But this was just the start. After the break, one of our gifted research librarians was scheduled to show us how to read references. During the break I showed her the powerpoints and she said "I guesss I'm not needed here!" but we decided it was always worth a review. She's prepared by reading our class text and in short order what had to some (not all) seemed familiar research tips became more and more exciting for the worlds of references and discussions and debates to which this book was inviting us. Who knew how much would be turned up by searches of databases, reviews, etc.? Most fun was learning that you need to use asterisks for certain searches, as there may be typos in catalog entries - case in point, the elusive Becoming Divine is listed in one library as Becoming Diving!! Most exciting were the citation indexes, which could show us who else was citing the works Rubenstein was citing - and what other things they tended to cite. I've always tried to introduce students to the idea that scholarship is a conversation, but it's never offered a rush like this.
It all resonates with Pantheologies, too, whose description of a "pluralist pantheist" world - an open, relational and self-exceeding concatenation of systems that are themselves open, relational and self-exceeding (24) - seemed an uncannily apt description also of the worlds of interconnected works the librarian had shown us. More, one group had shared the ideas, from William James' A Pluralistic Universe, undergirding Rubenstein's pluralist pantheism. Unlike the "monistic pantheism" which holds everything connected in a single all-comprehending unity (which we may or may ont one day grasp), "pluralistic pantheism" understands everything to be connected and related, yes, but not everything with everything else. Relations and connections overlap and are still being formed. There may be never be a final all-inclusive collection. In the meantime there is discovery, creativity! Was I the only one to feel that spirit in our classroom?
