The Richard Lectures

This year, the James W. Richard Lectures are thrilled to feature University of Oxford's Dr. Gavin Flood! Lectures will occur at 5 pm in the Contemplative Sciences Center on September 28, 29, and 30, 2026.

What if there is a socialization to metaphysics? The categories ‘person’ and ‘self’ have been central to the history of religions across civilizations, central to ideas about purpose, value, politics, and redemption. These lectures will offer a comparative history and phenomenology of the categories of person and self across medieval religious worlds, principally Christian Europe and Hindu India. The idea of the person in these civilizations arose not primarily from doctrine but from ritual systems that organized the social, metaphysical, and affective life of human communities. By examining the ritual foundations of personhood, the lectures propose a rethinking of what it means to be human in religious history, not as an abstract metaphysical essence, but as a ritually enacted and phenomenologically grounded mode of being-in-the-world.

Dr. Flood is a Professor of Hindu Studies and Comparative Religion in the Theology and Religion Faculty, and academic director of the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies.

We hope to see you all there for these fascinating lectures!