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Pantheism, Trinitarian Theism and the Idea of Unity: Reflections on the Christian Concept of God

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 October 2008

Douglas Hedley
Douglas Hedley
Affiliation:
Institut für Systematische Theologie, Fakultät der Evangelischen Theologie, Ludwigs-Maximillians-Universität München, 80799 München, Germany
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Abstract

Modern analytic philosophy of religion has become increasingly interested in the dogmatic substances of Christian theology. I argue that the doctrine of the Trinity provides an instance of the importance of dogmatic formulation for an appreciation of the philosophical aspect of the Christian concept of God. The starting point of my discussion is the recent defence of pantheism by Michael Levine, and his discussion of Neoplatonist and German Idealist models of deity. Both metaphysical theism and the alleged Neoplatonic metaphysical genealogy of pantheism are considered with particular reference to St Augustine's account of creation in the Confessions. Just as it is impossible to distinguish the purely philosophical from the purely dogmatic concept of God, one cannot give an adequate modern account of theism without a rigorous and sensitive treatment of the historical models. The issue of pantheism shows how a misunderstanding of the meaning of concept of ‘unity’ can distort our view of theism as a model of deity.

Type
Research Article
Information
Religious Studies , Volume 32 , Issue 1 , March 1996 , pp. 61 - 77
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1996

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References

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12 I owe this point to Michael Ayers of Wadham College, Oxford.

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16 I am thinking in particular of Schelling's Freiheitschrift of 1809.

17 Freiheitschrift 379/380 ‘Denn our Personliches kann Personliches heilen, und Gott muβ Mensch werden, damit der Mensch wieder zu Gott komme.’ For Hegel see Vorlesung uber die Philosophie der Religion, 111 (Hamburg: Meiner, 1966) p. 57,Google Scholar ‘Gott ist Geist…d.i. Subjektivitat, unendliche Personlichkeit.’ See Wagner, F.Der Gedanke der Personlichkeit Gottes bei Fichte und Hegel (Gutersloh: Mohn, 1971).Google Scholar

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29 Of course, the (Neo) Platonist acceptance of the eternity of the world constitutes a massive difference between Platonist and Christian since this removes the possibility of a Christian teleology. Yet the issue of the eternity of the world and the issue of the emanation of the lower from the higher can be quite intelligibly divided as logically separate ideas. To posit an affinity between Christian and pagan on the issue of emanation does not mean that Christian Platonists affirmed the eternity of the world.

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40 I have been deeply influenced in this essay by Professor Werner Beierwaltes at Munich. I would also like to thank Dr Mark Edwards for comments on a version of this paper read at Christ Church, Oxford in February 1995, and Professor Jan Rohls of Munich and Professor Philip Clayton of the Sonoma State University for stimulus and much talk about God.