Biblical anthropology is demonstrably both holist and dualist. It is holist in teaching that God created, redeems, and will glorify humans as whole embodied persons. It is dualist in teaching that God created humans of two ingredients and that he sustains persons apart from their bodies between death and resurrection. This chapter shows that key arguments against dualism are compromised by problematic hermeneutics, conceptual confusions, and faulty reasoning. It also shows that monism cannot account for the texts which (...) imply dualism, and that dualism is compatible with holism. N. T. Wright corroborates the exegesis supporting these conclusions but defines and rejects dualism as incompatible with holism. Nevertheless, his understanding of holism is compatible with virtually all current Christian dualism. However, Joel Green's holistic exegesis, integral anthropology, and practical theology make valuable contributions that dualists can affirm. (shrink)

IN MANY CHURCH-BODY DISPUTES OVER THE MORAL STATUS OF SAME-gender unions, the last line of defense against the affirmation of such unions is often an appeal to homosexual orientation as inherently "disordered," rendering same-gender unions unacceptable regardless of the loving and just qualities they may embody. On the basis of a biblical anthropology shaped by the eschatological orientation of the scriptures and further enhanced by contemporary Trinitarian discourse, this essay engages and challenges this traditional view as it has (...) been developed in the theological ethics of Helmut Thielicke. In so doing, the essay raises a key metaethical question of the theological foundations that inform Christian sexual ethics in general. (shrink)

The article explores biblical sources of ethics principles of business. It demonstrates that in the contemporary pluralistic world, principles of biblical business ethics can be valuable in the communication and interaction among representatives of different countries and cultures, as they encompass fundamental foundations for building business relationships. Due to the influence of Christian morality on the culture of many nations, biblical values have the potential to significantly impact individuals and their economic behavior, contributing to the dissemination of (...) important economic categories in society. The study reveals that important anthropological foundations for fruitful economic relations have been formed within the framework of biblical theocentrism, including considerations of human dignity, honesty, diligence, responsibility, and charity. The biblical perspective on property as a temporary stewardship has significant implications for awareness and education about responsibility not only towards other people but also towards the environment, holding crucial relevance in the context of corporate social responsibility in the modern world. (shrink)

The Bible is one of the most influential documents in human history that has not only changed believers’ lives but has also greatly influenced our society whether one is a Christian or not. While the Western world has somehow managed to remove the Bible from the public sphere and religion relegated as the opium of the oppressed masses in the Communist bloc, to Africans, the Bible has remained a moral compass without which human life becomes ungovernable. As the Bible has (...) come to occupy such a high place of authority in African life, the aim of this article is to examine the contemporary challenges that Africa is facing concerning issues of power and accountability in light of selected biblical texts. Using largely the canonical approach and socio-cultural anthropology, this article takes the Bible as a mirror that leaders should use to self-introspect in regard to their exercise of power and accountability to their subjects. It is our observation that there is now a tendency among African leadership especially during elections to rush to claim vox populi, vox Dei meaning ‘the voice of people is the voice of God’, yet rigging and failure to live up to God’s dictates may be manifestly characterising one’s leadership. A fish begins rotting in its head hence it is our conclusion that it is only by having a leadership that cultivates a fear of God at its heart that Africa can be healed of its problems. Contribution: In Africa, it is a paradox that while some political leaders purport to have been schooled in the Bible in mission schools, they lead a life divorced from it. This article adds a voice to the on-going religion and politics dialogue in Zimbabwe by soliciting an honest adherence to its principles. (shrink)

Not unlike the Catholics, the English Reformed circles—the Church of England—upheld the legitimacy of the Revelation and miracles, recognised the Mosaic account of creation, original sin and the Trinity, the non-corporeal nature of spiritual substance, the eternity of punishment or reward and the primacy of Church over State. And so where did Locke’s hermeneutics fit into this complex panorama in terms of the interpretations of Christian anthropology and the resurrection? As underscored in the early chapters of The Reasonableness of (...) Christianity, Locke does not appear to consider that the sin of Adam has to fall on the whole of posterity, and again there is no positive affirmation of the Trinity in this work which, although it is not named, in effect proves to be incompatible with the definitions of person and individual identity which he provides in the Essay concerning human understanding. (shrink)

Notions of uniform and gradual evolution have been replaced in some circles by biological and paleontological models that postulate that periods of rapid change punctuate long periods of evolutionary stasis. This new theory, called punctuated equilibria (or PE for short), may have implications for paradigms in scholarly disciplines other than the sciences. Whereas old evolutionary models exerted great influence upon historians, sociologists, anthropologists, and students of religion for more than a century, the new model may provide heuristic paradigms for research (...) that correlate more adequately with the current observations of scholars. We therefore provide suggestions for deployment of this new scientific paradigm in history and anthropology. In particular, this model can explain the rise of the Israelite state and the religious ethos in the Hebrew Bible, two major concerns of today's socioscientific study of biblical materials. Thus the possibility of an overarching paradigm for the social sciences is entertained. (shrink)

The cognitive science of religion that has emerged over the last twenty years is a multidisciplinary field that often challenges established theories in anthropology and comparative religion. This new approach raises many questions for biblical studies as well. What are the cross-cultural cognitive mechanisms which explain the transmission of biblical texts? How did the local and particular cultural traditions of ancient Israel and early Christianity develop? What does the embodied and socially embedded nature of the human mind (...) imply for the exegesis of biblical texts? "Mind, Morality and Magic" draws on a range of approaches to the study of the human mind - including memory studies, computer modeling, cognitive theories of ritual, social cognition, evolutionary psychology, biology of emotions, and research on religious experience. The volume explores how cognitive approaches to religion can shed light on classical concerns in biblical scholarship - such as the transmission of traditions, ritual and magic, and ethics - as well as uncover new questions and offer new methodologies. (shrink)

This chapter appeared in: G. J. van Nes et al. (eds.), Relational Anthropology for Contemporary Economics. Dordrecht: Springer, 121-132. -/- Abstract: This chapter is a comment on the contribution of Rebecca Klein in this volume, preceded by a conceptual analysis of the argument that is developed in the Homo Amans position paper. The main question that is raised is twofold and concerns the relation between science and worldview on the one hand, and between science and economic life on the (...) other. With respect to the science – worldview relationship, it is doubted that science can play the role the authors of the Homo Amans project expect it can have. What they have in mind is that science helps in validating and legitimizing a biblically informed concept of love. This author disagrees, to a large extent. Science can indeed orient itself on ideas and intuitions that are based on one’s worldview. But it cannot prove the truth of these intuitions and ideas. To think so, is to commit a naturalistic fallacy. With respect to the relationship between science and economic life, the author is also not convinced that science and philosophy as academic disciplines will by themselves be able (and should be expected to be able) to transform deeply ingrained, institutionally anchored economic practices. New theories, concepts, and paradigms are a precondition for change, but they do not bring about change by themselves. What is needed is a change in the practices themselves, a change that is both personal and comprehensive. What is needed is a clear, succinct, and encompassing view on the intrinsic normativity of economic interactions between relevant stakeholders in what we call ‘the’ economy. This is a huge undertaking, that requires painstaking ‘phenomenological’ analyses of a wide variety of economic practices. The chapter agrees with most of Klein’s observations and concerns with respect to the position paper. These observations and concerns gain even more depth and relief given the conceptual distinctions that are made in the chapter. (shrink)

Martin (Mordechai) Buber was born in Vienna in 1878. He lived in Germany until 1933, then emigrated to Switzerland, and later to Palestine. After the Second World War, the philosopher condemned Arab-Jewish hostility and inhumane actions towards Palestinian Arabs. Buber died in 1965 in Jerusalem. The creative legacy of the philosopher is extremely popular in many countries. As a thinker, Buber combined many diverse interests and aspirations. He was a non-trivial sage-philosopher, a brilliant translator of the Tanakh, a researcher of (...) Hasidism, an outstanding educator and preacher, poet and writer. Buber's views are close to dialectical theology and existentialism. The central idea of Buber's philosophy is being as a dialogue between God and man, man and the world. Developing the concept of religious existentialism, the thinker significantly enriched philosophical anthropology. The insight expressed by him, rooted in the biblical tradition, is simple and majestic: a person's life is in dialogue with other people who are like him. This dialogue is creative and saving when it is carried out through the medium of God, his precepts about morality and love. It is in this dialogue that the vitality of God himself is revealed. Thus, Buber responded with all his creativity to the philosophical ideas of the XX century, to the ideas of "the death of God" and "the death of Man". (shrink)

Human death is natural from the perspective of evolutionary biology but unnatural from the vantage point of classical Christian theology. The biblical notion that death entered the world as a result of sin seems hard to square with the view that (human) death has been an integral part of the natural order all along. I suggest an ecumenical solution to this conundrum by retrieving and elaborating the Augustinian modal distinction between strong and weak immortality. It is argued on exegetical (...) and theological grounds that the human being can best be seen as being created in a state of posse mori et posse non mori, and that—when conceptual ambiguities in their writings are dissolved—this is what theologians as diverse as the prelates of the Council of Trent, John Calvin, Louis Berkhof, and Wolfhart Pannenberg had in mind. It is also argued that this solution is compatible with contemporary evolutionary science and can be accepted by creationists of various stripes. (shrink)

Resumen La literatura universal, se encuentra poblada de arquetípicos que comparten una condición de desamparo y marginalidad, siendo la literatura realista de la segunda mitad del siglo XIX la que constata y da cuenta de su condición. En un mismo sentido, también la Biblia presenta un sinnúmero de personajes similares, marcando un punto de inflexión al llamarlo bienaventurados. Así pues, el presente estudio bíblico-literario, se centra en el arquetipo de la “viuda pobre”, sosteniendo dicha ficción literaria es una clave interpretativa (...) de la realidad, a la luz de la teoría literaria de la Estética de la Recepción. El articulo estudia la “viuda pobre” como un imaginario cultural y estableciendo la recepción de dicho imaginario en los cuentos “El Chiflón del diablo” y “El pago” del escritor chileno Baldomero Lillo, demostrando cómo el dialogo entre cultura y Biblia representa un aporte a la comprensión de determinadas ficciones literarias como categorías antropológicas.Universal literature is crowded by archetypical characters who share abandonment and marginalization conditions, being second half 19,h century realistic literature that confirms and exposes those conditions. In that sense, The Holy Bible presents a number of those characters. Resides, it highlights a turning point, hence, The Beatitudes point out: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven”. Thus, the following biblical-literary study, centered in the “Poor widow” archetype, aims to the establishment of literary fiction as interpretative key of reality, under Wolfgang Iser Aesthetics Reception's theory as its methodology. The objective aims to postulate “Poor Widow” as a Cultural imaginary, and finally to establish the reception of that imaginary within the stories “El Chiflón del Diablo” and “El Pago” by the chilean writer Baldomero Lillo, demonstrating that the dialog between culture and The Holy Bible represents a contribution to some literary fiction s as anthropological categories. (shrink)

When Giovanni Boccaccio undertook to compile the myths of Greco-Roman antiquity in the mid-fourteenth century, he was working within a long tradition of medieval commentaries on Ovid's mythological works and mythographical compendia, such as Alberic of London's De deis gentium. His Genealogie deorum gentilium libri, on which he worked until the final years of his life, also falls within the traditions of biblical exegesis and of philosophical commentary on texts, such as Boethius's De consolatione philosophiae and Virgil's Aeneid. The (...) complex and eclectic nature of Boccaccio's learning, however, along with the antimodern organizational structure of the treatise, has led to the underestimation of its importance in the history of medieval and Renaissance approaches to ancient myth. As Charles Osgood's partial translation of the work demonstrates, the focus of critics has been limited to the final two books of the treatise, in which Boccaccio defends both poetry and his work from detractors. The fourteenth and fifteenth books of the Genealogie have been by far the most long-lived sections of the work. The straightforward defense of poetry through recourse to the topos of the poeta theologus places the work in a historical continuum that leads from Albertino Mussato and Francesco Petrarca to Coluccio Salutati, Marsilio Ficino, and Angelo Poliziano, not to mention the poetic theorists of the English Renaissance, such as Sir Philip Sidney. (shrink)

Traditionally the central trope in Christian theological anthropology, “the image of God” tends to function more as a noun than a verb. While that has grounded significant interplay between specific Christian formulations and the concepts of nontheological disciplines and cultural constructs, it facilitates the withdrawal of the image and of theological anthropology more broadly from the context of active relation with God. Rather than a static rendering of the image a more interactionist, dynamic, and relational view of “imaging (...) God” is commended as a key anthropological term. Engaging with Psalm 8 suggests that, biblically, asking the anthropological question “What is humanity?” is tied to the answer to the theological question: who is God? This locates theological anthropology securely within the interactive context of being related to by God and suggests that theological anthropology might be a matter of performance rather than definition: actively imaging God. (shrink)

The objective of this work is to investigate the philosophical anthropology that underpins the anthropology of the Early Christians. It is curious to know why Christian anthropology is intellectually and practically inclined towards the philosophical anthropology of the Platonic tradition rather than the theological-philosophical tradition of the biblical Hebrew people in the Old Testament. Today the emphasis on Christian anthropology is that the human person is an integration of body and soul. Contrary to this (...) position, the writer maintains that the Christian anthropology, especially during the period of the early Christians, fundamentally conceives the human person as a composite of soul and body, which is a conscious employment of Platonic anthropology. This article observes that, as regards the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead, there is a dichotomy between theological coherency and the actual Christian practice on the Christian conception of the human person. Hence, this work argues that the Platonic influence on the philosophical anthropology of the Early Christian was a deliberate act to give a more rational foundation to the theological problematic on the resurrection of the dead and on the resurrected body. It explains why Aquinas’s theological cum philosophical thinking, though overwhelmingly an Aristotelian ground, could not “Aristotelize” his philosophical anthropology. (shrink)

The development of a robust, holistic theological anthropology will require that theology and biblical studies alike enter into genuine interdisciplinary conversations. Depth psychology in particular has the capacity to be an exceedingly fruitful conversation partner for theology because of its commitment to the totality of the human experience (both the conscious and unconscious aspects) as well as its unique ability to interpret archetypal symbols and mythological thinking. By arguing for a psycho-theological hermeneutic that accounts for depth psychology's conviction (...) that myths about the origin of the world are always simultaneously myths about the origin and emergence of human consciousness, I demonstrate that the presence of numerous Jungian archetypes in Genesis 1–3 suggests that the narrative can be read from a psychological perspective without diminishing or marginalizing the dominant theological themes of exile and return. Furthermore, such a reading fundamentally suggests that the narrative is not about how sin entered into creation, but rather how consciousness emerged in human community. (shrink)

RESUMEN Según Furio Jesi y Giorgio Agamben, la máquina antropológica es un dispositivo histórico que produce imágenes del hombre. En este artículo nos proponemos retomar esta categoría y mostrar que existen dos grandes modelos de máquina según la naturaleza de la imagen generada: la máquina teológica-bíblica, que funciona hasta el siglo XIX y que produce al hombre como ícono; la máquina ateológica, posterior a la muerte de Dios, que produce al hombre como fantasma. ABSTRACT According to Furio Jesi and Giorgio (...) Agamben, the anthropological machine is a historical dispositive that produces images of man. This paper aims at returning to this category and demonstrating that two models of the machine can be found depending on the nature of the image produced: the theological-biblical machine that operates until 19th century and that produces man as icon, and the a-theological machine, after disappearance of God, that produces man as phantasm. (shrink)

Scholars offer several options for Matthew’s value of the leper’s story in his narrative that range from revealing Jesus’ attributes of compassion and sympathy, manifesting God’s empire, to portraying Jesus’ function as a temple. Although these suggestions aptly portray Matthew’s rhetorical use of the leper’s healing in his narrative to address societal concerns of his time, for lack of referring to the social setting of the narrative, they do not capture the holistic healthcare system embodied by Jesus in Matthew’s narrative (...) that portrays Jesus as a superior healer to the rest of the other healers in the Roman Empire. The findings of the research for this article establish the argument that employing ethnomedical anthropology as a lens to read the leper’s healing narrative in Matthew 8:1–4 in the context of Matthew’s social setting reveals Matthew’s ideology for a transcendent and immanent Christology. The aim of the article is to demonstrate the effectiveness of medical anthropological theory in explaining the dynamics of health and healing reflected in biblical texts.Contributions: This article contributes to the interdisciplinary approach to the study of religion by employing a ethnomedical anthropological perspective to read the leper’s healing in Matthew 8.1–4 in reference to the first century CE health systems in the Roman Empire. This approach procured that Matthew’s immanent and transcendent perspectives of Christology is crucial in demonstrating the text’s function in constructing and sustaining the identity of Matthew’s community in antiquity. (shrink)

Summary This article seeks to lay a more solid foundation for the contemporary paradigm shift in the Christian theological thinking – that is, from theo-anthropology to theo-cosmology. In the new paradigm cosmic hope for the completion of the trinitarian project of creation, instead of human redemption from sin and death, comes to the fore as the most comprehensive horizon of Christian thinking. For this purpose the author reconstructs the underlying logic of the biblical faith in a narrative form (...) from creation to eschatology. (shrink)

There is a tension between Laudato si's consistent emphasis on relationships and interconnectedness and its acceptance of anthropocentrism. While Laudato si’ does reject certain problematic forms of anthropocentrism, the encyclical does not assert an alternative to this traditional framework. This article contends that “relatiocentrism” provides the best avenue for developing the convictions expressed within Laudato si’ while moving beyond the limitations of the encyclical itself. In so doing, this essay explores the use of narrative as a means of shaping identity (...) by mapping significant relationships and points of meaning. It examines the central anthropological claims of the encyclical and the tensions these create with anthropocentric narratives. And it examines relatiocentrism in light of the biblical creation accounts, the eschatological perspective of Laudato si’, and virtue ethics. The essay concludes by suggesting further theological and moral implications of this shift in perspective. (shrink)

This study deals with the concept of relationality, which has become one of the central themes of contemporary theological literature. The value of the concept in terms of philosophy of religion and related disciplines such as ecotheology and comparative theology is questioned within the framework of Jürgen Moltmann’s ecotheological anthropology. This study claims that the applications of relationality in theology have the potential to make significant contributions to the enrichment and deepening of the perspectives of the philosophy of religion (...) and related disciplines and that especially philosophy of religion can make conceptual and methodological contributions to relational theology. Relationality, in general, is the approach that puts the claim that everything exists in relation to everything else at the centre and is widely applied in many disciplines such as psychology, sociology, ecology, political science, education, philosophy, and theology. Relationality, which has become one of the most current issues in contemporary philosophy and metaphysics, is a method widely used in contemporary theology, especially in Christian theology, to define different dimensions of the relationship between God, the human being, and nature. Relationality in theology is a theological approach that emphasizes the importance of relationships and interdependence in understanding the nature of God, the world, and human beings. Moltmann, one of the most influential names in contemporary Christian theology, presents his theological anthropological views around the Biblical verses expressing that the human being was created in the image of God, as an alternative to traditional anthropology, on the basis of the theological dimensions of the ecological crisis and through a relational approach. In this respect, Molt-mann's anthropology is a remarkable option in dealing with the relational approach in theology with the current dimensions of the concept and within the framework of different philosophical and theological disciplines. In the context of this background, the study consists of four parts. In the first chapter, an introduction to the relational approach in theology is made to clarify the conceptual framework of the study. The function and role of relationality as an approach in contemporary theological anthropology are discussed in the second part, which presents the claim that the discussions on the current ecological crisis cause changes in the scope and focus of contemporary theological anthropological studies. This section is followed by an examination of Moltmann’s relational anthropology with reference to his approach to the doctrine of imago Dei. In the fourth and last part, in the context of Moltmann’s arguments and also beyond them, the problems that may occur as a result of the application of relationality in theology in terms of the aforementioned contemporary theological disciplines, especially the philosophy of religion, and its possible contributions to those fields are evaluated. (shrink)

The objective of this work is to investigate the philosophical anthropology that underpins the anthropology of the Early Christians. It is curious to know why Christian anthropology is intellectually and practically inclined towards the philosophical anthropology of the Platonic tradition rather than the theological-philosophical tradition of the biblical Hebrew people in the Old Testament. Today the emphasis on Christian anthropology is that the human person is an integration of body and soul. Contrary to this (...) position, the writer maintains that the Christian anthropology, especially during the period of the early Christians (here understood as the period within the first five centuries C.E.), fundamentally conceives the human person as a composite of soul and body, which is a conscious employment of Platonic anthropology. This article observes that, as regards the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead, there is a dichotomy between theological coherency and the actual Christian practice on the Christian conception of the human person. Hence, this work argues that the Platonic influence on the philosophical anthropology of the Early Christian was a deliberate act to give a more rational foundation to the theological problematic on the resurrection of the dead and on the resurrected body. It explains why Aquinas’s theological cum philosophical thinking, though overwhelmingly an Aristotelian ground, could not “Aristotelize” his philosophical anthropology. (shrink)

This book provides a systematic commentary on the first two books of the Bible: Genesis and Exodus. Drawing on these two essential books, it subsequently offers new readings of several issues relevant for today’s economic and social life. Western Humanism has its own founding cultural and symbolic codes. One of them is the Bible, which has for millennia provided a wealth of expressions on politics and love, death and economy, hope and doom. Biblical stories have been revived and reinterpreted (...) by hundreds of generations, and have informed many of our most beautiful works of art, not to mention the dreams of children and adults alike. And they have given us hope during the many painful times of exile and oppression that we have gone through, and are going through still. Among the books of the Bible, in both the Jewish and Christian traditions, Genesis and Exodus represent the true foundation of biblical theology and anthropology, but in them we also find the roots of the culture of markets, money and commerce, which would go on to flourish during the Middle Ages and ultimately form the ‘spirit of capitalism’ or the ‘religion of capitalism’ in the modern era. This book examines the Biblical foundations of our conception of social relations, and offers new insights on the present economic and social discourse. (shrink)

Natural sociability and the basic features of human nature stood at the centre of Thomas Abbt's confrontation with conjectural history, the popular eighteenth-century mode of reconstructing the evolution of human culture. Abbt (1738–1766) criticised conjectural histories due to their arbitrary character, and opted for a synthetic approach consisting of both sacred and secular history. He suggested that the anthropology of Genesis should be accepted as the starting point for a conjectural history, since it left ample room for further questions (...) and speculations. Yet his own perspective on human nature and its evolution remained naturalistic, as attested by his divergent interpretations of the confusion of tongues at Babel. Attempting to shed new light on the lesser-known elements of Abbt's work, the essay links his views on the Bible and conjectural history to his debate with Moses Mendelssohn over the constitution and destination of man. In this debate, both Mendelssohn and Abbt dealt with the contemporary controversy over the natural or artificial character of sociability, self-interest, and fellow-feeling. (shrink)

The funeral tradition of the Torajan people is one of the most recognised funeral traditions in the world, a part of Indonesia’s rich indigenous knowledge. However, this particular tradition has been in decline over time because of the alienation caused by the spreading of Christianity. This research aimed to reinterpret metaphysical anthropology of the funeral tradition of the Torajan people using the concept of the sleeping soul from the narration of Jesus in Mark 5:35–42 and Daniel 12:1–3. The research (...) used a qualitative approach with theological and ethnographic research types. The results of this study reveal that the concept of the sleeping soul in the biblical view can reinterpret metaphysical anthropology in the funeral tradition of the Torajan people as follows: souls are eternal in the process of death, souls of the deceased are helpless and the sleeping soul is an eschatological hope for Christianity and Torajan people.Contribution: The aim of this research is to find a Christian metaphysical anthropology doctrine that is cordial to the funeral tradition of the Torajan people. The relationship between the two is that they have the same way of appreciating human existence metaphysically. This finding contributes to Christianity in the preservation of Torajan culture. (shrink)

The development of a robust, holistic theological anthropology will require that theology and biblical studies alike enter into genuine interdisciplinary conversations. Depth psychology in particular has the capacity to be an exceedingly fruitful conversation partner for theology because of its commitment to the totality of the human experience as well as its unique ability to interpret archetypal symbols and mythological thinking. By arguing for a psycho‐theological hermeneutic that accounts for depth psychology's conviction that myths about the origin of (...) the world are always simultaneously myths about the origin and emergence of human consciousness, I demonstrate that the presence of numerous Jungian archetypes in Genesis 1–3 suggests that the narrative can be read from a psychological perspective without diminishing or marginalizing the dominant theological themes of exile and return. Furthermore, such a reading fundamentally suggests that the narrative is not about how sin entered into creation, but rather how consciousness emerged in human community. (shrink)

John Paul II is often misread as more of a philosopher than a theologian. But his Theology of the Body, rightly read, is in its entirety an exercise in exegesis. By focusing on the Bible, he gives a more fully theological account of his topic, one focused on the mystery of redemption by grace, rather than on merely human efforts.

The book by MA Doroho, intended for the most diverse circle of readers who, as the author points out, "seek Absolute Truth" is the author's vision of epistemology, ontology, anthropology and sociology. The specificity of reading the cognitive, ontological, anthropological and sociological problems of the author is due to his ideological beliefs.

Revised versions of papers presented at the 1994 Tyndale Fellowship jubilee conference held in Hayes Conference Centre, Swanwick.

This book suggests a bold comparative approach to broad cultural differences between Africa and Melanesia. Its theme is personhood, understood in terms of what anthropologists call embodiment. These concepts are applied to questions ranging from the meanings of spirit possession, to the logics of witchcraft and kinship relations, the use of rituals in healing, and even the impact of capitalism. Questioning common assumptions about the huge differences among these discrete areas, the contributions document surprising continuities.

Definition of the problem: Is it the brain that makes a human being a person? This anthropological question has been raised because of the findings of modern human brain research, and there are severe ethical consequences anew: If the appropriate anthropological answer is yes, then all invasive research would be problematic, because one would touch the basis of human essence. The problem is that the two major philosophical paradigms that offer an answer to the anthropological question, dualism and monism, have (...) opposing concepts. Arguments: This paper argues that the error of these two paradigms is that they understand the human body and the human mind as ’res’– as things. The explanation of the human being as an interactive unit of body and mind is impossible in both paradigms. A third anthropological view that tries to make that understandable is the anthropology of the Hebrew Bible. It does assume the category ’thing’ while speaking about humans, it presumes the category ’aspect’. There is no Hebrew word for ’mind’ in contrast to ’body’ or vice versa. The biblical language only knows terms for the unity of human beings seen under a certain aspect. Conclusion: Here, the body and thus the brain are important and necessary condition for human essence, but this is not a sufficient explanation for the human personality. Invasive research on the human brain is here neither generally forbidden nor tolerated – one has to demonstrate in every single case whether the planned operation touches regions that are crucial for the personality of the human subject. (shrink)

This chapter presents a partial argument for a Christian version of nonreductive physicalism. Its structure is based on the view that a Christian anthropology at a minimum must be: consonant with Scripture and at least a part of the Christian tradition; not in conflict with widely accepted science, and preferably supported by science; and internally coherent. The argument of the chapter, then, intentionally draws from biblical studies and theology, and from (a bit of) cognitive neuroscience. The impact of (...) cognitive neuroscience on current theories of human nature can be summarized roughly as follows: all of the human capacities once attributed to the mind or soul are being fruitfully studied as brain processes. Both theological and scientific developments are “resonant” with nonreductive physicalism. Finally, the chapter discusses resources for showing that nonreductive physicalism is a more coherent philosophical position than reductive physicalism. (shrink)

While the social and ecological landscape of the twenty-first century is worlds away from the historical-cultural context in which the biblical myth-symbols of the image of God and the knowledge of good and evil first emerged, Philip Hefner's understanding that Homo sapiens image God as created co-creators presents a plausible starting point for constructing a second naïveté interpretation of biblical anthropology and a fruitful concept for envisioning and enacting our human future.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reply to Sandra Costen Kunz's "Respecting the Boundaries of Knowledge"Paul O. IngramI am gratified by Sandra Costen Kunz's application of my thoughts on boundary constraints and my call for a Buddhist-Christian-science "trilogue" to her work in spiritual formation within the context of Protestant theological education. Over the past fifteen years I have witnessed numerous examples of what process theologians call "creative transformation" in contemporary science-religion dialogue. To this date, (...) creative transformation has occurred mainly among Christian theologians involved in this particular dialogue. But Buddhists are now beginning to engage the natural sciences in serious conversation. Most of this conversation is with the neurosciences because of Buddhism's strong emphasis on meditation and the fact that the physical realities described in scientific theory imply that nature—from the level of quantum events to the larger-scale structures of the universe—is interdependent and "empty" of permanency. I have argued, as has Kunz, that the New Testament reflects this same view of existence. But it is also true that classical Christian theological tradition, which presupposes Aristotelian and Neo-Platonic substance categories, is in conflict with biblical anthropology and portrayals of God. Process theology, science-theology dialogue, and Buddhist-Christian dialogue have clarified the biblical foundations of Christian faith apart from classical theism, at least among Christian liberal theologians. In my view, it is now time to deepen the process of creative transformation occurring in Buddhist-Christian dialogue by including the natural sciences as a third dialogical partner.Kunz's essay is an example of possibilities of creative transformation and dialogical engagement with the sciences; in her case, the cognitive sciences and Buddhism. She notes that in similarity with most theologians, most scientists are caught up in a Cartesian mind-body dualism. The result is that scientific accounts of mental processes tend to reduce subjective experience to the physical processes occurring in regions of the brain coupled with ignoring what meditators actually say they are experiencing, which scientists sometimes hold to be epiphenomenal. Kunz does not accept this dualism because it not only misrepresents reality, it undercuts the disciplines of spiritual discernment. She argues that combining third-person cognitive [End Page 187] scientific accounts of subjective experiences with Buddhist or Christian first-person descriptions of what is experienced in the disciplines of meditation or contemplative prayer offers a more comprehensive, more accurate account of meditative and contemplative experience. B. Alan Wallace draws a similar conclusion in regard to Buddhist meditation.1Although acknowledging that Christians have much to learn from Buddhist "discernment practices," distinctively Christian forms of meditation are rooted in the conviction that God's nature as love proclaimed by the historical Jesus is active in any situation. Kunz notes that Christian processes of spiritual discernment engendered by centering and contemplative prayer can be described as "making decisions" that correspond to the sorts of decisions the historical Jesus is portrayed as making in the New Testament: unselfish decisions for the common good. This means that authentic Christian faith is experienced and lived at the boundaries of ordinary conventional concerns. Or, to paraphrase Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-1945), when God as Jesus experienced God calling a person, God calls that person to his or her death. Sometimes an actual death, but always to life lived at the boundaries beyond mere conventionality. As a Lutheran, I can only agree.Paul O. IngramPacific Lutheran University (Emeritus)note1. B. Alan Wallace, Hidden Dimensions: The Unification of Physics and Consciousness (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007). [End Page 188]Copyright © 2011 University of Hawai'i Press... (shrink)

This article deals with theological criterions of medical ethics which depends on biblical anthropology and Christian doctrine for the Creation. It criticizes the assertion that life is not disposible as an example of wrong deduction from is to ought. The article also deals with the concept of person and the moral status of embryos and discusses the consequences for medical genetics and prenatal diagnostics.