Theological Language Research Articles

The Enlightenment of Zen Buddhism and the Hesychastic Vision of the Divine Light

My intention here is to present the religious phenomena of Zen and Hesychasm, analyzing similarities within the mechanism of prayer and movements within the respective faiths. There is a common way that the transcendent is exposed in Zen Buddhism and Hesychasm, but at the same time there is conflict between traditional Eastern Christian ideas on the communion with and the Western approaches to that are manifest in the Eastern and Western understanding of God. The divine in the Christian tradition and enlightenment in the Oriental religions are two different experiences. The common characteristics of the breathing exercises in Hesychasm and Zen make the study of these common religious phenomena interesting. Byzantine monks in the East were free persons and at the same time obedient to traditional authority. The bishops were elected from the monastic community. The Byzantine society respected monks who were completely devoted to and who engaged in unceasing prayer, fasting, and restraint. This unceasing prayer was very important for the monks, who adopted a variety of techniques and theories developed in relation to it. Traditionally, there are two schools of thought on the matter within Christianity: (1) The school of Evagrios of Pontos (Asia Minor), which is based on Platonism, with an epistemological approach to purify the mind and unite with the divine spirit; and (2) the school of Makarios, leading toward Neoplatonism, with an approach of purifying the heart. The monks of the fourteenth century leaned toward the Makarian school of thought. They emphasized that the human being is body, heart, and spirit that participate in the blessed vision of the uncreated and especially in prayer. In this way the whole human being is transformed and deified, a process known as theosis. The purpose of the monks in prayer is literally to attain communion with God. The is a universal symbol of and God's Reign, in contrast to darkness and its misery. The symbol of as was commonly used in Greek philosophy and religious tradition in the mystery religions (enlightenment: as vision of god or goddess); this was also true in Gnosticism, in the heretical sects of Judaism and Christianity. In the Christian creed Jesus Christ is the Son of God, viewed as Light of Light, and the entire Christian theology, ethics, and liturgies are imbued by this symbolism of light. It is true that some Eastern writers speak of in apophatic terms and symbolism. This is true only in a few neoplatonic theologians who speak of in an absolute apophatic way. For them, is beyond, as described in the writings of Dionysius the Areopagite, Maximus the Confessor, and others. However, according to the claim of the apophatic way, God is light more than darkness. Especially within the Christian life and theory, it is in the Uncreated light that the symbols of the are manifest in the created world. This is also evident from the Hebrew Bible. This transcendent is manifested in Jesus Christ, through his whole life and teaching, and especially in the Transfiguration on Mount Tabor and his Resurrection. In this light, all the faithful participants in their daily life will participate in the eschaton, in the End of Days. The hesychasts of the Holy Mountain make every effort to attain exactly this type of life. This type of theological language concerning and communion with always had a real and symbolic taste of the transcendent now, as well as the hope for a more complete taste and fulfillment of in the future. The hesychasts introduced an intensive realism and a time of completeness in relation with the divine and filled with God; this fulfillment was realized in their own practice of prayer and in their expectation that during prayer they participate in true uncreated and are therefore transfigured by the of the holy transfiguration. …

Katechontic Sovereignty: Security Politics and the Overcoming of Time

At its core, security is obsessed with the survival of the sovereign order. Security tends to see the sovereign's existence as threatened by agents whose purpose is to challenge the life of the sovereign. In this article, I mobilize a theological language about the relationship between sovereignty and security to grasp the place that the question of life versus death, the fact of sovereign violence, and the problem of temporality occupy in past and present modalities of security. The notion of sovereign restraint, captured by the theological concept of katechon, is introduced to suggest that the politics of security is dependent upon a fundamentally violent, uncompromising, and often terrorizing objective: to keep at bay forces of temporal finitude seen as disorder or chaos. Forces of temporal finitude that refuse to abide by the belief in the sovereign's infinity can be described as the eschaton or as agents of eschatological time. Katechontic sovereignty, the sovereign practice intent on holding off finite ends (and on casting away agents of eschatological “terror”), is generative of security operations that involve decisions over life and death, matters of biopolitics versus necropolitics, and encounters between the ontological vulnerability of the sovereign and “terrorizing” agents.

Doing Gender Justice as a Mission Imperative

Announcement of the kingdom of God The gospel of Luke describes John the Baptist going throughout Jordon, proclaiming a baptism of repentance: "The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: 'Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight'" (Luke 3: 4-5). When the people ask John, "What then should we do?" John doesn't moralize, but responds proactively: "Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none; and whoever has food must do likewise." Even tax collectors came to be baptized, and they asked him, "Teacher, what should we do?" He said to them, "Collect no more than the amount prescribed for you." Soldiers also asked him, "And we, what should we do?" He said to them, "Do not extort money from anyone by threats or false accusation, and be satisfied with your wages." (Luke 3: 11-14) In other words, to prepare the path for God's kingdom is to actively do justice and destroy the consequences of the sin. What we have in the words of John the Baptist is an expression of Christological eschatology, i.e. the kingdom of God is going to be given to us as a gift, but at the same time we have been called to "make the path smooth" in our acceptance of the gift. In that sense, eschaton is God-human endeavour, the kingdom that we're awaiting from God is anticipated and expressed in history through the praxis of human beings that should iconize the new eon. In Gustavo Gutierrez's words, "The hope which overcomes death must be rooted in the heart of historical praxis; if this hope doesn't take shape in the present to lead it forward, it will be only an evasion, a futuristic illusion." (1) Christological eschatology means one important thing: it is divine-human synergy, just as Christ has divine-human nature as defined by the ecumenical council of Chalcedon. It isn't a communist utopia in which heaven on earth will be brought about by the proletariat, or a utopia of Zealots during the time of Jesus that human will is capable of bringing kingdom of God. We sometimes forget this truth and make ourselves passive in history through the expectation that God will do everything exclusively. We forget sometimes that "from the very beginning Christianity was socially minded. The whole fabric of Christian existence is social and corporate. All Christian sacraments are intrinsically 'social sacraments,' i.e., sacraments of incorporation ... To build up the church of Christ means, therefore, to build up a new society and, by implication, to re-build human society on a new basis." (2) The New Testament reveals the kingdom of God as a new mode of relationship, a new quality of life. The kingdom is proclaimed when the sick and the poor are healed, when the dead are resurrected, when the disenfranchised are accepted, when abundance of food is offered to many, when justice, love, peace, harmony, and solidarity rule (Matt. 4:23, 5:10, 25:34; Luke 9:2, 9:12-18; Rom. 14:17; 1 Cor. 6:9). Let's look at the words from the beginning of the liturgy in the Orthodox Church: "Blessed is the kingdom of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit." Through these opening words, the liturgy is supposed to open up toward the eschatological kingdom, "a progressive movement towards the fullness of the kingdom of Christ, toward His cosmic and historical triumph." (3) The kingdom of God should be manifested in all of its social implications through historical limitations. It means that the liturgy should not reflect a patriarchal mode of relationship, the degradation of women,4 * disregard of lay people/ and inaccessibility for the sick and elderly. Primacy should be given to these issues that collide with the values of God's kingdom. Genesis 3:16 argues that man should rule over woman, but this verse comes as a consequence of the sin--the fall. This verse only expresses how the male-female relationship has been lived or conducted in our communities where the ideology of men rules, and not God's given/original order. …

Stages Along Life’s Way: House of Hospitality and the Development of Dorothy Day’s Spirituality

Although House of Hospitality has received less scholarly attention than Dorothy Day’s other works, it remains an essential document for understanding Day’s spiritual evolution. This paper will examine the theological language and categories used by Day in House of Hospitality to interpret her work with the poor. As will be shown, in 1939 Day’s self-understanding of her work was still (compared to her later writings) relatively unsophisticated and unduly dependent upon the language of popular Catholic piety. This lack of any sustained and consistent theological vocabulary in House of Hospitality , I argue, reveals the importance of Day’s subsequent discovery of the Retreat Movement of Father Onesimus Lacouture, S.J. and its subsequent influence on her understanding of both her conversion and the meaning of the Catholic Worker movement. I conclude that, while it is clearly an imperfect and preliminary work, House of Hospitality offers a unique backdrop against which the distinctive spirituality of her mature works is revealed even more fully. As such, it remains an indispensable witness to her life and worthy of our continued attention.

Czym homilia nie jest – błędy w jej głoszeniu

The Homiletic Directory (HD) is the sign of the special care of the Church for the high level of the homily preaching. The authors of the document stress the nature, purpose and functions of homily and firmly stand against unproper grasping of this prioritary form of proclamation of the Word of God (HD 6). (1) That is why the homily shouldn’t be identified with a conference or lesson, a thematic sermon on some abstractive subject – and shouldn’t be treaten as the catechetical teaching. Those forms of word ministry as a rule take place outside liturgy and are not closely connected with the purpose and the content of celebrated mystery. The relation of homily with the Biblical texts doesn’t mean however that the homilist ought to practice the exegesis exercises given from the lecturn – and lead the faithful into its scientific secrets. Although the preacher of the Word of God from his devotion is the witness of faith, his personal testimony, however, shouldn’t veil the proclaimed kerygma. It should be stated however, that the actual exegesis achievements, doctrinal insructions and personal homilist’s testimony may also be efficient as the elements of good homily (HD 7). (2) The homily level may also be deteriorated by such factors as: its neglectful preparation, wrong reading of sense of Biblical text, offering the faithful the shallow content in its doctrinal and moral meaning (HD 157.21). Similarly, the authors of the Directory citisize “specialistic theological language unknown to the listeners” – which is used in homilies (HD 31). Being in opposition towards the mistakes regarding the notion and homily preaching, the authors do it first of all taking into consideration the concern for the reliable and fruitful proclamation of the Word of God. That is why in kerygma actualization the homilist should stress its mystagogical relation with the celebrated liturgy – which belongs to the nature of homily and not to the other forms of preaching.

Mathematical Language / Scientific Interpretation / Theological Interpretation

The specific languages referred to in this presentation are: scientific language, mathematical language, theological language and philosophical language. Cosmological, scientific or theological models understood as distinct interpretations of a common symbolic language do not ensure, by such a common basis, a possible or legitimate correspondence of certain units of meaning. Mathematics understood as a symbolic language used in scientific and theological interpretation does not bridge between science and theology. Instead, it only allows the assertion of a rational-mathematical unity in expression. In this perspective, theology is nothing less rational than science. The activity of interpretation has an interdisciplinary character, it is a necessary condition of dialogue. We cannot speak about dialogue without communication between various fields, without passing from one specialized language to another specialized language. The present paper proposes to suggest this aspect.

A Teologia como ciência ôntica e sua relação com a Filosofia

The article aims to present theology as ontic science and its relation with Philosophy or “hermeneutic philosophy”, according the contributions of the philosopher Martin Heidegger. Such proposal justified in view of two aspects. The first one is to explain the scientific dimension of theology in the set of ontic sciences. The second is to break with that view that philosophy is subservient to theology and to present it as partner in the condition of a hermeneutic phenomenology. To achieve this goal, we will take a set of works of Martin Heidegger that supports his philosophy or hermeneutic phenomenology which is present in his text Phanomenologie und Theologie. Then we will introduce Theology as ontic science and its relation to philosophy. The result will be the conception of science, the onticity of theology and its historical, systematic, and practical nature. In this sense, the function of philosophy will appear as corrective” and the theological language ash a sort of some thinking and talking open to ontological existence of the Christian faith.

Revisitando a Tradição a partir do diálogo entre Teologia e Literatura

O propósito deste presente trabalho é apresentar algumas afinidades entre Teologia e Literatura, que já estão presentes na Tradição, e assim identificadas pode servir de um referencial para a superação da crise de linguagem teológica que privilegiou as fórmulas em detrimento da experiência de fé, a saber, o elemento material e fundacional do discurso da fé e da práxis.

A linguagem trinitária de Gregório de Nissa

O artigo estuda a linguagem trinitária de Gregório de Nissa, denominado Padre da Igreja, intelectual do período patrístico do século IV. Analisa a linguagem do ponto de vista do seu desdobramento naquela época, o conflito entre os aspectos linguísticos de Nissa e Eunômio e sua relevância no confronto com a linguagem teológica atual e a religação dos saberes.

Capitalism as Religion and Religious Pluralism: An Approach from Liberation Theology

Capitalism as Religion and Religious Pluralism:An Approach from Liberation Theology Jung Mo Sung religious pluralism and the struggle of the gods Religious pluralism as a social fact, namely, the coexistence of different religions within a social system, be it a country or an empire, is not anything new. The mere contact with other people and their various religions, for example, through commerce, still does not indicate religious pluralism. In this case, each group of people has its religion and its gods, and recognizes that other groups of people exist with other religions and other gods. Religious pluralism occurs when, because of immigration or the conquest of one people over another, groups of people with different religions live together in the same social space. Whether by immigration or by conquest, the resulting religious pluralism does not occur in an egalitarian or harmonious manner. Immigrants are forced to live out their religion within their group as a marginal religion in society, or even in hiding when it is not accepted in the society where they went to seek a livelihood. In the case of conquest or expansion of empires, the conquering power imposes its cultural values and religion on the conquered peoples. The empire can try to extinguish the religions of conquered peoples and impose their own as if it is the only one acceptable, or tolerate them as long as these religions do not question the imperial order. This means that the coexistence of different religions within the empire takes place in a hierarchical relationship: The religion of the empire is the ultimate and the others are tolerated provided they accept their place as subordinate. The Roman Empire was an example of an empire that tolerated the religions of subject peoples as long as they didn’t question the absolute power of the empire, with its own empire religion and emperor worship. In this historical context, it is empirically impossible to live out a third way: recognizing the otherness of the other and respecting their religion as we respect our [End Page 155] own. That’s because the “encounter” between religions takes place in a situation of colonial conquest and domination. Expecting that there could be a relationship of respect and dialogue among equals would ignore the role of religion in premodern societies, especially in the processes of domination. In these societies, religion has the function of being the foundation of the world-view that legitimized the existing social order, as well as the process of external conquest. Religion fulfills the function of legitimizing and justifying the conquest and consequent exploitation and oppression of the conquered people. Therefore, religion performs a key task for systems of oppression, the reversal of evil into good: conquest as peace; exploitation as the path to salvation or integration into civilization. Furthermore, religion transcendentalizes the imperial system of oppression and presents it as eternal or as an expression of divine will. Therefore, how to classify religions and manage their coexistence is not just a problem for religious leaders, but also a matter of the state, a matter of interest for the king or emperor. The limits of religious tolerance are determined by the interests of the dominant social system, even when they are often discussed in religious or theological language. Of course, no religion, even those that perform the function of legitimizing an empire, is totally homogeneous. Within a religion, there is or can be a certain “theological pluralism.” The figure of Las Casas in the Spanish conquest of America is an example of the contradictions that are in all religions. But the defense of the Indians and their religion that was made by Las Casas had to be made in the court of the king of Spain. The means of evangelization and the ways of seeing the culture and religion of the Indians (i.e., the other) is a problem of the state, and not just the Church. Before thinking about the ideal of a religious pluralism that makes possible “a fraternal living together of religions as also a covenant of all those in favor of Peace and the Common Good of Humanity and the Planet,”1 we must also remember that the Bible...

Dante's Infernal Fart and the Art of Translation

Dante’s Infernal Fart and the Art of Translation PAUL BAROLSKY Like Flaubert, and like many authors in his wake, I have always aspired to write a book about nothing —un livre sur rien—or at least an essay about nothing, even though I doubt such a piece would be well received in the academic world in which I am enmired.1 But no matter! Although my reach exceeds my grasp, I have approached the ideal of nothingness by contemplating the translation of a single phrase in Dante in which the poet refers to a blast of wind, which is, though more than nothing, far less than physical or substantial. This essay is a gesture, an exercise— a first step away from the world of matter towards a mere but mighty puff of wind. My airy aspirations lead me to the Divine Comedy and a single resounding burst of air, a pneumatic noise worthy of Pantagruel or Falstaff. I speak of a humorous moment in Dante that is acknowledged as such by many but by no means all the poets and scholars who have explicated the poet’s great work. As I will suggest, commentators often rush by this moment and do not give themselves, or their readers, ample time to savor Dante’s crude jest and the fun of it. In a recent review of translations of Dante’s Inferno by Clive James and Mary Jo Bang (and of Dan Brown’s novel of the same name) the formidable critic and polymath Joan Acocella suggested that there are by her count “something like a hundred English-language translations” of the Divine Comedy. Although I have been collecting English translations of Inferno for the last forty years or so, somewhat haphazardly , I admit, I am far behind her in my reckoning. I arion 22.1 spring/summer 2014 have in my collection only about thirty translations and I am ignorant of those I am missing. Even so, I find much to learn from the numerous translations I do have at hand. To overstate a point, I have never met a translation of the Inferno I did not like—for one reason or another. Back in the 1970s when the Charlottesville Dante Society met regularly to discuss Inferno, we always had with us, in addition to the original, the translations of Sinclair, Singleton, Ciardi, and Sayers. As we pondered the text, we discovered at various junctures that no single translation seemed to suffice, that each of our translators offered us something distinctive. Our understanding of what we were reading was enriched by multiple translations. There were many possibilities. Over the years I have required that my students in courses on Italian Renaissance art history and literature read Inferno . Doing so, I have turned to various translations to guide me in my understanding Dante, as I in turn have sought to guide the students. Our poet speaks in many voices, from the vulgar and obscene , to the sublime. Students who struggle with the elevated language and complexities of theology are easily delighted however by Dante’s more coarse-grained passages, such as a few details in canto 21, where our pilgrim and his guide Virgil meet Malacoda or “Evil Tail,” and his band of demons. These creatures, one might say, are the antitheses of the militant angels of paradise. At the conclusion of canto 21, having witnessed the punishment of those sinners guilty of graft who are driven into a pool of boiling pitch, Dante and Virgil are about to continue their journey. At this point the devil-inchief gives our pilgrims a rousing derisive send off. In the final line of the canto we read of Malacoda: “et elli avea del cul fatto trombetta.” Although the identity of this devil has been debated, we will leave that matter to the “glossators,” as we pause instead to enjoy and take delight in Dante’s humor . Just because he is deadly serious doesn’t mean our poet is without a sense of humor that we might savor. dante’s infernal fart and the art of translation 94 In the most literally precise translation of the description of the devil’s culo available, Mandelbaum...

Sin or Slim?

Is fat a sin? Popular ‘knowledge’ about obesity which frames fat as an avoidable behavioural condition would certainly suggest it can be blamed on the fat person. Discourses of health reproduced within public policy and media reporting assist in the pathologization of fat bodies, insisting that fat is the result of unhealthy lifestyle choices. It is, however, not simply medical interpretations of fat that facilitate this moral discourse. Religion also provides an important source of moral judgment. This paper draws on my qualitative research inside a UK secular, commercial slimming group to consider how the Christian moral language of sin functions within this setting to construct a politics of choice that holds the dieter personally responsible for her fat. Interpreting weight loss and weight gain as a measure of moral character, this theological language assists in the operation of ‘normative conformity’, conforming women’s bodies to cultural knowledge about fat.

Metaphor and Method in Concrete Ecclesiologies

AbstractThe past twenty-five years have seen a widespread turn to the concrete in theology, and an increased awareness of the importance of practices, believing communities and material culture for both Christian faith itself, and theological engagement with it. In ecclesiology, this turn to the concrete has manifested itself in the rise of concrete approaches to ecclesiology. These have developed over the past fifteen years or so, as ecclesiologists have integrated theological and social-scientific perspectives on the church, to create both general methodological studies, and smaller scale ‘ecclesiological ethnographies’ of particular church communities.This article critically explores some of the key methodological moves of the emerging discipline of concrete ecclesiology. In the first part of the article, I argue that concrete ecclesiologies display two characteristic methodological tendencies. First, they exhibit a tendency to define their approach as concrete and realistic in contrast to twentieth-century doctrinal approaches to ecclesiology, which they perceive as unhelpfully idealising and abstract. Second, they tend to express the task of ecclesiological ethnography as one of balancing the claims of two descriptive languages, theology and social science, with regard to a single object, the church. The underlying metaphor here is borrowed from christology: just as theological language about Christ's divine and human nature must be kept in balance, so doctrinal and social perspectives on the church must be kept in balance to avoid ‘ecclesiological Nestorianism’.In the second part of the article, I argue that these two methodological tendencies result in caricatured understandings of theology and ethnography as functional opposites. Theology tends to be regarded as an inherently abstracting and idealising influence in ecclesiology, while ethnography tends to be regarded as a means of straightforwardly accessing the ‘real’ church. This in turn creates a problematically thermostatic understanding of the relationship between theological and ethnographic insights in ecclesiology, casting them as mutually regulating and opposite influences. The article closes by proposing a potentially more fruitful alternative model for integrating theology and ethnography, by exploring the similarities between the ways in which the two disciplines understand and relate to their respective objects of study.

Islam and Christianity

In Islam and Christianity: Theological Themes in Comparative Perspective,
 John Renard gives us yet another gem of a book: beautifully written, meticulously
 researched, and cleverly presented. A comparative study of these two
 traditions could have easily resulted in a pluralistic muddle of two of the
 world’s most studied religious traditions. Instead, the author gives us a careful
 examination of theology that forces us to think carefully about categories like
 religion, faith, and orthodoxy.
 The preface begins with a confession of sorts, for Renard notes therein
 the tension between comparative linkage and religious authenticity that presents
 itself in such a project. While Islam and Christianity exhibit many of the
 same themes, nowhere does he put forth the kind of thesis that would yield a
 “many roads to one mountain” axiom. What makes this book compelling is
 its careful presentation of two distinct theologies that, although clearly different,
 exhibit a familial relationship. What is meant by “theology” is quite broad,
 and Renard seems to suggest that a number of theological languages are at
 play in these two traditions. Islam and Christianity is not the kind of reductionist
 work that one might expect to see in such an ambitious project; rather,
 it is a dialog, a conversation among scriptures, hagiographies, poems, liturgies,
 and ideas ...

K antropologickému projektu v teologii E. Schillebeeckxe. Člověk jako homo historicus

Through an analysis of the human experience structure in Schillebeeckx' theology, this article examines the anthropological conditions of the potential religiosity of humankind. The methodical validity of the approach: comprehending the image of humanity used in Schillebeeckx' theology presupposes a formal division of epistemic levels in its attitude towards humankind. The differentiation between the first, pre-religious basic level in theological language usage clarifies the given theological intention better. The validity of the content: in his theology Schillebeeckx works with the principle of the autonomy of the world and of humankind. As he seeks a field of values proper to religion, he allows the general human level to maintain its authenticity. The human experience structure in Schillebeeckx' concept displays human authenticity on its basic level, while at the same time it proves to be a transcending system in principle. As such it can and should be the starting point for an explicit understanding of humanity's religious dimension.

The Language Game of Divine Love according to Franz Rosenzweig and Karl Barth

Summary Language games can be opening and narrowing. On the base of this double sense my paper compares the language game of divine love according to Franz Rosenzweig and Karl Barth. They were contemporaries not only regarding their early publications. Both discovered revelation in the face of liberal theology which regarded it as a problematic, mythological concept. However, this similarity is contradicted by difference, based in the Christological dogma which can have a tendency to narrow the common basis of the two authors’ theological language game. There is also an anachronism, brought about by Rosenzweig’s anticipation of the concept of analogy which Barth came to years later. The emphasis of my paper lies on the question how the opening function of theological language games can be promoted. In Rosenzweig’s “speaking thinking” there can be found a trace to an answer.

“How Can I Sing God’s Song in a Foreign Land?”: Immigrant Experience as Exile

Most Americans can trace their origins to immigrants. Contemporary migration—internal or international, seasonal or permanent, voluntary or forced, unskilled or professional, legal or illegal—has arisen to an unprecedented scale as to radically change the “face of the earth” (Rosoli & Tomasi, 95–6, 98). Most immigrants tend to be marginalized politically, socially, culturally, linguistically, and demographically. Furthermore, marginalization can cut through inter-generational lines. Parents, sponsored by their children to join them abroad, are bewildered because their children have changed so much and because their grandchildren find them, as grandparents, more of a nuisance than an added source of affection. Marginalization also seems to be hereditary. Second-, third-, even fourth-generation descendants of, especially, non-white immigrants find themselves continually reminded that they do not really “come from here.” Any form of ministry to immigrants needs to take account of all these levels and aspects of marginalization. When does the immigrant experience become a religious or a theological predicament? How does the biblical theology of Exile assist immigrants in finding a theological language for their soul? Can immigrants, from their marginalized stance, become themselves ministering? If the theologians of liberation have found the redemptive potential of the Exodus, might not the immigrant find a similar potential in the Exile?

Il termine „Sacramentum” nell`accezione cristiana. La testimonianza di san Cipriano

In the second half of the second century, spreading throughout the Latin milieu, the Church, in particular in the Africa Proconsularis, faced a necessity to coin its own theological language. In opposition to the κοινή διάλεκτος the classical Latin did not have an appropriate terminology to render the new content being borne by the revealed religion. This process had begun with the translation of the Bible, spreading gradually along with the growth of Latin theologicalliterature, largely owed to Tertullian. His contribution in this field had also Saint Cyprian, bishop of Carthage and martyr, who was characterized by the great sense of responsibility and philological balance.One may acknowledge two directions the process advanced: to invent neologisms and to adapt classical terminology to the new meanings. The term sacramentum belongs to the latter set of christianized classical terms. In the pre-Christian Latin that term belonged to juridical-military jargon and meant a promise, soldier’s allegiance, an obligation, or an initiation confirmed by an oath. As adopted by Christians, since the second century onwards was assuming different semantics, and as an equivalent of Biblical μυστήριον, became gradually one of the key-terms of the Latin Church.The present research puts the question about the reasons that caused these two terms to identify with one another and that led to broaden the semantic field sacramentum by referring to different aspects of redemptive presence of Christ, in particular as sacramentum Christi, which is used to render the economy of salvation.In this respect the testimony of Cyprian is very important for the history of the Latin theology as it allows us to discover a better understanding of the term at the beginning of its use; the term, which passed to the later inheritance of theological tradition.

The Cambridge Introduction to Emmanuel Levinas by Michael M. Morgan (review)

Reviewed by: The Cambridge Introduction to Emmanuel Levinas by Michael M. Morgan Ruth Grossman The Cambridge Introduction to Emmanuel Levinas Michael M. Morgan. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011. 259 pp. Much has been written in praise of Michael Morgan’s previous book, Discovering Levinas (2007). The book has correctly been hailed as having filled an important gap in Anglo-American readership of Levinas. In his former book, Morgan strives to connect and relate Levinas with Anglo-American philosophy. Morgan’s recent book, The Cambridge Introduction to Emmanuel Levinas (2011), is a further helpful contribution to Levinas scholarship, although it is admittedly an abridged and revised version of the former. Morgan opens the first chapter of both books through a reading of Vasily Grossman’s Life and Fate, a favorite literary reference for Levinas toward the end of his career. This exposition is a helpful portrayal of Levinas’s ethical concerns in a nutshell. Morgan’s opening presentation of Levinas’s ethics through Grossman’s novel is both original and sensitive and offers a glimpse into Levinas’s unique philosophy. Nevertheless, although this chapter worked well in the previous book, the repetition of this episodic appeal [End Page 210] to Grossman’s novel in the first chapter of an introductory book is not an obvious choice. Morgan chooses to plunge into the depths of Levinas’s ethical metaphysics early on, hoping that newcomers will bear with him. The second chapter deals with questions of Levinas’s method and approach to ethics, offering an extensive discussion of the face-to-face relationship. The main issue Morgan explores is whether the face-to-face relation is a transcendental condition for the possibility of meaningful experience or a concrete experience that is empirically produced in everyday life. Morgan presents both arguments comprehensively, balancing between commentators who offer interpretations for the different readings. The chapter discusses Levinas’s face-to-face in its relation to phenomenology and to transcendental philosophy, leading to an understanding that Levinas, similarly to Wittgenstein, does not fit comfortably into conventional descriptive categories. Chapters 3 and 4 deal primarily with ideas central to Totality and Infinity and other essays dating from around its publication. Chapter 3 deals with the ethical content of the face, focusing on the self’s encounter with the other as that which bestows priority to ethics over language and community. Morgan mentions Bernard Williams’s reference to “thick” moral concepts as a helpful term in understanding Levinas’s “face,” as well as Stanley Cavell’s concept of “acknowledgment” as exceeding the scope of knowledge. Morgan then turns to Levinas’s later writing and the new terms associated with the face, such as obsession, substitution, and hostage. Chapter 4 once again takes up the way the face is primordial, whether as transcendental or as occurring within everyday life. The focus here is on Levinas’s treatment of philosophy as totality and the role of infinity in breaching it. Morgan starts by struc turing the discussion around modernist and postmodernist outlooks, relating them to Levinas’s concepts of totality and infinity. The discussion addresses Descartes’s famous third meditation, which Morgan relates to Charles Taylor’s treatment of shame and Franz Rosenzweig’s critique of totality. Chapter 5 deals with subjectivity, presenting Levinas’s early and later versions as essentially continuous. Morgan does not see a rift between the versions but rather a development. He presents the later version as Levinas’s effort to rethink rather than replace anthropocentrism. In Morgan’s view, Levinas at first presents the self as existing prior to the face-to-face and later argues that the self is always already in a social setting. How the difference between these views is to be reconciled is not addressed. [End Page 211] Chapter 6 concerns the relationship between God and ethics. Morgan investigates Levinas’s appropriation of religious and theological language. Once again, Morgan is of the view that Otherwise than Being elaborates and develops what appeared earlier in Totality and Infinity, rather than changes his position. Chapter 7 looks at time and history. Morgan surveys Levinas’s early treatment of time in Time and the Other. He tries to make sense of Levinas...

Alejandro García-Rivera: A Legacy in Theological Aesthetics

Alejandro García-Rivera: A Legacy in Theological Aesthetics Michelle A. Gonzalez (bio) In this article I will consider the contributions of the aesthetics of Alejandro García-Rivera in the field of Systematic Theology. It is difficult, if not impossible, as García-Rivera’s former student, to disassociate the personal from the academic. But personal testimony is also a form of speaking the truth. García-Rivera’s theological aesthetics had a profound influence on my intellectual development. If it were not for him, I never would have read Hans Urs von Balthasar, and it was from a seemingly casual suggestion by him that I discovered, and fell in love with, the writings of Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz. Along with Nancy Pineda-Madrid, we worked closely with him as he was writing The Community of the Beautiful (1999), and I can honestly say the many hours we spent with him discussing this text are one of my fondest memories as a student and academic. My essay focuses primarily on García-Rivera’s first two books, St. Martín de Porres and the Semiotics of Culture (1995) and The Community of the Beautiful.1 In defining theological aesthetics, García-Rivera states, early in The Community of the Beautiful, that a foundational question for this field is, “What moves the human heart?”2 This simple question that is so profound, transforms the manner in which we approach theology. Prior to its publication, academic theology, and in particular theology in the Americas that engages racial/ethnic minority communities, had distanced itself from the affective, instead reducing theology to either discourse as a socio-scientific rational model that has little to do with the human experience of, and response to the sacred, or to ethical actions. Theological aesthetics reminds us that this attention to Beauty is the most authentic manner in which to speak of the Mystery of the Sacred in regards to human encounter. In evoking Beauty, García-Rivera introduces the categories of love, awe, and desire into our theological language. Beauty is inherently attractive, meaning that it draws contemplators out of themselves and into a direct encounter with the phenomenon manifesting itself, and this Beauty, the contemplator knows, testifies to itself in a way that the other transcendentals of the True and the Good cannot. Latino theologian Roberto S. Goizueta sees this role of aesthetics as integral and organic to Latina/o theology: “If Tridentine Western theology stressed the fact that God is known in the form of the True (Doctrine), and liberation theology [the fact] that God is known in the form of the Good (Justice), U.S. Hispanic theology stresses the fact that God is known in the form of the Beautiful.”3 For too long revelation has been understood as truth (to be known) or good (to be chosen). As defined by García-Rivera, “Theological aesthetics recognizes in the experience of the truly beautiful a religious dimension.”4 In other words, theological aesthetics contends that Beauty is a result of divine initiative: Beauty not only exists, the human receives it. “Theological aesthetics attempts to make clear once again the connection between Beauty and the beautiful, between Beauty’s divine origins and its appropriation by the human heart.”5 Drawing from the work of von Balthasar, García-Rivera notes that in addressing both the objective and subjective dimensions of Beauty and its reception, theological aesthetics attempts to address modern suspicions surrounding the experience of Beauty.6 Situated as the first part of von Balthasar’s enormous trilogy, his aesthetics seeks to recover the aesthetic form of theology. The trilogy itself is based on the three transcendentals of being: the Beautiful (Herrlichkeit), the Good (Theodramatik), and the True (Theologik). The order of the trilogy is not arbitrary. The manifestation, or theophany, of the aesthetics leads to the encounter of the dramatics. As von Balthasar writes, “God does not want to be just ‘contemplated’ and ‘perceived’ by us, like a solitary actor by his public; no, from the beginning he has provided for a play in which we all must share.”7 The theo-drama, in turn, is followed by...