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Christian Philosophical Theology

Stephen T. Davis

This book exposes and defends crucial items in the theological world-view of Christianity from the perspective of Christian philosophy. The topics considered include the nature of religious unbelief, ... More

This book exposes and defends crucial items in the theological world-view of Christianity from the perspective of Christian philosophy. The topics considered include the nature of religious unbelief, the existence of God, the nature of God, religious faith, creation, revelation, Christology, redemption, scripture, and the beatific vision. The book revolves around questions like: Why believe in God? What is God like? Who was Jesus Christ? What is incarnation? How are humans redeemed? How should theology be done?Less

The Christocentric Cosmology of St Maximus the Confessor

Torstein Tollefsen

St Maximus the Confessor (580–662) is an influential Byzantine thinker. The book is a study of the basic features of his thought, his philosophical theology or metaphysics. The term ‘Christocentric ... More

St Maximus the Confessor (580–662) is an influential Byzantine thinker. The book is a study of the basic features of his thought, his philosophical theology or metaphysics. The term ‘Christocentric cosmology’ describes precisely the contents of his conception. God's Logos (the Word, Christ) contains the principles (divine ideas, logoi ) according to which a well‐ordered cosmos is created, and in accordance with which the cosmos returns (converts) to its origin. In accordance with these principles the created world participates in divine activity ( energeia , power, perfections), and the return (conversion) is the way from participation in being to participation in eternal well‐being or deification. Man is created as microcosm and mediator. Through his human nature, the incarnate Logos transforms the created totality and makes human beings able to participate in the redemptive movement. Maximus develops in a precise way the tension between God's transcendence and immanence. His philosophical theology makes it possible in the modern age to develop a conception of ecological theology and even to appreciate the modern concept of human rights.Less

Winds of Change: The Environmental Movement and the Global Development of the Wind Energy Industry

Ion Bogdan Vasi

This book brings social movements into the study of market formation and industry growth. It starts from the observation that while wind power stands out as a renewable energy success story in some ... More

This book brings social movements into the study of market formation and industry growth. It starts from the observation that while wind power stands out as a renewable energy success story in some countries and regions, it has failed to reach its true potential in many countries and has had an uneven global development. The book offers an interpretation that differs from the dominant technological and economic perspectives. It develops a model that argues that the development of the wind energy industry is influenced by interactions between the environmental movement, the social context, and natural resources. The model identifies three main pathways through which the environmental movement influences the development of the wind energy industry. The first pathway is the influence that environmental activists and organizations have on energy policymakers' decisions to adopt and implement pro‐renewable energy policies. The second pathway is the influence that environmental groups and activists have on energy consumers. The third pathway is the influence of the environmental movement on energy professionals. The empirical study combines quantitative and qualitative analyses. Case studies focus on Canada, Denmark, Germany, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The conclusion argues that environmentalist “global winds of change” are almost as important as the atmospheric winds for the development of the wind energy industry around the world. It also presents a few implications for future studies of industry creation and energy sector growth.Less

The Art of Performance

Heinrich Schenker

Heribert Esser (ed.)

From early on, Heinrich Schenker was deeply interested in performance. There are many references to a planned publication on performance, there are finished segments and many miscellaneous related ... More

From early on, Heinrich Schenker was deeply interested in performance. There are many references to a planned publication on performance, there are finished segments and many miscellaneous related notebook-jottings, but his theoretical writings took precedence over all else and he never completed the book. This book may be taken as a compilation, as is explained in detail in the editor's introduction. It presents what Schenker regarded as one of his main missions: to rectify the direction music performance had taken in his time. He argues that for a meaningful performance of a masterwork the performer must understand the inner workings of the music. Therefore, the many players — largely pianists — who merely use the text to show their own ability do injustice to the music and mislead audiences. This holds true even for those who follow the markings of the composers slavishly but without understanding. In discussing the great composers' modes of notation and showing that their markings only indicate a desired effect, we get highly practical and imaginative advice based on the author's own experience as performing pianist and composer. He covers different aspects of pianistic technique including hand motions, legato and non legato touch, fingering, pedal, and articulation. The discussion of dynamics and tempo are equally valid for all instrumentalists. Throughout, the aim of a free, “singing” performance which comes from having assimilated the music is stressed: it results in true “re-creation”.Less

Hugh of Saint Victor

Paul Rorem

Hugh of St. Victor (c.1096–1141) left a large and influential corpus of works on all aspects of theology, as well as the liberal arts broadly defined. This book introduces Hugh within his community ... More

Hugh of St. Victor (c.1096–1141) left a large and influential corpus of works on all aspects of theology, as well as the liberal arts broadly defined. This book introduces Hugh within his community in twelfth-century Paris and summarizes his major works according to his own threefold conception. First comes the pedagogical foundation (Didascalicon), including the historical sense of sacred scripture, then the (allegorical) framework of scriptural doctrine (especially creation and restoration in De sacramentis), and finally the tropological or spiritual finale of personal appropriation of the biblical message (the ark treatises and the Soliloquy). Hugh’s encyclopedic interests include grammar and geometry, philosophy and all of theology, history and eschatology, Job and Mary, the sacraments broadly and narrowly defined, spirituality, and the Dionysian Celestial Hierarchy. How he held all this together in his thought and corpus is a challenge to modern (and postmodern) readers.Less

The Genealogy of Violence: Reflections on Creation, Freedom, and Evil

Charles K. Bellinger

In the twentieth century, many thinkers have put forward theories that purport to explain the motivations underlying the violent behavior of human beings. This book presents Kierkegaard's thought as ... More

In the twentieth century, many thinkers have put forward theories that purport to explain the motivations underlying the violent behavior of human beings. This book presents Kierkegaard's thought as offering a way of interpreting violent behavior that is superior to the alternatives. The basic elements of Kierkegaard's psychology are drawn out of his published and unpublished works, concentrating on The Concept of Anxiety, Works of Love, and The Sickness unto Death. Violence, most fundamentally, arises out of human resistance to the possibility of psychological change and growth into maturity. Violence toward others seeks to fend off that potential for otherness within oneself that is entailed by the incompleteness of creation. Kierkegaard's theory of violence is compared and contrasted with Rene Girard's theory, and both thinkers are brought into conversation with Karl Barth and Eric Voegelin. Anabaptism's approach to interpreting the history of Christian violence is taken into consideration. Hitler and Stalin, as key contemporary examples of demonic violence, are analyzed in connection with Kierkegaard's aesthetic and ethical spheres of existence. The book closes with reflections on the Christian doctrine of atonement in light of the preceding discussion of the roots of human evil.Less

The Body in St Maximus the Confessor: Holy Flesh, Wholly Deified

Adam G. Cooper

Maximus the Confessor (580-662) is increasingly regarded as a theologian of towering ecumenical importance. This book engages the full vista of Maximus’ profound incarnational and cosmic theology ... More

Maximus the Confessor (580-662) is increasingly regarded as a theologian of towering ecumenical importance. This book engages the full vista of Maximus’ profound incarnational and cosmic theology with the question: What happens to the body when human beings are deified? The answer unfolds in five chapters under the rubrics of epistemology, cosmology, christology, ecclesiology and spirituality. Each specifies an integral dimension in the Confessor’s theological vision and its central motif, viz. God the Word wills always to be embodied in all things. By virtue of their respective teleological orientation to Christ the incarnate Word, creation, history and the life of virtue each functions as a pedagogical strategy by which the transcendent God simultaneously conceals and reveals himself with the aim of leading all creation, including matter and the body, into deifying union with himself by grace. Ultimately it is the deification of Christ’s body that constitutes the paradigmatic and definitive renewal of fallen creation.Less

The Commentaries of Origen and Jerome on St. Paul's Epistle to the Ephesians

Ronald E. Heine

It has long been known that Jerome depended on Origen to some extent in producing his own commentary on Paul's Epistle to the Ephesians. Several excerpts from Origen's commentary on Ephesians have ... More

It has long been known that Jerome depended on Origen to some extent in producing his own commentary on Paul's Epistle to the Ephesians. Several excerpts from Origen's commentary on Ephesians have been preserved in Greek. This book demonstrates the extent of Jerome's dependence on Origen by placing English translations of these excerpts from Origen's Commentary on Ephesians parallel to the English translation of Jerome's commentary on Ephesians. These parallels show that in every case where Jerome's commentary can be compared with Origen's, Jerome has followed Origen, either by translating his text or paraphrasing his thought. By this and other means, all the passages that can be attributed in some degree to Origen have been identified in Jerome's commentary in order to allow Origen's comments on Ephesians to be heard again, even if muffled at times, through the words of Jerome. This is important because Origen's commentary, in all probability, was the first complete commentary ever composed on the Epistle to the Ephesians. Origen's comments are sometimes philological, discussing the meaning of Greek words in the text and the syntax of the phrases in the Greek sentences of Paul. His comments deal also with theology, for Ephesians provided many texts that were key elements in some of his theological views, such as the pre‐existent church, the constitution of the foundation of the material world after the fall, God's foreknowledge, the unity of revelation based on the ancient prophets’ knowledge of God's future work in Christ, and the Christian struggle against hostile spiritual powers.Less

The Paradise of God: Renewing Religion in an Ecological Age

Norman Wirzba

Jewish and Christian doctrines of creation, when interpreted as accounts of the moral and spiritual character of the world rather than simply its origin, hold the key to addressing a variety of ... More

Jewish and Christian doctrines of creation, when interpreted as accounts of the moral and spiritual character of the world rather than simply its origin, hold the key to addressing a variety of contemporary environmental concerns. They do so by showing how our identities as creatures lead to vocations that promote the care, peace, and celebration of creation. This account is developed through a sustained conversation with contemporary ecological science and agrarian thought. This book develops why the idea of creation has fallen upon hard times in modernity, and how something like a culture of creation might be envisioned that would pair ecologically informed theology with a variety of cultural concerns like education, economics, work, food, design, and built environments. This new interpretation of creation offers the possibility for a culture of justice and peace for humans and non-humans alike.Less

Creation Ethics: Reproduction, Genetics, and Quality of Life

David DeGrazia

The ethics of creating—or declining to create—people has been addressed in several contexts: debates over abortion and embryo research; literature on “self-creation”; discussions of procreative ... More

The ethics of creating—or declining to create—people has been addressed in several contexts: debates over abortion and embryo research; literature on “self-creation”; discussions of procreative rights and responsibilities, genetic engineering, and future generations. Here, for the first time, is a sustained, scholarly analysis of all of these issues—a discussion combining breadth of topics with philosophical depth, imagination with current scientific understanding, argumentative rigor with accessibility. The overarching aim of this book is to illuminate a broad array of issues connected with reproduction and genetics, through the lens of moral philosophy. With novel frameworks for understanding prenatal moral status and human identity, and exceptional fairness to those holding different views, the author sheds new light on the ethics of abortion and embryo research, genetic enhancement and prenatal genetic interventions, procreation and parenting, as well as decisions that affect the quality of life of future generations. Along the way, he helpfully introduces personal identity theory and value theory as well as such complex topics as moral status, wrongful life, and the “nonidentity problem.” The results include a subjective account of human well-being, a standard for responsible procreation and parenting, and a theoretical bridge between consequentialist and nonconsequentialist ethical theories. The upshot is a synoptic, mostly liberal vision of the ethics of creating human beings.Less

Myth: A Biography of Belief

David Leeming

Myths are living entities that continue to energize thought and action in the modern world. If ancient mythmakers conceived of the evident reality of creation in terms of character and events we ... More

Myths are living entities that continue to energize thought and action in the modern world. If ancient mythmakers conceived of the evident reality of creation in terms of character and events we associate with such works as Genesis or the Rig Veda, modern scientific mythmakers see it in terms of evolution and the Big Bang. Myth has always been intricately related to religion and new religious metaphors and energies are to be found in the new scientific myths. Modern works of literature reflect ways in which the modern mind uses the ancient Creation, Deity, and Hero archetypes to reveal new understandings.Less

Developmental Theism: From Pure Will to Unbounded Love

Peter Forrest

This book is a speculative philosophical theology based on three themes: that a version of materialism is a help, not a hindrance, in philosophical theology; that God develops; and that this ... More

This book is a speculative philosophical theology based on three themes: that a version of materialism is a help, not a hindrance, in philosophical theology; that God develops; and that this development is kenotic, an abandonment of power. The materialism considered in this work is non-reductive: of metaphysical necessity, the mental supervenes on the physical. Materialism leads to the thesis that the primordial God is metaphysically necessary, the limiting case of supervenience. It is speculated that the brain-analogue of the primordial God consists of all the possibilities for creation. It is also speculated that God changes. In the beginning there was a God which loved no one and which was not lovable, but was all-powerful and all-knowing. A sequence of acts resulted in a community of divine love, the Holy Trinity, and a world with many creatures who were autonomous agents. God loved us so much that one Divine Person became fully human and was willing to suffer to show us divine love. This is the kenotic development of God from Pure Will to Unbounded Love. In addition, kenosis provides a new resource for understanding evil. The Primordial God is good but in an inhuman way; why should anyone expect otherwise? But as a result of God's kenotic development, God is now like a loving parent, as the great monotheistic religions teach.Less

Work and Object: Explorations in the Metaphysics of Art

Peter Lamarque

This book explores certain fundamental metaphysical aspects of works of art, giving focus to a distinction between works and the materials that underlie or constitute them. This constitutive material ... More

This book explores certain fundamental metaphysical aspects of works of art, giving focus to a distinction between works and the materials that underlie or constitute them. This constitutive material might be physical or abstract. For each work there is an ‘object’ (i.e., the materials of its composition) associated with it and a central claim in the book is that the work is never simply identical with the ‘object’ that constitutes it. Issues about the creation of works, their distinct kinds of properties (including aesthetic properties), their amenability to interpretation, their style, the conditions under which they can go out of existence, and their relation to perceptually indistinguishable doubles (including forgeries and parodies) are raised and debated. A core theme is that works like paintings, music, literature, sculpture, architecture, films, photographs, multimedia installations, and many more besides, have fundamental features in common, as cultural artefacts, in spite of enormous surface differences. It is their nature as distinct kinds of things, grounded in distinct ontological categories, that is the subject of this enquiry. Although much of the discussion is abstract, based in analytical metaphysics, there are many specific applications, including a study of Jean-Paul Sartre's novel La Nausée and recent conceptual art. Some surprising conclusions are derived about the identity and survival conditions of works, and about the difference, often, between what a work seems to be and what it really is.Less

Eternal God: A Study of God without Time

Paul Helm

The book is a new edition of Eternal God first published in 1988, and contains four new chapters. It offers a defence of divine timeless eternity. After sketching the nature of such eternity in the ... More

The book is a new edition of Eternal God first published in 1988, and contains four new chapters. It offers a defence of divine timeless eternity. After sketching the nature of such eternity in the first two chapters, a number of philosophical objections are considered, such as the argument from personality and from the incompatibility of divine eternity and indexical knowledge. A number of standard objections are discussed, and the account is further developed in the light of these. Among them are the nature of an eternal God's foreknowledge of what happens in time, and its relation to human choice, and how and in what manner such divine foreknowledge differs from fatalism. This leads to a consideration of foreknowledge and human responsibility, the sense in which timeless divine choice is free, and how it is possible to refer to an eternal God. The first of the final four new chapters explores the view of W. L. Craig that God is timeless sans creation but temporal thereafter. This leads to a consideration of timelessness and causation, in connection with creation, and then the importance of the distinction between a timeless God's perspective on his creation and those of agents in time. Assuming that God is triune, the final chapter discusses the relation between the three persons of the divine, first if God is considered to be in time, and then if he is eternal.Less

Method and Metaphysics in Maimonides' Guide for the Perplexed

Daniel Davies

Maimonides' Guide for the Perplexed is one of the most discussed books in Jewish history. Since its appearance, many readers have advocated an “esoteric” reading of the Guide, professing to find a ... More

Maimonides' Guide for the Perplexed is one of the most discussed books in Jewish history. Since its appearance, many readers have advocated an “esoteric” reading of the Guide, professing to find a hidden message in Maimonides' metaphysical beliefs. Through close readings of the Guide, this book addresses the major debates surrounding its secret doctrine. It argues that perceived contradictions in Maimonides' accounts of creation and divine attributes can be squared by paying attention to the various ways in which he presents his arguments. Furthermore, by employing philosophical rigor, it shows how a coherent theological view can emerge from the many layers of the Guide. But Maimonides' clear declaration that certain matters must be hidden from the masses cannot be ignored, and the kind of inconsistency that is peculiar to the Guide requires another explanation. It is found in the purpose Maimonides assigns to the Guide: scriptural exegesis. Ezekiel's account of the chariot, treated in one of the most laconic sections of the Guide, is the subject of the final chapters. By connecting the vision with currents in the wider Islamic world, the book shows how Maimonides devises a new method of presentation in order to imitate scripture's multilayered manner of communication. He updates what he takes to be the correct interpretation of scripture by writing it in a work appropriate for his own time, and to do so he has to keep the Torah's most hidden secrets.Less

Thomas Aquinas on God and Evil

Brian Davies

This book offers an in-depth study of Saint Thomas Aquinas's thoughts on God and evil, revealing that Aquinas's thinking about God and evil can be traced through his metaphysical philosophy, his ... More

This book offers an in-depth study of Saint Thomas Aquinas's thoughts on God and evil, revealing that Aquinas's thinking about God and evil can be traced through his metaphysical philosophy, his thoughts on God and creation, and his writings about Christian revelation and the doctrines of the Trinity and the Incarnation. The book first gives an introduction to Aquinas's philosophical theology, as well as a nuanced analysis of the ways in which Aquinas's writings have been considered over time. For hundreds of years scholars have argued that Aquinas's views on God and evil were original and different from those of his contemporaries. The book shows that Aquinas's views were by modern standards very original, but that in their historical context they were more traditional than many scholars since have realized. The book also provides insight into what we can learn from Aquinas's philosophy.Less

Infinite Minds: A Philosophical Cosmology

John Leslie

This book develops a Platonic creation story. The cosmos exists just because of the ethical need for it. We, and all the intricate structures of our universe, exist as intricately structured thoughts ... More

This book develops a Platonic creation story. The cosmos exists just because of the ethical need for it. We, and all the intricate structures of our universe, exist as intricately structured thoughts in a divine mind that knows everything worth knowing. There could also be infinitely many other universes in this mind, and after death we might explore the wonders of its knowledge. Minds of the same kind could exist in infinite number. This book unfolds a view of the nature of the universe. This view is unusual, but rich in philosophical inspiration and suggestion. Over the last three decades the author has been developing his theory in a series of publications; now this book gives it its definitive exposition.Less