In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Hannah Arendt and Theology by John KiessGregory WilliamsHannah Arendt and Theology John Kiess NEW YORK: BLOOMSBURY T&T CLARK, 2016. XI 1 249 PP. $21.99Of the great secular Jewish thinkers of the mid-twentieth century, none has occasioned quite so much recent attention among Christian theologians as Hannah Arendt. Arendt's popularity is due to a number of factors, not least of which is the ongoing revival of Augustine's thought in (...) political theology, and it is unlikely to subside any time soon. This is why John Kiess's most recent volume, Hannah Arendt and Theology, is of importance to the field of Christian ethics.After providing an intellectual biography of Arendt, the bulk of Kiess's text is devoted to the key loci that theological authors have highlighted in her work, [End Page 210] specifically her concepts of evil, citizenship, action, and thinking. In writing about each of these, Kiess articulates the ways in which theologians have underestimated Arendt. For example, in defending Arendt vis-à-vis Eric Gregory, Kiess argues that "Arendt points to a kind of love that Augustine appears to have overlooked, one which, if falling short of the love of God and neighbor, reaches higher than the love of self to the good of what is common to all" (121).At the same time, Kiess also points out the places where Arendt underestimates Christian theology. Possibly his biggest critique is that, in arguing that the evils of totalitarianism not only transcend but completely "break" traditional definitions of evil, Arendt assumes tradition to be a static article passed on intact from one generation to the next. Against this view, Kiess holds up Alasdair MacIntyre's definition of a tradition as an ongoing argument and shows how Arendt's efforts actually demonstrate the way traditions operate dynamically in contexts of ongoing crisis.Both of these examples also point to broader metaethical questions. In particular, Kiess's statement that Augustine "overlooked" the existence of a nonsalvific love that still rises above the level of the lust for domination that constitutes the telos of the earthly city, or even the love of human glory that gives rise to its greatest virtues, seems to elide the fact that neither Augustine nor his contemporary interpreters have simply forgotten about such a possibility; rather, a chief insight of Augustinian political thought is to deny it. This is precisely why Augustine, as Kiess notes, "longed for a more transformative founding" than Arendt does in her stress on human natality (178). Kiess, it seems, wants to have it both ways on this point. Either the loves of the earthly city can amount to something more than an ethics domination or glory, in which case Augustine's doubts about the founding of political entities based on those loves is overly pessimistic, or the loves and the goods of the earthly and heavenly cities are incommensurable, in which case Arendt's amor mundi, however noble its outcomes, is not immune to the degradations of the earthly city as a whole and must be regarded as one more penultimate earthly virtue.This brings us back to the question of tradition. For all his emphasis on how Arendt exemplifies the dynamism and responsiveness of traditions, Kiess never actually specifies to which tradition Arendt belonged. To put it bluntly, he does not treat it as relevant that Arendt was not a Christian. While she is an extensive and extremely helpful commentator on the Christian theological tradition, she wrote as a critic and an outsider. We can expect certain basic differences between Arendt and her Christian interlocutors to remain irresolvable because that is the nature of interreligious difference. That does not mean, however, that dialogue is not fruitful, and it is because of this that Kiess's text is, and is likely to remain, extremely generative. [End Page 211]Gregory WilliamsDuke UniversityCopyright © 2017 Society of Christian Ethics... (shrink)

1. In his article, “McTaggart’s Logical Determinism”, Nicholas Rescher has claimed that McTaggart’s theory of universal determination, i.e., his “logical determinism,” is unsound. In this paper I shall argue that Rescher’s criticisms are inconclusive and that, for the most part, they rest upon a failure to distinguish between McTaggart’s principle of intrinsic determination and his principle of extrinsic determination. McTaggart’s theory of universal determination, I shall suggest, is based upon the principle of extrinsic determination, and that, given certain fairly uncontroversial (...) assumptions, this principle is both valid and adequate to establish McTaggart’s theory of universal determination. (shrink)

1. In his article, “McTaggart’s Logical Determinism”, Nicholas Rescher has claimed that McTaggart’s theory of universal determination, i.e., his “logical determinism,” is unsound. In this paper I shall argue that Rescher’s criticisms are inconclusive and that, for the most part, they rest upon a failure to distinguish between McTaggart’s principle of intrinsic determination and his principle of extrinsic determination. McTaggart’s theory of universal determination, I shall suggest, is based upon the principle of extrinsic determination, and that, given certain fairly uncontroversial (...) assumptions, this principle is both valid and adequate to establish McTaggart’s theory of universal determination. (shrink)

1. In his article, “McTaggart’s Logical Determinism”, Nicholas Rescher has claimed that McTaggart’s theory of universal determination, i.e., his “logical determinism,” is unsound. In this paper I shall argue that Rescher’s criticisms are inconclusive and that, for the most part, they rest upon a failure to distinguish between McTaggart’s principle of intrinsic determination and his principle of extrinsic determination. McTaggart’s theory of universal determination, I shall suggest, is based upon the principle of extrinsic determination, and that, given certain fairly uncontroversial (...) assumptions, this principle is both valid and adequate to establish McTaggart’s theory of universal determination. (shrink)