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5 - Narratives and foundations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 November 2009

Raymond Plant
Affiliation:
King's College London
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Summary

For wisdom dealt with mortal powers,

Where truth in closest words shall fail,

When truth embodied in a tale

Shall enter in at lowly doors.

And so the Word had breath and wrought

With human hands the creed of creeds

In loveliness of perfect deeds,

More strong than all poetic thought;

Which he may read that binds the sheaf,

Or builds the house, or digs the grave

And those wild eyes that watch the wave

In roarings round the coral reef.

(Tennyson, In Memoriam)

If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?

(Psalm 11)

It doesn't matter how you slice the salami, it's still the same salami.

(Anon, New York)

Given the difficulties in undertaking a theology of history in the modern world, it might be thought that the basis for political theology has to be sought elsewhere: in systematic theology, so that the political implications of Christian belief could be derived by a process of inference from some sense of the foundations of theology as a doctrine of God. It might be thought that a doctrine of God would then yield an account of creation, within which would stand an account of the human person, and from this an account of society and politics. On this sort of view, the universal would be connected to the particular through a process of inference from what were to be taken as foundational propositions to be found in either a biblical or natural theology and their concomitant doctrine of God. Universal and particular would be linked through a greater and greater specification of the consequences of this foundational set of beliefs.

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Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2001

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  • Narratives and foundations
  • Raymond Plant, King's College London
  • Book: Politics, Theology and History
  • Online publication: 23 November 2009
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511612770.007
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  • Narratives and foundations
  • Raymond Plant, King's College London
  • Book: Politics, Theology and History
  • Online publication: 23 November 2009
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511612770.007
Available formats
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Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Narratives and foundations
  • Raymond Plant, King's College London
  • Book: Politics, Theology and History
  • Online publication: 23 November 2009
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511612770.007
Available formats
×