Speech and theology : language and the logic of Incarnation / James K.A. Smith.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Smith, James K. A., 1970-

Series:

Radical orthodoxy series.

Radical orthodoxy series

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Christianity--Philosophy.

Christianity.

Incarnation.

Language and languages--Religious aspects--Christianity.

Language and languages.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (201 p.)

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

London ; New York : Routledge, 2002.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

God is infinite, but language finite; thus speech would seem to condemn Him to finitude. In speaking of God, would the theologian violate divine transcendence by reducing God to immanence, or choose, rather, to remain silent? At stake in this argument is a core problem of the conditions of divine revelation. How, in terms of language and the limitations of human understanding, can transcendence ever be made known? Does its very appearance not undermine its transcendence, its condition of unknowability?Speech and Theology posits that the paradigm for the encounter between the material and the divine, or the immanent and transcendent, is found in the Incarnation: God's voluntary self-immersion in the human world as an expression of His love for His creation. By this key act of grace, hinged upon Christs condescension to human finitude, philosophy acquires the means not simply to speak of perfection, which is to speak theologically, but to bridge the gap between word and thing in general sense.

Contents:

SPEECH AND THEOLOGY Language and the logic of incarnation; Copyright; Contents; Acknowledgements; Abbreviations; Part One Horizons; 1 Introduction: how to avoid not speaking; The violence of concepts and the possibility of theology; Method and the question of justice; Phenomenology's other: the French challenge to phenomenology; Towards a new phenomenology; 2 Phenomenology and transcendence: genealogy of a challenge; Transcendence in early phenomenology; Three phenomenological reductions: an heuristic; First reduction: the possibility of transcendent knowledge in Husserl

Second reduction: Heidegger's critique of HusserlThe violence of immanence: the French critique; A third reduction to unconditioned givenness; The same and the other: Levinas; The "Saturated Phenomenon": Marion's critique of Husserl; Incommensurability and transcendence: the violence of the concept; A formalization of the question; Phenomenology as respect: Derrida; Thinking the concept otherwise: towards an incarnational phenomenology; Part Two Retrieval; 3 Heidegger's "new" phenomenology; Towards a new phenomenology with the young Heidegger

Taking Husserl at his word: a phenomenology of the natural attitudeHorizons: Husserl's phenomenological worlds; Critique: Heidegger's factical world; Finding words for facticity: formal indication as a "grammar"; "Words are lacking": the demand for new "concepts"; A factical grammar: the logic of formal indications; Religious experience, the religious phenomenon, and a phenomenology of religion; The return of the concept: Destrukting Being and Time; 4 Praise and confession: how (not) to speak in Augustine; Lost for words?: the challenge of speaking for Augustine

Between predication and silence: how (not) to speak of GodWords and things: the incommensurability of signa and res; Use, enjoyment, and reference: Augustine's phenomenology of idolatry; How (not) to speak of God: the icon of praise; How (not) to tell a secret: interiority and the strategy of "confession"; Interior secrets: on not knowing who we are; Silence and secrets: interiority and the problem of communication; Confession: the strategy of the interior self; Part Three Trajectories; 5 Incarnational logic: on God's refusal to avoid speaking; The problem of theology

On (not) knowing the Wholly Other: a critique of revelation in Levinas and MarionThe appearance of the paradox: revelation in Kierkegaard; Analogy and respect: retrieving analogy in a French context; The specter of Platonism: reconsidering participation and incarnation; Index

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references (p. 177-182) and index.

ISBN:

9781134473939

1134473931

9781134473946

113447394X

9781283642224

1283642220

9781280112355

1280112352

9780203995273

0203995279

OCLC:

252960338