Mitt forskarliv

René Gothóni, Emeritus Professor of Comparative Religion at the University of Helsinki, gives an elucidating account of his extraordinary career as field researcher among Buddhist monks in Sri Lanka and among Orthodox pilgrims to the Holy Mountain of Athos in Greece. In this autogiroapahan he also provides a meticulous analysis of his personal background and his several rites of passage to the first Professor of Comparative Religion at the Faculty of Arts in Helsinki.

Having accounted for his earliest interest in Buddhism, he records the way he became an astute observer of the current monastic life in one of the main Buddhist monasteries in Sri Lanka and gives a reassuringly lucid explanation of a young monk’s way to monkhood, how the monastic order mirrors social order in Kandy, and how the monk’s use of an umbrella is
a token of Sinhalese Buddhism.

To conduct comparative field studies, he shifted focus on pilgrimage movements to the Holy Mountain of Athos, applying the methods of participating observation and interviews to unfold the enigma of pilgrimages. In analyzing concepts and technical terms Gothóni applies Hans-Georg Gadamer’s finding (Sein, das verstanden werden kann, ist Sprache) and argues that there is a fundamental difference between the Roman-Catholic and the Orthodox concept of “pilgrim”.

Gothóni vividly documents the academic schools and intrigues as well as the methodic differences between natural sciences and humanities regarding subjects of study and methods. Apart from his stringent scholarly work, Gothóni relates how composing songs reduces stress and releases new energy for scholarly work. Unexpectedly, he confesses that it was the resonance of the chanting monks that melodiously spoke to him and led him to Orthodoxy.

Gothóni is a life member of Clare Hall College, Cambridge, since 1990, a life member of the Finnish Society of Sciences and Letters since 1992, a member of its board between 1996 and 2007.