Towards a Christian Philosophy (original) (raw)

The relationship between philosophy and Christianity has, of course, a long history, as do the discussions of that relationship. My own position is not dissimilar to that of many of the early Church Fathers, though of course that position must be elaborated differently for various historical and personal reasons, and hopefully enriched by attention to the history of Western philosophy. As with all such relations, one's understanding of this relation has a lot to do with one's understanding of the terms involved. To promote the possibility of "Christian philosophy" is also to comment on that "and" which might be understood to relate two otherwise distinct and irreconcilable terms. In the end I claim this "and" must be understood as that "love" which defines philosophy as the "love of wisdom" (and finally, the wisdom of love), and does so in terms which (almost) merge-with the surprising assistance of such thinkers as Martin Heidegger, Jacques Derrida, and Paul Ricoeur-with those of the Church Fathers cited. On the one hand, I intend nothing but the historical, orthodox, and catholic understanding of Christianity, especially with regard to the central figure of Jesus the Christ, the Trinitarian God whom He embodies, represents, and reveals, and the Scriptures given as The Bible. On the other hand, I present the specifically philosophical pertinence of this unique Person as such emerges from the texts of the "philosophers" considered, and in a manner which I claim does not force the issue by reading into their texts what is not there. Attending to a (Christian) philosophical reflection on (Christian) philosophy also offers elaborations of inherited doctrines, both Christian and philosophical, including a way to read and think unique to the outcome. Such is the adventure of this current work. Preface This project was begun in the late 1980s and early 1990s. The preliminary form of the manuscript was written in 1993. It has remained mostly unchanged since, with the exception of some additional footnotes in response to various works of which I became aware subsequent to that preliminary form. The manuscript was submitted as a thesis for the Doctorate of Philosophy degree at the Institute for Christian Studies, Toronto, Canada. My appreciation for feedback and support is due to Dr. Jim Olthuis and Dr. Bob Sweetman, in particular. Further, I owe a word of thanks for editing to Jennifer Tong and for typesetting to Jelle Huisman. After initial approval, the manuscript sat for years due to various institutional and personal situations. Now I am reviving it. I had thought of redoing it in light of later reflections, but each time I tried to do so, it became another book, disrupting what had been initially woven together. So, I make this work available such as it is, knowing that any interaction will help to rebirth the project and advance those further thoughts, those already known to be implicit and those as yet unthought. Contents Chapter One-13 Chapter Oneinterest, if not disquiet, among my concerned and careful readers. The reason ought not to be because I intend to present some controversial or innovative understanding of Christianity. On the contrary, I intend nothing but the historical, orthodox, and catholic understanding, especially with regard to the central figure of Christianity, Jesus the Christ [= Messiah], and the Trinitarian God whom He embodies, represents, and reveals, though it is true that the following reflections also do offer some possible elaborations of these doctrines. These possible elaborations are one very important reason that the relation between Christianity and philosophy is highly charged for the Christian community and that the development of a specifically Christian philosophy is so pertinent. On the other hand, the difficulty which I anticipate for the reader steeped in the tradition of Western philosophy is that the specifically philosophical pertinence of this unique Person, Jesus of Nazareth, the Crucified and Resurrected One, emerges from our consideration of the texts of the "philosophers" 1 considered, and in a manner which I claim does not force the issue by reading into their texts what is not there. Thus I can affirm with Mark D. Jordan that "What philosophy promised but could not provide, that is now given forth in the person of Christ" (1985:303); or, as de Lubac put it (1992:487), "It is a matter of affirming that only a Christian philosophy can be truly, wholly philosophy"; or again, with Balthasar (1993:147, hereafter CP), "The finally valid answer to pagan [including neo-pagan] wisdom, the answer equal to it in rank, can lie only in the total Christian wisdom." I am quite aware that such assertions are no doubt scandalous to many. Nonetheless, though I judge it better for 1 The word "philosophers" was used in quotation marks because whether that is the best designation for Heidegger, Ricoeur, and Derrida depends on our discussion of the meaning of philosophy itself. This issue is quite problematic, if not contentious; it is also the topic of this essay, beginning in the second chapter. For instance, Rorty: "I shall use the word 'theorist' rather than 'philosopher' because the etymology of 'theory' gives me the connotation I want, and avoids some I do not want. The people I shall be discussing do not think that there is something called 'wisdom' in any sense of the term which Plato would have recognised. So the term 'lover of wisdom' seems inappropriate. But theoria suggests taking a view of a large stretch of territory from a considerable distance, and this is just what the people I shall be discussing do. They all specialise in standing back from, and taking a large view of, what Heidegger called the 'tradition of Western metaphysics'-what I have been calling the 'Plato-Kant canon.'" (Contingency, Irony, Solidarity, 96). I, however, do favor 'wisdom' and 'love'. On the other hand, Rorty's concern for 'theoria' intersects my concerns in SIG. Chapter One-23 there a cross-over? Am I overly Christianizing Heidegger, or at least just as bad, overly Heideggerizing Christianity? For those who might think so, and I myself have not been untroubled by these possibilities, the question naturally arises, What about Heidegger's neo-paganism, and even his seeming repugnance to the Christian Message? Am I saying that some sort of syncretism between Christianity and such a neo-paganism is recommended? These are not only legitimate, but crucial questions and concerns. I acknowledge them as such upfront here in the introduction, even alerting those not otherwise suspect or troubled. All I can say is that I am committed to being faithful, i.e. true, 7 to the texts I consider, whether those of Heidegger or the Bible, with such "faithfulness" also being integral to that "love" which defines philosophy. But that is just to say that the question of reading-how to read?, what is a faithful reading?, is a "non-violent" interpretation possible, desirable, etc.?, in short, the question of hermeneutics, including "what is 'true'?"-is also inextricably intertwined with my central question regarding philosophy per se, as indeed has so often been the case, and quite explicitly so at least since Heidegger. For that reason, too, Heidegger is a convenient "case" to consider for my own interests, which have, no doubt, also been shaped by Heidegger's work. Something further, however, needs to be said here about these hermeneutical concerns. To respond to the "troubling" questions just mentioned, I want to begin to comment on the terms I used above-"resonances," "echoes," the "unsaid," the "unthought," etc.-for it is upon the clarification of these terms that the answers to those questions depend. To do so, however, I introduce a "visual" figure. 8 Granting that there is something lens-like about words and texts-that is, something mediatorial and revelational-my concern in this text has been to "see through" the words of others to what I believe is the topic of utmost concern for us human 7 The Hebrew emeth can be translated as either "faithfulness" or "truth," thus hinting at a more personal understanding of truth, an understanding which nonetheless "accounts for" aspects of both the more traditional correspondence theory of truth and the (more) Heideggerean alethetic understanding of truth. 8 I am using visual imagery here, but I do not mean necessarily to imply some traditional metaphysics of light prejudice. The role of traditional metaphysics and its "overcoming" is very much thematized in what follows. Chapter Onebeings, and thus also, human thought. It is what Heidegger called that which is most worthy of thought. Finally, again to lay my cards on the table, I take this "topic" of most worthy consideration to be the Glory of God, or if one prefers, the glorious God or the Lord of glory, etc., the One who has been manifested most fully through the Person of Jesus and the New Testament Scriptures, by means of the Holy Spirit. I will be saying more about this "glory" in terms of the twofold (dvoika) of Word and Spirit (and Father), but it is worth noting here that the implication of "word" in/by this "most worthy of topics" (i.e. "glory") also entails the detailed and respectful textual work I intend to demonstrate in what follows. It is also worth noting that this attention to "words" is not unlike Heidegger's own procedure, for it was his "vision of Being" which was not only granted by, but also shed new light on, the meaning of traditional words and texts, opening him to the charge of "violence," distortion, etymologizing, misreading, etc. My own way of thinking likewise reads Heidegger (and others) in the light of my own "vision of Being," while at the same time remaining as attentive as possible to the dawning of any new light and the clearing-sightings thereby granted in this interactive process. This is not really such an odd procedure as some have imagined, but is, in fact, very much...