In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:178 BOOK REVIEWS The Glory of the Lord: A Theological Aesthetics, II: Studies in Theological Style: Clerical Styles. By HANS URS VON BALTH.AS.AR. Translated by Andrew Louth, Francis McDonagh, and Brian McNeil, C.R.V. Edited by John Riches. San Francisco: Ignatius Press; New York: Crossroad, 1984. Pp. 362. This is the second volume of the translation of Hans Urs von Balthasar's H errlichkeit edited by Joseph Fessio and John (...) Riches, corresponding to the first part of the second volume of the original. The translation has been a joint project, and, if as a wsult it is more uneven than that of the first volume, with rare exceptions it is an accurate rendition into good English of the author's difficult German. The problems which the book presents to the reviewer do not stem from the translation, but from the subtlety of the theological viewpoint of the author himself-a viewpoint here manifest, if not in actu secundo, then in actu primo proximo, for this volume is given over to an examination of the thought of five " clerical " or "official " theologians (Irenaeus, Pseudo-Dionysius, Augustine, Anselm, and Bonaventure) whom von Balthasar has chosen because they exemplify that aesthetic integration of theological insight which the author considers to offer the sole means of avoiding the dead ends of systematization, these being those logical culs-de-sac into which the clerical theologians of the medieval schools, with the exception 'of a few such as Bonaventure, were carried by their mistaken devotion to a new project, typified by Thomism and dominant by the end of the thirteenth century, of enclosing the free unity and rational integrity of the truth revealed in Christ within the transcendentally necessary structures of the sterile immanentist rationalism which von Balthasar considers to be constitutive of all systematic thought. It would doubtless be possible to read this second volume with some profit, apart from any acquaintance with the first, but it would be to miss the context in which the theologies chosen for examination become luminous. In any event, this volume, like the first, is not to be read at a sitting, or merely once: the product of a lifetime's study, The Glory of the Lord must itself be studied, and the study should follow the sequence of the work itself. Von Balthasar's literary style is highly allusive, while his thought is at once subtle and dense; the combination imposes upon the reviewer a task of interpretation which can be undertaken only with some diffidence, yet the importance of. providing some sort of prolegomenon to the easily bewildering richness of this masterwork in order that it be made more ac- BOOK REVIEWS 179 cessible to the readership for whom its author and editors intend it must warrant the risk indissociable from such interpretation. At first hand, much of the reviewer's work is already done by the author in an introductory section, which in turn states the goal of the entire enterprise, that of providing concrete historical (" dramatic ") realizations of the " form" of Christ, " the glory of the Lord," which the first volume set forth as the norm of all valid theology. The theologies which do this are " beautiful," and by being so have a factual impact upon the history and culture of the faith. Von Balthasar then explains what is meant by theological "style:" the freedom of the theologian manifesting itself in giving a particular free but obedient form to the content of the revelation, whose Form is the glory of God. The author then recites the decline of "official " or " clerical " style of theology from the end of the thirteenth century, and points to the emergence of a new "lay " style in the later medieval period, a style which was to become normative in consequence of the effective abdication by the official scholastic theology from the properly theological task of seeking to understand ever more profoundly the ecclesial tradition of the revelation in Christ, in favor of the sterile academic commentary upon St. Thomas wherein scholasticism languished until the Enlightenment, and then from the neoThomist revival in the late nineteenth century until its final defeat by biblical scholarship in the recent past... (shrink)

Defending Life is arguably the most comprehensive defense of the pro-life position on abortion - morally, legally, and politically - that has ever been published in an academic monograph. It offers a detailed and critical analysis of Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey as well as arguments by those who defend a Rawlsian case for abortion-choice, such as J. J. Thomson. The author defends the substance view of persons as the view with the most explanatory power. The substance (...) view entails that the unborn is a subject of moral rights from conception. While defending this view, the author responds to the arguments of thinkers such as Boonin, Dworkin, Stretton, Ford and Brody. He also critiques Thomson's famous violinist argument and its revisions by Boonin and McDonagh. Defending Life includes chapters critiquing arguments found in popular politics and the controversy over cloning and stem cell research. (shrink)

Hans-Georg Gadamer and Paul Ricoeur were two of the most important hermeneutical philosophers of the twentieth century. Gadamer single-handedly revived hermeneutics as a philosophical field with his many essays and his masterpiece, Truth and Method. Ricoeur famously mediated the Gadamer-Habermas debate and advanced his own hermeneutical philosophy through a number of books addressing social theory, religion, psychoanalysis and political philosophy. This book brings Gadamer and Ricoeur into a hermeneutical conversation with each other through some of their most important commentators. Twelve (...) leading scholars deliver contemporary assessments of the history and promise of hermeneutical philosophy, providing focused discussion on the work of these two key hermeneutical thinkers. The book shows how the horizons of their thought at once support and question each other and how, in many ways, the work of these two pioneering philosophers defines the issues and agendas for the new century. (shrink)

Moloney, Francis J In 1996 the American sociologist, Rodney Stark, published a provocative sociological study called The Rise of Christianity. He wrote this book because his reading of the work of the historians of early Christianity showed that their history was good, but their sociology was nonexistent. He minimalised many theories about the rise of Christianity. Theologians and church historians regularly point to the transforming effect of the purity of the doctrine, the teaching of the resurrection, the blood of (...) the martyrs, a sacramental life, and other such central Christian beliefs and phenomena as the reasons for its rapid spread in the Roman Empire. Stark questions this, insisting that the fundamental motivation for the phenomenon was that the Christians cared for one another, especially their women. (shrink)

Catholics and Evangelical Protestants often find themselves on the same side on a variety of issues in bioethics. However, some Evangelicals have expressed reluctance to embrace the natural law reasoning used by Catholics in academic and policy debates. In this article, I argue that the primary concerns raised by Evangelicals about natural law reasoning are, ironically, concerns expressed by and intrinsic to the natural law tradition itself. To show this, I address two types of Protestant critics: the Frustrated Fellow Traveler (...) and the Solo Scripturist. (shrink)

Psychologism in logic is the doctrine that the semantic content of logical terms is in some way a feature of human psychology. We consider the historically influential version of the doctrine, Psychological Individualism, and the many counter-arguments to it. We then propose and assess various modifications to the doctrine that might allow it to avoid the classical objections. We call these Psychological Descriptivism, Teleological Cognitive Architecture, and Ideal Cognizers. These characterizations give some order to the wide range of modern views (...) that are seen as psychologistic because of one or another feature. Although these can avoid some of the classic objections to psychologism, some still hold. (shrink)

Although the notion of physician value neutrality in medicine may be traced back to the writings of Sir William Osler, it is relatively new to medicine and medical ethics. We argue in this paper that how physician value neutrality has been cashed out is often obscure and its defense not persuasive. In addition, we argue that the social/political implementation of neutrality, Political Liberalism, fails, and thus, PVN's case is weakened, for PVN's justification relies largely on the reasoning undergirding PL. For (...) these reasons, we conclude that PVN has no philosophical or ethical warrant and thus should be abandoned. We suggest that the physician present to her patients some type of statement or creed that would give them an idea of where she stands on important axiological issues and how these stands are cashed out clinically. (shrink)

We share Minkoff et al.’s (2024) concern regarding the potential disavowal of pregnant patients’ right to refuse medical interventions, without or against their explicit consent, aimed at preservin...

This article critically assesses an account of religious liberty often associated with several legal and political philosophers: Ronald Dworkin, John Rawls, and Christopher Eisgruber and Lawrence Sager. Calling it the Religion as Comprehensive Doctrine approach, the author contrasts it with an account often attributed to John Locke and the American Founders Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, the Two Sovereigns approach. He argues that the latter provides an important corrective to RCD’s chief weakness: RCD eliminates from our vision those aspects of (...) religious belief and practice that most conventional religious believers would consider essential to their faith. (shrink)

Moloney, Francis J Jesus' teaching on divorce is a question of central importance to the Christian churches. The ministry of Pope Francis, and the agenda of the Synod of Bishops on the Family, has again drawn attention to the issue. Given the paucity of material on marriage and divorce in the entire Bible, it is not surprising that very little material in the New Testament is dedicated to Jesus' attitude to the issue. But what is found in Paul, (...) Mark, Matthew and Luke is confronting to contemporary sensitivities, and calls for clear analysis. An uncritical affirmation that Jesus prohibited divorce does not do justice to what is recalled in our inspired Scriptures. The fact that he did so must be given its due importance, but Jesus' prohibition of divorce and remarriage is not the only word on marriage and divorce in the pages of the New Testament. A neglect of the subtleties expressed across the pastoral and theological reinterpretations of Paul, Mark, and Matthew, accepted by the church as the inspired Word of God, call for close attention. (shrink)

This book is an extended argument for the critical importance which justice and ethical leadership should have in business ethics education. The book examines the history of ideas and purposes in education, the contemporary role of business schools, and the social foundations of moral education to conclude that the pragmatic pursuit of the good must be a central aim of business strategy. To meet the challenges of facing society today, the masters of business must be moral craftsmen in a just (...) and democratic private property economy that serves the common good. The author grounds this vision for business leadership in the centrality of systems of exchange in human society, in generating prosperity and providing for the general welfare. Business ethics education has focused primarily on moral formation of individual leaders and managers in the context of ethical codes, organizational culture, and legal compliance. Important as this approach is, it fails to generate a sufficient level of business responsibility to satisfy legitimate social concerns regarding the use of natural resources, environmental sustainability, reasonable limitation of systemic risk in capital markets, and fair allocation of goods and services. If the social purpose of business is not intentionally embraced and diligently pursued, the economy may enrich a few but impoverish the society, its resources, and its democracy. Hence this book argues for a new vision of business ethics that is grounded in public accountability of business operations and outcomes for the common good, as a matter of justice. (shrink)

The purpose of this essay is to offer support for the substance view of persons, the philosophical anthropology defended by Patrick Lee in his essay. In order to accomplish this the author presents a brief definition of the substance view; argues that the substance view has more explanatory power in accounting for why we believe that human persons are intrinsically valuable even when they are not functioning as such, why human persons remain identical to themselves over time, and why it (...) follows from these points that the unborn are human persons; and responds to two arguments that attempt to establish the claim that the early human being is not a unified substance until at least fourteen days after conception. (shrink)

The name of Gerhard PODSKALSKY is well known to all Byzantinists and his works on Russian Christianity and theology (988–1237) and Greek theology (1453–1821) published by Beck in 1982 and 1988 respectively have become classic works of reference. Since both Bulgaria and Serbia were the Empire's immediate neighbours and at various times integral parts of the Byzantine Empire this book is of greater importance for the Byzantinist than the previous two and without any doubt it will find a place in (...) every scholar's library. In his preface the author stresses (p. VII) that the book has been written with Western scholars in mind and for this reason he not only gives brief summaries of the contents of all original Slav works but also lists translations in Western languages of the works discussed, which makes the book invaluable for scholars who do not have a working knowledge of Slavonic and modern Slav languages. (shrink)

Discusses Derrida as a religious thinker, reading Dante’s Commedia and Derrida’s religious writings together.

_Discusses Derrida as a religious thinker, reading Dante’s Commedia and Derrida’s religious writings together._.

As this quotation indicates, the development of Gadamer’s philosophical hermeneutics over the years has been characterized by a tension arising from the desire both to differentiate his thought from Hegel’s and to identify with it in an abiding spirit of agreement. The effect has been a noteworthy shift of emphasis in Gadamer’s relationship to Hegel as he has moved from a “profiling” stance in Wahrheit und Methode to one of appropriation in his more recent essays. My goal here is to (...) examine this shift of emphasis and to reflect on its philosophical significance. This will be done in three stages: first, we shall examine the way Gadamer “profiles” himself against Hegel in Wahrheit und Methode by highlighting different shades of meaning that emerge from the notion that “the true is the whole” when that notion is rethought “from the center of language”; second, we shall revisit with Gadamer the “neighborhood of the great teacher of concrete universality, Hegel,” in order to appropriate the enduring significance of this Hegelian theme for hermeneutics as an evocation of the way reason works in history to achieve freedom; and finally, we shall reflect upon the way in which the thinking of Hegel and Gadamer “belong-together” in their relation of difference amid identity, and upon the significance this has for our own thinking regarding the way in which the questions of truth and freedom belong-together in human existence. (shrink)

As this quotation indicates, the development of Gadamer’s philosophical hermeneutics over the years has been characterized by a tension arising from the desire both to differentiate his thought from Hegel’s and to identify with it in an abiding spirit of agreement. The effect has been a noteworthy shift of emphasis in Gadamer’s relationship to Hegel as he has moved from a “profiling” stance in Wahrheit und Methode to one of appropriation in his more recent essays. My goal here is to (...) examine this shift of emphasis and to reflect on its philosophical significance. This will be done in three stages: first, we shall examine the way Gadamer “profiles” himself against Hegel in Wahrheit und Methode by highlighting different shades of meaning that emerge from the notion that “the true is the whole” when that notion is rethought “from the center of language”; second, we shall revisit with Gadamer the “neighborhood of the great teacher of concrete universality, Hegel,” in order to appropriate the enduring significance of this Hegelian theme for hermeneutics as an evocation of the way reason works in history to achieve freedom; and finally, we shall reflect upon the way in which the thinking of Hegel and Gadamer “belong-together” in their relation of difference amid identity, and upon the significance this has for our own thinking regarding the way in which the questions of truth and freedom belong-together in human existence. (shrink)

To find more information on Rowman & Littlefield titles, please visit us at www.rowmanlittlefield.com.