Austrian religious studies scholar
Volker Helmut Manfred Zotz (born 28 October 1956) is an eminent Austrian philosopher, religious studies scholar, Buddhologist and a prolific author.
Early life.
The Zotz family originated in Tyrol and spread to Germany. Volker Zotz was born in Landau in der Pfalz, Germany, where he attended elementary school and high school.
His interest in spirituality led him to an early study of Christianity as well as of Indian and Chinese religions. What impressed him most was Buddhist philosophy and meditation. When Zotz was sixteen he became a major disciple of Lama Anagarika Govinda, with whom he was close until his death in 1985. During his high school days, Zotz also met the author Oscar Kiss Maerth, whose ideas he did not completely agree with, but with whom he had an intense exchange of ideas.
After graduating from Max Slevogt High School in Landau in the 1970s, he published his first poems in two volumes and a novel. As a conscientious objector Zotz had to perform eighteen months of alternative civilian service in a nursing home. From 1978 he studied Buddhism under Ernst Steinkellner and philosophy under Kurt Rudolf Fischer at the University of Vienna. He repeatedly interrupted his studies in Vienna to conduct research and fieldwork in India, Nepal and Afghanistan and to receive spiritual training from Lama Anagarika Govinda.
Career.
In 1986 Zotz received a Ph.D. from the University of Vienna for his doctoral thesis "Zur Rezeption, Interpretation und Kritik des Buddhismus im deutschen Sprachraum." This dissertation investigates the influence of Buddhism on German philosophy, literature and culture during the Fin de siècle.
Zotz has been a lecturer of Buddhist philosophy at the University of Vienna. 1989 he moved to Japan where he was a professor and researcher at Ryukoku University and Otani University in Kyoto and at Rissho University in Tokyo for ten years. During the period in Japan he was influenced considerably by the Buddhologist Takamaro Shigaraki. In 1999 Zotz was appointed professor of philosophy at the University of Luxembourg. At that time he was also teaching at Saarland University.
Besides his scholarly work, Volker Zotz's European audience knows him as author and publicist. The volume, "Buddha", is the most popular book on its topic in German language, regularly reprinted and translated into several languages. Zotz is a leading member of the Arya Maitreya Mandala, founded by Lama Anagarika Govinda in 1933. In the early 1990s Zotz initiated a study centre called "Komyoji" in Austria which is an attempt at describing a cross-cultural philosophy of religion. Since 1994 Zotz has been the driving force behind many of Komyoji's educational programs, such as workshops explaining various philosophical and theological topics. Volker Zotz is married to the Austrian writer and anthropologist Birgit Zotz.
References.
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