Embracing varieties of religious experience
Reflections from Dean David Hempton to mark Divinity School’s bicentennial
"Many of the changes the [Harvard Divinity] School has gone through have been driven by students, and this will continue," said Divinity School Dean David Hempton. HDS is marking its bicentennial. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer
November 14, 2016
By Liz Mineo, Harvard Staff Writer
In 1816, when Harvard Divinity School (HDS) was established, its founders aimed to ensure that “every encouragement be given to the serious, impartial, and unbiased investigation of Christian truth.”
Two hundred years later, HDS has expanded its mission. With more than 30 traditions represented, from Islam to Buddhism to the non-affiliated, the School has become a veritable mosaic of religions that go beyond Christianity.
To track the evolution of the School over the past two centuries, the Gazette interviewed Dean David N. Hempton, the Alonzo L. McDonald Family Professor of Evangelical Theological Studies and John Lord O’Brian Professor of Divinity. A Belfast-born social historian of religion, Hempton also talked about the School’s first and recent graduates, changes in the world’s religious landscape, and the role of religious literacy in building peace.
GAZETTE: Who were the School’s first graduates?
HEMPTON: Most of the graduates from those early years were preachers and religious leaders, but many became teachers, college presidents, editors, writers, politicians, and diplomats. Many of them were involved in philanthropic endeavors, poverty relief, asylum reform, and they also took part in the abolition movement. An interesting fact is that many of our graduates from that period achieved significant distinction and they were included in the Dictionary of American Biography.
http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2016/11/embracing-varieties-of-religious-experience/
