Book Review: Cloud of the Impossible: Negative Theology and Planetary Entanglement

Abstract

Cloud of Impossible: Negative Theology and Planetary Entanglement. By Catherine Keller. Insurrections: Critical Studies in Religion, Politics, and Culture. New York: Columbia University Press, 2015. 408 pp. $35.00 (paper).In Cloud of Impossible, Catherine Keller marches resolutely into tension between negative theologies and theologies of relation. Kellers project is a breath of fresh air for theologians who have long wanted to hold these two approaches together but have been unable to see a way forward. This book provides a third space (p. 313), a distinguishing feature of Kellers theology, in which to grapple with question that she does not explicitly pose until near end: How shall we greet unknown before us? (p. 286; authors italics). Keller leans into paradox of a constructively that attends to the tension between cloud of our nonknowing and crowd of our nonseparability (p. 31). She consults a cloud/ crowd of often unexpected witnesses, including not only theologians and philosophers but also poets, scientists, and indie rock groups: Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman, Max Planck, and band Cloud Cult all make appearances.The book is divided into three sections (plus a Before and After, introduction and conclusion), each titled with a word derived from fold, pli, Kellers key metaphor for both relation and apophasis: Complications, Explications, and Implications. In part 1 Keller traces her lineage in constructive theological tradition, with its concern for relational theology (chapter 1). In chapter 2 she offers a similar genealogy of negative/ theology, rooting it in Moses' mystical encounter with divine at Sinai (p. 50). She follows thread of luminous darkness through church fathers and mystical thinkers, culminating in anonymous Cloud of Unknowing (her title being a nod to this misty and mystical text). The section closes with Nicholas of Cusa, whose ideas about learned ignorance and God as possibility itself' (p. 110) provide crease along which Keller folds together pieces of her theology of apophatic entanglement (p. 6; author's italics).In part 2, Keller engages quantum physics, a field that she characterizes as preoccupied with a mystery just as theology has been. Our Spooky Entanglements (the title of chapter 4) or our mutual implication (enfoldedness) in one another's lives is expressed even in behavior of particles-and scientists do not quite know why. A treatment of process philosophy follows naturally in chapter 5, where Keller brings Gilles Deleuze and Alfred North Whitehead into conversation. Short chapters on Walt Whitman and Judith Butler conclude part 2. …