Amos Yong, presently the J. Rodman Williams Professor of Theology at Regent University School of Divinity in Virginia, attempts to accomplish a gigantic task with this refreshingly demanding book. As a second generation evangelical Christian in the Pentecostal tradition—his parents converted from Malaysian Theravada Buddhism (ix)—he conducts a thoroughgoing dialogue between Christianity and Buddhism on the topics of science, human nature, and world perception and relates this to the religion–science dialogue, a quest pursued by his mentor Joseph A. Bracken, SJ, whose work he gratefully acknowledges (xi; 185–91). He is convinced that such an approach will “provide illumination unavailable when [the topics are] taken up on their own or even in pairs” (2). Unfortunately, Yong labels his effort with the nonword “trialogue” (also using derivatives like “trialectic” [174/177] and “trialogical” [223/224]) to indicate the “complex interactions occurring amidst a tridirectional conversation” (note 2). Speaking of “multidimensional discourse” or using a similar term would have served the cause much better. However, the “task of the book is,” he explains “to follow out a trialogue among Christian theology, Buddhist philosophy, and modern science, both in order to compare and contrast the religion—science and the interreligious dialogues, and to work toward the development of a philosophy and theology of nature appropriate to the needs of the religiously plural world of the twenty‐first century” (174).

The book has a clear structure. Its Preface (XI‐XV) informs about the origins of the Pentecostal author's interest to probe the suitability of Spirit and Pneumatology as topics for dialogue with Buddhists and also with science, while the Introduction (1–31) provides a circumspect methodological reflection on issues involved in the science–religion discourse as well as in interreligious dialogue, and in “pneumatological epistemology” (27). Pneumatology furnishes, according to Yong, “dynamic categories for comprehending science and religion” and provides “a dialogical and intersubjective means of adjudicating multidisciplinary and multireligious claims to truth” (20). Part 1, entitled “Pneuma: Divine Presence and Nature in the Theology and Science Dialogue” (37–98), takes off with an account of the conversations between theologians and scientists on Spirit/spirit pointing to highly interesting convergences in Pneumatology and Field Theory by alerting to the dimensions of potentiality and relatedness, on the basis of which Yong then discusses creation and anthropology, understood as “a reconception and extension of Pannenberg's pneumatological theology of nature” (57). He succeeds in opening fascinating insights into Trinitarian theology in general and a “pneumatological theology of nature” in particular (79).

The second part, entitled “Shunyata: Nature and Science in Mahayana Buddhism” (99–172), discusses the same topics as the previous one—science, nature, the human—albeit this time in light of two Mahayana traditions, the Tibetan and the Japanese, notably the Kyoto School. The author chose shunyata (Pali/Sanskrit meaning “emptiness”) as the topic, because “both Tibetan and East Asian Buddhist understandings of the world (nature) and human beings as ultimately emptiness (without self‐substantiality) will open up surprising connections both to the cosmological and cognitive sciences, and to the pneumatological theology of nature,” even though in other Mahayana traditions and throughout Theravada Buddhism” shunyata “is of minor import” only (100). The section, which shows that the author is well informed about the discussions within Mahayana Buddhism and the dialogues between Buddhists and Christians, comes to the conclusion that shunyata does indeed stimulate the Buddhist—science dialogue “and yet” does “retain its religious and soteriological significance,” a great advantage for his project (172).

The goal of part three (Pneuma and shunyata: Nature, the Environment, and the Christian‐Buddhist‐Science Trialogue, 173–241) is “to model a method of inquiry in a pluralistic and scientific context, and to explore the fecundity of the pneumatological imagination for such task” (174), thereby also aiming at developing “a normative theological vision for Christian practice” (178). Yong wants to show that “the incommensurability…between Christianity and Buddhism…and between religion and science…is not so radical that communication is impossible, especially not for those open to exploring possible avenues of bridging from one tradition to the other” (210). Taking the concept of time as an example he is able to show that it is indeed possible “to chart a mediating path forward” in these dialogues and to bridge the impasse “via a pneumatological hermeneutic” (217). He emphasizes also “that religion needs to confront the legitimate issues which science raises about the place and extent of critical rationality” and asks: “Can religion with its affirmation of transcendence engage in science with its assumptions about naturalism and the causal (at least) closure of the world? What truck has Jerusalem and Kyoto with Athens and Tokyo?” (218–9)

The argument could have stopped here with the bibliography (247–75) and two indices (names/subjects; 277–82) concluding the book. However, one is taken by surprise to find an additional final chapter on “Spirit and Environment: Toward a Christian Ecological ethic ‘After’ Buddhism” (224–41) and an Epilogue (242–46). Though the author wants “to sketch an environmental ethic that ‘puts feet on’ the pneumatological imagination” by showing “how to live relationally in a pluralistic and scientific world” as “people of Christian faith” (224–25), this chapter, while still raising pertinent questions like that of theodicy and the problem of evil, is much too short and cursory to be of real value; it rather lags behind and appears to be supplemental only, while the Epilogue is a straightforward apology. With it, Yong obviously responds to a felt need—or a real pressure—to explain to fellow Pentecostals why he has undertaken such a study at all. However, the remarks in these few pages free of footnotes show that he stands his turf well. Christians should get involved in interreligious dialogue, Yong argues, to “empower more faithful witness to the living Christ that will benefit the common good” and will be at the same time “a living expression of what Christians call the Holy Spirit, even if our Buddhist interlocutors might only experience this reality as no more than an ephemeral cosmic breath” (246).

On the whole, this book is a very valuable, stimulating read benefitting everyone who likes to be intellectually challenged and pushed outside the box of conventional thinking; especially those interested in interreligious dialogue will gain a lot from it. However, Yong's study suffers from trying to achieve too much and from too much of self‐referencing (more than 60 times). Genuine scholarship is not about cultivating egos; scholarship is about pursuing truth selflessly.