Species and Salvation: Theology of History in the Anthropocene?

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-17
Author(s):  
Henning Trüper
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of History ◽  
Karl Rahner ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Human Species ◽  
History Writing ◽  
Related Notion ◽  
History Of ◽  
Salvation Theology ◽  
Theology Of History ◽  
Historical Thought

In this article I will discuss various thoughts of a few recent representatives of the tradition of the philosophy of history—Heinz Dieter Kittsteiner, Ulrich Beck, and finally Karl Rahner—and bring them into a conversation with Dipesh Chakrabarty's work on the problems of human species history and the Anthropocene. The aim of this undertaking is to gain greater clarity on the question of the work that theology continues to do for historical thought. I argue that Rahner's notions about “inclusivism”—according to which the possibility of salvation is vested in the species history of humanity rather than in the history of Christian revelation—and his related notion of an irresolvable tension between “anonymous” and what one might then call “onomastic” histories signal the continuing significance of a theology of the baptismal sacrament for historical thought. Rereading Rahner's thought sheds light on certain quandaries of the Anthropocene discussion, regarding the way in which species history can be related to other kinds of history writing, and the novel opening for theodicy generated by the breakdown of the culture–nature divide.

scholarly journals On Eminescu’s philosophy of history: towards an English anthology of relevant texts

2020 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 241-258
Author(s):  
Catalin Pavel
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Philosophy Of History ◽  
Complex Interplay ◽  
History Of ◽  
Academic Philosophy ◽  
Per Se ◽  
First Time ◽  
Selection Of ◽  
Historical Thought

The present paper aims to offer Anglophone researchers a selection of translated quotes from Mihai Eminescu’s non-literary oeuvre, relevant to the philosophy of history of the most complex Romanian author of the nineteenth century. It should thus become possible to reconsider Eminescu’s position within the concert of European philosophers of history. The fragments gathered here stem mainly from his activity as a cultural and political journalist, throughout which he voiced, albeit unsystematically, his views on history. Although he did not ultimately articulate an academic philosophy of history per se, these fragments, now available in English for the first time, may give valuable insights into Eminescu’s conception of history. Above all else, they meaningfully complement whatever can be gleaned from Eminescu’s already translated poetry or literary prose. Hopefully the fragments presented here will aid scholars in establishing more precisely what Eminescu’s views on history owe to Schopenhauer’s metaphysics and what to the proper philosophy of history he could find in Hegel. This is a double allegiance scholars have also recognized in Maiorescu’s work. By the same token, it would further be important to chart Eminescu’s ambivalence towards Hegel, an ambivalence also visible in the works of Romanian philosopher Vasile Conta. Finally, the fragments below may help to bring to the fore the complex interplay between Hegelian theodicy and Kantian teleology in Eminescu’s historical thought.

scholarly journals Kategorie "początku i końca dziejów" w serbskiej historiozofii – dominanty problemowe i metodologiczne

2014 ◽  
Vol 14 ◽  
pp. 189-201
Author(s):  
Dorota Gil
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of History ◽  
The Other ◽  
National Consciousness ◽  
End Of History ◽  
Historical Figures ◽  
History Of ◽  
The One ◽  
Theology Of History ◽  
Folk Tradition ◽  
Point Of Reference

The concept of “the beginning and end of history” in Serbian historiosophy. Dominant problematic and methodological featuresIn this study, the most representative and (importantly) not easily methodologically categorised historiosophical concepts of the Serbian state and nation are taken into consideration. Among these, the most elementary point of reference is that of “the beginning and end”. On the one hand the Serbian philosophy of history – dependant both on common historiosophical concepts and native ideas – demonstrates its connections with orientations of a post-Hegelian background; while on the other connections can be seen with the Providentialist historiosophy dominant in the first part of the 20th century in Serbia and, nowadays, taking into account history in Soteriologic and Eschatological terms – Christian historiosophy (more strictly: the Orthodox theology of history based on the Russian pattern), as well as eclectic historiosophy referring to the contamination of indigenous folk tradition and ethicised Orthodoxy (which in turn synthesises mythic and messianic elements). Within all perspectives and methodological practices, the very thought enabling the whole history of Serbia and the Serbs to be grasped – referring at the same time either to constant casual mechanisms concerning the national consciousness or to the variously-defined national psyche – is co-constructed and present in all ideas: the concept of “the beginning and end”. Within this concept, several events and historical figures – forming a constitutional and basic domain of meaning with its potential as loci communes – are grasped: the beginning of Nemanjić’s state, St. Sava as the “Serbian beginning and end”, and the very central event – the Battle of Kosovo – within the transcendental frame – as the beginning of the cyclically repetitive “holy history”, etc. Kategorie początku i końca dziejów w serbskiej historiozofii – dominanty problemowe i metodologiczneArtykuł omawia najbardziej reprezentatywne i – co istotne – wymykające się jed­noznacznej kategoryzacji metodologicznej ujęcia historiozofii dziejów państwa i narodu serbskiego, w których kategoria „początku i końca” stanowi elementarny i stały punkt odniesienia. Zależna od ogólnych koncepcji historiozoficznych, ale także oparta o refleksję rodzimą, serbska filozofia historii ujawnia związki z nurtami o rodowodzie postheglowskim, nade wszystko jednak z dominującą tu w I poł. XX wieku historiozofią prowidencjalistyczną i – także współcześnie – ujmującą historię w perspektywie soteriologicznej i eschatologicznej – chrześcijańską (a dokładniej – wzorowaną na rosyjskiej – prawosławną teologią historii) oraz ukształtowaną w oparciu o tradycję ludową i zetnizowane prawosławie eklektyczną historiozofią syntezującą pierwiastki mityczne i mesjanistyczne. Niezależnie od perspektyw i strategii metodologicznych historiozoficzną refleksję umożliwiającą ogarnięcie całości dziejów Serbii i Serbów, a przy tym wskazującą na stałe mechanizmy sprawcze lokalizowane w sferze świadomości, bądź też rozmaicie rozumianej psychiki narodowej, współtworzy elementarna – obecna we wszystkich koncepcjach – kategoria „początku i końca”. W jej obrębie mieszczą się konstytuujące podstawową sferę sensów i mające status loci commu­nes najważniejsze wydarzenia i postaci historyczne (początek państwa i świętej dynastii Nemanjiciów; św. Sava jako „serbski początek i koniec”; centralne wydarzenie – bitwa na Kosowym Polu – w wymiarze transcendentnym – „początek” cyklicznie powtarzającej się „historii świętej”, itd.).

Ibn Khaldûn in World Philosophy of History

1959 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 110-125 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hayden V. White
Keyword(s):  
Social Values ◽  
Late Phase ◽  
Historical Analysis ◽  
Philosophy Of History ◽  
Main Ingredient ◽  
The West ◽  
Ibn Khaldun ◽  
Historical Materials ◽  
History Of ◽  
Historical Thought

It is a distinguishing feature of modern Western historical thought that it has striven self-consciously to free itself from the use of non-historical categories of explanation in order to consitute itself as an autonomous, self-explanatory and self-justifying form of thought. Croce believed this movement to be a late phase of humanism and identified it as the main ingredient in the Western intellectual tradition. In his view, the history of historiography in the West has been one long struggle to expel the category of transcendence from historical analysis, that is, a struggle of history against philosophy of history.Unlike modern historical thought with its value free orientation, most previous historiography has been informed, either consciously or unconsciously, by a specific set of social values and has used historical materials as either a mine of examples for support of the position pre-chosen (like Cicero) or as evidence for the study of phenomena the noumena of which lie just outside the range of history proper (like Marx). The former approach never really arrives at history, the latter passes through it too rapidly to the goal which it believes lies beyond it. In so far as most previous historiography has been governed by these two tendencies, it has always been philosophy of history rather than history proper.

Historians and Philosophers

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vincenzo Ferrone
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Western Culture ◽  
Philosophy Of History ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
History Of ◽  
Theology Of History ◽  
Reciprocal Influences ◽  
Double Nature ◽  
European Civilization

This chapter examines the peculiarity of the Enlightenment as a category in the history of Western culture by highlighting the important differences and points of contact and reciprocal influences between the views of the Enlightenment held by philosophers and those held by historians. It considers efforts in the twentieth century to analyze the “Enlightenment question,” which proved pivotal in the study of the rise of modern European civilization. It also discusses the double nature of the eighteenth-century epistemological paradigm, caught between history and philosophy, as well as its unique historiographical character. Finally, it shows how, at the end of the eighteenth century, the Enlightenment opposed a brand new philosophy of history to a centuries-old theology of history.

“What Freedom?”

2019 ◽  
Vol 74 (3) ◽  
pp. 305-331
Author(s):  
John Owen Havard
Keyword(s):  
South America ◽  
French Revolution ◽  
The Political ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Free Condition ◽  
Narrative Design ◽  
Economic Liberalism ◽  
History Of ◽  
Ways Of Thinking ◽  
John Owen

John Owen Havard, “‘What Freedom?’: Frankenstein, Anti-Occidentalism, and English Liberty” (pp. 305–331) “If he were vanquished,” Victor Frankenstein states of his monstrous creation in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1818), “I should be a free man.” But he goes on: “Alas! what freedom? such as the peasant enjoys when his family have been massacred before his eyes, his cottage burnt, his lands laid waste, and he is turned adrift, homeless, pennyless, and alone, but free.” Victor’s circumstances approximate the deracinated subject of an emergent economic liberalism, while looking to other destitute and shipwrecked heroes. Yet the ironic “freedom” described here carries an added charge, which Victor underscores when he concludes this account of his ravaged condition: “Such would be my liberty.” This essay revisits the geographic plotting of Frankenstein: the digression to the East in the nested “harem” episode, the voyage to England, the neglected episode of Victor’s imprisonment in Ireland, and the creature’s desire to live in South America. Locating Victor’s concluding appeal to his “free” condition within the novel’s expansive geography amplifies the political stakes of his downfall, calling attention to not only his own suffering but the wider trail of destruction left in his wake. Where existing critical accounts have emphasized the French Revolution and its violent aftermath, this obscures the novel’s pointed critique of a deep and tangled history of English liberty and its destructive legacies. Reexamining the novel’s geography in tandem with its use of form similarly allows us to rethink the overarching narrative design of Frankenstein, in ways that disrupt, if not more radically dislocate, existing rigid ways of thinking about the novel.

On Purpose

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Ruse
Keyword(s):  
Intelligent Design ◽  
Ancient Greece ◽  
Western Thought ◽  
History Of ◽  
Historical Thought ◽  
The Way

Can we live without the idea of purpose? Should we even try to? Kant thought we were stuck with it, and even Darwin, who profoundly shook the idea, was unable to kill it. Indeed, purpose seems to be making a comeback today, as both religious advocates of intelligent design and some prominent secular philosophers argue that any explanation of life without the idea of purpose is missing something essential. This book explores the history of purpose in philosophical, religious, scientific, and historical thought, from ancient Greece to the present. The book traces how Platonic, Aristotelian, and Kantian ideas of purpose continue to shape Western thought. Along the way, it also takes up tough questions about the purpose of life—and whether it's possible to have meaning without purpose.

Between History and Nature

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anik Waldow
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
History Of Science ◽  
Philosophy Of History ◽  
Literary Translation ◽  
Scientific Models ◽  
Human Sciences ◽  
Hermeneutic Philosophy ◽  
History Of ◽  
Point Of Departure ◽  
The Way

From within the philosophy of history and history of science alike, attention has been paid to Herder’s naturalist commitment and especially to the way in which his interest in medicine, anatomy, and biology facilitates philosophically significant notions of force, organism, and life. As such, Herder’s contribution is taken to be part of a wider eighteenth-century effort to move beyond Newtonian mechanism and the scientific models to which it gives rise. In this scholarship, Herder’s hermeneutic philosophy—as it grows out of his engagement with poetry, drama, and both literary translation and literary documentation projects—has received less attention. Taking as its point of departure Herder’s early work, this chapter proposes that, in his work on literature, Herder formulates an anthropologically sensitive approach to the human sciences that has still not received the attention it deserves.

The Invention of Papal History

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stefan Bauer
Keyword(s):  
Catholic Reformation ◽  
History Writing ◽  
Historical Texts ◽  
The Past ◽  
History Of ◽  
Cultural Standards ◽  
Commissioned Works ◽  
The One ◽  
Late Renaissance ◽  
The Church

How was the history of post-classical Rome and of the Church written in the Catholic Reformation? Historical texts composed in Rome at this time have been considered secondary to the city’s significance for the history of art. The Invention of Papal History corrects this distorting emphasis and shows how history-writing became part of a comprehensive formation of the image and self-perception of the papacy. By presenting and fully contextualizing the path-breaking works of the Augustinian historian Onofrio Panvinio (1530–68), this book shows what type of historical research was possible in the late Renaissance and the Catholic Reformation. Historiography in this period by no means consisted entirely of commissioned works written for patrons; rather, a creative interplay existed between, on the one hand, the endeavours of authors to explore the past and, on the other hand, the constraints of patronage and ideology placed on them. This book sheds new light on the changing priorities, mentalities, and cultural standards that flourished in the transition from the Renaissance to the Catholic Reformation.

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