Theological Investigations Research Articles

Book Review: Theological Investigations Volume 20

Book Review: Theological Investigations Volume 20

Theological Investigations

Theological Investigations

Book Review: Theological Investigations

Book Review: Theological Investigations

Review of Book: Theological Investigations Vol. XVII, Jesus, Man and the Church

Review of Book: Theological Investigations Vol. XVII, Jesus, Man and the Church

Theological Investigations: Volume XVI by Karl Rahner, S. J., and: The Acting Person by Karol Wojtyla

BOOK REVIEWS Theological Investigations: Volume XVI. By KARL RABNER, S. J. New York: The Seabury Press, 1979. Pp. xii + Q75, with index. $14.95. The Acting Person. By KAROL WoJTYLA. Boston: D. Reidel, 1979. Pp. xxiii + 367, with index. By reviewing these two books together we should be able to compare the anthropologies of Karol Wojtyla and Karl Rahner. Clearly, The Acting Person is an essay in philosophical anthropology. While the most recent volume of Rahner's Theological Investigations is more diversified in scope, the human person remains sufficiently in the forefront to found a comparative essay. Given the probably greater familiarity of the reader with the thought of Rahner, I shall use Wojtyla's book as the point of departure and give it a lengthier treatment. Discussing each author in turn will help to provide a brief overview of their works as a basis for a presentation of their views on human transcendence and freedom. In this way we can achieve a sharper focus. The simple devout soul who stumbles into a religious book store and, moved by the impressive cover picture of His Holiness in full regalia, purchases The Acting Person for devotional reading will find his or her perseverance sorely tried. This is a difficult volume. The prose as translated from Polish is turgid and makes for laborious reading. To read this book once is to read it twice; one must continually reread what one has just read. But such writing is not peculiar to philosophers. And the depth of analysis is remarkable. Wojtyla's understanding of man is comprehensive and detailed. At times repetitious, he seldom veers from his chosen theme. Wojtyla begins with methodology. The focus is upon experience, and the approach is in the line of phenomenological realism. The author claims that his work is consistent with traditional philosophy, which he identifies as Aristotelian-Thomistic philosophy (p. xiii) . Yet his presentation is a rethinking and recasting of the tradition, not denying it, " but supplementing it in an attempt to rethink it to the end " (p. Q66) . In this rethinking he especially acknowledges the influence of Max Scheler's Wertethik. Wojtyla seeks by his phenomenological approach to explain what experience and intuition provide. Part One is entitled " Consciousness and Efficacy ". The focus is on the person as revealed through conscious action. The various dynamisms are considered along with the proper efficacy of the human person. In Part Two we find " The Transcendence of the Person in the Action ". Here the structure of freedom is considered in relationship to the problem of the will and the cognition of truth and value as it leads to choice and decision. 472 BOOK REVIEWS 473 Throughout, the complexity is underlined. The study turns to freedom as manifested in self-determination, then to the possibility of fulfillment, and the role of conscience and responsibility. Part Three moves to the complement of transcendence, namely " The Integration of the Person in the Action ". Here, the person's subjectivity as manifested through the body is considered, with an extensive treatment of the emotions. Part Four is entitled "Participation", and turns to the problem of Intersubjectivity and social being. But what is the purpose of this book? It is of course to " exfoliate the complexity of man". Yet the aim seems to be more than analytical. Granted that throughout the volume the author concentrates upon the dynamic interaction and unity of the person and action, these are seen as leading to the true and authentic attainment of freedom and fulfillment. The becoming of the person through genuine freedom and the fulfillment gained through action appear as a guiding thread through this discourse on man. To grasp Wojtyla's idea of freedom and how is it related to transcendence and action much groundwork is needed. Wojtyla thoroughly analyzes action. Action discloses the person; better, the person is manifested through action. The author firmly renounces a static human nature as grounding human acts. The dynamic nature of man is thoroughly accepted. Contrasting this contemporary approach with a more traditional philosophy of man, the Polish philosopher notes that for the latter man's nature is rational, he is a person in virtue of reason, and his rationality...

Theological Investigations, Vol. XVI: Experience of the Spirit: Source of Theology. By Karl Rahner. Translated by David MorlandO.S.B., New York: Seabury, 1979. xii + 275 pages. $14.95.

Theological Investigations, Vol. XVI: Experience of the Spirit: Source of Theology. By Karl Rahner. Translated by David MorlandO.S.B., New York: Seabury, 1979. xii + 275 pages. $14.95.

REVIEWS

Recherches dans la foi. By Henri dc Lubac Theological Investigations, Vol. XVI. By Karl Rahner Explorations in Theology, 4. By Maurice Wiles Explorations in Theology, 5. By Donald MacKinnon The Phenomenon of Christianity. By Ninian Smart Incarnation and Myth: the Debate Continued. Edited by Michael Goulder The Debate About Christ. By Don Cupitt Christian Priesthood Examined. By Richard Hanson The Eucharist and Human Liberation. By Tissa Balasuriya The Open Secret: Sketches for a Missionary Theology. By Lesslie Newbigin The Church and Unity. By Basil Christopher Butler Contemplation and Action in World Religions: Selected Papers from the Rothko Chapel Colloquium ‘Traditional Modes of Contemplation and Action’. Edited by Yusuf Ibish and Ileana Marculescu Alternative Altars: Unconventional and Eastern Spirituality in America. By Robert S. Ellwood, Jr Samson: A Secret Betrayed, A Vow Ignored. By James L. Crenshaw When Prophecy Failed: Reactions and Response to Failure in the Old Testament Prophetic Traditions. By Robert P. Carroll The Triumph of Impotence. By Dermot Cox Holy Bible. New International Version. Sponsored by New York International Bible Society A Greek‐English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature. By Walter Bauer, translated and adapted by W.F. Arndt and F.W. Gingrich. Second Edition, revised and augmented by F.W. Gingrich and F.W. Danker A Complete Categorized Greek‐English New Testament Vocabulary. By David Holly A Grammatical Analysis of the Greek New Testament. By Max Zerwick and Mary Grosvenor. Vol II, Epistles‐Apocalypse Paul: Crisis in Galatia: A Study in Early Christian Theology. By George Howard The Making of Late Antiquity. By Peter Brown St Nicholas of Myra, Bari and Manhattan. By C.W. Jones Sir Philip Sidney and the Poetics of Protestantism: A Study of Contexts. By Andrew D. Weiner Classical Influences on Western Thought A.D. 1650–1870. Edited by R.R. Bolgar The Letters and Diaries of John Henry Newman. Volumes II and III. Edited by Ian Ker and Thomas Gomall Church and State in Yugoslavia since 1945. By Stella Alexander A History of African Christianity 1950–1975. By Adrian Hastings The Tory Islanders. A People of the Celtic Fringe. By Robin Fox Ulysses and the Sirens. By Jon Elster Reliable Knowledge: An Exploration of the Grounds for Belief in Science. By John Ziman Being qua Being. By Panayot Butchvarov Aquinas: God and Action. By David B. Burrell Obscenity and Community Standards

Rahner Retrospective: I‐Rupturing Der Pianische Monolithismus

In the preface to the thirteenth volume of his Schriften zur Theologie, which appeared in 1978, Karl Rahner speaks of a fourteenth volume as nearing readiness for the press and to be published in late 1979 (to the best of my knowledge it has not yet appeared), and, although he does not say so in so many words, his tone suggests that the fourteenth will be the last of the series which began in 1954. Since the appearance in 1961 of Cornelius Ernst’s translation of the first volume, and the inauguration of Rahner’s Theological Investigations (with an allusion to Wittgenstein in the title), the English version has kept pace very creditably, despite inexorably rising costs and perceptible decline in concern with systematic theology, not to mention the difficulty of finding competent translators. The publication of Theological Investigations XVI, admirably translated by David Morland of Ampleforth, giving us the first half of Schriften XII (1975), the volume which Rahner dedicated to his mother on her hundredth birthday, offers an opportunity to review the series so far, and perhaps to underline the author’s most characteristic perspectives and concerns, or at any rate to outline pathways in this forbiddingly massive corpus of some 7000 pages of text.It should be noted at the outset that the first six volumes of the English translation correspond exactly to the first six volumes of the original. As Rahner’s productivity was released in the wake of the Vatican Council his collected essays became increasingly substantial. The densely printed German volumes proved too unwieldy for us, with the result that the next four volumes to appear were split in two and thus yielded eight volumes in the English edition. The eleventh volume of the Schriften is the only exception to the rule that the series is devoted to miscellanies of articles, lecture texts and so on, by being confined entirely to Rahner’s work on the history of the sacrament of penance.

Review of Book: Theological Investigations Volume Sixteen — Experience of the Spirit: Source of Theology

Review of Book: Theological Investigations Volume Sixteen — Experience of the Spirit: Source of Theology

Foundations of Christian Faith: An Introduction to the Idea of Christianity by Karl Rahner

BOOK REVIEW KARL RAHIDJR: Foundations of Christian Faith: An Introduption to .the Idea of Christianity. Translated by WILLIAM V. DYcH. New York: Seabury Press, 1978. $19.50. In a number of ways this book is a summary. In the first place, it is a theological summary-statement of the principal Christian beliefs in their resonance with contemporary human concerns. The distinctive Christian claims about God, human person and history, world, about Christ, Church and sacraments, about hoped-for destiny-each is expounded with a sensitivity to present cultural interests. Moreover, Foundations summarizes, brings to plenary statement, a career of public theologizing in the Roman Catholic tradition that has extended over forty years (beginning with early studies on patristic spirituality); in some way, the home-coming of that odyssey is narrated on the pages of this book. The book might also be taken as a one-volume summary of the fourteen volumes of Rahner's Theological Investigations (hereafter TI), not to mention of the principal motifs that Rahner contributed to the Mysterium Salutis series. The basic themes and fresh insights of TI are granted a more succinct but also more systematic treatment in Foundations. In this respect, if keyed to the corresponding more extended items in Tl, the present book will provide a most serviceable introduction and map of Rahner's theology; indeed, in at least the first two chapters, Rahner has achieved a mode of expression that renders his thought somewhat more accessible than is the case with parallel treatments in Hearers of the Word or in certain items of Tl, for example. Finally and most importantly, this book presents a summary of Rahner's thought: the distinctive style, motivations and deployment of his theological thinking. For encountering that thinking in its utmost conciseness of basic principles and in particular clarity of line and movement, Foundations seems destined to be inscribed on the list of theological classics. For, to a degree that is exceptional in the history of theological thinking, Rahner's enterprise has exhibited a remarkable consistency over the years. Surely the spine of this consistency has been Rahner's possession of his transcendental method of inquiry from the very outset of his theological career (at least from the completion of Spirit in the World); this transcendental perspective has proved to be the Archimedean point of Rahner's project. But the consistency of his thinking has not been simply methodological but also contentual. For with a few axioms in hand (e.g." the 'immanent' Trinity is the 'economic' Trinity") Rabner has generated a theological edifice that has varied little in the course of its 186 BOOK REVIEW 187 accomplishment. With one exception (the emergence of a dominant Christocentrism ), most of the peripeties in Rahner's thought have been the result of external factors: e.g., the perceived shift in magisterial teaching on monogenism; Metz's critique of the " privatization of salvation "; the emergence of future-oriented theologies. Precisely the inner consistency of Rahner 's thought has permitted him to address these developments outside his system and to find a place for them within an already constituted theological universe, a place that does not jar the whole. No other work of Rahner's so strikingly illustrates that inner consistency nor so well reveals his theological universe as does Foundations. In any discussion of this work the issues of the audience of the intended address and of the mode of that address cannot be separated. As the "Preface " remarks (p. xiii) , Foundations grew out of lecture-courses that Rahner offered at Munich and Miinster in response to the requirement of Vatican H's Decree on Priestly Formation (art. 14) that a basic course treating the Christian mystery of salvation in an introductory and overview fashion begin the theological formation of Catholic students for the priesthood. The latter were the original audience of this work. Nevertheless. in its present form, Foundations is addressed to the broader community of believers; on their behalf, it is an attempt to state the grounds upon which the Christian option to believe is both intellectually honest and responsible in the contemporary world. Indeed, as part of his treatment of the "Jesus of history/Christ of faith" problem...

Theological Investigations. Volume XIV: Ecclesiology, Questions in the Church, the Church in the World by Karl Rahner

496 BOOK REVIEWS sage which Heidegger made famous, describes our situation. " It is the time of the gods that have fled and of the God that is coming. It is the time of need, because it lies under a double lack and a double Not: the No-more of the gods that have fled and the Not-yet of the God that is coming" (" Holderlin and the Essence of Poetry," p. 289). Heidegger also cites Nietzsche's pronouncement of the death of God to make the same point. This is a profane age in which the absence of the divine is intensely felt. Being has withheld the presence of the divine from us; we, on our part, are unprepared for that presence. We, nonetheless, desire the divine presence; we want to be religious. Heidegger cautions us, however, not to seek satisfaction of that want by clinging to the gods that are no longer. Silence is the proper response to the absence of God. But it is an expectant silence; this is at once a time of need and a time of preparation. Heidegger is suggesting that our age is similar to the age of Socrates and Aristophanes when old gods were nearing death. Both periods evidence a loss of meaning, a homelessness, a decline of traditional values. Heidegger assumes that Being will again become meaningful when poets arise who will mythically or symbolically give meaning to Being by naming gods. In the interim, Heidegger feels, we should silently dwell within the emptiness of the absence of the divine. Heidegger waits watchfully for the epiphany of the God promised by the Poet. Ohio University Athens, Ohio JAMES L. PEROTTI Theological lnvesti.qations. Volume XIV: Ecclesiology, Questions in the Church, the Church in the World. By KARL RAHNER. Translated by David Bourke. New York: The Seabury Press, A Crossroad Book, 1976. Pp. 842. $12.95. This volume contains nineteen disparate essays on contemporary Church questions, the results of lectures and papers delivered by Karl Rahner during the years 1969-1971. Parenthetical numbers below refer respectively to these essays. The first set of seven essays is pastoral in its intent and deals with uncertainties about faith and ecclesiastical discipline which Catholics experience today. Changeable and unchangeable factors of dogma, ethics, the structure of the Church are difficult to identify in the concrete, and thus conflict arises; but the only point for a Christian to wonder about BOOK REVIEWS 497 is that the unchangeable element endures in the new forms and is opportune for meeting the questions of the day (1). Heresy, being cut off from the Church because of doctrine, is still a possibility in the Church today; but pluralism of ideas which are incapable of a synthesis is a fact of modern life which calls for the individual Christian to develop attitudes toward the official teachings of the Church: Rabner gives a set of guidelines for developing a Christian attitude toward the Church's teaching for today (2). Indirectly Rahncr addresses Hans Kiing's book Unfehlbar? -eine Anfrage, through a complex and difficult study of "ultimate certainties ," both those offered by human trust and the meaningfulness of existence and those which come from belief in Jesus Christ and the acceptance of the Church's teaching (3) . A more concrete article considers the concept of infallibility in the Catholic ecclesiology in historical perspective: its relatively late definition, the likelihood of future definitions of dogma, how the dogma itself has progressed since 1870, i.e. it has come of age (4). A burning and rather caustic defense of a 1967 document of the German Bishops which treated among other things the non-infallible teaching office in the Church reminds us of the pettiness and intrigue which still associate themselves with ecclesiastical enterprise (5) . The nature and function of the Roman Congregation of the Faith and its relation to the newly formed Commission of Theologians is outlined in a paper which Rabner delivered at the first session of the International Papal Commission of Theologians, October 6, 1969, the outline of problems and topics for the Commission to treat is still topical (6). Finally, there is a reflection upon the right of a local synod to...

REVIEWS

Books Reviewed in this Article: Theology as Narration. A commentary on the Book of Exodus. By G.A.F. Knight. Pp.viii, 209 Edinburgh, The Handsel Press, 1976, £5.00. The Books of Ezra and Nehemiah. By R.J. Coggins. Pp.xi, 150 (Cambridge Bible Commentary), Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1976, £4.50 (hardback), £2.25 (paperback). The First and Second Books of the Chronicles. By R.J. Coggins. Pp.x, 314 (Cambridge Bible Commentary), Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1976, £7.95 (hardback), £3.50 (paperback). Matthew : Structure, Christology, Kingdom. By Jack Dean Kingsbury. Pp.xiv, 178, London, SPCK, 1976, £6.50. Paul and Palestinian Judaism. By E.P. Sanders. Pp.xviii, 627, London, SCM Press, 1977, £15.00. The Use and Abuse of the Bible. By Denis Nineham. Pp.xii, 296, London, Macmillan, 1976, £10.00. Biblical Studies: Essays in Honour of William Barclay. Edited by Johnston R. McKay and James F. Miller. Pp. 224, London, Collins, 1976, £4.50 Theological Investigations, Vol. XIV. By K. Rahner. Pp. 340, London, Darton Longman and Todd, 1976, £5.50. Building God's World. By Robert Fancy. Pp.190, Denville, N.J. Dimension Books, 1976, $4.95. The Ultimate Church and the Promise of Salvation. By Jerome P. Theisen, Pp.xx, 198, Collegeville, Minnesota, St. Johns Press, 1976, $7.50. Original Sin: two major trends in contemporary Roman Catholic interpretation. By G. Vandervelde. Pp. 350, Amsterdam, Rodopi N.V., 1975, no price given. Look for the Living. The Corporate Nature of Resurrection Faith. By Peter Selby. Pp.viii, 212, London, SCM Press, 1976, £2.50. A Christian Method of Moral Judgement. By J. Philip Wogaman. Pp.xi, 270, London, SCM Press, 1976, £5.75. La Conscience du Libre Arbitre. By Paul Siwek. Pp.119, Rome, Herder, 1976, no price stated. L'Expérience de l'Esprit (Mélanges E. Schillebeeckx). By Paul Brand and others. Pp.253, Paris, Beauchesne, 1976, no price given. Nature and Supernature. By E.L. Mascall. Pp. 94, London, Darton, Longman & Todd, 1976, £1.50. The Doctrine of the Trinity. God's Being is in Becoming. By Eberhard Jüngel. Pp.xxi, 166 (Monograph Supplements to the Scottish Journal of Theology), Edinburgh, Scottish Academic Press, 1976, £3.25. The Materials, Sources and Methods of Ecclesiastical History. Edited by Derek Baker. Pp.xii, 370 (Studies in Church History 11) Oxford, Black‐well, for the Ecclesiastical History Society, 1975, £10.00. The Correspondence of Erasmus, Volume III. Translated by R.A.B. Mynors and D.F.S. Thomson, annotated by James McConica. Pp.xvi, 392. Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 1976, £17.50.St Thomas More: The Complete Works: Vol. 12, A Dialogue of Comfort against Tribulation. Edited by Louis L. Martz and Frank Manley. Pp.clxvii, 566; Vol. 13, Treatise on the Passion, Treatise on the Blessed Body, Instructions and Prayers. Edited by Garry E. Haupt. Pp.clxxxiv, 364, New Haven and London, Yale University Press, 1976, £30.60 and £25.20. Deus Destroyed: The Image of Christianity in Early Modern Japan. By George Elison, Pp.xiv, 542, Cambridge (Mass.), Harvard University Press, 1973, £17.50. The Economics of the Zambezi Missions 1590–1759. By W.F. Rea. Pp.189 (Bibliotheca Instituti Historic S.I. 39), Rome, Institutum Historicum S.I., 1976, no price given. The Holy See and the International Order. By H.E. Cardinale. Pp.557, Gerrards Cross, Colin Smythe, 1976, £17.50. What is Romanticism? By Henri Peyre, translated from the French by Roda P. Roberts. Pp.214, Alabama, University of Alabama Press, 1977, no price given. The Two Dantes and Other Studies. By Kenelm Foster. Pp.ii, 260, London, Darton, Longman & Todd, 1977, £7.50. The Eye in the Mandala: Patrick White — A Vision of Man and God. By Peter Beatson. Pp. 1 72, London, Paul Elek, 1976, £5.95. The Spirit of Solzhenitsyn. By Olivier Clement. Pp. 235, London, Search Press, 1976, £5.95.

"Theological Investigations, Volume 14: Ecclesiology, Questions in the Church, The Church in the World," by Karl Rahner

"Theological Investigations, Volume 14: Ecclesiology, Questions in the Church, The Church in the World," by Karl Rahner

Book Review: Theological Investigations 14

Book Review: Theological Investigations 14

REVIEWS

Books Reviewed in this Article: Records of the Trials of the Spanish Inquisition in Ciudad Real, Volume I, 1483–1485. Edited by Haim Beinart. Records of the Trials of the Spanish Inquisition in Ciudad Real, Volume I, 1483–1485. Edited by Haim Beinart. The Correspondence of Erasmus, Volume II. Translated by R.A.B. Mynors and D.F.S. Thomson, annotated by Wallace K. Ferguson. The English Catholic Community, 1570–1850. By John Bossy. The Church in Victorian Scotland 1843–1874. By Andrew L. Drummond and James Bulloch. The Principle of Reserve in the Writings of John Henry Cardinal Newman. By Robin C. Selby. Newman on Development. The search for an explanation in history. By Nicholas Lash. Bonhoeffer: Exile and Martyr. By Eberhard Bethge, edited with an essay by John W. de Gruchy. Kleine Geschichte des Oesterreichischen Staatsvertrages. By Gerald Stourzh. A Theology of the Old Testament. By John L. McKenzie. The Formation of the Gospel According to Mark. By E. Trocmé. Jesus and the Spirit. By James D.G. Dunn. Ethics in the New Testament. By Jack T. Sanders. Can Ethics be Christian? By James M. Gustafson. Wittgenstein and Religious Belief. By W. Donald Hudson. Darkness and Light: The Analysis of Doctrinal Statements. By Garth L. Hallett, S.J. The Common Catechism. A Christian Book of Faith. Mysticism & Theology. An Essay in Christian Metaphysics. By Illtyd Trethowan. Theological Investigations, Volume XIII. By Karl Rahner, translated by David Bourke. Elucidations. By Hans Urs von Balthasar, translated by John Riches. Searchings. By Bishop B.C. Butler. Has Dogma a Future? By Gerald O'Collins. The Experiment Hope. By Jürgen Moltmann. Edited and translated with a foreword by M. Douglas Meeks. Christian at the Crossroads. Karl Rahner. Biblical Reflections on Crises Facing the Church. By Raymond E. Brown. The Runaway Church. By Peter Hebblethwaite. The Seduction of the Spirit. By Harvey Cox. Silent Music. By William Johnston. The Transfiguration of Politics. By Paul Lehmann. Speaking in Parables. By Sallie TeSelle. The Story‐Shaped World. By Brian Wicker. Gerard Manley Hopkins: Poems. A Casebook. Edited by Margaret Bottrall. Gerard Manley Hopkins: a critical symposium by the Kenyon Critics.

Book Review: Theological Investigations 13

Book Review: Theological Investigations 13

Theological Investigations

Theological Investigations

Karl Rahner SJ: Theological Investigations. Vol. 11: Confrontations I. 1974. 257 pp. £4.75. Vol. 12: Confrontations II. 1974. 331 pp. £5. Vol. 13: Theology, Anthropolgy, Christology. 1975. 235 pp. £4.75. All translated by David Bourke. Darton, Longman £ Todd, London.

KARL RAHNER SJ: Theological Investigations. Vol. 11: Confrontations I. 1974. 257 pp. £4.75. Vol. 12: Confrontations II. 1974. 331 pp. £5. Vol. 13: Theology, Anthropolgy, Christology. 1975. 235 pp. £4.75. All translated by David Bourke.TRUTH AND DIALOGUE, edited by John Hick.THE ASIAN JOURNAL OF THOMAS MERTON, edited by Naomi Burton, Patrick Hart and James Laughlin.PRAYER by Simon Tugwell OP.DID YOU RECEIVE THE SPIRIT? by Simon Tugwell OP.ELIOT, by Stephen Spender.CHARLES RAVEN, Naturalist, Historian, Theologian, by F. W. Dillistone.SCREAM QUIETLY OR THE NEIGHBOURS WILL HEAR, by Erin Pizzey.WOMEN'S RIGHTS: A Practical Guide, by Anna Coote and Tess Gill.RIGHTS: A Handbook for People under Age, by Nan Berger

Book Review: THEOLOGICAL INVESTIGATIONS Vols. 11 and 12. By Karl Rahner. Darton, Longman and Todd 1974; pp. 331 and 257. Price £4.75, and £5.00

Book Review: THEOLOGICAL INVESTIGATIONS Vols. 11 and 12. By Karl Rahner. Darton, Longman and Todd 1974; pp. 331 and 257. Price £4.75, and £5.00

Book Review: Theological Investigations

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