Ernst Troeltsch and Liberal Theology

Ernst Troeltsch and Liberal Theology PDF Author: Mark Chapman
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 0191554367
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 234

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Book Description
This is the first discussion in English of the ethical implications of German liberal theology in the early years of the twentieth century. It avoids pejorative interpretative categories (such as `culture protestantism'), seeking instead to understand a much neglected period on its own terms. The leading figure, Ernst Troeltsch (1865-1923), is treated as a `public theologian', engaging at many different levels with his social and political context and trying to ensure that religion could continue to shape the future course of history. To understand his context he made use of the tools of the emergent discipline of sociology and also entered into dialogue with philosophers and historians. Troeltsch's public theology is contrasted with other liberal models of theology, particularly those of the New Testament scholar Wilhelm Bousset and the systematic theologian Wilhelm Herrmann, who were far more reluctant to engage seriously with their context and as a result isolated religion from its wider social and intellectual setting. Troeltsch's theological solution is also compared with Max Weber's sociological response to the problems of modernity: Troeltsch's ideas of cultural synthesis are seen as both constructive and critical and as having much to contribute to contemporary social and political theology.

Ernst Troeltsch and Liberal Theology

Ernst Troeltsch and Liberal Theology PDF Author: Mark Chapman
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 0191554367
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 234

Get Book Here

Book Description
This is the first discussion in English of the ethical implications of German liberal theology in the early years of the twentieth century. It avoids pejorative interpretative categories (such as `culture protestantism'), seeking instead to understand a much neglected period on its own terms. The leading figure, Ernst Troeltsch (1865-1923), is treated as a `public theologian', engaging at many different levels with his social and political context and trying to ensure that religion could continue to shape the future course of history. To understand his context he made use of the tools of the emergent discipline of sociology and also entered into dialogue with philosophers and historians. Troeltsch's public theology is contrasted with other liberal models of theology, particularly those of the New Testament scholar Wilhelm Bousset and the systematic theologian Wilhelm Herrmann, who were far more reluctant to engage seriously with their context and as a result isolated religion from its wider social and intellectual setting. Troeltsch's theological solution is also compared with Max Weber's sociological response to the problems of modernity: Troeltsch's ideas of cultural synthesis are seen as both constructive and critical and as having much to contribute to contemporary social and political theology.

The Spirit of American Liberal Theology

The Spirit of American Liberal Theology PDF Author: Gary Dorrien
Publisher: Presbyterian Publishing Corp
ISBN: 1646983300
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 661

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Book Description
The Spirit of American Liberal Theology is an interpretation of the entire U.S. American tradition of liberal theology. A highly condensed and far-more-accessible summary of Gary Dorrien’s three-volume trilogy, The Making of American Liberal Theology (Westminster John Knox Press 2001, 2003, and 2006), Dorrien here presses the argument that the most abundant, diverse, and persistent tradition of liberal theology is the one that blossomed in the United States and is still refashioning itself. While discussions of English and German liberalism persist, new material includes expanded treatment of the Black social gospel, the Universalists, developments into early 2020s, and a robust expression of the author’s post-Hegelian liberal-liberationist perspective.

Comparative Theology and the Problem of Religious Rivalry

Comparative Theology and the Problem of Religious Rivalry PDF Author: Hugh Nicholson
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 019984237X
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 345

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Book Description
In theological discourse, argues Hugh Nicholson, the political goes "all the way down." One never reaches a bedrock level of politically neutral religious facts, because all theological discourse - even the most sublime, edifying, and "spiritual"--is shot through with polemical elements. Liberal theologies, from the Christian fulfillment theology of the nineteenth century to the pluralist theology of the twentieth, have assumed that religious writings attain spiritual truth and sublimity despite any polemical elements they might contain. Through his analysis and comparison of the Christian mystical theologian Meister Eckhart and his Hindu counterpart ÍaSkara, Nicholson arrives at a very different conclusion. Polemical elements may in fact constitute the creative source of the expressive power of religious discourses. Wayne Proudfoot has argued that mystical discourses embody a set of rules that repel any determinate understanding of the ineffable object or experience they purport to describe. In Comparative Theology and the Problem of Religious Rivalry, Nicholson suggests that this principle of negation is connected, perhaps through a process of abstraction and sublimation, with the need to distinguish oneself from one's intra- and/or inter-religious adversaries. Nicholson proposes a new model of comparative theology that recognizes and confronts one of the most urgent cultural and political issues of our time: namely, the "return of the political" in the form of anti-secular and fundamentalist movements around the world. This model acknowledges the ineradicable nature of an oppositional dimension of religious discourse, while honoring and even advancing the liberal project of curtailing intolerance and prejudice in the sphere of religion.

Schleiermacher, the Study of Religion, and the Future of Theology

Schleiermacher, the Study of Religion, and the Future of Theology PDF Author: Brent W. Sockness
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter
ISBN: 3110216345
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 417

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Book Description
The past three decades have witnessed a significant transatlantic and trans-disciplinary resurgence of interest in the early nineteenth-century Protestant theologian and philosopher, Friedrich Schleiermacher (1768-1834). As the first major Christian thinker to theorize religion in a post-Enlightenment context and re-conceive the task of theology accordingly, Schleiermacher holds a seminal place in the histories of modern Christian thought and the modern academic study of religion alike. Whereas his “liberalism” and humanism have always made him a controversial figure among theological traditionalists, it is only recently that Schleiermacher’s understanding of religion has become the target of polemics from Religious Studies scholars keen to disassociate their discipline from its partial origins in liberal Protestantism. Schleiermacher, the Study of Religion, and the Future of Theology documents an important meeting in the history of Schleiermacher studies at which leading scholars from Europe and North America gathered to probe the viability of key features of Schleiermacher’s theological and philosophical program in light of its contested place in the study of religion.

Against False Apologetics

Against False Apologetics PDF Author: Brent W. Sockness
Publisher: Mohr Siebeck
ISBN: 9783161468612
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 278

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Book Description
"Brent W. Sockness takes as his point of departure the judgment frequently encountered in twentieth-century theological literature that the last great German liberal Protestant systematic theologians prior to the rise of dialectical theology, Wilhelm Herrmann (1846-1922) and Ernst Troeltsch (1865-1923), represent antithetical and paradigmatic alternatives in modern Christian theology. Going beyond the usual 'explanations' which invoke abstract allegiances (Kant vs. Schleiermacher, Marburg vs. Heidelberg neo-Kantianism, Ritschlianism vs. the History-of-Religions School), the author undertakes an exhaustive analysis of the nearly thirty years of mutual commentary, critique, and polemic which transpired between Herrmann and Troeltsch in both published and unpublished sources. Sockness charts the contours of their relations from their first encounters among the 'Friends of the Christian World,' through their increasingly hostile exchanges in the first decade of the century, to their personal reconciliation after the War."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

Protestant-Catholic Conflict from the Reformation to the 21st Century

Protestant-Catholic Conflict from the Reformation to the 21st Century PDF Author: John Wolffe
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137289732
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 373

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Book Description
Taking a fresh look at the roots and implications of the enduring major historic fissure in Western Christianity, this book presents new insights into the historical dynamics of Protestant-Catholic conflict while illuminating present-day contexts and suggesting comparisons for approaching other entrenched conflicts in which religion is implicated.

Religion, Theory, Critique

Religion, Theory, Critique PDF Author: Richard King
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231518242
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 558

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Book Description
Religion, Theory, Critique is an essential tool for learning about theory and method in the study of religion. Leading experts engage with contemporary and classical theories as well as non-Western cultural contexts. Unlike other collections, this anthology emphasizes the dynamic relationship between "religion" as an object of study and different methodological approaches and openly addresses the question of the manifold ways in which "religion," "secular," and "culture" are imagined within different disciplinary horizons. This volume is the first textbook which seeks to engage discussion of classical approaches with contemporary cultural and critical theories. Contributors write on the influence of the natural sciences in the study of religion; the role of European Christianity in modeling theories of religion; religious experience and the interface with cognitive science; the structure and function of religious language; the social-scientific study of religion; ritual in religion; the phenomenology of religion; critical theory and religion; embodiment and religion; the impact of colonialism and modernity; theorizing religion in terms of race and ethnicity; links among religion, nationalism, and globalization; the interplay of gender, sex, and religion; and religion and the environment. Each chapter introduces the topic, identifies key theorists and issues, and respects the pluralistic nature of the scholarship in the field. Altogether, this collection scrutinizes the explicit and implicit assumptions theorists make about religion as an object of analysis.

New Testament Theology

New Testament Theology PDF Author: George Bradford Caird
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 9780198263883
Category : Bible
Languages : en
Pages : 532

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Book Description
Exploring New Testament theology based on the conference table approach, this book examines the plan and the need for salvation as expressed by the writers of the New Testament.

Theology and the University in Nineteenth-Century Germany

Theology and the University in Nineteenth-Century Germany PDF Author: Zachary Purvis
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0191086150
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 402

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Book Description
Theology and the University in Nineteenth-Century Germany examines the dual transformation of institutions and ideas that led to the emergence of theology as science, the paradigmatic project of modern theology associated with Friedrich Schleiermacher. Beginning with earlier educational reforms across central Europe and especially following the upheavals of the Napoleonic period, an impressive list of provocateurs, iconoclasts, and guardians of the old faith all confronted the nature of the university, the organization of knowledge, and the unity of theology's various parts, quandaries which together bore the collective name of 'theological encyclopedia'. Schleiermacher's remarkably influential programme pioneered the structure and content of the theological curriculum and laid the groundwork for theology's historicization. Zachary Purvis offers a comprehensive investigation of Schleiermacher's programme through the era's two predominant schools: speculative theology and mediating theology. Purvis highlights that the endeavour ultimately collapsed in the context of Wilhelmine Germany and the Weimar Republic, beset by the rise of religious studies, radical disciplinary specialization, a crisis of historicism, and the attacks of dialectical theology. In short, the project represented university theology par excellence. Engaging in detail with these developments, Purvis weaves the story of modern university theology into the broader tapestry of German and European intellectual culture, with periodic comparisons to other national contexts. In doing so, he Purvis presents a substantially new way to understand the relationship between theology and the university, both in nineteenth-century Germany and, indeed, beyond.

Theology and the Soul of the Liberal State

Theology and the Soul of the Liberal State PDF Author: Leonard V. Kaplan
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 9780739126172
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 408

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Book Description
Conventional wisdom suggests that theology is necessarily unfriendly to the liberal state, but neither philosophical analysis nor empirical argument has convincingly established that conclusion. Examining the problem from a variety of perspectives, including law, philosophy, h...