An Elon University professor will head a three-year, multi-million dollar project to build a reference library of books that examine how science and religion intersect. Pranab Das, Professor and Chair in the Department of Physics, has been named Executive Editor of the International Society for Science and Religion Library Project.
The project officially begins Nov. 1. Its management and leadership team is to be based in England, Paris and North Carolina. In addition to a collection of approximately 250 texts, which seeks to balance the many subfields and perspectives in the published body of scholarship, Das will also oversee the publication of a stand-alone companion volume that includes critical essays on each book in the library.
“I am, naturally, honored to have been entrusted with leadership of this large and intellectually-challenging program,” Das said of the project, which is run by an organization of premiere scholars in the academic study of science and religion. “The ISSR is, in fact, an invitation-only, learned society whose 130 or so members were inducted through a process of nomination and judging.”
The ISSR Library Project is headquartered at St. Edmunds College, Cambridge University. It is sponsored by a 1 million pound grant from John Templeton Foundation.
An international competition will be launched in which applicants from colleges and university around the world can apply for copies of the library and the companion book. About 150 sets are to be distributed to the best of the applicants.