Religious Studies articles from June 1995

Religious Studies archives from June 1995

Divine commands and arbitrariness.
June 1, 1995... One of the commonest ways of developing what has become known as the Euthyphro objection to religious morality results in the rejection of divine command theory on the ground that its voluntarist basis, the claim that what is right or wrong is...

Anselm on the necessity of the Incarnation. (St. Anselm)
June 1, 1995... Anselm's Cur Deus Homo (CDH) begins by asking for what reason or by what necessity did God become a man and by His death restore... the world... since He could have restored the world... by means of some other person... or by merely...

Empty time and the eternality of God. (St. Augustine's concept of time)
June 1, 1995... Not so long ago Augustine claimed that God was the maker of all periods of time for 'how could uncountable ages pass by, which Thou hadst not made, when Thou art the Author and Creator of all ages? Or, what periods of time existed, which were...

How subjectivity is truth in the 'Concluding Unscientific Postcript.'
June 1, 1995... The purpose of this paper is to analyze the text of the Concluding Unscientific Postscript in order to clarify Kierkegaard's position that subjectivity is truth. The topic is obviously central to an understanding of the theological epistemology...

Intrinsic evil, truth and authority. (critique of Pope John Paul II's encyclical 'Veritatis Splendor')
June 1, 1995... Pope John Paul's recent encyclical, Veritatis Splendor, addresses itself beyond its immediate audience in the Catholic Church to 'all people of good will'.(1) While my Catholic friends assure me that the Catholic Church is one club that once...

The religious creativity of modern humanity: some observations on Eliade's unfinished thought.
June 1, 1995... INTRODUCTION In the Preface to the first volume of his History of Religious Ideas Eliade stated that the unity of the spiritual history of humanity is a recent discovery, which has not yet been sufficiently assimilated. Its importance for...

Explanatory rationalism and contingent truths.
June 1, 1995... I The argument of this paper is that current scepticism about explanatory rationalism is unjustified in one respect. It is widely assumed and sometimes argued that it is impossible to explain why there are positive contingent truths. In this...

The problem of evil and a plausible defence.
June 1, 1995... Philosophers seem divided between those who believe that the problem of evil refutes theism and those who believe the problem has been solved. Both camps are mistaken; in part because the problem has been too narrowly framed, in part because...

Foundation of religious beliefs after foundationalism: Wittgenstein between Nielsen and Phillips.
June 1, 1995... Foundationalism, as a metatheory that all human beliefs are eventually based on one or several self-justified foundations, despite the efforts of its persistent defenders, is not taken for granted.(1) In philosophy of religion, it means that we...

Divine Power.
June 1, 1995... The revival of interest in medieval philosophy continues apace. This book deals in considerable detail with just one rather specialized topic, the interpretation of the distinction between potentia absoluta and potentia ordinata as applied to...

Hell: The Logic of Damnation.(Brief Article)
June 1, 1995... The doctrine of universalism holds that there is a perfectly good God who will save everyone. Heaven will be full and hell will be empty. Universalism's grounds are partly exegetical; universalists typically read the bible, properly understood,...

Rationality and Theistic Belief.
June 1, 1995... McLeod offers a clear and rigorous critique of the 'Reformed Epistemology' understanding of the epistemic status of religious belief and practice. Reformed Epistemology espouses a modified foundationalism according to which, given certain...

Reported Miracles: A Critique of Hume.
June 1, 1995... J. Houston opens this extended evaluation of David Hume's scepticism regarding miracle reports by sketching the views of Augustine, Aquinas and Locke regarding the nature, purpose and possibility of miracles. According to Houston, being more...

Biblical Faith and Natural Theology: The Gifford Lectures for 1991.
June 1, 1995... James Barr needs no introduction to his academic audience: for many years an eminent scholar in Oxford, he has produced a series of masterly studies in his discipline. Some of them are listed in the bibliography of this surprising book, which...

Body, Subject and Self.
June 1, 1995... This book is subtitled, 'the possibilities of survival after bodily death'. Its conclusion is that if one accepts either the materialist monist understanding of selfhood, or the Cartesian dualist view, then life after death must be deemed...