At the University of Pretoria, Historical Theology consists of various sub-disciplines, that is, History of Christianity, History of Doctrine, History of Theology, History of Missions, Church History, and Church Polity. This article is located in History of Missions, as a contribution to the centenary celebration of the Maranatha Reformed Church of Christ (MRCC). The main focus of this contribution is an analysis of Prof. P.S. Dreyer’s mission theology as reflected in his publications, and how it shaped the mission policy (...) of the Nederduitsch Hervormde Kerk van Afrika (NHKA) and the growth of the MRCC. For 35 years (1954–1989), Prof. Dreyer was a member and chairman of the Mission Board of the NHKA. As part-time Superintendent of Mission and chairman of the Board, he not only had many administrative and financial responsibilities, but he also played a role in the establishment of at least 60 congregations in black communities, as well as the theological education of more than 200 MRCC students and ministers. All of this was based on a clear understanding of the nature of the church, as well as the responsibility and calling of the church to proclaim Jesus Christ to all people. Contribution: This article addressed the role of theology and individual theologians in the history of the church and mission in South Africa, and how it impacted upon the relationship between different race groups and the development of an indigenous Christianity. (shrink)

An architect and architectural philosopher, Berlage created a series of buildings and a body of writings that probed the problems and possibilities of Modernism. His principal texts, given here in English for the first time, present a vital chapter in the history of European Modernism.

Die Briefe des jüngeren Plinius gehören zu den berühmtesten Briefsammlungen der Antike. Die ersten neun Bücher geben ein vielseitiges Bild des Lebens und Treibens der vornehmen Welt unter der Regierung von Kaiser Trajan. Das 10. Buch enthält den Briefwechsel zwischen Plinius als Statthalter von Bithynien und dem Kaiser.

In The Specter of Materialism Petrus Liu examines what "materialism" means for progressive queer theory and Marxist approaches to China's postsocialist economy. Liu recasts the history of queer theory in light of the Beijing Consensus, arguing that North American queer theory's inability to sustain a materialist analysis is the result of its positioning of the United States, rather than China, as the focal point of contemporary global capitalism. Analyzing relations of gender and sexuality that have been reconfigured by China's (...) global capitalist accumulation-such as dagongmei (female migrant laborers in China's export-oriented sunbelt) and money boys (rural-to-urban sex workers)-Liu argues for a materialist queer theory that positions China at the center. (shrink)

Dreyer Kruger, now in his eighties, was asked to reflect on the years of his active professional experience, especially while at Rhodes University from 1974 to 1989. Considered by many to be the doyen of phenomenological psychology in South Africa, he introduced what, at that time, was a revolutionary view in the social sciences of understanding what it means to be human.During his tenure as an academic psychologist, a cohort of doctoral level phenomenologically-oriented psychologists emerged, many of whom emigrated (...) from South Africa during its apartheid era to take up high-raking positions elsewhere in the academic arena in the USA, UK, Australia and New Zealand, while those remaining in South Africa continued his legacy of promoting phenomenology as a field of interrogation in the social and human sciences. (shrink)

This article is an exercise in Practical Ecclesiology. The author reflects on church, mission and ethics from historical, hermeneutical and strategic perspectives. Using the ecclesiology of Karl Barth as a point of departure, the author argues that the church needs to be church if it wants to be a credible witness to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Integrity is essential if a church wants to be missional. Integrity means the church has to become what it already is, the body of (...) Christ. This contribution is dedicated to Prof Graham Duncan, professor emeritus of church history, a man of integrity and dedicated to the missional calling of the church. (shrink)

Imagery has played an important, albeit controversial, role in the study of memory psychophysics. In this commentary we critically examine the available data bearing on whether pictorial based depictions of remembered perceptual events are activated and scanned in each of a number of different psychophysical tasks.

The Netherdutch Reformed Church finds itself in a precarious situation. It could be described as a watershed moment in the life of this denomination. The impasse developed due to various factors such as the loss of membership, the economic situation, ecumenical isolation and various other influences, which eventually resulted in a strong institutionalised organisation. Institutionalisation necessarily resulted in a shift of focus from the essence of being Church towards institutional continuation. As a result, the organic growth of the church suffered. (...) This article investigates the institutionalism of the Netherdutch Reformed Church from an open systems perspective, thereby identifying the dysfunctionality between form and function and ending with certain perspectives in respect of a change in focus by the church to realise the true essence of being Church of Jesus Christ. (shrink)

Ubuntu is a dynamic and celebrated concept in Africa. In the great Sutu-nguni family of Southern Africa, being humane is regarded as the supreme virtue. The essence of this philosophy of life, called ubuntu or botho, is human relatedness and dignity. The Shona from Zimbabwe articulate it as: "I am because we are; I exist because the community exists." This volume offers twenty-two such reflections on practicing ubuntu as it relates to justice, personhood and human dignity both in Southern African (...) as well as in wider international contexts. This work highlights the potential of ubuntu for enriching our understanding of justice, personhood and human dignity in a globalising world. -- publisher's description. (shrink)

In this article, I would like to clarify Austin's thesis that illocutionary acts are essentially conventional and to show, how this idea is connected with his concept of securing uptake. Contrary to what most critics believe, I will show that Austin provides a criterion characterising the nature of all illocutionary acts and allowing to distinguish them from perlocutionary acts.

Since 1923 the Sammlung Tusculum has published authoritative editions of Greek and Latin works together with a German translation. The original texts are comprehensively annotated, and feature an introductory chapter. In the new volumes, additional essays delve into specific aspects of the works, illuminating their historical context and reception to the present day. The high academic quality of the new editions together with clearly written essays and annotations make the Sammlung Tusculum essential reading for students who are discovering an ancient (...) author for the first time as well as professional scholars who would like to gain a deeper understanding of specific aspects of a given work. Moreover, the series is ideal for lay readers who would like to engage with antiquity through a reliable German translation. The series contains over 270 titles, available in print and eBook editions, making previously out-of-print titles and rarities available again for the first time. In order to celebrate the 90th anniversary of the series, De Gruyter is proud to present Tusculum Online, an eBook package which contains all titles that appeared between 1923 and 2013 - a fitting tribute to an important part of German publishing history. For more information, please see www.degruyter.com/tusculum. (shrink)

Editio princeps of Peter Thomae's De ente. It is generally acknowledged by historians of philosophy that medieval philosophers made key contributions to the discussion of the problem of being and the fundamental issues of metaphysics. The Quaestiones de ente of Peter Thomae, composed at Barcelona ca. 1325, is the longest medieval work devoted to the problem of being as well as the most systematic. The work is divided into three parts: the concept of being, the attributes of being, and the (...) descent of being. Many of the philosophical tools that Peter pioneered in this work, such as the distinction between objective being and subjective being, and various modes of quiddities and abstraction, were adopted by later thinkers and discussed up to the eighteenth century. Apart from defending and further extending Scotistic doctrine, one of Peter's achievements in the De ente is to fully reconcile Scotistic univocity with the traditional doctrine of the analogy of being. In addition to the critical edition, the present volume also contains a detailed introduction and study of the philosophy and the manuscripts of the De ente, with an appendix containing the Question on univocity by Francis Marbres (John the Canon), who copied extensively from the De ente. (shrink)

v. 1. Dualism in the Archaic and Early Classical periods of Greek history -- v. 2. Dualism in the political and social history of Greece in the fifth and fourth century B.C. -- v. 3. Dualism in Greek literature and philosophy in the fifth and fourth centuries B.C. -- v. 4. Dualism in the ancient Middle East -- v. 5. A cultural history of Dualism -- v. 6. Dualism in the Hellenistic world -- v. 7. Dualism in the Palestinian-Syrian region (...) during the first century A.D. until. ca. 140 -- v. 8. Gnostic dualism in Asia Minor during the first centuries A.D. (2 v.) -- v. 10. Dualism in Roman history: 1. Imperialistic dualism -- v. 11. Dualism in Roman history: 2. Dualism in interior politics and social life -- v. 12. Dualism in Roman history: 3. The Christian church in conflict with the Roman Empire and with Judaism -- v. 13. Dualism in Roman history: 4. The struggle between orthodoxy and heterodoxy in the early Christian church -- v. 14. Dualism in Roman history: 5. Enemies of the Roman Order -- v. 15. Imperialism in medieval history I : dualism in Byzantine history, 476-638 and dualism in Islam, 572-732 -- v. 16. Imperialism in medieval history II : dualism in German history I -- v. 17. Imperialism in medieval history III : dualism in German history II -- v. 18. The dualism of the Christian and Muslim worlds during the middle ages -- v. 20. Gnostic-dualistic tendencies in the history of medieval Europe -- v. 21. Dualism and non-dualism in medieval theology and philosophy. (shrink)

Duhem is commonly held to have founded his view of history of science as continuous on the ‘metaphsical assertion’ of natural classification. With the help of a strict distinction between formal and material characterization of natural classification I try to show that this imputation is problematic, if not simply incorrect. My analysis opens alternative perspectives on Duhem's talk of continuity, the ideal form of theories, and the rôle of ‘bon sens’; moreover it emphasizes some aspects of Duhem's realism that play (...) an important part in his philosophy of science. (shrink)

In this book, linguists and philosophers combine to offer a unique insight not only into Grice's contribution to philosophy of language, but on his theories of natural and non-natural meaning, implicatures and the semantic-pragmatic distinction.