Abstract

In the modern history of reason and freedom religion has been excluded from public discourse. The German theologian, Helmut Peukert, develops a bold response to this situation by entering into dialogue first with contemporary theories of science and then with the theory of communicative action elaborated by Karl-Otto Apel and Jurgen Habermas. A crucial feature of Peukert's argument is his concern to show how freedom is both a fundamental dimension of human subjectivity and a basic category for theology. Thus, the category of freedom is an important intersection point for a dialogue between theology and the theory of communicative action. ;Chapter One surveys Peukert's understanding of fundamental theology and his dialogue with contemporary theories of science. The outcome of this dialogue is the perception that context of intersubjective action is an ineluctable hermeneutical dimension for all areas of human inquiry. ;Chapter Two of the study outlines the approaches to intersubjectivity developed in the modern history of freedom, the early Frankfurt School and in the theory of communicative action. Following Peukert and Christian Lenhardt the argument advances the claim that an intersubjective account of freedom leads to a concept of solidarity in which theological dimensions are implicated. ;In Chapter Three the inability of a theory of communicative action to provide a fully coherent account of freedom and solidarity is examined. This failure is the basis for Peukert's development of a fundamental theology incorporating the dimensions of freedom and solidarity. Theology is understood to be a more adequate theory of human subjectivity and freedom than a Habermasian approach to the theory of communicative action. ;The limitations of Habermas' approach are ultimately traceable to his resistance to the theological and aesthetic sensitivities of early critical theory . Chapter Four develops this claim and links it to some contemporary criticisms of discourse ethics in Benhabib and Dallmayr. ;On the basis of Peukert's dialogue with the theory of communicative action it becomes possible to see how theology consistently draws attention to dimensions of human freedom ignored by procedural accounts of social rationality