Abstract
Swami Abhishiktananda (Fr. Henri Le Saux, 1910–1973) was a French Benedictine who wrote a pioneering work in Hindu-Christian dialogue entitled Saccidānanda: A Christian Approach to Advaitic Experience. Therein he attempted an inclusivist integration of the theologies of Advaita Vedanta and Roman Catholicism. He later rejected aspects of Saccidānanda and argued that Advaita and Christianity are too different to be integrated in this manner. In place of Saccidānanda, Abhishiktananda developed two positions at the end of the 1960s which anticipated current Roman Catholic debates over the theology of religions. One was an experiential inclusivism which bears affinities with the pluralist position of Paul Knitter and others. The other was a “comparativist” position, similar to the one later developed by Francis Clooney and James Fredericks. This paper will examine how Abhishiktananda developed these various approaches to Hindu-Christian dialogue and the tensions between them.