Jonathan Edwards and the Trinitarian Shape of Beauty
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HOLY BEAUTY a Reformed Perspective on Aesthetics Within a World of Unjust Ugliness John W. De Gruchy Much of My Theological Ende
HOLY BEAUTY A Reformed Perspective on Aesthetics within a World of Unjust Ugliness John W. de Gruchy Robert Selby Taylor Professor of Christian Studies Director of the Graduate School in Humanities University of Cape Town Much of my theological endeavour over the years has focussed on the struggle against apartheid in South Africa. During the past decade my focus has shifted to the relationship between Christianity and democratic transformation and, more recently to theological aesthetics and to the role of art in transformation. This latter interest has clearly not meant a lessening of concern for theological engagement with public life. That remains constant both out of the conviction that theology and ethics cannot be separated, and the fact that the struggle against the legacy of apartheid and injustice more generally remains. The transition to democracy requires an ongoing struggle for social transformation. My interest in theological aesthetics, then, is not an opting out of a commitment for social justice but an attempt to address a set of issues that have previously been neglected by those of us who were engaged as theologians in the struggle against apartheid. To emphasise this point let me say that I wrote these words in the midst of a workshop of `Christianity, art and healing’ where the focus was on the new holocaust facing sub-Saharan Africa, the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Nadine Gordimer, the celebrated South African novelist, has noted that art is `at the heart of liberation.’1 The struggle against apartheid certainly produced an artistic creativity of a remarkable kind and intensity.2 It is remarkable, then, that theologians engaged in the struggle did not take this into account in doing theology. -
David Hume and the Origin of Modern Rationalism Donald Livingston Emory University
A Symposium: Morality Reconsidered David Hume and the Origin of Modern Rationalism Donald Livingston Emory University In “How Desperate Should We Be?” Claes Ryn argues that “morality” in modern societies is generally understood to be a form of moral rationalism, a matter of applying preconceived moral principles to particular situations in much the same way one talks of “pure” and “applied” geometry. Ryn finds a num- ber of pernicious consequences to follow from this rationalist model of morals. First, the purity of the principles, untainted by the particularities of tradition, creates a great distance between what the principles demand and what is possible in actual experience. The iridescent beauty and demands of the moral ideal distract the mind from what is before experience.1 The practical barriers to idealistically demanded change are oc- cluded from perception, and what realistically can and ought to be done is dismissed as insufficient. And “moral indignation is deemed sufficient”2 to carry the day in disputes over policy. Further, the destruction wrought by misplaced idealistic change is not acknowledged to be the result of bad policy but is ascribed to insufficient effort or to wicked persons or groups who have derailed it. A special point Ryn wants to make is that, “One of the dangers of moral rationalism and idealism is DONAL D LIVINGSTON is Professor of Philosophy Emeritus at Emory Univer- sity. 1 Claes Ryn, “How Desperate Should We Be?” Humanitas, Vol. XXVIII, Nos. 1 & 2 (2015), 9. 2 Ibid., 18. 44 • Volume XXVIII, Nos. 1 and 2, 2015 Donald Livingston that they set human beings up for desperation. -
Tapping Reeve, Coverture.Pdf
TSpace Research Repository tspace.library.utoronto.ca Tapping Reeve, Coverture and America's First Legal Treatise Angela Fernandez Version Published PDF Citation Angela Fernandez, "Tapping Reeve, Coverture and America's First (published version) Legal Treatise" in Angela Fernandez & Markus D. Dubber eds, Law Books in Action: Essays on the Anglo-American Legal Treatise (Oxford: Portland, Oregon: Hart Publishing, 2012) 63. Publisher’s Statement Angela Fernandez, "Tapping Reeve, Coverture and America's First Legal Treatise" in Angela Fernandez & Markus D. Dubber eds, Law Books in Action: Essays on the Anglo-American Legal Treatise (Oxford: Portland, Oregon: Hart Publishing, 2012) 63. Copyright © [2012]. Reprinted by permission of Hart Publishing. How to cite TSpace items Always cite the published version, so the author(s) will receive recognition through services that track citation counts, e.g. Scopus. If you need to cite the page number of the author manuscript from TSpace because you cannot access the published version, then cite the TSpace version in addition to the published version using the permanent URI (handle) found on the record page. This article was made openly accessible by U of T Faculty. Please tell us how this access benefits you. Your story matters. 3 Tapping Reeve, Coverture and America’s First Legal Treatise ∗ Angela Fernandez By marriage, the husband and wife are one person in law: that is, the very being or legal existence of the woman is suspended during the marriage, or at least is incorporated and consolidated into that of the husband: under whose wing, protection, and cover, she performs every thing; and is therefore called in our law- french a feme-covert; is said to be covert-baron, or under the protection and influence of her husband, her baron, or lord; and her condition during her marriage is called her coverture. -
The Intermediate World: a Key Concept in Beautiful Thinking
Open Philosophy 2018; 1: 50–58 Dorthe Jørgensen* The Intermediate World: A Key Concept in Beautiful Thinking https://doi.org/10.1515/opphil-2018-0005 Received February 28, 2018; accepted April 25, 2018 Abstract: The term ‘the intermediate world’ is a key concept in Den skønne tænkning (Beautiful Thinking) and the metaphysics of experience presented by this book. The metaphysics of experience is about the experiences of transcendence and beautiful thinking that take place in the intermediate world. In the article “The Intermediate World,” this subject is introduced through a discussion of thoughts and concepts formulated by Paul Klee (Zwischenwelt), Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten (beautiful thinking), Aristotle (phantasia), Immanuel Kant (expanded thinking), Mark C. Taylor (imagination), and Eugenio Trías (the limit). The text depicts the intermediate world as the level of experience at which the understanding does not yet distinguish between subject and object. The intermediate world is thus not a realm between human and world, nor is it something outside the world we know. The intermediate world is rather the present world in its most original state: the ‘place’ where we find the source of all experience and cognition, a source called ‘basic experience’ characterized by sensation, faith, and comprehension. In this realm, imagination is active and takes the form of an objective force rather than a subjective mental power. Imagination opens mind and world, thus allowing not-yet- actualized possibilities to become perceivable. Keywords: experience, metaphysics, Klee, aesthetics, imagination, Baumgarten, sensitivity, Trías, limit, thinking 1 Introduction The expression ‘beautiful thinking’ derives from §1 in Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten’s Aesthetica. -
BEFORE the ORIGINAL POSITION the Neo-Orthodox Theology of the Young John Rawls
BEFORE THE ORIGINAL POSITION The Neo-Orthodox Theology of the Young John Rawls Eric Gregory ABSTRACT This paper examines a remarkable document that has escaped critical at- tention within the vast literature on John Rawls, religion, and liberalism: Rawls’s undergraduate thesis, “A Brief Inquiry into the Meaning of Sin and Faith: An Interpretation Based on the Concept of Community” (1942). The thesis shows the extent to which a once regnant version of Protestant the- ology has retreated into seminaries and divinity schools where it now also meets resistance. Ironically, the young Rawls rejected social contract liber- alism for reasons that anticipate many of the claims later made against him by secular and religious critics. The thesis and Rawls’s late unpublished remarks on religion and World War II offer a new dimension to his intellec- tual biography. They show the significance of his humanist response to the moral impossibility of political theology. Moreover, they also reveal a kind of Rawlsian piety marginalized by contemporary debates over religion and liberalism. KEY WORDS: John Rawls, community, liberalism, religion, political theology, public reason PROTESTANT THEOLOGIAN REINHOLD NIEBUHR DIED IN 1971. In that same year, philosopher John Rawls published his groundbreaking work, A The- ory of Justice. These two events symbolically express transformations in American intellectual and political culture that remain significant today. In the academy, religious defenders of a liberal consensus had been chal- lenged by ascendant secular liberalisms and emergent religious voices critical of liberalism of any kind. Parallel developments in the political culture had begun to see the fracturing of coalitions that transcended di- verse religious and secular commitments in order to support democratic institutions and practices. -
Leibniz on Consciousness and Self-Consciousness Rocco J
Leibniz on Consciousness and Self-Consciousness Rocco J. Gennaro [Final version in NEW ESSAYS ON THE RATIONALISTS, Oxford U Press, 1999] In this paper I discuss the so-called "higher-order thought theory of consciousness" (the HOT theory) with special attention to how Leibnizian theses can help support it and how it can shed light on Leibniz's theory of perception, apperception, and consciousness. It will become clear how treating Leibniz as a HOT theorist can solve some of the problems he faced and some of the puzzles posed by commentators, e.g. animal mentality and the role of reason and memory in self-consciousness. I do not hold Leibniz's metaphysic of immaterial simple substances (i.e. monads), but even a contemporary materialist can learn a great deal from him. 1. What is the HOT Theory? In the absence of any plausible reductionist account of consciousness in nonmentalistic terms, the HOT theory says that the best explanation for what makes a mental state conscious is that it is accompanied by a thought (or awareness) that one is in that state.1 The sense of 'conscious state' I have in mind is the same as Nagel's sense, i.e. there is 'something it is like to be in that state' from a subjective or first-person point of view.2 Now, when the conscious mental state is a first-order world-directed state the HOT is not itself conscious; otherwise, circularity and an infinite regress would follow. Moreover, when the higher-order thought (HOT) is itself conscious, there is a yet higher-order (or third-order) thought directed at the second-order state. -
The Identity of Jesus of Nazareth*
Criswell Theological Review 6.1 (1992) 91-130. Copyright © 1992 by The Criswell College. Cited with permission. THE IDENTITY OF JESUS OF NAZARETH* CARL F. H. HENRY Lecturer at Large Prison Fellowship Ministries Nowhere is the tension between historically repeatable acts and a once-for-all event focused more dramatically than in the conflict over the identity of Jesus of Nazareth. Shall we explain him as the ideal model of mankind and expound divine incarnation by philosophical analysis of what is humanly possible, or shall we depict him rather in terms of the christologically unparalleled? The Gospels provide our only significant information about Jesus' life and work. Skeptical critics thrust upon these sources tests of reliabil- ity that they do not impose upon other historical writing. If universally applied, those same criteria would in principle invalidate ancient Greek and Roman accounts that secular historians routinely accept as factual.1 Efforts to destroy the credibility of gospels often betray a bias against the supernatural. Gerald G. O'Collins recalls "the official Soviet thesis (which appears recently to have been abandoned) that Jesus never existed and was a purely mythological figure.”2 Consistent Marx- ists would need to reject the theology-of-revolution view that the his- torical figure of Jesus nurtures its liberationist challenge to an alienated world. The assumptions of evolutionary naturalism likewise lead to a rejection of Jesus as in any way normative and decisive for human destiny. * This essay represents the two lectures read at the Criswell Lecture Series, Criswell College, January 1991. 1 Cf. A N. Sherwin-White, Roman Society and Roman Law in the New Testa- ment, (London and New York: Oxford University Press, 1963). -
Spirit Speaks January-February 2014 Volume 11 Issue 1
Spirit Speaks January-February 2014 Volume 11 Issue 1 Honoring Presence ~ Nurturing Spirit ~ . ~ Enriching the lives of all we serve Dr. Moira’s Message Dear Ones, A NEW Year! Such a gift! Not all of us were given it in 2014. Many of us saw the transition of loved ones in 2013 and are adjusting to a new reality without them. I know however, that their last gift to us is a reminder to get our house in order, so that when the moment of our own transition arises, we are ready to move into it in grace, peace and joy, and with a sense of accomplishment. Recently, I read somewhere, “So many people complain that there is never enough time and yet they live as though they had all the time in the world.” I am still pondering the insightfulness of these words. When I preside over memo- rial services, I remind us all that whatever it is we have put aside, on the back burner until later, our passed loved ones are saying to us on their departure: “What are you waiting for? When do you think you’ll have enough time to take care of these things? What if you run out of time? Bring these things forward now. Whatever needs mending, fixing, healing and releasing, take care of it now!” The only right time to take care of anything is NOW. This is a great time of year to decide to work on that list of back burner things, and one by one take care of them. -
1 Hutcheson and Kant: Moral Sense and Moral Feeling Published In
1 Hutcheson and Kant: Moral Sense and Moral Feeling Michael Walschots Published in Kant and the Scottish Enlightenment. Edited by Elizabeth Robinson and Chris W. Surprenant. London: Routledge, 2017. pg. 36 – 54. The eighteenth century is a rich and fascinating period in the history of Germany philosophy for a variety of reasons. Not least among these is the fact that German authors of the period somewhat extensively engaged with the writings of those in other European countries and beyond. The extent to which German philosophers engaged with eighteenth century British philosophy is an excellent example. Describing the reception of British philosophy in eighteenth century Germany, Manfred Kuehn writes that The works of Locke, Shaftsbury, Hutcheson, Hume, Smith, Ferguson, and almost every other British philosopher of note were full of problems that needed solutions and observations that needed to be explained, if German philosophy of the traditional sort was to succeed. (Kuehn 2001, 183-4) Although many German philosophers of the period could read English, the wide reception of these British authors was made possible in large part by the, in some cases rapid, translation of their texts into German. This is certainly true of the Scottish philosopher who will be the focus of this paper: Francis Hutcheson (1694-1747). A translation of Hutcheson’s posthumous System of Moral Philosophy, first published in 1755, was published just one year later in 1756. Translations of Hutcheson’s An Essay on the Nature and Conduct of the Passions (1728) and An Inquiry into the Original of Our Ideas of Beauty and Virtue (1725) followed somewhat soon thereafter, appearing in 1760 and 1762 respectively. -
From Zarathustra to the Wisdom of Salomon Wolfgang Leidhold, Cologne [EVS: Panel 2 — Religious Experience : Eric Voegelin and Beyond]
DRAFT - Seattle 2011 The Noetic Turn: From Zarathustra to the Wisdom of Salomon Wolfgang Leidhold, Cologne [EVS: Panel 2 — Religious Experience : Eric Voegelin and Beyond] Summary: Taking Eric Voegelin‘s theory of experience as a point of departure, this essay examines more closely the logic of experience (and of religious experience in particular). Voegelin‘s main thesis is that, since all ideas and concepts are based on experience, there is no „history of ideas― as an isolated process that is intelligible in itself but ideas must be studied and can only be understood if based on the founding experiences as their intelligible field. In an attempt to go beyond Voegelin‘s achievements, the paper sets ou by analyzing the structure of experience more closely. The results are applied to historic case-studies, starting with the Gathas of Zarathustra; neolithic myth and paleolithic symbolism are studied next; from here the analysis proceeds to Hindu and Daoist traditions, finally to some Old and New Testament sources. In the end, the findings are summarized as a new theory: the structure of experience varies not only regarding compactness and differentiation; but the experiental field itself is changing in terms of horizon, dimensions, and structure. As a consequence, experience and its symbolization are equivalent only if the structure is similar. The difference between „cultures― does not only regard the varying symbolizations of basically equivalent experiences, they are based on different modes of experience. Therefore we have to go one step beyond Eric Voegelin‘s achievements and study the history of experience. 1. Star Gazer One night as a young boy about twelve years of age I sat at home in the kitchen and looked out of the window at the nocturnal sky. -
MORAL OBJECTIVITY and the PSYCHOLOGY of MOTIVATION by Jude Ndubuisi Edeh a DISSERTATION Submitted in Partial Fulfilment Of
Philosophy MORAL OBJECTIVITY AND THE PSYCHOLOGY OF MOTIVATION By Jude Ndubuisi Edeh A DISSERTATION Submitted in Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy (Dr.phil) University of Münster Münster, Germany 2017 Dekan:Prof. Dr. Thomas Großbölting Erstgutachter: PD. Dr. Michael Kühler Zweitgutachter: Prof. Dr. Reinold Schmücker Tag der mündlichen Prüfung: 04.10.2018 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I am immensely grateful to Michael Kühler and Reinold Schmücker, my supervisors, for their generosity with their time, energy and support. It’s not always a given that you find people who are both interested in your project and believe you can handle it, especially at its budding stage. I benefited tremendously from your constructive criticisms and helpful comments, without which the completion of this project would not have been successful. I owe, in addition, a significant debt of gratitude to Nadine Elzein for supervising this project during my research stay at the King’s College, University of London. Nadine, your enthusiasm, philosophical insight and suggestions are invaluable. I owe special thanks also to Lukas Meyer for hosting me in August 2015 at the Institute of Philosophy, University of Graz. This project would not have been possible without the friendship, support, and insight of a good many people. In particular, I owe a significant debt of gratitude to: Nnaemeka’s family, Anthony Anih’s family, Anthony C. Ajah, Uzoma Emenogu, Vitus Egwu. I will always remain indebted to my family for their undying care and love. I would never have made it this far without your encouragement and support. ii ABSTRACT This dissertation provides a solution to the tension of specifying and reconciling the relationship between moral judgement and motivation. -
Black Women in Massachusetts, 1700-1783
2014 Felicia Y. Thomas ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ENTANGLED WITH THE YOKE OF BONDAGE: BLACK WOMEN IN MASSACHUSETTS, 1700-1783 By FELICIA Y. THOMAS A Dissertation submitted to the Graduate School-New Brunswick Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Graduate Program in History written under the direction of Deborah Gray White and approved by ________________________ ________________________ ________________________ ________________________ ________________________ New Brunswick, New Jersey May 2014 ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION Entangled With the Yoke of Bondage: Black Women in Massachusetts, 1700-1783 By FELICIA Y. THOMAS Dissertation Director: Deborah Gray White This dissertation expands our knowledge of four significant dimensions of black women’s experiences in eighteenth century New England: work, relationships, literacy and religion. This study contributes, then, to a deeper understanding of the kinds of work black women performed as well as their value, contributions, and skill as servile laborers; how black women created and maintained human ties within the context of multifaceted oppression, whether they married and had children, or not; how black women acquired the tools of literacy, which provided a basis for engagement with an interracial, international public sphere; and how black women’s access to and appropriation of Christianity bolstered their efforts to resist slavery’s dehumanizing effects. While enslaved females endured a common experience of race oppression with black men, gender oppression with white women, and class oppression with other compulsory workers, black women’s experiences were distinguished by the impact of the triple burden of gender, race, and class. This dissertation, while centered on the experience of black women, considers how their experience converges with and diverges from that of white women, black men, and other servile laborers.