This paper systematically reconstructs Boethius’s reflections on God, attempting to find the common element to which all of the variations in these reflections can be retraced. This common element is constituted by the continuous tension between kataphatic and apophatic theology. Boethius apparently both kataphatically defines God in his logical works, and maintains that God can only be defined apophatically in his theological works. This tension can, at times, cause some incoherence as one moves from one level of discourse (...) to another: that is, from the logico-linguistic to the metaphysical-ontological level of discourse. Boethius’s thought manifests this incoherence. This incoherence is in part common to Neoplatonic thought and its sources, but would also seem to be dictated by the nature of the very operation of reflecting upon God. (shrink)

What is God? What does it mean to believe in God? What happens to God after the death of God? This book examines “the death of God” from a philosophical standpoint. It focuses on monotheism, polytheism, and nature, and it discusses the renewed importance of spirituality—and the “spiritual but not religious”—in response to the death of God. In recent years, religious belief has been in decline, but secularism cannot satisfy our spiritual needs. We are now living in a “post-secular” age (...) in which the relationship between philosophy, spirituality, and religion must be re-examined. As an exploratory essay, this book engages the reader at a profound level, and considers a variety of modern thinkers, including Nietzsche, Hegel, Freud, Levinas, Assmann, and Buber. It offers a sustained meditation on the origin of God, the death of God, and the future of “God” as a guiding ideal. (shrink)

_National Jewish Book Award winner __ An internationally recognized scholar and theologian shares a Jewish mysticism for our times in this " humane, accessible " book (_Publishers Weekly_, Starred Review)__ “Green challenges traditional notions of God, Israel, and Torah, offering a radically new understanding and stimulating the reader to join him in a journey of discovery.”—Daniel Matt, Graduate Theological Union_ Judaism, one of the world’s great spiritual traditions, is not addressed to Jews alone. In this masterful book, winner of the (...) 2020 National Jewish Book Award in the Con­tem­po­rary Jew­ish Life and Practice category, Arthur Green calls out to seekers of all sorts, offering a universal response to the eternal human questions of who we are, why we exist, where we are going, and how to live. Drawing on over half a century as a Jewish seeker and teacher, he shows us a Judaism that cultivates the life of the spirit, that inspires an inward journey leading precisely toward self-transcendence, to an awareness of the universal Self in whose presence we exist. As a neo-hasidic seeker, he is both devotional and boldly questioning in his understanding of God and tradition. Engaging with the mystical sources, he translates the insights of the Hasidic masters into a new religious language accessible to all those eager to build an inner life and a human society that treasures the divine spark in each person and throughout Creation. (shrink)

Philosophers, and other thinking people, have long pondered three grand questions about the nature of reality and our status and significance within it.

This review points out how Baldwin's book is unique in that it foregrounds proto-Marxist views of God. But it misses the mark by not mentioning "Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari’s work on the rhizomic nature of the Buddhist ‘mandala’.".

The aim of this article is to examine the relationship between Wolfhart Pannenberg's idea of God and his conception of history, with the intention of determining the precise nature of the link that, in his view, connects both philosophical and the theological reflection on the meaning of history. We shall first analyze Pannenberg's response to the traditional criticism of Christianity as an anthropomorphic projection of the human being. Then we shall pay attention to the features of any possible fundamentum (...) of history. We will show that, according to Pannenberg, a transition from a philosophical into a theological consideration of history is needed in order to provide a rationally acceptable foundation for both the unity and the meaning of universal history. (shrink)

God, sex, and economics are all intertwined. The trafficking of people for sex intensifies each year. The sex trade crosses a spectrum from ‘high class’ escorts to sex slaves. The sex industry includes toys, pornography, and the exchange of sex between buyers, sellers, and managers. In this market exists sexual poverty caused by injustice, the imbalance of sexual power between individuals and within structures. Poverty pushes people into the market to sell, to be sold. Theologically there is a harmful, top-down, (...) and irrelevant theology that often ignores our sexuality. Liberation theology’s hermeneutical circle, a circle of action and reflection in community, can address sexual poverty. Its steps include: 1. assessing our situation; 2. analyzing our situation with academic tools; 3. analyzing our faith; and 4. praxis; right action. It can help us to draw the line between sexual exploitation and the celebration of sex as a way to know God. (shrink)

For centuries, humans have contemplated the minds of gods. Research on religious cognition is spread across sub-disciplines, making it difficult to gain a complete understanding of how people reason about gods' minds. We integrate approaches from cognitive, developmental, and social psychology and neuroscience to illuminate the origins of religious cognition. First, we show that although adults explicitly discriminate supernatural minds from human minds, their implicit responses reveal far less discrimination. Next, we demonstrate that children's religious cognition often matches adults' implicit (...) responses, revealing anthropomorphic notions of God's mind. Together, data from children and adults suggest the intuitive nature of perceiving God's mind as human-like. We then propose three complementary explanations for why anthropomorphism persists in adulthood, suggesting that anthropomorphism may be an instance of the anchoring and adjustment heuristic; a reflection of early testimony; and/or an evolutionary byproduct. (shrink)

The later Wittgenstein’s approach to philosophical inquiry has influenced a number of philosophers who have reflected on the significance of evil for a Christianview of creation. The strengths and shortcomings of this influence are considered here, with particular attention to the work of D. Z. Phillips. Wittgenstein’s legacyemerges as a decidedly mixed blessing. On the one hand, a sensitive analysis of the religious use of language reveals the anthropomorphic confusion inherent in attempts to depict God as acting, or as (...) failing to act, for morally sufficient reasons. On the other, a sharp distinction between the natural and the spiritual domains, and the opposition to metaphysics with which it is associated, obscure rather than assist the search for understanding. By way of contrast, the paper concludes with a discussion of Simone Weil’s (profoundly metaphysical) conception of Christ’s mediation between creature and Creator; a conception which points the way to a resolution of the intellectual tension to which evil gives rise in the order of creation. (shrink)

When Western Christianity came to Asia, it merged with Eastern religions and histories and developed very differently in different places. Today Asian women in each country build up very unique images of God. They practice Eastern forms of worship and liturgical rites, and do indigenized theologies. They simultaneously try to find their own ways of naming, imaging, believing in and communicating with their own God. Korean Christianity has inherited many images of God from Western Christian doctrines and theologies. However, when (...) it meets and merges with Koreanized Buddhism, Confucianism, and Shamanism, some of the images of God in Christianity are transformed and re-imagined in Korean women's social cultural and religious contexts. As an Asian woman, especially a Korean woman, I would like to introduce one of the many Asian women's theologies, Korean women's images of God. It cannot represent all Asian women's ways of doing theologies, but it will give some clues to show how Asian women do theologies in their own context. In particular, I will examine three images of God that demonstrate how Western Christianity and Eastern religions meet and are transformed in Korean Christian women's living contexts. (shrink)

"I have noticed, increasingly, that people after the age of 65 or thereabouts begin to experience the fear of death in a very palpable way. While in their childhood and youth they had viewed death as happening only to grandparents, while in middle age they could still afford to relegate death to remote corners of their consciousness where it could not intrude upon the pleasures of living, the advent of old age after 65 brings to them a deeply disturbing sense (...) of mortality." So begins An Equal Joy, a collection of essays in which award-winning author Catherine Lim undertakes a bold and intense exploration into the fear of death, the nature of religion and the question of who we are. Drawing on her own experiences and myraid influences--from the Taoist "Sky God" of her childhood and the Christian God Jesus of her adulthood to scientist Pascal and philosopher Socrates; from intimate conversations with close friends to the imagined world of fictional characters--Lim reflects on the beauty of both the natural world and the world of faith. As Lim writes, "Truth, Goodness and Beauty. For me, they form the goals of a perfect life." In sharing her insights, Lim not only provokes us to reflect on the meaning of life but also encourages us to live as meaningful a life as possible. (shrink)

Essays reveals dimensions of Tracy's thought on Catholicism, pluralism, mission, other topics.

Prominent in the canonical texts and traditions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam is the claim that God speaks. Nicholas Wolterstorff argues that contemporary speech-action theory, when appropriately expanded, offers us a fascinating way of interpreting this claim and showing its intelligibility. He develops an innovative theory of double-hermeneutics - along the way opposing the current near-consensus led by Ricoeur and Derrida that there is something wrong-headed about interpreting a text to find out what its author said. Wolterstorff argues that at (...) least some of us are entitled to believe that God has spoken. Philosophers have never before, in any sustained fashion, reflected on these matters, mainly because they have mistakenly treated speech as revelation. (shrink)

Stranger and more momentous than the strangest of scientific theories is the appearance of God on the intellectual horizon of contemporary science. From Einstein, Planck, and Heisenberg, to Margenau, Hawking, and Eccles, some of the most penetrating modern minds have needed God in order to make sense of the cosmos.

Bringing together Leibniz's writings on God and religion for the very first time, Leibniz on God and Religion: A Reader reflects the growing importance now placed on Leibniz's philosophical theology. This reader features a wealth of material, from journal articles and book reviews published in Leibniz's lifetime to private notes and essays, as well as items from his correspondence. Organised thematically into the following sections, this reader captures the changes in Leibniz's thinking over the course of his career: The Catholic (...) Demonstrations The existence and nature of God Reason and faith Ethics and the love of God The Bible Miracles and mysteries The churches and their doctrines Grace and predestination Sin, evil, and theodicy The afterlife Non-Christian religions In preparing this reader, Strickland has returned to Leibniz's original manuscripts to ensure accurate translations of key texts, the majority of which have not been available in English before. The reader also contains a number of texts previously unpublished in any form. Alongside the translations, this reader contains an introductory essay, explanatory notes on all of the texts, and suggestions for further reading. This valuable sourcebook enables students of all levels to achieve a well-rounded understanding of Leibniz's philosophical theology. (shrink)

Schleiermacher’s approach to the doctrine of God has attracted interest in contemporary theological scholarship. The article tries to map the major features of his God-construal and a number of perspectives are highlighted. Attention is given to the general sentiments of his project, the history of interpretation, the question of a primary referent for ‘God’ and the centrality of causation, the role of structure in his Glaubenslehre and finally the attribute tradition and the doctrine of the Trinity. The second part of (...) the article engages Schleiermacher’s interpretation from the developments in especially the Trinitarian Renaissance since the last part of the 20th century. A number of critical divergences are identified, for example, the preference given to plurality, greater appreciation for the immanent Trinity, a Trinitarian approach to the attributes and an expansive notion of the ‘practical’ implications of the Trinity. Critical questions about ‘Schleiermacher’s God’ are raised in the conclusion. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Historical Background Current Trends New Directions Additional recommended readings.

Sobb, Joseph Today's Gospel extract from the Sermon on the Mount, has two different though related themes. The second especially is reflected in the first reading. The first theme may be heard as a succinct, indeed stark, summary of much of Jesus' teaching. The way of living to which Jesus invites his disciples calls for an integrity, an undivided heart which, of course, reflects his own relationship with his Father. So Paul can boldly proclaim in his second letter to the (...) Corinthians that his own word is like Christ's, not a 'yes' and 'no', but always a whole-hearted 'yes.' In minor matters and significant ones, we can find ourselves pulled in many directions, with demands and expectations and options that may threaten to overwhelm us. Jesus invites us to a clear sightedness that will recognise what or who is the centre of our lives. Later in Matthew's Gospel, this question is echoed when Jesus says we have only one Teacher, one Father, one Master. In todays's second reading, Paul alludes to his ministry as Christ's 'servant,' though in a different context. The second theme of the Gospel extract follows on as the consequence of the Christian commitment to serve God without reserve. Jesus' challenging words conclude with the call to action, 'Seek first.' In this context, Isaiah's oracle may be heard as a startling word of encouragement and hope. This oracle has been preceded by a series of joyful and reassuring oracles to the servant of the Lord and to the dispirited people of Israel. It concludes with God's heartening affirmation that Israel is 'carved on the palms of my hands.' With the best of intentions, though unfortunately unhelpfully sometimes, you will hear the platitude, 'Try not to worry.' It is important to acknowledge that worry is not necessarily a bad thing, for we can be worried, that is concerned, about a situation or a person, and with good reason. In the former English text of the Mass, the so-called embolism following upon the Lord's prayer said 'Protect us from all anxiety.' This, surely, is the meaning of Jesus' exhortation, repeated five times, 'do not worry.' Anxiety can involve an element of fearfulness or lack of trust. There are many images of God in the Scriptures. Isaiah's oracles offer images of God that are a response to fearfulness and a reason for trust. They portray Israel's God in terms of the divine presence and action in Israel's story, a God who saves, who has compassion, who liberates, and who never will forget Israel. Jesus reiterates this image of God, 'your heavenly Father,' and chooses to illustrate it in attractively concrete and personal ways: life and food and clothing. The disciples are called to trust in God who knows their needs. Thus his call is really 'do not anxious,' for God's love can be trusted. But Jesus does not stop there. The word, righteousness, appears in Matthew's gospel seven times, five times in the Sermon on the Mount; never in Mark and once in Luke. At his baptism, Jesus acts to 'fulfil all righteousness;' he warns against a righteousness which is self-regarding. So the christian disciple's focus is outward not inward. To 'serve God' is to be active in the 'cause of righteousness.' In the Old Testament Scriptures, righteousness is ascribed to God in the first place, and then to God's People who are to reflect this God in their lives and action. Jesus, God's servant, continues this tradition, and calls his followers to do likewise. 'May your Kingdom come' is more than a petition; it is a call to action. (shrink)

This volume argues that theistic philosophy should be seen not as an “armchair” enterprise but rather as a critical endeavor to bring philosophy of religion into close contact with emerging sciences of religion. This text engages with the rationality of religious belief by investigating central problems and arguments in philosophy of religion from the perspective of new naturalistic research. A central question the book analyzes is whether findings in cognitive science of religion falsify or undermine religious ideas and beliefs. With (...) regard to CSR, this volume offers a sustained and critical investigation of the neutrality and positive-relevance view, before offering a re-appraisal of the conflict view. The text argues that when scrutinizing these views, much more attention must be paid to specific normative premises that allow empirical findings to have epistemic relevance. A novel feature is the theoretical application of analytical epistemology in virtue-epistemology to the central question of whether CSR undermines, supports, or is neutral with respect to religious belief. This book appeals to upper-level students and researchers in the field. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Notes.

When Kent Nerburn received a letter from a young woman questioning her calling to spend her life in the arts, the writer and artist was struck by how closely her questions mirrored the doubts and yearnings of his own youth. Nerburn resolved that he would write his own letter: a letter of welcome and encouragement to all artists setting out on the same strange and magical journey, sharing the wisdom of a life spent working in the arts. From struggles with (...) money and the bitterness of rejection, to spiritual questions of inspiration and authenticity, Dancing With the Gods offers insight, solace and courage to help artists on the winding road to artistic fulfilment. Tender and joyous, it is a celebration of art's power to transform the darkest of human experience and give voice to the grandest of human hopes. (shrink)

Lengthy review of Nicola Spanu's 2020 book, Proclus and the Chaldean Oracles A Study on Proclean Exegesis, with a Translation and Commentary of Proclus’ Treatise On Chaldean Philosophy. The review indulges in some reflections on methodology and the interpretation of Neoplatonic texts.

The purpose of this article is to provide a comment on Simone Weil’s brief but seminal essay ‘Reflections on the Right Use of School Studies with a View to the Love of God.’ It complements an earlier one on Weil’s Lectures on Philosophy. The essay was sent via a letter to her friend and mentor, the Catholic priest, and Dominican friar, Father Joseph-Marie Perrin O.P. It set out her belief that school studies should provide the individual pupil or student (...) with an education in the value and acquisition of attention. This, Weil believed, would be of fundamental value when reaching out to God through prayer. Such a capacity for attention would also enhance the student’s general academic and social learning providing a basis for authentic dialogue with others, and not only teachers and schoolfellows. The article introduces her as a religious philosopher, explains the origins of the essay, and Weil’s friendship with Father Perrin, who was her Christian religious mentor, examines the text itself, considers some critical commentaries, and assesses its relevance to the philosophy and practice of education today. (shrink)

A commentary on the Symposium as a challenge and a gift to Athens. I begin with a reflection on three dates: 416 bce, the date of Agathon’s victory party, c. 400, the approximate date of Apollodorus’ retelling of the party, and c. 375, the approximate date of the ‘publication’ of the dialogue, and I argue that Plato reminds his contemporary Athens both of its great poetic and legal and scientific traditions and of the historical fact that the way late fourth (...) century Athens appropriated them in some way led to the city’s demise at the turn of the century; thus the dialogue is Plato’s challenge to his contemporary Athens to recognize and overcome its flawed relation to its cultural resources. Heard in this way, the key moments are Aristophanes’ implied critique of Pausanias and Eryximachus and Socrates’ implied critique of Aristophanes and Agathon. Proceeding by a close reading, I argue that Plato exposes, for those moved to rise to his challenge, the failure of his great predecessors to conceive the divine in a way that, worthy of the height and otherness divinity requires, can provide substantive orientation for the burgeoning new reason that animates the city’s culture. (shrink)

Damaris Cudworth, later Lady Masham, was born in 1659 and died in 1708. She was the daughter of Ralph Cudworth, the wife of Sir Francis Masham, and the close friend, confidante, and, ultimately, caretaker of John Locke. Her philosophical writings — and writings to or about philosophers — consist in the following: (1) an account of Locke's life contained in a letter to Jean le Clerc; (2) various letters — mostly personal — to Locke; (3) letters to various other philosophers, (...) including Van Limborch, Shaftesbury, and Leibniz; (4) two monographs, each published anonymously: A Discourse Concerning the Love of God, which appeared in 1696, and Occasional Thoughts in Reference to a Vertuous or Christian Life, which appeared in 1705. This chapter focuses on correspondence between Masham and Leibniz. The correspondence is printed in volume 3 of Gerhardt's Die Philosophischen Schriften von Leibniz. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:BOOK REVIEWS Easter in Ordinary: Reflections on Human Experience and the Knowledge of God. By NICHOLAS LASH. Oharlottesville, Virginia: Uni· versity Press of Virginia, 1988. Pp. 313. $29.95 (hardbound). Nicholas Lash sets out "to construct an argument in favor of one way of construing or interpreting human experience as experience of the mystery of God " (p. 3), and to show that this awareness of God has nothing (...) to do with analyses of " religious experience " or of theism. Recent attention to religious experience, such as that of the philosopher Riohard Swinburne or of the research unit established by the zoologist Alister Hardy at Oxford, relies on a conception of that experience as individualistic rather than communal and as a matter of feeling or sensation in contrast to thought. Lash aMrihutes ·this view of religious experience to the legacy of William James, and contrasts it with that of Frederick Schleiermacher. According to Lash, James identifies the personal wi~h the individual, contrasts thought with feeling, and regards religious experience as private in contrast to public, or " naked " with respect to language, institutions, and other cultural forms. Schleiermacher avoids these errors by focusing not on discrete, datable experiences that one can identify as religious, hut on a moment that pervades all human experience, to the source or object of which the grammar of Christian doctrine gives the name "God." Lash acknowledges that Schleiermacher can he read in support of either of these two different ways of construing religious experience (pp. 112, 129), hut he does not realize that James can also he read in a way that blurs the dichotomy he sets up. Both James and Schleier· maoher provide uncommonly sophisticated accounts of the social character of the self and of the role of language and thought in shaping perception and feeling. In his Ethik, Schleiermacher locates the individual in social and cultural institutions, and elaborates the anthropology that informs his influential lectures on hermeneutics. Three of many notable contributions of James' Principles of Psychology are a chapter on the self that is the source of conceptions of the social self in American sociology and social psychology, a critique of classical empiricism showing that the distinction between sense impressions and ideas is an artifact of an erroneous psychological theory, and a famous chapter on the stream of thought in which he argues human experi505 506 BOOK REVIEWS enoe is not divided into ideas, sensations, and feelings, but is a continuous flow of consciousness. Toward the end of his career, he gave up the concept of consciousness as too closely associated with the mental in contrast to the physical, and spoke instead of the flux of experience. Lash accuses James of Cartesi1an dualism, and attributes to him the view that there is a "little person," a Cartesian self imprisoned in the body. He admi,ts that the Principles contains no such view, hut sug· gests that Jaines becomes mo't'e and more Cartesian as he develops, his radical empiricism. In fact, there is very little in James that could accurately be called Cartesian, and nothing ei,ther in the Principles or in the late Essays in Radical Empiricism that would condone any such picture of an homunculus inside the body. Contrary to Lash's view, the idea of "pure experience" in the latter work does not refer to experience that is independent of language, culture, or institutions, but is rather a reminder that such distinctions as that between objec· tive and subjective, feeling and thought, or perception and fantasy, are not girven in experience, but are products of our interpretations. Despite their social views of the self, both Sohleiermacher and James focus on the consciousness of the individual when they come to ex· amine religious experience or piety. James says.that he will stress the more extreme or devdoped reports of religious experience in order to examine the " ripe fruits " of,tJhe religious life. Both share a Protes· tant bias toward personal piety as the heart of religion, and regard ritual and institutional forms as the communal context for that piety, and an insufficient appreciation for the value of the routine and conventional. But this is not to be identified in either... (shrink)

Dunn, Geoffrey D As a seminary student I was taught that a homily ought to end with a eucharistic link. Mature reflection leads me to conclude that the entire homily is itself the eucharistic link. It joins together the interplay of the life of the assembly and the Scriptures, on the one hand, and the great prayer of thanksgiving on the other. My reflections are missing the element of the life of the assembly, which can be supplied only by (...) individual preachers in touch with their communities, but hopefully they provide something of the reason why, on this particular occasion, the assembly can move on to offer God thanks. (shrink)