Jürgen Moltmann as a Doctrinal Theologian: The Nature of Doctrine and The Possibilities for its Development

1995 ◽  
Vol 48 (4) ◽  
pp. 489-506
Author(s):  
Richard Clutterbuck

Moltmann derives much of the power of his theology from his willingness to endure the tensions of paradox, a willingness signalled early in his career with the title of his work, The Crucified God. Such paradoxes, however, leave unanswered questions and the need for further explorations. It is the argument of this article that an aspect of Moltmann's theology in particular need of exploration is the area of the status of Christian doctrine and its appropriate development. There is a major tension, we will suggest, between the disavowal of‘doctrine’, ‘dogma’, ‘tradition’ and ‘system’ as helpful concepts, and the strongly doctrinal and systematic content of Moltmann's theology. This tension, we believe, has something to do with the ambivalence in Moltmann's attitude to the intellectual legacy of the Enlightenment, to ‘modernity’. We shall try to show that Moltmann operates with a mixture of internal criteria (based on key doctrines) and external criteria (based on perceived human needs) for assessing authenticity in doctrine. Finally, within the dynamic of Moltmann's theology, with what we shall identify as its emphasis on historicality, there are resources for advancing an account of the theological significance of the development of doctrine. We explore these and ask why Moltmann himself has not put them to greater use.

Author(s):  
Michaela Sibylová

The author has divided her article into two parts. The first part describes the status and research of aristocratic libraries in Slovakia. For a certain period of time, these libraries occupied an underappreciated place in the history of book culture in Slovakia. The socialist ideology of the ruling regime allowed their collections (with a few exceptions) to be merged with those of public libraries and archives. The author describes the events that affected these libraries during and particularly after the end of World War II and which had an adverse impact on the current disarrayed state and level of research. Over the past decades, there has been increased interest in the history of aristocratic libraries, as evidenced by multiple scientific conferences, exhibitions and publications. The second part of the article is devoted to a brief history of the best-known aristocratic libraries that were founded and operated in the territory of today’s Slovakia. From the times of humanism, there are the book collections of the Thurzó family and the Zay family, leading Austro-Hungarian noble families and the library of the bishop of Nitra, Zakariás Mossóczy. An example of a Baroque library is the Pálffy Library at Červený Kameň Castle. The Enlightenment period is represented by the Andrássy family libraries in the Betliar manor and the Apponyi family in Oponice. 


2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 1285-1298
Author(s):  
Diana Anggraeni ◽  
Herland Franley Manalu ◽  
Desty Anggraini

Humans have gone through many incidents, both good and bad experiences, and sometimes these experiences are shared with others in the form of stories. The stories, as one of the forms of literary works, would be nothing without the created characters within them because they provide the viewers with a purpose and a reason for us to learn about what happens in the story. Besides, they act as one important element in the movie with various psychological effects. This research aims to analyze the characteristics and the hierarchy of human needs, especially esteem needs, that appear in the main character named Will Traynor in the ‘Me Before You’ movie directed by Thea Sharrock. This study uses descriptive data analysis which describes a phenomenon and the main character in the movie. The results revealed seven characters comprising the esteem needs hierarchy: sensitive, open-minded, friendly, kind, confident, humble, and stubborn. The esteem needs hierarchy is the desire to have the need to be approved, valued, and recognized to have some self-esteem. This is striking in the movie because of the status of the character, Will Traynor as a lord, and Louisa Clark who is only a maid and has no superiority over Will in her life. The findings imply the personality of humans differ in their characters and psychology as shown from the esteem needs hierarchy in Will’s personality expressing the different types of characteristics.


Problemos ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 97 ◽  
pp. 186-197
Author(s):  
Marius Markuckas

In the works devoted to the phenomenon of transhumanism, it is widely recognized that philosophy of the Enlightenment had a great intellectual influence on the formation of transhumanism. Yet, this article states that the ideas of Enlightenment philosophy can be reasonably treated as not only consisting the conceptual transhumanism core but also as being a source of its internal contradictions. The paper defends the position that transhumanism in general is an intrinsically controversial project and introduces the premises for this contradiction – the basic anthropological views inherited from philosophy of the Enlightenment. Finally, the article questions the status of transhumanism as a techno-scientific program and states it to be an ideologically engaged project in anthropological engineering, which, in its turn, is devoid of any clear theoretical and practical outline.


2021 ◽  
pp. 297-316
Author(s):  
Matthias Goldmann

While human rights discourse became fundamental for challenging austerity in the aftermath of the Great Financial Crisis, in historical perspective, such a role of human rights represents the exception rather than the rule. Human rights discourse in the context of sovereign debt-induced austerity has varied enormously over time. Far from reflecting progress, its history reveals changing paradigms of human rights law. This chapter focuses on one of these paradigm shifts occurring at the turn from the 1970s to the 1980s. In the 1970s, newly independent states invoked human rights mostly to assert their sovereignty and avert international interference. This structural human rights paradigm abruptly disappeared from austerity debates in the 1980s, when the sovereign debt crisis hit the Global South, creating a need for multilateral liquidity assistance. Faced with pressure to reconsider the social impact of structural adjustment programmes, the International Monetary Fund shifted the terms of the debate from ‘human needs’, a human rights-related term, to ‘human capital’. Consequently, at the time when human rights rose to the status of the ‘last utopia’, they ceased to have relevance for austerity. Hence, whether human rights discourse promotes social ends depends on the particular context and time. The chapter ends by proposing a political paradigm of human rights law reflecting this insight.


Vox Patrum ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 69 ◽  
pp. 143-154
Author(s):  
Bogdan Czyżewski

The annonymous work called The Rule of the Master, in the so-called Thema, contains a commentary to the Lord’s Prayer. The Master, in his interpretion of invocation, touches the Christian doctrine. He analyse adopted sonship, which men is receiving by the Grace of God. This grace is a fruit of salvation given by Christ passover. Every Christian receives this grace in sacrament of baptism. First three request in Lord’s Prayer, although directed to God strictly, also refer to bound between man and Father. These prayers contains double dimension: theo­centric and antropocentric. First, these three request are leading to the God, and from Him, return to man to realize to him the obligations which are connected with the status: the child of God. Four next requests concer the specific needs of man, such as daily food, forgiveness, defense against the devil and temptations. We can not admit, that these four are focusing only on man. We can find in it also a deep theocentric feature. By directing these request to God, says The Master, man expect suport and help.


2021 ◽  
pp. 119-141
Author(s):  
Oksana Prokopyuk

The article examines the socio-cultural aspects of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra Library functioning in the 1770–80s. The focus is on acquiring the books as a purposeful way to form a collection of books that best demonstrated the monastery’s needs for books, interests and reading tastes of the fraternity. The author attempts to reconstruct the network of «book agents»: people who assisted in books acquisition; determine who was the initiator and who was the implementer of procurement; specify the needs in the printed books, as well as whether printed books completely displaced the manuscripts at the end of the 18th century.The author discovers the interest of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra in replenishing the book collection not only to meet the readers’ needs of the fraternity but also based on the understanding of the importance of a well-stocked library to confirm the status of the monastery. It has been established that the «book agents» were the Lavra attorneys in Moscow and St. Petersburg, who carried out various assignments of the monastery; former Lavra monks transferred to other dioceses; or persons loyal to Lavra, specifically involved for this purpose. There is interest in translated literature, periodicals, new publications, and activity in the purchase of printed materials, which generally signals changes in the reading practices of the monastic corporation. The analysis of the repertoire of purchased books confirmed the spread of the ideas of the Enlightenment and the growing demand for secular and educational books on science and nature. The Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, while remaining quite traditional in the segment of theological literature, where Latin continued to dominate, demonstrated openness to new trends in book culture of the second half of the 18th century.


2006 ◽  
pp. 37-73 ◽  
Author(s):  
Predrag Krstic

In this paper the author is attempting to establish the relationship - or the lack of it - of the Critical Theory to the "Jewish question" and justification of perceiving signs of Jewish religious heritage in the thought of the representatives of this movement. The holocaust marked out by the name of "Auschwitz", is here tested as a point where the nature of this relationship has been decided. In this encounter with the cardinal challenge for the contemporary social theory, the particularity of the Frankfurt School reaction is here revealed through Adorno installing Auschwitz as unexpected but lawful emblem of the ending of the course that modern history has assumed. The critique of this "fascination" with Auschwitz, as well as certain theoretical pacification and measured positioning of the holocaust into discontinued plane of "unfinished" and continuation and closure of the valued project, are given through communicative-theoretical pre-orientation of J?rgen Habermas?s Critical Theory and of his followers. Finally, through the work of Detlev Claussen, it is suggested that in the youngest generation of Adorno?s students there are signs of revision to once already revised Critical Theory and a kind of defractured and differentiated return to the initial understanding of the decisiveness of the holocaust experience. This shift in the attitude of the Critical Theory thinkers to the provocation of holocaust is not, however, particularly reflected towards the status of Jews and their tradition, but more to the age old questioning and explanatory patterns for which they served as a "model". The question of validity of the enlightenment project, the nature of occidental rationalism, (non)existence of historical theology and understanding of the identity and emancipation - describe the circle of problems around which the disagreement is concentrated in the social critical theory.


2014 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
pp. 213-223 ◽  
Author(s):  
Victoria Freeman

Indigenous scholars and others have characterized Canadian discourses of reconciliation as supporting a top-down, government-defined and controlled agenda, which is at best ineffective and misleading and at worst fraudulent and recolonizing. Some have argued that reconciliation should only occur after the Indian Act has been abolished, reparations made, land and resources returned, and a political and economic nation-to-nation relationship restored. The author agrees that it is essential to look critically at state and nationalistic discourses of reconciliation and that neither the federal government, the churches, nor non-Indigenous peoples generally can or should control the agenda. However, while reconciliation is not a sufficient condition for decolonization in Canada, Indigenous resurgence on its own will not achieve full decolonization either. If the psychic structures of colonialism persist, various forms of neocolonialism will be prevalent even after a nominal “nation-to-nation” relationship has been established, given the demographic imbalance and geographical proximity between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples. There will always be a need for relationship and negotiation.In fact, decolonization and reconciliation may be understood as complementary and concurrent processes. The concept of reconciliation underlines the emotional, psychological and human changes that are as necessary as political and economic reformulations for decolonization and that are not easily addressed by other means. Rather than a top-down government-initiated campaign focused on assimilation into the status quo or a Eurocentric Christian doctrine focused on forgiveness, reconciliation can be a transformative process of building the relationships, alliances and social understandings necessary to support the systemic changes that true decolonization entails. Indigenous and other cultural paradigms for resolving conflicts, making restitution and healing relationships, such as the Sto:lo concept of lummi or “facing yourself,” can help restore interconnectedness and reciprocity at all levels, both within Indigenous communities and between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples and the land. We also should not overestimate the government’s power to control even those reconciliation processes it does initiate, let alone those that arise autonomously. Decolonization and reconciliation are processes underway on many fronts in Canada, and they can’t be controlled by anyone.


2018 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 197-210
Author(s):  
Tatiana Artemyeva

Among various approaches to intellectual processes in history we can find some space for new aspects of the history of visuality, including emblem studies.The visual part of the emblem depends on the conceptual description, and its artistic value or the quality of its image is not as important as its textual part. We can compare this with the calligraphic status of handwriting, or the particular configuration and style of a typeface. They are not important for the content of the text, although we can include them in our consideration. Paradoxically, the textual part of the emblem usually contains visual descriptions as explanations and can completely replace the image. The sustained connection between an image and a description of an emblem allows us to give it the status of a concept. In this paper, I use examples from the Russian emblematic discourse of the Enlightenment to contextualise an illustrated edition of the poetry of Gavriil Derzhavin.


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