LEGAL POLYCENTRISM: A CHRISTIAN THEOLOGICAL AND JURISPRUDENTIAL EVALUATION

2017 ◽  
Vol 32 (3) ◽  
pp. 383-405
Author(s):  
David VanDrunen
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Good Reason ◽  
Image Of God ◽  
Christian Theology ◽  
Single Source ◽  
Multiple Sources ◽  
Christian Perspective ◽  
Moral Economic ◽  
The Image Of God ◽  
Civil Government

AbstractLegal theorists have long debated whether law originates from a single source (the actions of state officials) or from multiple sources (including the innumerable communities and associations that constitute broader civil society). In recent years, proponents have defended polycentrism—and its critics have tried to refute it—from various moral, economic, and historical angles. But no contemporary writer has examined polycentrism from a Christian perspective. In the absence of such a study heretofore, this article attempts to evaluate legal polycentrism from a Christian theological and jurisprudential perspective. The Christian scriptures and Christian theology do not directly address whether law is polycentric or monocentric. Nevertheless, appealing to a number of biblical-theological issues—including the image of God, the Noahic covenant (Genesis 8:21–9:17), wisdom, and the purpose of civil government—I argue that Christians have good reason to regard polycentrism as a more satisfactory view of law.

Known by God: C. S. Lewis and Dietrich Bonhoeffer

2005 ◽  
Vol 77 (4) ◽  
pp. 343-352
Author(s):  
Brian S. Rosner
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Image Of God ◽  
The Other ◽  
Christian Theology ◽  
Human Relationship ◽  
Dietrich Bonhoeffer ◽  
Introductory Essay ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Pastoral Value ◽  
The Image Of God

Whereas knowing God is central to every version of Christian theology, little attention has been paid to the other side of the divine-human relationship. This introductory essay approaches the subject via the brief but poignant remarks of two twentieth-century authors appearing in a work of fiction and in a poem. If C. S. Lewis recognizes the primacy of being known by God, Dietrich Bonhoeffer helps define it and underscores its pastoral value. Both authors accurately reflect the main contours of the Bible’s own treatment. Calvin’s view of the image of God, which T. F. Torrance defines as ‘God’s gracious beholding of man as his child,’ may be of assistance in defining what it means to be known by God.

Toward the Development of a Christian Psychology: Sensation and Perception

1978 ◽  
Vol 6 (3) ◽  
pp. 200-209 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ronald L. Koteskey
Keyword(s):  
Central Nervous System ◽  
Image Of God ◽  
Neural Pathways ◽  
Sensory Inputs ◽  
Extrasensory Perception ◽  
Christian Perspective ◽  
The Central Nervous System ◽  
Meaningful Experiences ◽  
The Image Of God ◽  
The Brain

A Christian perspective on psychology is briefly reviewed. Sensation is seen as emphasizing how humans are similar to animals. Human sensory organs are similar anatomically and physiologically to those of other mammals. Humans are sensitive to similar stimuli and have similar neural pathways to the brain. Perception is seen as emphasizing how humans are created in the image of God. The central nervous system is not simply a passive receiver of sensory inputs, but an organizer of sensations, cognitions, motivations, and emotions into meaningful experiences. Extrasensory perception, meditation, drugs, dreams, and visions are also discussed from this perspective.

Das Alte Testament in christlicher Perspektive

2017 ◽  
Vol 77 (2) ◽  
pp. 88-100
Author(s):  
Bernd Oberdorfer
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
Image Of God ◽  
Historical Criticism ◽  
Christian Perspective ◽  
Christian View ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
Human Reality ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Image Of God

Abstract According to Notker Slenczka, Jesus redefined the early Jewish understanding of God so radically that the Old Testament could not remain an adequate expression of the Christian idea of God. Moreover, in the light of historical criticism, the messianic promises of the OT could no longer be read as prophetic references to Jesus, either. The OT could hence only be seen as revelation to Jews; for Christians, however, it is valuable as paradigmatic expression of human reality and their necessity of salvation only, and to them authentic information about redemption is provided only by the New Testament. The essay discusses this position and defines a possible Christian view on the relation between Old and New Testament based on the insight that Jesus’ redefinition of the image of God can only be understood in the light of the history of God’s self-revelation to Israel, of which Jesus is a part; from a Christian perspective, the words, actions and fate of Jesus then also shed new light on the history of God’s self-revelation to Israel.

Toward the Development of A Christian Psychology: Emotion

1980 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 303-313 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ronald L. Koteskey
Keyword(s):  
Negative Emotions ◽  
Image Of God ◽  
Christian Perspective ◽  
Christian Psychology ◽  
The Image Of God ◽  
Positive And Negative Emotions

This article adds to a previous reinterpretation of psychology from a Christian perspective by placing emotion in that perspective. From various definitions, theories, and experiments it is shown that both the animal-like physiological aspects and the God-like cognitive aspects of emotion must be considered. Finally, several positive and negative emotions are discussed as being part of the image of God in humans.

Man in the Image of God: The Disagreement Between Barth and Brunner Reconsidered

1986 ◽  
Vol 39 (4) ◽  
pp. 433-459 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joan E. O'Donovan
Keyword(s):  
Human Life ◽  
Image Of God ◽  
Christian Theology ◽  
Human Being ◽  
Reproductive Process ◽  
Recent Developments ◽  
Complex Forms ◽  
The One ◽  
And Control ◽  
The Image Of God

The task of understanding the uniqueness of human being which underlies the obligations obtaining among men in distinction from all other creatures, is a perennial task of Christian theology. The one complete and final revelation of God in Jesus Christ has planted this task firmly and unalterably at the centre of theological reflection rather than at its periphery. In our generation the search for theological clarity on this matter receives heightened urgency from the pervasive assault on dignity of human being coming from recent developments in the modern sciences and technologies. This assault is conducted simultaneously in the theoretical and practical realms, armed by the increasing coalescence of the two realms in advanced scientific method.1 Today the most consequential knowledge of human life is produced by the most exact, intricate, and complex forms of manipulation and control. In the enthralling feats of biochemical technology the coming–into–being of individual human life is now the object of experimental making.2 Whetheror not our mastery of the reproductive process will ever lay bare the mystery of human generation, it certainly throws open to an unprecedented degree the question of what human being is, and by what its uniqueness is constituted.

Childhood in Eastern Patristic Thought: Some Problems of Theology and Theological Anthropology

1994 ◽  
Vol 31 ◽  
pp. 39-52 ◽  
Author(s):  
Graham Gould
Keyword(s):  
Theological Anthropology ◽  
Human Person ◽  
Image Of God ◽  
Christian Theology ◽  
Early Church ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Eternal Salvation ◽  
The Image Of God ◽  
Present Life

The writings of the Early Church concerning childhood are not extensive, but in the works of a number of Eastern Christian authors of the second to fourth centuries it is possible to discern some ideas about childhood which raise important problems of Christian theology and theological anthropology. The theological problem is that of the question posed for theodicy by the sufferings and deaths of infants. It is harder to give a brief definition of the anthropological problem, but it is important to do so because to define the problem as the Eastern Fathers saw it is also to identify the set of conceptual tools—the anthropological paradigm—which they used to answer it. These are not, naturally, the concepts of modern anthropology and psychology. Applied to patristic thought, these terms usually refer to speculations about the composition and functioning of the human person or the human soul which belong to a discourse which is recognizably philosophical and metaphysical—by which is meant that it is (though influenced by other sources, such as the Bible) the discourse of a tradition descending ultimately from the anthropological terminology of Plato, Aristotle, and the Stoics. Patristic anthropology seeks to account for the history and experiences of the human person as a created being—fhe experience of sin and mortality in the present life, but also of eternal salvation and advancement to perfection in the image of God.

Kant’s Philosophical and Theological Commitments

2014 ◽  
pp. 600-607
Author(s):  
Peter Yong ◽  
Eric Watkins
Keyword(s):  
Image Of God ◽  
Original Sin ◽  
Christian Theology ◽  
Philosophical Theology ◽  
Existence Of God ◽  
The Image Of God

This essay attempts to lay out some of the most central aspects of Kant’s relationship to Christianity, which is as influential as it is complex. The first section explains several core claims in Kant’s philosophical theology by elucidating both Kant’s criticisms of the traditional arguments for the existence of God (i.e., the cosmological, teleological and ontological arguments) and his own positive theistic arguments, which he believes to be more compelling. The second section examines some important elements of Kant’s constructive Christian theology by looking at his interpretations of the doctrines of (i) creation in the image of God, (ii) original sin, (iii) redemption, and (iv) grace.

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