Theological Philosophy: Rethinking the Rationality of Christian Faith (original) (raw)
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The question of the Christian faith's rationality is often treated in isolation from the equally pressing question of what, if anything, makes rationality theological. Naturally, the danger in asking the first question without the second is that the terms of inquiry are so easily prejudiced against critical analysis of what constitutes "rationality" in the first place. In this ambitious, twovolume work, Lydia Schumacher laudably refuses to separate these questions and attempts to answer them both. To this end, the author pursues two tasks. The first attempts nothing less than "a full-scale reconfiguration of philosophy … to obtain a definition of rationality that is both amenable to faith and intrinsically more plausible than the definitions that tend to undermine faith" (Rationality as Virtue, p. 2). This "pro-theology philosophy" defines rationality in terms of a personal commitment to the summum bonum, which is upheld by the presence of certain intellectual and moral virtues. Equipped with this conception of rationality, the second task is to show how belief in the God of Christian faith in particular excels at-is even "arguably necessary" for-maintaining and fulfilling this conception of rationality (Theological Philosophy, p. 16).
TOP42 E. Stump, The Non-Aristotelian Character of Aquinas's Ethics. Aquinas on the Passions
Although Thomistic philosophy has often been equaled to a Christianized Aristotelianism, Eleonore Stump weakens this common conception through the unraveling of the notions of virtue and passion within the Thomistic ethics, and comparing these with their Aristotelian counterparts. The exposition of the Thomistic theory of virtue serves as a starting point to the development of the classification of the passions that Thomas Aquinas presents. Given their different cultures, one pagan and the other Christian, Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas construct two different theoretical apparatus, dependant on their own fundamental final realities: non-personal metaphysics for the former, and Trinity for the latter. In the case of Aquinas, the perfection of virtues and the passions do not only depend on rationality, but God plays a main role in this respect.
University of the Philippines
The question of whether or not religious believing is reasonable is one of the most important of all human concerns. This paper will explore a virtue-theoretic approach, i.e., the stress on the role of agent-based intellectual virtues, to the justification of religious belief. In this thesis, I will argue that the epistemic justification or the rationality of religious beliefs is primarily based on whether the belief was conscientiously held by an intellectually virtuous agent. Rationality is not determined by the content of a belief per se, but the way in which the belief is formed and maintained. All things considered, it is the behavior of the intellectually virtuous person that determines justified believing and is the paradigm for evaluating what is rational. This means that religious beliefs are considered rational when they originate from the performance of excellent epistemic traits. We are concerned not just with what is believed, but above all with what the belief reveals of the person. Hence, rationality is better defined in relation to how rational agents or wise persons behave. There is a good-making quality about the virtues that enable the epistemic agent to connect his beliefs to the world in a way that opens the door to a heightened attentiveness to reality. Religious communities that strive to acquire intellectual virtues become environments for excellent religious believing and reliable belief formation. They embrace an integrative-holistic model of rationality that includes the whole person (head, heart, habits, habitat, & humanness) in attaining justified beliefs. They acknowledge their own fallibility and trust a collaborative approach in seeking answers to their questions. They have the intellectual integrity to revise their beliefs in light of better evidence. They are open to hearing different voices that may help in the acquisition of excellent beliefs, especially if the voices come from the insights of wise exemplars. They become reservoirs for the attainment of epistemic goods and the advancement of human flourishing. This work will focus on the salient role of intellectual virtues in producing rational beliefs. Intellectual virtues help generate rational beliefs by placing conscientious agents in a better position to acquire excellences. These virtue-driven excellences bring religious believers to at least three rationality-conducive belief-forming states: (1) “epistemic conscientiousness,” (2) “epistemic trust,” and (3) “epistemic grasping.” It is my contention that religious beliefs formed this way are responsible, rational, reliable, warranted, and justified.
Epistemic Temperance and the Moral Perils of Intellectual Inquiry
An oft-repeated dictum in contemporary epistemology is that the epistemic goal minimally includes the acquisition of true beliefs and the avoidance of false beliefs. There is, however, a robust epistemological tradition in the Christian West that distinguishes between a virtuous and a vicious desire for and pursuit of cognitive contact with reality. The cognitive ideal for humans consists (in part) in epistemic temperance, an appetite for and pursuit of truth that is conducted in proper measure, and calibrated to appropriate objects and ends. Here I explore this rich Christian tradition with an eye toward its application to contemporary Christian philosophy.
Two Visions of Moral Virtue? Aquinas on Moral Virtue in Revelation and Reason
Theological and philosophical accounts of moral virtue differ in important respects, but also feed into one another. Understanding how the one can fit together with the other is especially important for theologians. Their account of moral virtue attempts to articulate the revealed moral teaching of Scripture but also draws on reason's philosophical categories and conceptual frameworks. This paper considers whether Aquinas, whose theological account of moral virtue is arguably the most important and influential, succeeds in explaining how the two are related. First, I argue that Aquinas's explanation of the matter appears principally in his discussion of divine law and can be summarised in three theses. (1) Scripture contains a teaching on the moral virtues and that teaching belongs to the domain of natural reason; (2) human reason needs the aid of Revelation to understand and appreciate what is virtuous; (3) Scripture's teaching on the moral virtues goes beyond natural reason by always presenting them in the eschatological setting of our redemption in Christ. In the second part of the paper, I consider how Aquinas's explanation of these theses withstands the apparent incompatibility that exists between the third and the first two.