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From Laws to Liturgy: an Idealist Interpretation of the Doctrine of Creation Durham E-Theses From Laws to Liturgy: An Idealist Interpretation of the Doctrine of Creation EPSEN-III, EDWARD,JOSEPH How to cite: EPSEN-III, EDWARD,JOSEPH (2017) From Laws to Liturgy: An Idealist Interpretation of the Doctrine of Creation, Durham theses, Durham University. Available at Durham E-Theses Online: http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/12176/ Use policy The full-text may be used and/or reproduced, and given to third parties in any format or medium, without prior permission or charge, for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-prot purposes provided that: • a full bibliographic reference is made to the original source • a link is made to the metadata record in Durham E-Theses • the full-text is not changed in any way The full-text must not be sold in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holders. Please consult the full Durham E-Theses policy for further details. Academic Support Oce, Durham University, University Oce, Old Elvet, Durham DH1 3HP e-mail: [email protected] Tel: +44 0191 334 6107 http://etheses.dur.ac.uk 2 From Laws to Liturgy: An Idealist Interpretation of the Doctrine of Creation Edward Epsen Abstract Christian idealism is an interpretative framework for developing the doctrine of creation in the parallel contexts of theology and philosophy. It recommends itself by its explanatory fecundity and consilience. Against physical realism’s claim that the physical world is ontologically fundamental and mind- independent, idealism holds that it is constituted by facts about the organization of human sense experience. The sensory regularities in turn may be explained by a prephysical temporal reality of angelic minds who causally constrain human experience within a divinely decreed nomological system. Idealism is here re-attached to a tradition of Christian Platonism, recovering and updating the traditional notions of the aeon, angelic government, and the divine ideas, so as to be capable of explanatory work in regard to the philosophical problems of perception and induction. In so doing, Christian idealism enables theologians coherently to articulate the thesis that the ontological objectivity and empirical immanence of the world, as grounded in the phenomenological laws of nature, is explained by the liturgical function of the cosmic Church hierarchy. An idealist theology thus develops the doctrine of the cosmic liturgy, that the various works of God in heaven and earth are analogously unified in a single sacramental economy of the Eucharist. From Laws to Liturgy: An Idealist Interpretation of the Doctrine of Creation Edward Joseph Epsen PhD Thesis Department of Theology & Religion Durham University March 2016 Table of Contents Statement of Copyright Preface 1 Chapter I: Creation and Christian Metaphysics: An Introduction I.1 The God-World Relation in Metaphysics: Idealism and Traditional Christian Theism 8 I.2 How Platonism Becomes Christian Idealism 11 I.3 Cosmos and Eucharist: A Starting Point in Liturgical Theology 23 I.4 On Angelic Cosmology and Method 30 Part A – Making the Theological Case for Idealism: The Conceptual Content in Traditional Context Chapter II: A World as Liturgical Language II.1 Introduction: Trinitarian Themes 35 II.2 Logos Cosmology and the Absolute Primacy of Christ 38 II.3 Idealism and the ‘Protosacramentality’ of the Physical World 47 II.4 Idealism and the ‘Apophasis of the Real’ 52 Chapter III: Early Idealist Theories of Creation III.1 Introduction 57 III.2 Emanation and the One-Many Relation in Plotinus’s Theoretical System 59 III.3 The Critique of Aristotle’s Categories 63 III.4 Gregory’s Phenomenalistic Idealism 66 Chapter IV: Dionysian Hierarchy and Symbolic Theology IV.1 Introduction 74 IV.2 Mystical Ascent Through Incongruous Images 76 IV.3 The Cosmic Hierarchy 81 IV.4 The Celestial Hierarchy and the Visible Creation Economy 84 Chapter V: Berkeley and the Immaterial Language of Embodiment V.1 Introduction 92 V.2 The Language Model of Vision 93 V.3 The Heterogeneity of the Senses and the Confinement of the Sensibles 96 V.4 Analogous Fields of Discourse: Or Odos and Diastasis Revisited 101 V.5 The Idealist Construction of Space 104 Part B – Christian Idealism: An Analytic Exposition Chapter VI: The Nexus of Mind and Matter in Perceptual Consciousness VI.1 Introduction 108 VI.2 Realism, Idealism, and Perceptual Theory 109 VI.3 An Ontology of Sensory Universals 115 VI.4 Perceptual Error and Objecthood 119 VI.5 An Idealist View of Physical Causality 123 Chapter VII: The Construction of the Physical World VII.1 Introduction 128 VII.2 The Logical Construction of Things in Space 131 VII.3 Idealism and the Logical Structure of Physical Theory 138 VII.4 Against the Claims of Physical Realism 142 VII.5 Realism and Idealist Theology of Visible Creation 147 Chapter VIII: The Ultimate Reality as a Community of Minds VIII.1 Introduction 151 VIII.2 Christian Theism and the Problem of Creative Laws 152 VIII.3 The Augustinian-Cartesian View of the Soul 156 VIII.4 The Logical Construction of Time 160 VIII.5 The Laws of Creation 170 Part C – The Theological Case for Christian Idealism Continued Chapter IX: The Cosmic Liturgy IX.1 Introduction 177 IX.2 The Celestial Scope of Natural Theology 178 IX.3 The Challenge to Physical Realism from Angelic Cosmology 190 IX.4 Unity in the Angelic Administration of the Mystery: A Eucharistic Cosmos 195 Appendix 207 Bibliography 210 The copyright of this thesis rests with the author. No quotation from it should be published without the author's prior written consent and information derived from it should be acknowledged. Acknowledgements This work was generously supported by two scholarships from the Centre for Catholic Studies within Durham University’s Department of Theology and Religion. It benefited from my discussions with Anna Blackman, Mike Higton, David Kennedy, Jennifer Leigh, Paul Murray, and David Wilkinson. Karen Kilby was a consistent source of encouragement and dialogue. Andrew Louth and John Milbank provided critical commentary that helped me to improve the clarity of my communication and to test the work’s impact. Andrew, especially, provided helpful editorial feedback on significant portions of the work. A special mention must be made of my supervisory team, Christopher Insole and Simon Oliver. Their support was unwavering and I learned much from my interaction with both of them, about the practice of theology, writing, and professional service .I have no doubt that this work is significantly better than it would have been on account of their suggestions. Much of the content of the early chapters was shaped by my exchanges with Chris. From the start he emboldened me not to shy away from some of the seemingly out-of-fashion and speculative topics in liturgical studies and angelology that are integral to the full vision of the work. He was also tireless in reading and commenting on drafts at many stages of preparation and I count myself fortunate indeed to have had his fair and insightful attention. Preface This work aims to offer an interpretation and defense of orthodox Christian cosmology as expressed in the traditional doctrine of creation, that the triune God freely creates out of nothing a world that he absolutely transcends, which remains wholly dependent on his continued sustaining providence, and whose final purpose is the sanctification of man in union with his Creator through the attunement of man’s heart to the praise of the Lord’s glory. In the spirit of systematic theology, my goal is to provide for an understanding of the content of this article of faith, using the resources of idealist metaphysics for exposition and insight. Developing Christian idealism as an interpretative theory for the doctrine results in a rationally defensible exposition. It is rich in explanatory power on account of its grounding in analytic metaphysics, where idealism offers solutions to the problems of perception1 and induction, but also fertile in its implications for dogmatics. It is a helpful resource to theologians in the attempt to articulate a dogmatic cosmology: an understanding of what God produces in creation, and how it is ordered and governed. An idealist interpretation helps systematize the interrelations among Trinity, creation, providence, Christology, the sacraments and other confessional elements, including those that were once traditionally significant but have fallen by the wayside, such as the doctrine of angels2 and the doctrine of the cosmic liturgy.3 It shows us that a coherent idealist theology of the laws of nature that appeals to angelic cosmology is abductively supported by its solution to the philosophical problems of perception and induction. Thus the interpretation enables us to make a very bold claim indeed. As the establishment of the laws of nature through the angelic governance is in the service of the liturgical life of the Church, the angels and thus the liturgy are the reason why the physical world is objective and empirically immanent. The possibility of science is explained by the possibility of the Eucharist. The broad outline of the theological argument for the particular version of Christian idealism that I wish to offer runs as follows: (A) Revelation presents us with a trinitarian model of creation in which the transcendent, omnipotent God 1 See Howard Robinson, Perception (London: Routledge, 1994), and John Foster, The Nature of Perception (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), both of whom offer idealist theories of perception. 2 Augustine, de Gen. ad lit. IV, 32-49, pseudo-Dionysius, Hierarchia Coelestis, Aquinas ST Ia.50-64, 106-114; but see also Gregory the Great, Dialogues (1911) IV, 177-258, and John Damascene, De fide Orth. III.2. 3 See Hans Urs von Balthasar, The Cosmic Liturgy: The Universe According to Maximus the Confessor (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2004), Erik Peterson, The Angels and the Liturgy (New York: Herder and Herder, 1964), Louis Bouyer, Cosmos: The World and Glory of God (Petersham, MA: Saint Bede’s Publications, 1988), pp.194- 205,.and Keith Lemna, “The Angels and Cosmic Liturgy: An Oratorian Angelology”, Nova et Vetera 8,4 (2010): 901-921.
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