bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Names and Pseudonyms
Authors: Humberstone Lloyd
Published: January 2009

Was there such a person as Lewis Carroll? An affirmative answer is suggested by the thought that Lewis Carroll was Charles Dodgson, and since there was certainly such a person as Charles Dodgson, there was such a person as Lewis Carroll. A negative answer is suggested by the thought that in arguing thus, the two names ‘Lewis Carroll’ and ‘Charles Dodgson’ are being inappropriately treated as though they were completely on a par: a pseudonym is, after all, afalseorfictitiousname. Perhaps we should say instead that there was really no such person as Lewis Carroll, but that when Charles Dodgson published under that name, he was pretending that there was, and further, pretending that the works in question formed part of the literary output of this pretendedly real individual. Whether or not this is correct for the case of ‘Lewis Carroll’, I will be suggesting that an account of this second style–afictionalistaccount, for short–is appropriate for at least a good many pseudonyms. We shall get to reasons why it might nonetheless not be especially appropriate in the present case in due course: one advantage of the ‘Lewis Carroll’/‘Charles Dodgson’ example, such qualms notwithstanding, is that everyone (likely to be reading this) is familiar not only with both names but with which of them is the pseudonym. Another is that, as we shall have occasion to observe below, Dodgson himself had some interesting views on this particular case of pseudonym(it)y.
Cambridge Philosophers III: McTaggart
Authors: Geach Peter
Published: January 2009

McTaggart′s father and mother were both members of a prosperous Wiltshire family, the Ellises: in fact they were first cousins, and this inbreeding may account for his premature death from a circulatory disease to which several Ellises succumbed. The Ellises were of yeoman stock, and had enriched themselves by West Indian enterprises; they had risen in the social scale via the practice of law. It is rather reminiscent of the The Forsyte Saga, a saga, as Galsworthy said, of the Sense of Property.
Simultaneity: A Composite Rejoinder
Authors: Cohen Michael
Published: January 2009

V. Alan White and Gertrud Walton have published responses to my note on Einstein's simultaneity Gedankenexperiment, in which I present a version of the argument free of the flaws to be found in that given by Einstein. White thinks I go too far, that no reformulation is necessary; Walton, that I don't go far enough, and that i the inconsistencies in Einstein's exposition are ‘irreconcilable’. I r shall try to explain why I think both are mistaken.
On Sartre and the Drug Connection: A Response to Haynes-Curtis
Authors: Smith Thomas
Published: January 2009

In Sartre and the Drug Connection, Carole Haynes-Curtis claims that previous commentators on the philosopher's writings have failed to recognize the significance of the impact of a mescalin experiment on Sartre's early philosophical perspective. ‘The residual effects of this nightmarish experience’, Haynes-Curtis claims, ‘haunted him for many years to come’, and was essentially the result of Sartre undergoing what, in modern parlance, is sometimes called a ‘Bad Trip’. (SDC 87)
Literature and Knowledge
Authors: Wilson Catherine
Published: January 2009

There is probably no subject in the philosophy of art which has prompted more impassioned theorizing than the question of the ‘cognitive value’ of works of art. ‘In the end’, one influential critic has stated, ‘I do not distinguish between science and art except as regards method. Both provide us with a view of reality and both are indispensable to a complete understanding of the universe.’ If a man is not prepared to distinguish between science and art one may well wonder what he is prepared to distinguish between, but in all fairness it should be pointed out that the writings of anti-cognitivists contain equally strenuous statements of doctrine. For I. A. Richards, poetry consists of ‘pseudo-statements’ which are ‘true’ if they ‘suit and serve some attitude or link together attitudes which on other grounds are desirable’.
Principia Ethica Re-examined: The Ethics of a Proto-logical Atomism
Authors: Kovesi Julius
Published: January 2009

One of the questions that any future history of British moral philosophy in the twentieth century should investigate and document is how it came about that Moore's Principia Ethica was appropriated by what we can call theHumean tradition of moral philosophy. I shall not trace that development now but only argue that there was no excuse or justification for it.
The Moral Patient
Authors: McPherson Thomas
Published: January 2009

The attitude of the impartial spectator has seemed to some to be the appropriate one for a moral philosopher: the philosopher should disengage himself from the moral battle and try to understand it; the academic moral philosopher's responsibility is to write about morality rather than to recommend moral positions—and, indeed, where an ideological standpoint is presupposed in academic moral philosophy, it is commonly not consciously presupposed.
Reason, Passion and the Will
Authors: Dilman İlham
Published: January 2009

Fulke Greville speaks of the will as inevitably divided between reason and passion. Shakespeare takes such a division seriously but, through Hamlet, he recognizes the possibility of reason and passion being united in a man's will and purpose.
Moral Scepticism and Moral Conduct
Authors: MacKenzie J. C.
Published: January 2009

For a period in the middle of the present century moral philosophy was dominated by the debate between prescriptivists and descriptivists. Prescriptivists proclaimed a gap between ‘is’ and ‘ought’, between facts and values, and cheerfully accepted the sceptical consequence that morals, and values generally, could not be objects of knowledge.
Slaves and Citizens
Authors: L. Clark Stephen R.
Published: January 2009

R. M. Hare has argued1 that there are conceivable (though unlikely) circumstances in which it would be right not to abolish the institution of slavery: in the imaginary land of Juba established slave-plantations are managed by a benevolent elite for the good of all, no ‘cruel or unusual ’ punishments are in use, and citizens of the neighbouring island of Camaica, ‘free ’but impoverished, regularly seek to become slaves. Hare adds that it is unlikely, given human nature, that ‘masters ’would treat ‘slaves ’humanely, and avoid a gradual corruption of their moral consciousness which would cancel out any possible advantages of the system. Slavery is wrong, he argues, not because it violates ‘fundamental human rights’, but I because it would in practice generally increase misery.
On Being Moved by Fiction
Authors: Mannison Don
Published: January 2009

What are we moved to when we are moved by something? Sometimes to tears; other times to action; and, on other occasions, to quiet contemplation. When a member of the Sierra Club is moved by something, he or she may be moved to tears or to political activism; but ‘being moved by’ in such circumstances just might consist in feelings of awe. ‘Moved by’ carries an obvious suggestion of causality on its semantic face. What I am moved by is what brings it about that I feel or act the way I do. To be ‘unmoved’ is to be unresponsive; or, at times, to lack compassion. To be moved by something or someone often involves having care or concern for that which is found moving. A variety of this sort of concern just could be an essential ingredient in the stance of the environmental preservationist.
Radical Freedom
Authors: Reinhardt Lloyd
Published: January 2009

Hilary Putnam has recently observed that the fact/value distinction has acquired a strength and pervasiveness in our culture that make it akin to an institution.1 I take it he meant an institution in the sense that Taboo is an institution in some cultures, not in the sense that the Church is an institution in ours. Invoking the distinction is a widespread conversational gambit in social life, not only in academic discussions. ‘That's a value judgment’ and ‘That's emotive’ are to be heard at dinner parties more often than ‘Pass the salt’.
Rousseau and the Fall of Social Man
Authors: Skillen Anthony
Published: January 2009

As ideas and feelings succeeded one another, and heart and head were brought into play, men continued to lay aside their natural wildness; their private connections became ever more intimate as their limits extended. They accustomed themselves to assemble before their huts round a large tree; singing and dancing, the true offspring of love and leisure, became the amusement, or rather the occupation, of men and women thus assembled together with nothing else to do. Each one began to consider the rest, and to wish to be considered in turn; and thus a value came to be attached to public esteem. Whoever sang or danced best, whoever was the handsomest, the strongest, the most dexterous, or the most eloquent, came to be of most consideration; and this was the first step towards inequality, and at the same time towards vice. From these first distinctions arose on the one side vanity and contempt and on the other shame and envy; and the fermentation caused by these heavens ended by producing combinations fatal to innocence and happiness.
Can a Form of Life be Wrong?
Authors: Hinman Lawrence M.
Published: January 2009

In recent years, a particular doctrine about forms of life has come to be associated with Wittgenstein's name by followers and critics of his philosophy alike. It is not a doctrine which Wittgenstein espoused or even, given his understanding of philosophy, one which he could have accepted; nor is it worthy of acceptance on its own merits. I shall here outline the standard interpretation of Wittgenstein's remarks on forms of life, consider the textual basis for such a reading of Wittgenstein, present a more consistent reading of the texts, place the problem of forms of life within a wider philosophical context, and show the ways in which it is indeed possible to say that a form of life is wrong. In the process, I shall note some important similarities between Wittgenstein's actual position, Quine's analysis of scientific knowledge, and Hans-Georg Gadamer's claims about the fusion of horizons.
William James and the Ethics of Belief
Authors: Doore G.L.
Published: January 2009

There is widespread agreement among philosophers that William James's well-known attempt to justify religious faith in ‘The Will to Believe’ is a failure. But despite the fact that James wrote his essay as a reply to the ‘tough-minded’ ethics of belief represented by such thinkers as W. K. Clifford and T. H. Huxley, the reasons commonly given today for rejecting James's position seem to be mostly based on the same principle of intellectual ethics that motivated Clifford and Huxley. Clifford, it may be recalled, maintained that ‘It is wrong always, everywhere, and for everyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence’. Although this is a rather rhetorical way of stating it, the principle is basically the same one adhered to by most scientists and philosophers who consider themselves rigorous and ‘objective’ thinkers. Even philosophers not associated with the hardheaded modern Anglo-American style of empiricism commonly pledge their allegiance to such a principle. For example, Brand Blanshard (who is an epistemological idealist) holds that the ‘main principle’ of the ethics of belief is that one should ‘equate one's assent to the evidence’ and he then goes on to criticize James, on the basis of this principle, for advocating self-deception and intellectual dishonesty.
Dreams of Immorality
Authors: Mann William E.
Published: January 2009

Are we responsible for our misdeeds in dreams? The obvious answer would seem to be ‘No’. Dreams catch us with our defences down: just those critical and discriminative abilities which are distinctive of our waking lives as responsible moral agents seem out of play when we dream; el sueño de la razón produce monstruos. Moreover, if we are responsible for our dreamt misdeeds, then parity of reasoning demands that we be praised for dreaming noble dreams. But that is absurd. Moral credit should not come that easily, and so neither should moral blame.
Miss Anscombe on Sidgwick's View of Humility
Authors: Wardle John
Published: January 2009

In her well-known paper ‘Modern Moral Philosophy’ (Philosophy, 1958) G. E. M. Anscombe makes the following assertion: ‘he [Sidgwick] thinks that humility consists in underestimating your own merits—i.e. in a species of untruthfulness’. I should like to show that this is not so.
Impartial Perception
Authors: Sanford David H.
Published: January 2009

McTaggart's argument for the unreality of space, unlike his argument for the unreality of time, has nothing to do with token-reflexives. The argument for the unreality of time depends on the contention that there would be no time if there were no facts whose descriptions essentially contain temporally token-reflexive expressions such as ‘now’, ‘past’, ‘present’, and ‘future’. According to Michael Dummett, McTaggart was right not to make an analogous claim about space
Philosophy and Philosophies
Authors: Craig E.J.
Published: January 2009

People who approach philosophy, as it figures in the activities of mostEnglish-speaking universities, often find their expectations curiously wideof the mark. They have expectations, of course, because the word ‘philosophy’ is not a technical term; there is no need to have taken any exams to use it happily enough in general conversation.
Religion and Politics
Authors: Graham Gordon
Published: January 2009

1. The appearance of Islam upon the stage of international politics hasbeen greeted by some commentators as a return to the Middle Ages. Preciselywhat they mean by this is not very clear, to themselves no less than their readers perhaps. In part, no doubt, they refer to the kinds of punishment Islamic law requires, which have a brutality associated in the common mind with medieval Europe. In part too there is the feeling that the phenomena of religion in politics, inquisitions, holy wars, government by clergy, are things of the past and that the undesirability of theocracy is a question long since settled.
Are They Class-names?
Authors: Hinton J. M.
Published: January 2009

We often, in effect, take it for granted that some word or phrase is what is called ‘the name of a class, be that class empty or non-empty’. We do so whenever in effect we either wonder about, or mean to be taking a view on, the number of members a certain suppositious class has, on the ultrasimple number scale: ‘None, more than none’.
Does Physics Lead to Berkeley?
Authors: Nelson John O.
Published: January 2009

Russell said that physics drove him to a position not unlike that of Berkeley —by which he meant subjectivism or solipsism. ‘As regards metaphysics’, he tells us in hisAutobiography, ‘when, under the influence of Moore, I first threw off the belief in German idealism, I experienced the delight of believing that the sensible world is real. Bit by bit, chiefly under the influence of physics, this delight has faded, and I have been driven to a position not unlike that of Berkeley, without his God and his Anglican complacency’.
Freedom and Capacity
Authors: Srzednicki Jan
Published: January 2009

There were 180 applications from prospective contestants of the StawellGift in 1978. The race limit, imposed in the interests of safety, is just 60 runners. Of the 60 acceptances Richard Roe was the hotfavourite, but healong with six others fell victim to the great oyster poisoning, and had towithdraw on the day of the race, along with five of the others; the sixth died of the poisoning just as the race was run. In the event the winner was John Doe, the second favourite according to the bookmakers.
The Idea of a Necessary Connection
Authors: Mounce H. O.
Published: January 2009

Hume is not a philosopher who has been viewed, on the whole, with excessive sympathy. Slips and inadequacies of argument, which are the inevitable consequence of human fallibility, are treated by his critics not with charity but with delight; and there are few who think it necessary to state his argument at its strongest before proceeding to refute it. A striking example of this procedure may be found in Antony Flew's paper ‘Another Idea of Necessary Connection’. The example is striking because Flew is normally one of the most sympathetic of Hume's critics and he might have been expected, in dealing with Humes view of causal necessity, to have proceeded with exceptional fairness, the incidental being identified and discarded and the essential view standing forth at its strongest. This, as I shall show, is not what occurs; but first let us consider what we are to take the essential view to be.
Sport and the Artistic
Authors: Wertz S. K.
Published: January 2009

Recently David Best has advanced the claim that sport is not an art form, and that although sport may be aesthetic, it is not artistic. Such a claim is false and runs counter to ordinary usage and sport practice. On behalf of sport practice, let me cite as an example the world-class Canadian skater, Toller Cranston, who thinks there are such things as ‘artistic sports, those being gymnastics, diving, figure skating’. (I might add trampolining and power- or weight-lifting to this category.) Best claims that athletes like Cranston are conceptually confused and that they endow sport with greater respectability than should be allowed. Ascribing the predicate ‘artistic’ to sport performances reflects ‘barbarous usage’. Why does Best exclude the artistic from the realm of sport? Upon examination of his argument, one finds that this exclusion derives mainly from his concepts of art and sport. He thinks that art has a subject-matter, a content, and that sport does not. Sport is contentless, so ‘sport’ and ‘art’ are two logically distinct regions. But is this so? Are we to accept Best's argument or are we to listen to accomplished, reflective athletes in the area of artistic sports? It seems the most reasonable analytic procedure would be to listen to Cranston's case and decide whether such a piece of intentionalist criticism5 should override Best's premises.
Metaphorical Non-Sequitur?
Authors: Sontag F.
Published: January 2009

There is no particular problem with using ‘metaphorical’ language where God is concerned. In Metaphorical Theology Sallie McFague offers a lengthy analysis to show us that metaphorical language is legitimate for theological discourse. This should come as no surprise to anyone except positivists or other stringent empiricists who accept nothing but direct evidence for any discourse. Traditional theologians, such as Thomas Aquinas, have long held that no discussion of God directly qualifies divinity. Mystics, as McFague acknowledges, have in fact been shocked at the idea of speaking about God directly. What, then, is McFague's point in reminding us of the necessary indirection of all speaking about God? She is attempting to curb the increasing agnosticism, if not skepticism, among contemporary theologians, by speaking to what she considers to be ‘the contemporary sensibility’.
Mr. Sanders' Pharisees and Mine A Response to E. P. Sanders, Jewish Law from Jesus to the Mishnah
Authors: Neusner Jacob
Published: January 2009

Despite the risible misnomer of his book of miscellaneous essays, which, claiming to speak of ‘Jewish law to the Mishnah,’ discuss mere anecdotes and episodes in Jewish law in the first century with special reference to the Gospels, Professor Edward P. Sanders’ current account of his views should not be dismissed as the merely random thoughts of one who wanders beyond the boundaries of his field of first-hand knowledge. Holding Sanders to his claim that he knows something about what he calls ‘Jewish law,’ let us take seriously his conception of the Pharisees of the first century. Since, intending to persuade colleagues that his picture of, and apologia for, the Pharisees, not mine, accurately portray how things really were in the first century, Sanders devotes two of his five chapters to that subject, we turn forthwith to the contrasting results contained in his current book.
Reflections on the Sermon on the Mount
Authors: Davies W. D. , Allison Dale C.
Published: January 2009

Because the sermon on the mount (hereafter SM) has received as much attention as any text in all of world literature, informed attempts to interpret it should in some way come to terms with the history of the discussion. For this reason we shall commence by examining several traditional approaches to the SM. We fully recognise that ‘a history of the interpretation of the Sermon on the Mount throughout the past two millennia would virtually amount to an introduction to the entire development of Christian theology and ethics’ — a fact which means that our own review is of necessity brief and piecemeal. Nonetheless, the following few pages do suffice to reveal certain important tendencies in exegetical history. Among them, and of first importance for our concerns, is the unfortunate habit of viewing the SM in isolation. Interpreters have again and again failed to take seriously the broader, literary context of Mt. 5–7 and have instead interpreted the chapters as though they were complete unto themselves, as though they constituted a book instead of a portion of a book. The considerable hermeneutical consequences have, on the whole, led away from the intent of the evangelist (our primary concern herein). It is our contention that any credible interpretation of Mt. 5–7 must constantly keep an eye on Mt. 1–4 and Mt. 9–28, for the part (the SM) draws its true meaning only from the whole (Matthew's Gospel). Put otherwise, the proper interpretation of the SM must be at one with the proper interpretation of the First Gospel in its entirety.
Modern Trinitarian Perspectives
Authors: Thompson John
Published: January 2009

The modern scene in Christian theology is characterized by a number of very diverse movements from feminism and liberation theology to radical views on christology and the charismatic movement. For many to speak or write about the Trinity is neither realistic nor helpful. In more recent writings, however, there has been renewed interest in the doctrine of the Trinity and in its application to the spheres of the church and also of social and political concerns. Further, a variety of groups as well as individuals have been turning their attention to this central Christian doctrine which is basically attempting to say what we believe about God: Barth, Moltmann, Jungel, the Torrances, on the Protestant side and the Roman Catholics, Von Balthasar, Rahner, and Congar, as well as the Orthodox Lossky, Zraoulas and Meyendorff. Groups likeC.E.C.the Conference of European Churches (The Reconciling Trinity), and the British Council of ChurchesB.C.C.(The Forgotten Trinity) and the Irish Theological Association (The Trinity and the Enlightenment)have all dealt in varied ways with this subject.
Parables, Secrecy and Eschatology in Mark' Gospel
Authors: Mearns C. L.
Published: January 2009

The hypothesis advanced in this paper is that Mark applies the motif of secrecy to the understanding of the parables in order to alter their eschatological reference. When Mark interprets the parables explicitly, he does so in such away as to support the overall imminent apocalyptic stance of his gospel. Our point of departure is Mark 4.10–12, one of the most contentious elements in the New Testament, which remains today a challenging crux for scholars. The text runs (RSV):

And when he was alone, those who were about him with the twelve asked him concerning the parables. And he said to them, ‘To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside everything is in parables; so that they may indeed see but not perceive, and may indeed hear but not understand; lest they should turn again and be forgiven,’
Gen. 15.6 and Early christian Struggles Over Election
Authors: Sutherland D. Dixon
Published: January 2009

Gen. 15.6 clearly stood as a pivotal scriptural foundation in St Paul's effort to define Christian identity. Paul sought to formulate that definition in Gal. 3 and Rom. 4 in terms of the Jewish understanding of divine election of Israel. The crux of his argument focused on including Gentiles in God's convenantal election. By his reinterpretation of Gen. 15.6 Paul showed that judaism of his day had wrongly excluded non-Jews from the Abrahamic promises.
The Puritan Roots of American Universalism
Authors: Morris K. R.
Published: January 2009

If the Calvinism of America's Puritan forefathers is anything in relation to a belief in universal salvation, it is its opposite. The Calvinist's belief that Christ's atonement is restricted to effecting the salvation of a limited number of preordained saints is about as far as one can go in the opposite direction from universalism and still retain an aspect of grace and redemption for humanity. But in this essay I will argue that there was a direct link between the Puritan Calvinism of 17th century New England and the widespread movement toward universalism within New England churches in the late 18th and early 19th centuries.
Crux probat Omnia: Eberhard Jüngel and the Theology of the Crucified One
Authors: Davidson Ivor J.
Published: January 2009

Eberhard Jüngel is by turns one of the most stimulating and one of the most exasperating writers in modern theology. His style can be both diffuse and tightlypacked, both dryly technical and rhetorically impassioned, combining the scholarly rigours of a formidable intellect and the effusiveness of a highly popular lecturer and preacher. His translators routinely complain of the difficulties of rendering his involved German into lucid English, while it is rumoured that Jüngel celebrates on hearing of their problems. He shows very little interest in English-language theology, but remains firmly within the milieu of the German tradition. He inherits from Barth the conviction that theology deals with profound realities which require no apology and which can never bereduced to simplistic verbal schemata. From his Doktorvater, Ernst Fuchs, he has gained a hermeneutical perspective whose concern with issues of temporality and language goes back to the later Heidegger. This dual legacy lends obvious intellectual weight to Jungel's creative theology, but it also ensures that his work does not make for easy reading.
Canons to the Left of Him: Brevard Childs, his Critics, and the Future of Old Testament Theology
Authors: Provan Iain
Published: January 2009

It is well known that the seeds from which the modern discipline of OT theology grew are already found in 17th and 18th century discussion of the relationship between Bible and Church, which tended to drive a wedge between the two, regarding canon in historical rather than theological terms; stressing the difference between what is transient and particular in the Bible and what is universal and of abiding significance; and placing the task of deciding which is which upon the shoulders of the individual reader rather than upon the church. Free investigation of the Bible, unfettered by church tradition and theology, was to be the way ahead. OT theology finds its roots more particularly in the 18th century discussion of the nature of and the relationship between Biblical Theology and Dogmatic Theology, and in particular in Gabler's classic theoreticalstatementof their nature and relationship. The first book which may strictly be called an OT theology appeared in 1796: an historical discussion of the ideas to be found in the OT, with an emphasis on their probable origin and the stages through which Hebrew religious thought had passed, compared and contrasted with the beliefs of other ancient peoples, and evaluated from the point of view of rationalistic religion. Here we find the unreserved acceptance of Gabler's principle that OT theology must in the first instance be a descriptive and historical discipline, freed from dogmatic constraints and resistant to the premature merging of OT and NT — a principle which in the succeeding century was accepted by writers across the whole theological spectrum, including those of orthodox and conservative inclination.
Jonathan Edwards as Great Mirror
Authors: Thuesen Peter J.
Published: January 2009

‘There is no historical task’, wrote Albert Schweitzer in 1906, ‘which so reveals a man's true self as the writing of a Life of Jesus.’ In his famous study of the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century quest for the ‘historical Jesus’, Schweitzer exposed the tendency of each generation of scholars to find its own thoughts in the man from Nazareth. Since Schweitzer, scholars have become ever more skeptical about the possibility of ‘objective’ interpretation. Hans-Georg Gadamer, noting the predilection of readers to rewrite texts in their own language, concluded that ‘all understanding is self-understanding’. Quentin Skinner, taking a different tack, complained that history all too often becomes ‘a pack of tricks we play on the dead’. And Peter Novick, carrying the criticisma step further, observed that even if scholars recognize the specks in their opponents' eyes, they usually fail to see the logs in their own. In short, if modern hermeneutical studies since Schweitzer have conveyed one overriding message, it is that subjectivity is inescapable.
Frei's Christology and Lindbeck's Cultural-Linguistic Theory
Authors: Higton Mike
Published: January 2009

George Lindbeck's bookThe Nature of Doctrinis often taken as a manifesto for a supposed ‘Yale school’, comprising Lindbeck himself, David Kelsey, Ronald Thiemann, Garrett Green and several others. The work of the late Hans Frei (1922–1988) is normally seen as central to this school, and his difficult writings are often explained by recourse to, and assumed to be adequately represented by,The Nature of Doctrine.
An Open Letter to Francis Watson on Text, Church and World
Authors: Rowland Christopher
Published: January 2009

I was asked to write a review of your book but have decided to make this into an open letter. I have done so for two reasons. Firstly, there is something rather artificial in writing a review of a book by a person I feel is more than a mere acquaintance and whose work I have read and company I have enjoyed over the years. It is rather deceitful to give the readers of this piece the impression that it is an entirely dispassionate account from someone who is in no way involved with the writer of the book and is thereby unconstrained by the demands of friendship. That will not mean diat I will draw back from reflecting on the things on which I find myself parting company with you but does make clear the context in which I do so. Secondly, in a way, which I hope is consistent with a theme of your book, I want to engage in dialogue rather than the monologue which is the typical genre of the review and hope that you will respond in that precise, systematic way in which you respond so carefully to questions and comments in discussion.
Some Problems with Pannenberg's Solution to Barth's ‘Faith Subjectivism’
Authors: Molnar Paul D.
Published: January 2009

Among recent reconstructions, Wolfhart Pannenberg's systematic theology is one of the most influential attempts to overcome authoritarianism and subjectivism. Without presenting a thorough development of Pannenberg's theology here, I shall discuss the relationship between philosophy and theology by analyzing Pannenberg's critique of Barth's ‘subjectivism’ and ‘authoritarianism’. I argue that by grounding theological knowledge in a version of Heidegger's concept of anticipation, Pannenberg has not escaped his own religious subjectivism. Thus theological meaning inevitably results from a philosophy of existence grounded in an anticipatory grasp (Vorgriff) of the totality of reality which is presumed to refer to the reality of God.
The ‘True Remedy’: Jonathan Edwards' Soteriological Perspective as Observed in his Revival Treatises
Authors: Jinkins Michael
Published: January 2009

The revival treatises represent one of the most fruitful and provocative portions of the Jonathan Edwards corpus. The purpose of the treatises, considered as a whole, was (1) to provide a cogent account of the revivals which cropped up in New England in 1734–35 and agin in 1740–1743; (2) to defend the revivals to those, like Charles Chauncy, who objected to their emotional excesses or were skeptical of their validity; and (3) to encourage to moderation and humility those who were taking part in the revivals. In the course of accomplishing these objectives Edwards presents a morphology of the conversion experience, provides a basic description of his anthropology/psychology and gives an indication of the pneumatological side of his doctrine of God. We will consider each of these streams of thought briefly in terms of how they relate to Edwards' soteriology.
Polanyi and Christological Dualisms
Authors: Palma Robert J.
Published: January 2009

The problem which this article addresses comprises representative Christological dualisms, long in the making, which have come to a head in the twentieth century. They include the Jesus of history and Christ of faith dichotomy, Christology from above as opposed to Christology from below, and ontological Christology over against functional Christology. Behind such dualisms are genuine and fundamental dualities whose integration has been severely damaged in modern theology through the compounding of longstanding dualisms in Western Thought with modern critical thought as shaped by rationalism, empiricism, and scepticism. In this essay I wish to show how Michael Polanyi's theories of being and knowing have much to offer in overcoming the above dualisms. The prospect of such was already made evident to me several years ago in the work of Thomas F. Torrance, and more recently in the work of Colin Gunton. My present purpose is not just to repeat what they have already said, but rather to carry this project forward by applying major theories of Polanyi especially to Christological dualisms. While Torrance has made extensive use of Polanyi in addressing dualisms in theology, it is not in such Christological texts as Space, Time and Incarnation or Space, Time and Resurrection, that Polanyi is especially utilized. However, in The Mediation of Christ Polanyi's influence seems implicit where Torrance addresses the dualist, including gnostic, threat to Christology in the early centuries of the Christian church.
Jesus, Human Being and the Praxis of Intercession: Towards a Biblical Perspective
Authors: Wallis Ian G.
Published: January 2009

The problems surrounding intercessory prayer are manifold and well rehearsed; and few areas of religious observance undergo more of a metamorphosis during the life of a believer. Invocation of God to intervene so that the ‘divine will’ might be done more often than not gives way to a benign acceptance of the status quo and to the hallowing of time in which God is sought in all circumstances. And in this process many unhelpful notions of prayer are laid to rest. Images of God as cosmic messenger, interrupter of the natural order and manipulator of so-called human freedom prove incompatible with the canon of experience, to say nothing of a host of philosophical and theological objections. The resulting interpretations of intercession, however, are often far from convincing, especially when viewed in the light of scripture, which seems to bear witness to a God who, whilst independent from creation, remains intimately involved in its business and, especially, in that of humanity. For instance, there is the impression – stemming, perhaps, from the relative silence of many spiritual writers – that intercession is a ‘lesser’ form of prayer and one which must necessarily be jettisoned in the journey towards God as the soul is dispossessed of all insularity and self-centredness. Then there are the attempts to re-appropriate the language of intercession within a spirituality which is compatible with a modern world view.
What Could It Mean for the Church to Be Christ's Body?: A Question without a Clear Answer
Authors: Hauerwas Stanley
Published: January 2009

We were on our honeymoon. Theological questions were not high on our agenda as we toured Ireland. We drove innocently into Sneem, a village on the ring of Kerry, identified as the ‘tidy town of Ireland’ in 1988. It was certainly that. The houses that surrounded the central square were as immaculate as they were colorful.
Women and ‘Conformity to Christ' Image’ The Challenge of Avoiding Docetism and Affirming Inclusivism
Authors: Thompson William M.
Published: January 2009

Women who pray with Paul, ‘I live, no longer I, but Christ lives in me’ (Gal 2:20), as surely as we men are ‘imagines Christi’, in the analogous way in which we usually understand this. ‘For those he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son’ (Rom 8:29; cf. 1 Cor 15:49). But how can we affirm this without denying the theological relevance of Jesus' sex and gender identity? Saying that sex and gender is purely contingent and accidental (in the technical, ‘scholastic’ sense) seems, while true, somehow inadequate.
Nec Tamen Consumebatur. Exodus 3 and the Non-Consumable Other in the Philosophy of Emmanuel Levinas.
Authors: Purcell Michael
Published: January 2009

Brevard Childs, reflecting on the significance of Exodus 3 In the history of theology, comments:

In the history of Christian theology most of the major theological problems have entered into the discussion of Exodus 3. In the early and medieval periods the interest focused on the issue of ontology and divine reality; in recent years on revelation as history or history as revelation. The amazing fact is how seminal this one passage continues to be for each new generation.
‘The Being of Beings’ Jonathan Edwards' Understanding of God as Reflected in His Final Treatises
Authors: Jinkins Michael
Published: January 2009

The final phase of jonathan Edwards' work centers around his defense of Calvinism against ‘Arminianism’. Along with certain tendencies in this ‘Arminianism’, which included its undermining of the unconditionality and freedom of the grace of God and its narrowing of the conception of God to those attributes acceptable to current cultural standards, it also held to the view that the human will is not determined by God or nature, or anything prior to its own acts, butis ‘self-determining’, possessing ‘a certain sovereignty over itself and its own acts’, thus determining its own volition. The notion of ‘indifference’, the mind's being ‘in equilibrio’ prior to any ‘act of volition’, was essential to the Arminian conception of liberty, as was ‘contingence’, understood as a lack of connectedness to any prior chain of causation.
Kant and Erasmus
Authors: Galbraith E. C.
Published: January 2009

In a previous paper I have argued against the assumption made by much German literature at the beginning of the twentieth century, that Luther is the religious forerunner of Kant. Even though it is the Lutheran mythology that Kant is demythologizing, Luther still cannot be considered as the religious forerunner of Kant. There are two main reasons for this. First, Kant has an entirely different conception of the religious life in terms of freewill and salvation. Kant affirms freewill, Luther denies it. Kant considers good works as a prerequisite to salvation, Luther rules outworks as playing any part in the quest for salvation, since justification is by faith alone. Secondly, Kant's view of evil and human nature in general is far removed from the Lutheran conception of human depravity. Luther claims that human beings are totally corrupt, and in need of God's grace in order to become good. Kant argues that although human beings have a disposition towards evil, their underlying nature is good.
Hosanna in the Highest
Authors: Hart Henry St John
Published: January 2009

This paper was originally delivered on 6th May 1977 as the Presidential Address of the Cambridge Theological Society. It has been lightly edited and prepared for publication with the author's help by Dr William Horbury and Professor J. C. O'Neill, in honour of the author and in gratitude for his teaching and inspiration on his 80th birthday, 15th April 1992.
The Effective ‘History of the Bible: A Challenge to Biblical Scholarship?
Authors: Räisänen Heikki
Published: January 2009

Abiblical scholar is sometimes asked, “What effect has the Bible had?” To my embarrassment, I have not been able to draw on solid results of research to answer this very reasonable question. It has been all but ignored by the exegetical guild.
Theology, Eschatology and the Prologue of John
Authors: Painter John
Published: January 2009

There is a long tradition recognizing the evangelist as a theologian of stature. In recent times C.K. Barrett referred to him as a theologian second only to Paul and Martin Hengel described John as “a towering theologian”. In this paper it is argued that the evangelist was a profoundly theological writer and that a complex eschatology formed an essential dimension of his theology which was shaped in the dialogue and debate with the synagogue resulting in the development of distinctive christological, theological and eschatological views that have significantly influenced subsequent Christian history.
Religion, Ethics and the History of Religion School
Authors: Chapman Mark D.
Published: January 2009

The Göttingen New Testament Professor, Wilhelm Bousset observed that historical research was in ‘danger of placing Christianity in the flux of development’, of ‘failing to give due worth to its special character and unique meaning, and thereby neutralising and relativising everything’. ‘The halo of the supernatural which had clung around “sacred history” was destroyed,’ and history had become a ‘labyrinth for modern religious liberalism’, where it threatened ‘to betray itself’. In their attempts to avoid such a relativisation of the Christian faith, most of the members of the History of Religion School sought refuge in a primordial mystical experience expressive of non-rational feelings, of emotions, moods and fantasies.
Does Theology Presuppose Faith?
Authors: Vroom Hendrik M.
Published: January 2009

One reason why the legitimacy of theology as an academic discipline is disputed, is the claim that theology presupposes faith. Such a presupposition, it is said, constitutes a danger for the academic nature of theology and, indirectly, its place in the university; in an academic discipline a scholar cannot proceed from a specific consideration which can not be discussed and which one can not give up without placing oneself outside that discipline, i.e., Christian theology. Therefore, while Christian theology is a valid intellectual pursuit for Christians who reflect on the content of their faith, it does not fall within the contours of an academic discipline which is universally accessible. Such is the rationale, and it involves not only Christian but Jewish and Islamic theology as well and in general all reflection on religion and philosophy of life which is undertaken in particular circles and which proceeds from unverifiable assumptions which lack universal endorsement. In this article we are concerned with the objection that theology is not properly academic (‘wissenschaftlich’) because of its unverifiable presupposition that God exists and its being connected to a particular religious community. Theology presupposes faith, it is said, and the point of dispute is whether any academic discipline may have such a presupposition. Three different things may be implied by this objection.
‘Who Makes the Morning Darkness’: God and Creation in the Book of Amos
Authors: Gillingham Susan
Published: January 2009

This paper has been the result of teaching and comparing two very different Old Testament texts, both of which are concerned with the relationship between God and the created order. One is Genesis 1, with its priestly concerns for harmony within the created order; the other is the book of Amos, where one encounters a profoundly pessimistic view of the coming disorder throughout the natural world. In making associations between these two texts, one cannot help but ask why the earlier reflections in Amos offer such aradical and developed understandingof God's relationship with creation — quite distinct from the view of God evidenced in the first chapter of Genesis.
The Vision of the Pope. An Ecumenical Effort of Edmund Schlink (1903–1984)
Authors: Eber Jochen
Published: January 2009

Ten years after the Second Vatican Council the novel Die Vision des Papstes: Erzählung was published simultaneously by Catholic and Protestant publishers under the pseudonym ‘Sebastian Knecht’. The author of the work was the former official observer of the Protestant Church of Germany (EKD) to the Council, the Heidelberg professor Edmund Schlink, who retired in 1972. The fact of his authorship was known only by a few friends prior to his death; following the death of her husband Mrs Irmgard Schlink revealed the pseudonym. Thus today, one may first examine the historical reasons why Schlink wrote the book. Further, its theological content makes possible a clearer view of the strengths and problems of the particular way to the unity of the Church Schlink recommends in the story. Finally, the effect of the work raises the question if it was meaningful to suggest a solution to ecumenical problems by means of belles lettres.
Locality and Catholicity: Reflections on Theology and the Church
Authors: Webster John
Published: January 2009

Why is theology good for the church? One authoritative contemporary answer runs like this: theology is good for the church to the extent that it aims at a description of the linguistic and conceptual world of Christian faith normatively set forth in Holy Scripture. Theology, on this model, is ‘intratextual’ or ‘intrasemiotic’, offering a ‘thick description’, a kind of ethnography of the public, intersubjective meaning routines of Christianity, most of all as they are instantiated in Scripture which is the encoding of the ‘semiotic universe’ of Christian faith. Viewed as such, theology is a close cousin to what Clifford Geertz calls ‘interpretive explanation’: it is a discipline which ‘trains its attention on what institutions, actions, images, utterances, events, customs … mean to those whose institutions, actions, customs, and so on they are’; as such, it furnishes‘systematic unpackings of the conceptual world’ of Christian faith.
How is ‘Eternity’ to be Understood in the Theology of Judaism?
Authors: Neusner Jacob
Published: January 2009

The canonical books of Judaism, to which we turn for the definition of theological categories and doctrines, rarely set forth ideas in the form of abstractions and generalizations, with the result that understanding any generative theological categories requires the philological exegesis of texts. In the case of the Judaic canon, the pertinent texts are those of the Torah, written and oral. When we turn to the written Torah, which the West knows as the Old Testament, and to the Oral Torah, which Judaism assembles out of the Mishnah, the two Talmuds, the Midrash-compilations of the formative age, our work only begins. For we have also to determine for ourselves what words, in the canonical writings, stand for, or refer us to, the counterpart category that our Christian and Greek philosophical heritage has conferred upon us. When, as we shall see, we ask ourselves about how the classical theology of Judaism conceives of ‘eternity’, we therefore engage in a prior inquiry into what we mean by ‘eternity’ and how in the Judaic canon's substrate of theology we may locate the counterpart-language for that meaning. Not only so, but we have further to find out in what context thought takes place on the category, ‘eternity’: when and why is discourse on eternity precipitated in the canonical theology of Judaism? And when not?
On Style in Karl Barth
Authors: Sonderegger Katherine
Published: January 2009

Karl Barth exacts a heavy punishment on his critics. Reading his many volumes is toil as well as pleasure, as Barth himself observed, in the special irony he reserved for his own work. But it is not the length of theChurch Dogmatics, the scripture commentaries, the sermons or the letters, however great, that weighs on the critic. Critics are bothered — for lack of a better term — by his style.