The Oxford Handbook of Theology and Modern European Thought

by Adams, Nicholas; Pattison, George; Ward, Graham

• ISBN13: 9780199601998
• ISBN10: 0199601992
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2013-05-05
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

'Modern European thought' describes a wide range of philosophies, cultural programmes, and political arguments developed in Europe in the period following the French Revolution. Throughout this period, many of the wide range of 'modernisms' (and anti-modernisms) had a distinctly religious and even theological character-not least when religion was subjected to the harshest criticism. Yet for all the breadth and complexity of modern European thought and, in particular, its relations to theology, a distinct body of themes and approaches recurred in each generation. Moreover, many of the issues that took intellectual shape in Europe are now global, rather than narrowly European, and, for good or ill, they form part of Europe's bequest to the world-from colonialism and the economic theories behind globalisation through to democracy to terrorism. This volume attempts to identify and comment on some of the most important of these. The thirty chapters are grouped into six thematic parts, moving from questions of identity and the self, through discussions of the human condition, the age of revolution, the world (both natural and technological), and knowledge methodologies, concluding with a section looking explicitly at how major theological themes have developed in modern European thought. The chapters engage with major thinkers including Kant, Hegel, Kierkegaard, Heidegger, Schleiermacher, Nietzsche, Dostoevsky, Barth, Rahner, Tillich, Bonhoeffer, Sartre, de Beauvoir, Wittgenstein, and Derrida, amongst many others. Taken together, these new essays provide a rich and reflective overview of the interchange between theology, philosophy and critical thought in Europe, over the past two hundred years.

Author Biography

Nicholas Adams is Senior Lecturer in Theology and Ethics, University of Edinburgh.

George Pattison is Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity, University of Oxford.

Graham Ward is Regius Professor of Divinity, University of Oxford.

Table of Contents

Introduction
Part I: Identity
1. The Self and the Good life, Clare Carlisle
2. Community (1) The Nation, Stephen Backhouse
3. Community (2): The City, Graham Ward
4. The Other, Pamela Anderson
5. Language, Steven Shakespeare
6. Freedom, Daphne Hampson
Part II: The Human Condition
7. Work and Labour, John Hughes
8. Suffering, Paul Fiddes
9. Death, George Pattison
10. Evil, Jennifer Geddes
11. Love, Werner Jeanrond
Part III: The Age of Revolution
12. Sovereignty, Luke Bretherton
13. Tradition, Tracey Rowland
14. Messianism, Judith Wolfe
15. Nihilism, Conor Cunningham
16. Sacrifice, Douglas Hedley
17. War and Peace, Stanley Hauerwas
Part IV: The World
18. Nature, Gordon Graham
19. The Sublime and the Beautiful, Ross Wilson
20. Time and History, Arne Gron
21. Technology, David Lewin
Part V: Ways of Knowing
22. Wissenschaft, Johannes Zachhuber
23. Hermeneutics, Jim Fodor
24. Phenomenology, Merold Westphal
25. The Metaphysics of Modernity, William Desmond
Part VI: Theology
26. The Bible, Nicholas Adams
27. Incarnation, David Law
28. Sacramentality, David Brown
29. Atonement, Simeon Zahl
30. Eschatology/ providence, David Fergusson
Afterword, Christoph Schwobel