AJC Co-sponsors Religious Leadership Meetings in India

[Ari Gordon <gordona@ajc.org>]

AJC Co-sponsors Religious Leadership Meetings in India

May 26, 2011 - New Delhi - AJC has concluded a series of ground-breaking 
meetings in India with leaders of the Hindu, Jain, Muslim and Sikh communities.

"All of these meetings reflect the new world of global interfaith cooperation 
in which AJC has been a trailblazer," said Rabbi David Rosen, AJC's 
International Director of Interreligious Affairs. "Deepening relations between 
the spiritual foundations of our respective civilizations are just as important 
as diplomatic relations and provide for deeper, stronger and more lasting bonds 
of friendship and collaboration."

Rosen was part of a group of leading Jewish scholars from Israel that met with 
Hindu scholars in Delhi to advance the historic bilateral collaboration that 
AJC has pioneered. The gathering follows the Hindu-Jewish leadership summits 
AJC has co-sponsored in India, Israel and the U.S. since 2007. "The 
Hindu-Jewish relationship in particular has taken impressive new strides in 
recent years," said Rosen.

This week's meeting in Delhi was convened under the auspices of the Chief 
Rabbinate of Israel and the All India Dharma Acharya Sabha, and facilitated by 
AJC and the World Council of Religious Leaders. Participants discussed the 
theological points of convergence and difference in the two great religions.

Israel's Ambassador to India, Mark Sofer, who addressed the meeting, stressed 
the importance of this gathering of religious leaders for the State of Israel. 
The Jewish delegation was also joined by representatives of the Indian Jewish 
community.

In addition, the Jewish delegation also held meetings with Sikh leadership from 
its world center in Amritsar; with leadership of the Jain religion; and with 
leaders of the Muslim community in India.

>Posted by:

>Ari M. Gordon
>Special Advisor 
>Interreligious and Intergroup Relations
>American Jewish Committee
>165 E56th Street
>New York, NY 10022
>(212) 891-6717
>gordona@ajc.org