Michael S. Kogan
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- January 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780195112597
- eISBN:
- 9780199872275
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195112597.003.0008
- Subject:
- Religion, Judaism
This chapter explores “true” claims of each of the faiths in religious narrative. It argues that the truth claims of each of the faiths to bear a revealed message can only be evaluated in terms of ...
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This chapter explores “true” claims of each of the faiths in religious narrative. It argues that the truth claims of each of the faiths to bear a revealed message can only be evaluated in terms of their ethical and spiritual fruits. All of them must lead their adherents to lead lives of respect for the dignity of all people, reverence for all forms of life, for the earth itself, and for the divine source of all things. While all these “true” faiths will adhere to shared ethical and spiritual standards, their truth claims must be further examined.Less
This chapter explores “true” claims of each of the faiths in religious narrative. It argues that the truth claims of each of the faiths to bear a revealed message can only be evaluated in terms of their ethical and spiritual fruits. All of them must lead their adherents to lead lives of respect for the dignity of all people, reverence for all forms of life, for the earth itself, and for the divine source of all things. While all these “true” faiths will adhere to shared ethical and spiritual standards, their truth claims must be further examined.
C. Kavin Rowe
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- September 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780195377873
- eISBN:
- 9780199869459
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195377873.003.0005
- Subject:
- Religion, Early Christian Studies
Reading Acts as lively political theology in its time necessarily raises questions that directly relate to several crucial contemporary problems. Indeed, the argument is that engaging Acts in this ...
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Reading Acts as lively political theology in its time necessarily raises questions that directly relate to several crucial contemporary problems. Indeed, the argument is that engaging Acts in this way offers significant resources on which modern thinkers can draw to understand conflicts that arise in light of profoundly different schemes of life. “God,” “tolerance,” “diversity,” “culture,” and “religious violence” are words that explicitly point to issues requiring sustained and refined reflection in the 21st century. After a condensed exposition of the reading of Acts given in Chapters 2 through 4, therefore, this final chapter pursues several critical questions that attend the interrelation between claims to universal truth about God and the politics they produce (e.g., the nature of religious truth, the relation between normative truth claims and tolerance of the religious other, the political significance of polytheism, etc.).Less
Reading Acts as lively political theology in its time necessarily raises questions that directly relate to several crucial contemporary problems. Indeed, the argument is that engaging Acts in this way offers significant resources on which modern thinkers can draw to understand conflicts that arise in light of profoundly different schemes of life. “God,” “tolerance,” “diversity,” “culture,” and “religious violence” are words that explicitly point to issues requiring sustained and refined reflection in the 21st century. After a condensed exposition of the reading of Acts given in Chapters 2 through 4, therefore, this final chapter pursues several critical questions that attend the interrelation between claims to universal truth about God and the politics they produce (e.g., the nature of religious truth, the relation between normative truth claims and tolerance of the religious other, the political significance of polytheism, etc.).
Robert Fogelin
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195177541
- eISBN:
- 9780199850143
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195177541.001.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, General
Human beings are both supremely rational and deeply superstitious, capable of believing just about anything and of questioning just about everything. Indeed, just as our reason demands that we know ...
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Human beings are both supremely rational and deeply superstitious, capable of believing just about anything and of questioning just about everything. Indeed, just as our reason demands that we know the truth, our skepticism leads to doubts we can ever really do so. This book guides us through a contradiction that lies at the very heart of philosophical inquiry. The book argues that our rational faculties insist on a purely rational account of the universe; yet at the same time, the inherent limitations of these faculties ensure that we will never fully satisfy that demand. As a result of being driven to this point of paradox, we either comfort ourselves with what Kant called “metaphysical illusions” or adopt a stance of radical skepticism. No middle ground seems possible and, as the book shows, skepticism, even though a healthy dose of it is essential for living a rational life, “has an inherent tendency to become unlimited in its scope, with the result that the edifice of rationality is destroyed.” In much Postmodernist thought, for example, skepticism takes the extreme form of absolute relativism, denying the basis for any value distinctions and treating all truth-claims as equally groundless. How reason avoids disgracing itself, walking a fine line between dogmatic belief and self-defeating doubt, is the question the book seeks to answer.Less
Human beings are both supremely rational and deeply superstitious, capable of believing just about anything and of questioning just about everything. Indeed, just as our reason demands that we know the truth, our skepticism leads to doubts we can ever really do so. This book guides us through a contradiction that lies at the very heart of philosophical inquiry. The book argues that our rational faculties insist on a purely rational account of the universe; yet at the same time, the inherent limitations of these faculties ensure that we will never fully satisfy that demand. As a result of being driven to this point of paradox, we either comfort ourselves with what Kant called “metaphysical illusions” or adopt a stance of radical skepticism. No middle ground seems possible and, as the book shows, skepticism, even though a healthy dose of it is essential for living a rational life, “has an inherent tendency to become unlimited in its scope, with the result that the edifice of rationality is destroyed.” In much Postmodernist thought, for example, skepticism takes the extreme form of absolute relativism, denying the basis for any value distinctions and treating all truth-claims as equally groundless. How reason avoids disgracing itself, walking a fine line between dogmatic belief and self-defeating doubt, is the question the book seeks to answer.
Michael Horace Barnes
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195396270
- eISBN:
- 9780199852482
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195396270.003.0011
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Society
This chapter reviews the status of religious thought today as a result of developments in science and its cognitive style. One convenient division identifies three major types of religious ...
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This chapter reviews the status of religious thought today as a result of developments in science and its cognitive style. One convenient division identifies three major types of religious truth-claims: the miraculous, the cosmological, and the metaphysical. The history of modern science presents an obvious challenge to the plausibility of the belief in miracles. The range of knowledge of natural causality has expanded until supernatural interventions have been squeezed into a few gaps. Science has defined the boundaries of plausibility for religious beliefs. Many theologians have in fact accepted those boundaries, even though they sometimes seem to say otherwise. Science has discovered an enormous amount of fundamental intelligibility to the universe, and has vindicated the hopes of generations that such intelligibility exists. Religious thought which does not accept this may find in it a fundamental reason to affirm the ultimate and religious validity of being a knower in the world.Less
This chapter reviews the status of religious thought today as a result of developments in science and its cognitive style. One convenient division identifies three major types of religious truth-claims: the miraculous, the cosmological, and the metaphysical. The history of modern science presents an obvious challenge to the plausibility of the belief in miracles. The range of knowledge of natural causality has expanded until supernatural interventions have been squeezed into a few gaps. Science has defined the boundaries of plausibility for religious beliefs. Many theologians have in fact accepted those boundaries, even though they sometimes seem to say otherwise. Science has discovered an enormous amount of fundamental intelligibility to the universe, and has vindicated the hopes of generations that such intelligibility exists. Religious thought which does not accept this may find in it a fundamental reason to affirm the ultimate and religious validity of being a knower in the world.
Gary Alan Fine and Bill Ellis
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- September 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199736317
- eISBN:
- 9780199866458
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199736317.003.0002
- Subject:
- Political Science, International Relations and Politics
Using beliefs and rumors that emerged during the first days after September 11, this chapter discusses how a culture in crisis uses these tools to make sense out of a disorienting event such as this. ...
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Using beliefs and rumors that emerged during the first days after September 11, this chapter discusses how a culture in crisis uses these tools to make sense out of a disorienting event such as this. Rumor is a truth claim not backed by authoritative information. Whether true or false, it is an expression of a community's collective beliefs. These are especially illustrated in rumors about religious miracles and signs that occurred in the attacks, about groups of Arab Americans who publicly celebrated the event, and about a terrorist who warned his girlfriend about the attack in advance. The chapter analyzes these in terms of the politics of plausibility (the sort of thing Americans are predisposed to believe) and of credibility (the sources that Americans normally trust for reliable information). To flourish in public discourse, a rumor should be both credible and plausible.Less
Using beliefs and rumors that emerged during the first days after September 11, this chapter discusses how a culture in crisis uses these tools to make sense out of a disorienting event such as this. Rumor is a truth claim not backed by authoritative information. Whether true or false, it is an expression of a community's collective beliefs. These are especially illustrated in rumors about religious miracles and signs that occurred in the attacks, about groups of Arab Americans who publicly celebrated the event, and about a terrorist who warned his girlfriend about the attack in advance. The chapter analyzes these in terms of the politics of plausibility (the sort of thing Americans are predisposed to believe) and of credibility (the sources that Americans normally trust for reliable information). To flourish in public discourse, a rumor should be both credible and plausible.
Roberto S. Goizueta
- Published in print:
- 2003
- Published Online:
- January 2005
- ISBN:
- 9780195161199
- eISBN:
- 9780199835201
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/019516119X.003.0008
- Subject:
- Religion, Theology
The claim that, in the crucified and risen Christ, God is preferentially identified with the victims of the history transforms the preferential option for the poor from an ethical imperative into the ...
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The claim that, in the crucified and risen Christ, God is preferentially identified with the victims of the history transforms the preferential option for the poor from an ethical imperative into the privileged locus of all Christian theology. The author argues that the preferential option makes not only ethical but also epistemological and theological claims. The possibility of preferring some viewpoints or of making normative truth-claims is the precondition of an authentic, pluralistic community that affirms the dignity of all peoples. The preferential option forces us to confront the question of truth; Christian praxis is liberating only because it affirms something that is real or true.Less
The claim that, in the crucified and risen Christ, God is preferentially identified with the victims of the history transforms the preferential option for the poor from an ethical imperative into the privileged locus of all Christian theology. The author argues that the preferential option makes not only ethical but also epistemological and theological claims. The possibility of preferring some viewpoints or of making normative truth-claims is the precondition of an authentic, pluralistic community that affirms the dignity of all peoples. The preferential option forces us to confront the question of truth; Christian praxis is liberating only because it affirms something that is real or true.
Gary Alan Fine and Bill Ellis
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- September 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199736317
- eISBN:
- 9780199866458
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199736317.003.0009
- Subject:
- Political Science, International Relations and Politics
Rumors about foreigners, outside our borders or within, can be dangerous, both to the aliens and to ourselves. In an increasingly globalized world, we need good neighbors, even as differences cannot ...
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Rumors about foreigners, outside our borders or within, can be dangerous, both to the aliens and to ourselves. In an increasingly globalized world, we need good neighbors, even as differences cannot be erased. Five strategies may help us rise above the divisions that rumors perpetuate. We must question easy truth claims, acknowledge the reality of social change, remember the effects of the past, build upon our common strengths, and recognize that unity is a long‐term challenge. The goal of rumor study should not simply be to document rumors, for they always will exist, or to determine their fallacy, for they allege facts only to embody values. Rumors must be taken seriously, even if they are controversial, as they reveal beliefs and values that many people embrace. Objective study of them can help the world live together as a community.Less
Rumors about foreigners, outside our borders or within, can be dangerous, both to the aliens and to ourselves. In an increasingly globalized world, we need good neighbors, even as differences cannot be erased. Five strategies may help us rise above the divisions that rumors perpetuate. We must question easy truth claims, acknowledge the reality of social change, remember the effects of the past, build upon our common strengths, and recognize that unity is a long‐term challenge. The goal of rumor study should not simply be to document rumors, for they always will exist, or to determine their fallacy, for they allege facts only to embody values. Rumors must be taken seriously, even if they are controversial, as they reveal beliefs and values that many people embrace. Objective study of them can help the world live together as a community.
Thomas Docherty
- Published in print:
- 1996
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198183570
- eISBN:
- 9780191674075
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198183570.003.0010
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
Much contemporary theory, exercised by the problematical nature of the validation or legitimation of truth-claims, has turned to the work of Levinas, in whom this ethical demand for a philosophy of ...
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Much contemporary theory, exercised by the problematical nature of the validation or legitimation of truth-claims, has turned to the work of Levinas, in whom this ethical demand for a philosophy of alterity finds its most overt articulation. This chapter argues that the philosophy of alterity has never been properly adhered to because of the lack of philosophy of love. It argues against truth as epistemology, and for truth as the eruption of a specific event, and that event is characterized through a specific configuration of love. It attempts to clear the way for the claim that in the postmodern mood in philosophy, there is a rehabilitation of a specific inflection of love as a determinant of thinking.Less
Much contemporary theory, exercised by the problematical nature of the validation or legitimation of truth-claims, has turned to the work of Levinas, in whom this ethical demand for a philosophy of alterity finds its most overt articulation. This chapter argues that the philosophy of alterity has never been properly adhered to because of the lack of philosophy of love. It argues against truth as epistemology, and for truth as the eruption of a specific event, and that event is characterized through a specific configuration of love. It attempts to clear the way for the claim that in the postmodern mood in philosophy, there is a rehabilitation of a specific inflection of love as a determinant of thinking.
Francis Watson
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- February 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780195383355
- eISBN:
- 9780199870561
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195383355.003.0002
- Subject:
- Religion, Biblical Studies, History of Christianity
It is commonly assumed that "Darwin" represents the triumph of scientific rationality over scripture and superstition—an assumption combining ignorance of history with a philosophically naïve account ...
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It is commonly assumed that "Darwin" represents the triumph of scientific rationality over scripture and superstition—an assumption combining ignorance of history with a philosophically naïve account of "truth." Before the seventeenth century, it was widely accepted that biblical interpretation and natural philosophy should each articulate the truth about the world in its own way, without the unnatural conflation or harmonizing of their respective stories into a single framework. The harmonistic model arose in the context of geological investigation, which initially appealed to the Genesis creation and flood narratives to interpret the fossil record and later sought to adapt the scriptural narratives to the modern geological discovery that the world is much older than previously thought. In all of this, scriptural narrative is removed from its natural habitat and forced to serve interests quite alien to it. The significance of Darwin is that, in developing his distinctive biological theories, he did not seek to coordinate them with scripture—thereby liberating scripture from science, and science from its own misuse of scripture.Less
It is commonly assumed that "Darwin" represents the triumph of scientific rationality over scripture and superstition—an assumption combining ignorance of history with a philosophically naïve account of "truth." Before the seventeenth century, it was widely accepted that biblical interpretation and natural philosophy should each articulate the truth about the world in its own way, without the unnatural conflation or harmonizing of their respective stories into a single framework. The harmonistic model arose in the context of geological investigation, which initially appealed to the Genesis creation and flood narratives to interpret the fossil record and later sought to adapt the scriptural narratives to the modern geological discovery that the world is much older than previously thought. In all of this, scriptural narrative is removed from its natural habitat and forced to serve interests quite alien to it. The significance of Darwin is that, in developing his distinctive biological theories, he did not seek to coordinate them with scripture—thereby liberating scripture from science, and science from its own misuse of scripture.
Toshimasa Yasukata
- Published in print:
- 2003
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780195144949
- eISBN:
- 9780199834891
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195144945.003.0006
- Subject:
- Religion, Philosophy of Religion
Elucidates Lessing's ideal of humanity, the ideal that finds poetic and literary expression in Nathan the Wise. The parable of the three rings, the starting point for the plot that stands at the ...
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Elucidates Lessing's ideal of humanity, the ideal that finds poetic and literary expression in Nathan the Wise. The parable of the three rings, the starting point for the plot that stands at the center of the entire work, offers a clue to Lessing's religious idea of humanity. We construe this famous parable as implying not only Lessing's attitude toward positive religions but also his view as to the meaning of the truth claim of a historical religion in this “interim” between the beginning and the end of history. It is observed that Lessing's idea of humanity as illustrated by this drama and by the parable in particular, is suffused with deep piety and a noble wisdom free of prejudice. The essence of Nathan's reason as illustrated in Act 4, Scene 7 suggests that the essential core of Lessingian reason is formed by a “believing reason” or “hearkening reason” which, fully aware of its own limitations, opens itself to the decrees of the reason‐transcending deity.Less
Elucidates Lessing's ideal of humanity, the ideal that finds poetic and literary expression in Nathan the Wise. The parable of the three rings, the starting point for the plot that stands at the center of the entire work, offers a clue to Lessing's religious idea of humanity. We construe this famous parable as implying not only Lessing's attitude toward positive religions but also his view as to the meaning of the truth claim of a historical religion in this “interim” between the beginning and the end of history. It is observed that Lessing's idea of humanity as illustrated by this drama and by the parable in particular, is suffused with deep piety and a noble wisdom free of prejudice. The essence of Nathan's reason as illustrated in Act 4, Scene 7 suggests that the essential core of Lessingian reason is formed by a “believing reason” or “hearkening reason” which, fully aware of its own limitations, opens itself to the decrees of the reason‐transcending deity.
C. Kavin Rowe
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- September 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780195377873
- eISBN:
- 9780199869459
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195377873.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Early Christian Studies
This book engages constructively the cultural power of the theological vision of the Acts of the Apostles. According to Acts, the apocalypse of God in Jesus of Nazareth entails the formation of a new ...
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This book engages constructively the cultural power of the theological vision of the Acts of the Apostles. According to Acts, the apocalypse of God in Jesus of Nazareth entails the formation of a new culture. On the one hand, this new culture is constituted in such a way as necessarily to disrupt basic patterns of pagan existence—to the extent that one can speak of the potential for cultural dissolution; on the other, the Christians resolutely reject accusations of governmental overthrow and sedition. How the Christians embody the possibility of cultural disintegration and claim legal innocence before the Roman authorities are two aspects of one complex dialectic that informs Luke's total project: to narrate the inextricable interconnection between God's revelation and a total pattern of life. The dialectic in Luke's writing exhibits the theological effort to redescribe cultural dismantling as the light and forgiveness of God: the deconstructive move of the apocalypse to the Gentiles has its reconstructive counterpart in the creation of a people who receive light in darkness, forgiveness of sins, and guidance in the way of peace. The theological vision of Acts confronts its modern interpreters with a number of pressing questions about claims to universal truth about God and the politics such claims produce. The book thus concludes with an extended reflection on the intersection between Acts' vision and current ways of thinking about religious truth, tolerance, and politics.Less
This book engages constructively the cultural power of the theological vision of the Acts of the Apostles. According to Acts, the apocalypse of God in Jesus of Nazareth entails the formation of a new culture. On the one hand, this new culture is constituted in such a way as necessarily to disrupt basic patterns of pagan existence—to the extent that one can speak of the potential for cultural dissolution; on the other, the Christians resolutely reject accusations of governmental overthrow and sedition. How the Christians embody the possibility of cultural disintegration and claim legal innocence before the Roman authorities are two aspects of one complex dialectic that informs Luke's total project: to narrate the inextricable interconnection between God's revelation and a total pattern of life. The dialectic in Luke's writing exhibits the theological effort to redescribe cultural dismantling as the light and forgiveness of God: the deconstructive move of the apocalypse to the Gentiles has its reconstructive counterpart in the creation of a people who receive light in darkness, forgiveness of sins, and guidance in the way of peace. The theological vision of Acts confronts its modern interpreters with a number of pressing questions about claims to universal truth about God and the politics such claims produce. The book thus concludes with an extended reflection on the intersection between Acts' vision and current ways of thinking about religious truth, tolerance, and politics.
William J. Wainwright (ed.)
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- April 2005
- ISBN:
- 9780195138092
- eISBN:
- 9780199835348
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195138090.001.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Philosophy of Religion
The philosophy of religion as a distinct discipline is an innovation of the last 200 years, but its central topics—the existence and nature of the divine, humankind’s relation to it, the nature of ...
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The philosophy of religion as a distinct discipline is an innovation of the last 200 years, but its central topics—the existence and nature of the divine, humankind’s relation to it, the nature of religion, and the place of religion in human life—have been with us since the inception of philosophy. Philosophers have long critically examined the truth of and rational justification for religious claims, and have explored such philosophically interesting phenomena as faith, religious experience, and the distinctive features of religious discourse. The second half of the twentieth century was an especially fruitful period, with philosophers using new developments in logic and epistemology to mount both sophisticated defenses of, and attacks on, religious claims. The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Religion contains newly commissioned chapters by twenty-one prominent experts who cover the field in a comprehensive but accessible manner. Each chapter is expository, critical, and representative of a distinctive viewpoint. The Handbook is divided into two parts. The first, “Problems,” covers the most frequently discussed topics, among them arguments for God’s existence, the nature of God’s attributes, religious pluralism, the problem of evil, and religious epistemology. The second, “Approaches,” contains four essays assessing the advantages and disadvantages of different methods of practicing philosophy of religion—analytic, Wittgensteinian, continental, and feminist.Less
The philosophy of religion as a distinct discipline is an innovation of the last 200 years, but its central topics—the existence and nature of the divine, humankind’s relation to it, the nature of religion, and the place of religion in human life—have been with us since the inception of philosophy. Philosophers have long critically examined the truth of and rational justification for religious claims, and have explored such philosophically interesting phenomena as faith, religious experience, and the distinctive features of religious discourse. The second half of the twentieth century was an especially fruitful period, with philosophers using new developments in logic and epistemology to mount both sophisticated defenses of, and attacks on, religious claims. The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Religion contains newly commissioned chapters by twenty-one prominent experts who cover the field in a comprehensive but accessible manner. Each chapter is expository, critical, and representative of a distinctive viewpoint. The Handbook is divided into two parts. The first, “Problems,” covers the most frequently discussed topics, among them arguments for God’s existence, the nature of God’s attributes, religious pluralism, the problem of evil, and religious epistemology. The second, “Approaches,” contains four essays assessing the advantages and disadvantages of different methods of practicing philosophy of religion—analytic, Wittgensteinian, continental, and feminist.
Peter J. Steinberger
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- September 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780748693627
- eISBN:
- 9781474408721
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748693627.003.0003
- Subject:
- Political Science, International Relations and Politics
This chapter provides an account of the concept of state, the implications of which should be important for thinking clearly about what happens when nations engage one another in the international ...
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This chapter provides an account of the concept of state, the implications of which should be important for thinking clearly about what happens when nations engage one another in the international arena. It first considers the enterprise of the state by examining a single, ostensibly trivial but nonetheless highly representative example of state activity. Reflecting on this example, it suggests that the state is best understood as what is sometimes called a universe of discourse; and examines, in that context, the process by which implicit truth-claims are problematized and become the subject matter for rational reconstruction. It argues that the model of the state as a universe of discourse is superior in several respects to the traditional model of the state as a kind of organism. It traces out some of the consequences of this claim for the understanding of politics.Less
This chapter provides an account of the concept of state, the implications of which should be important for thinking clearly about what happens when nations engage one another in the international arena. It first considers the enterprise of the state by examining a single, ostensibly trivial but nonetheless highly representative example of state activity. Reflecting on this example, it suggests that the state is best understood as what is sometimes called a universe of discourse; and examines, in that context, the process by which implicit truth-claims are problematized and become the subject matter for rational reconstruction. It argues that the model of the state as a universe of discourse is superior in several respects to the traditional model of the state as a kind of organism. It traces out some of the consequences of this claim for the understanding of politics.
Aaron Langenfeld
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780823278404
- eISBN:
- 9780823280513
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Fordham University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5422/fordham/9780823278404.003.0004
- Subject:
- Religion, Theology
Aaron Langenfeld reflects on how the discipline of comparative theology should be related to the normative grounds for religious truth claims to which theology as a whole is committed. Confirming a ...
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Aaron Langenfeld reflects on how the discipline of comparative theology should be related to the normative grounds for religious truth claims to which theology as a whole is committed. Confirming a fundamental characteristic of comparative theology, he proposes that this challenge cannot be met if the question of truth is neglected; rather, it must be preserved as the central focus in concrete comparative work. To justify this proposition, in his Christian-Muslim work on salvation Langenfeld elaborates a fundamental insight regarding the Muslim critique of Christian anthropology, particularly regarding the concept of original sin, which is presumed in the Christian understanding of salvation and redemption. Langenfeld suggests we can see more easily how comparative theology really does proceed like other substantive forms of theology and thus is fairly measured by familiar theological standards, even if breaking new ground interreligiously.Less
Aaron Langenfeld reflects on how the discipline of comparative theology should be related to the normative grounds for religious truth claims to which theology as a whole is committed. Confirming a fundamental characteristic of comparative theology, he proposes that this challenge cannot be met if the question of truth is neglected; rather, it must be preserved as the central focus in concrete comparative work. To justify this proposition, in his Christian-Muslim work on salvation Langenfeld elaborates a fundamental insight regarding the Muslim critique of Christian anthropology, particularly regarding the concept of original sin, which is presumed in the Christian understanding of salvation and redemption. Langenfeld suggests we can see more easily how comparative theology really does proceed like other substantive forms of theology and thus is fairly measured by familiar theological standards, even if breaking new ground interreligiously.
Eric Tagliacozzo and Andrew Willford
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- June 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780804760201
- eISBN:
- 9780804772402
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Stanford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.11126/stanford/9780804760201.003.0001
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Anthropology, Theory and Practice
This chapter takes a look at how history and anthropology reveal the contingencies of knowledge-production. This refers to the terms of expertise that produce disciplinary knowledge and ...
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This chapter takes a look at how history and anthropology reveal the contingencies of knowledge-production. This refers to the terms of expertise that produce disciplinary knowledge and evidentiary-based truth claims and the servicing of such truths in the name of cultural and political projects. The chapter skims the preceding chapters and examines the intersection between history and anthropology.Less
This chapter takes a look at how history and anthropology reveal the contingencies of knowledge-production. This refers to the terms of expertise that produce disciplinary knowledge and evidentiary-based truth claims and the servicing of such truths in the name of cultural and political projects. The chapter skims the preceding chapters and examines the intersection between history and anthropology.
Matthew Kohrman
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520226449
- eISBN:
- 9780520935563
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520226449.003.0005
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Medical Anthropology
This chapter considers the case of Ma Zhun, a woman who was denied a disabled identification (ID) card by the China Disabled Persons' Federation (CDPF). It explains that Ma Zhun went the Federation's ...
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This chapter considers the case of Ma Zhun, a woman who was denied a disabled identification (ID) card by the China Disabled Persons' Federation (CDPF). It explains that Ma Zhun went the Federation's office because she was told by her employer that getting an ID card was her only chance of keeping her job and that her request was denied because she was only missing toes on one foot. The chapter examines the CDPF's formulation of a set of truth claims about what comprises canji as a distinct sphere of alterity and about what constitutes China as a distinct national locality.Less
This chapter considers the case of Ma Zhun, a woman who was denied a disabled identification (ID) card by the China Disabled Persons' Federation (CDPF). It explains that Ma Zhun went the Federation's office because she was told by her employer that getting an ID card was her only chance of keeping her job and that her request was denied because she was only missing toes on one foot. The chapter examines the CDPF's formulation of a set of truth claims about what comprises canji as a distinct sphere of alterity and about what constitutes China as a distinct national locality.
Saida Hodžić
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- September 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780520291980
- eISBN:
- 9780520965577
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520291980.003.0004
- Subject:
- Anthropology, African Cultural Anthropology
Chapter 3, When Cutting Did and Did Not End, examines how it is that the discourse of FGM lives on, despite the demise of cutting. Although cutting is on the wane in Ghana, the discourse of its ...
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Chapter 3, When Cutting Did and Did Not End, examines how it is that the discourse of FGM lives on, despite the demise of cutting. Although cutting is on the wane in Ghana, the discourse of its “intractability” is used to produce suspect citizens and to legitimate punitive rationality and “Zero Tolerance” campaigns and legislation. This chapter shows how social science “evidence” is mobilized to support truth claims that rural communities “resist” anti-cutting campaigns and continue to practice cutting “underground.” It also refracts the endings of cutting through the lens of nostalgia: former circumcisers long for the ancestral benevolence that cutting secured for them, and uncut Ghanaians bemoan the disappearance of the traditional patriarchal values they believe cutting upheld.Less
Chapter 3, When Cutting Did and Did Not End, examines how it is that the discourse of FGM lives on, despite the demise of cutting. Although cutting is on the wane in Ghana, the discourse of its “intractability” is used to produce suspect citizens and to legitimate punitive rationality and “Zero Tolerance” campaigns and legislation. This chapter shows how social science “evidence” is mobilized to support truth claims that rural communities “resist” anti-cutting campaigns and continue to practice cutting “underground.” It also refracts the endings of cutting through the lens of nostalgia: former circumcisers long for the ancestral benevolence that cutting secured for them, and uncut Ghanaians bemoan the disappearance of the traditional patriarchal values they believe cutting upheld.
Jürgen Schaflechner
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- January 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780190850524
- eISBN:
- 9780190850555
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780190850524.003.0002
- Subject:
- Religion, Hinduism
In the first chapter, the author evaluates the various possibilities to engage with the empirical material collected for this book. Due to the shrine’s new accessibility, paired with its recent ...
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In the first chapter, the author evaluates the various possibilities to engage with the empirical material collected for this book. Due to the shrine’s new accessibility, paired with its recent institutionalization, many formerly disconnected practices and narratives started to meet on a regular basis. Doing fieldwork at the site, together with engaging with a variety of texts and other media, the author was confronted with the question of how to organize all of these voices that uniformly claimed to speak the truth about the shrine and its annexed practices. Chapter 1 elaborates on the theoretical foundations of this work through a concept the author calls “the solidification of tradition.” Utilizing newer anthropological theories of the ontological turn and supplementing them with the political philosophy of post-foundationalism helps the author to produce his own engagement with the various truth-claims encountered during his research.Less
In the first chapter, the author evaluates the various possibilities to engage with the empirical material collected for this book. Due to the shrine’s new accessibility, paired with its recent institutionalization, many formerly disconnected practices and narratives started to meet on a regular basis. Doing fieldwork at the site, together with engaging with a variety of texts and other media, the author was confronted with the question of how to organize all of these voices that uniformly claimed to speak the truth about the shrine and its annexed practices. Chapter 1 elaborates on the theoretical foundations of this work through a concept the author calls “the solidification of tradition.” Utilizing newer anthropological theories of the ontological turn and supplementing them with the political philosophy of post-foundationalism helps the author to produce his own engagement with the various truth-claims encountered during his research.
Ayon Maharaj
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- November 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780190868239
- eISBN:
- 9780190868260
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780190868239.003.0004
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Philosophy of Religion
This chapter reconstructs from Sri Ramakrishna’s teachings a unique and philosophically sophisticated model of religious pluralism. For Sri Ramakrishna, God is infinite, so there are correspondingly ...
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This chapter reconstructs from Sri Ramakrishna’s teachings a unique and philosophically sophisticated model of religious pluralism. For Sri Ramakrishna, God is infinite, so there are correspondingly infinite ways of approaching and realizing God. Therefore, all religions and spiritual philosophies—both theistic and nontheistic—are salvifically effective paths to one common goal: God-realization, or the direct spiritual experience of God in any of His innumerable aspects or forms. Maharaj then examines Sri Ramakrishna’s response to the thorny problem of conflicting religious truth-claims. Sri Ramakrishna reconciles religious claims about the nature of the ultimate reality by claiming that every religion captures a uniquely real aspect of the impersonal-personal Infinite Reality. Regarding other types of religious truth-claims, Sri Ramakrishna maintains that while every religion errs on some points of doctrine, these errors do not substantially diminish the salvific efficacy of religions. Finally, Maharaj defends Sri Ramakrishna’s doctrine of religious pluralism against numerous objections.Less
This chapter reconstructs from Sri Ramakrishna’s teachings a unique and philosophically sophisticated model of religious pluralism. For Sri Ramakrishna, God is infinite, so there are correspondingly infinite ways of approaching and realizing God. Therefore, all religions and spiritual philosophies—both theistic and nontheistic—are salvifically effective paths to one common goal: God-realization, or the direct spiritual experience of God in any of His innumerable aspects or forms. Maharaj then examines Sri Ramakrishna’s response to the thorny problem of conflicting religious truth-claims. Sri Ramakrishna reconciles religious claims about the nature of the ultimate reality by claiming that every religion captures a uniquely real aspect of the impersonal-personal Infinite Reality. Regarding other types of religious truth-claims, Sri Ramakrishna maintains that while every religion errs on some points of doctrine, these errors do not substantially diminish the salvific efficacy of religions. Finally, Maharaj defends Sri Ramakrishna’s doctrine of religious pluralism against numerous objections.
Peter S. Fosl
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- August 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780262014083
- eISBN:
- 9780262265782
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- The MIT Press
- DOI:
- 10.7551/mitpress/9780262014083.003.0015
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Metaphysics/Epistemology
The main goal of this chapter is to describe the relationship between Hume’s skepticism and his naturalism, and in doing so demonstrate the way some of his most important recent commentators have ...
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The main goal of this chapter is to describe the relationship between Hume’s skepticism and his naturalism, and in doing so demonstrate the way some of his most important recent commentators have misunderstood both. It is not surprising that commentators have gotten things wrong, since both Hume’s skepticism and his naturalism are complex and, more importantly, inconsistent with one another. If one takes seriously the conclusions Hume reaches in those sections of his texts which address skepticism with regard to the senses and reason, it is easy to conclude that he can have no basis either for asserting claims about an independently and continuously existing natural reality or for reasoning out the lines of any naturalistic theory of the world and the humans who inhabit it. In spite of this, Hume does advance truth-claims—claims composing a positive, elaborate, naturalistic theory of the self, the world, and others.Less
The main goal of this chapter is to describe the relationship between Hume’s skepticism and his naturalism, and in doing so demonstrate the way some of his most important recent commentators have misunderstood both. It is not surprising that commentators have gotten things wrong, since both Hume’s skepticism and his naturalism are complex and, more importantly, inconsistent with one another. If one takes seriously the conclusions Hume reaches in those sections of his texts which address skepticism with regard to the senses and reason, it is easy to conclude that he can have no basis either for asserting claims about an independently and continuously existing natural reality or for reasoning out the lines of any naturalistic theory of the world and the humans who inhabit it. In spite of this, Hume does advance truth-claims—claims composing a positive, elaborate, naturalistic theory of the self, the world, and others.
