

(With Ronald Geaves) Isms: Understanding Religion, Allen & Unwin (Crows Nest, New South Wales, Australia), 2007.

UNDER NAME THEODORE P.C. GABRIEL

Lakshadweep, History, Religion, and Society, Books & Books (New Delhi, India), 1989.

Christian-Muslim Relations: A Case Study of Sarawak, East Malaysia, Aldershot (Avebury, England), 1996.

Hindu-Muslim Relations in North Malabar, 1498-1947, Edwin Mellen Press (Lewiston, NY), 1996.

Hindu and Muslim Inter-Religious Relations in Malaysia, Edwin Mellen Press (Lewiston, NY), 2000.

Contributor to books, including Contemporary Religions: A World Guide, Longman (London, England), 1992; Indian Insights, edited by P. Connoly and S. Hamilton, Luzac International, 1996; and UFO Religions, edited by Christopher Partridge, Routledge (New York, NY), 2003.

Contributor to periodicals, including Social Research.

SIDELIGHTS:

Theodore Gabriel is an honorary research fellow at the University of Gloucester in England. Gabriel is also emeritus lecturer in the same department, having retired from active teaching. As an academic, his interests encompass world religions, particularly Islam. His research covers topics such as Islam in South and East Asia, Hinduism in South India, tribal religions, and inter-religion religions, according to a biographer on the University of Gloucestershire Department of Humanities Web site.

Gabriel often collaborates with Ronald Geaves, a professor of theology and religious studies at the University of Chester in England. In Islam and the West Post-9/11, edited with Geaves, Yvonne Haddad, and Jim Idleman Smith, Gabriel and his coeditors present essays that "discuss how Muslims and Christians can reach a better understanding" between themselves and their faiths, commented reviewer Benet Exton on the Curled Up with a Good Book Web site. The editors present material in two general categories: theoretical issues and case studies. Gabriel opens the book with an essay that asks the controversial but vitally important question: Is Islam against the West? Contributor John J. Shepherd considers the roots of violence and extremism in the three major religions of Islam, Christianity, and Buddhism, while Geaves contributes a piece discussing the definition of moderate Islam in the post-9/11 world. In the second section, Marcia Hernasen looks at how Muslim response to 9/11 has evolved. Lamin Sanneh explores the nature and applications of Shari'ah sanctions in Nigeria, and Colin Chapman investigates how Israel has become the focus of anger for Muslims against the West. Exton concluded that the volume is a "great source for all for a better understanding of the Muslim world and the West."

Gabriel and Geaves also collaborated on Isms: Understanding Religion, This book is a "colourful and accessible reference work that lays out the differences between religious dogmas in straightforward terms," observed Tim Roberts on the M/C Reviews Web site. Gabriel and Geaves devote a separate section to each of the major religions, wherein the "authors explain each the intellectual history, major figures, historic buildings (usually accompanied by photographs), and competing factions of each religion," Roberts noted. The major faiths are covered, including Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, and more. Gabriel and Geaves also cover a number of religious systems that have often been misrepresented throughout history and in the popular press, including Voodoo and Satanism. Their evenhanded approach and detailed explanation of these sorts of "vernacular religions" can help, in some way, to rehabilitate their bad reputations with fact. In the end, Roberts concluded, "Gabriel and Geaves have delivered a compact, colorful and surprisingly engaging text which outlines the salient differences between the world's major and minor faiths."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Reference & Research Book News, August, 2000, review of Hindu and Muslim Inter-Religious Relations in Malaysia, p. 40; May, 2007, review of Isms: Understanding Religion.

ONLINE

Curled Up with a Good Book,http://www.curledup.com/ (January 17, 2008), Benet Exton, review of Islam and the West Post-9/11.

M/C Reviews,http://www.media-culture.org/ (September 27, 2007), Tim Roberts, "Cultural Studies," review of Isms.

University of Gloucestershire Department of Humanities Web site,http://www.glos.ac.uk/faculties/ehs/humanities/ (January 17, 2008), biography of Theodore Gabriel.