God and Self in the Confessional Novel explores the question: what happened to the theological practice of confession when it entered the modern novel? Beginning with the premise that guilt remains a universal human concern, this book considers confession via the classic confessional texts of Augustine and Rousseau. Employing this framework, John D. Sykes, Jr. examines Goethe's The Sorrows of Young Werther, Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground, Percy's Lancelot, and McEwan's Atonement to investigate the evolution of confession and guilt in literature from the eighteenth century to the early twenty-first century.

In this book, George Karuvelil seeks to establish the rationality of religion and theology in the contemporary world. Theology has always required some philosophical basis. Moreover, Christian theology has had a dynamic character that enabled it to adapt to more than one philosophy depending on the need of the time. For instance, it shifted in accordance with the change from Neo-Platonism to Aristotelianism in the thirteen century. However, this dynamism has been absent since the dawn of modernity, when reason became identified with modern science to disastrous results. While the advent of postmodernism has brought the limits of modernism to light, it has done nothing to establish the rationality of religion, other than to treat religion as a cultural phenomenon along with science. This book conceives fundamental theology as a discipline that seeks religious truth in the midst of diverse perspectives, ranging from militant atheism to violent religious fanaticism.

Many contemporary philosophers assume that, before one can discuss prayer, the question of whether there is a God or not must be settled. In this title, first published in 1965, D. Z. Phillips argues that to understand prayer is to understand what is meant by the reality of God. Beginning by placing the problem of prayer within a philosophical context, Phillips goes on to discuss such topics as prayer and the concept of talking, prayer and dependence, superstition and the concept of community. This is a fascinating reissue that will be of particular value to students with an interest in the philosophy of religion, prayer and religious studies more generally.

Is belief in God justified? This question has been examined numerous times, but never from the angle taken by this book: that of the 'reflective Muslim'. The reflective Muslim describes a person of Islamic faith who acknowledges that people of other religious and non-religious persuasions are as concerned with seeking truth and avoiding error as they themselves are.
This work begins with the assumption of religious ambiguity - i.e., that the total relevant evidence neither shows belief in God to be true nor false. Accordingly, the central question of this work is whether a person can be entitled to hold and act on their belief in God when there is religious ambiguity?
The author contends that belief in God can be justified under the condition of religious ambiguity, and he defends this view by employing an account of faith inspired by the pioneering work of the American intellectual, William James.

First published in 1964, this is a short collection of both literary and philosophical essays. Whilst two essays consider Greek literature written at the point at which the Athenian empire was breaking apart, another group explore the background from which Christianity arose, considering Paganism and the religious philosophy at the time of Christ. These, in particular, display Gilbert Murray's 'profound belief in ethics and disbelief in all revelational religions' as well as his conviction that the roots of our society lie within Greek civilization. Finally, there is an interesting discussion of Order and the motives of those who seek to overthrow it.

Can religious belief survive in a scientific era? Aldous Huxley thought so. His early recognition of the profound significance of twentieth-century science and the need for moral and spiritual direction resulted in his espousal of mysticism. An examination of his fiction and nonfiction reveals Huxley's significance for cross-disciplinary debates between religion, science and literature and provides examples of the transmission or refraction of knowledge from one discourse to another.

Decolonial Judaism: Triumphal Failures of Barbaric Thinking explores the relationship among geopolitics, religion, and social theory. It argues that during the postcolonial and post-Holocaust era, Jewish thinkers in different parts of the world were influenced by Global South thought and mobilized this rich set of intellectual resources to confront the assimilation of normative Judaism by various incipient neo-colonial powers. By tracing the historical and conceptual lineage of this overlooked conversation, this book explores not only its epistemological opportunities, but also the internal contradictions that led to its ultimate unraveling, especially in the post-9/11 world.

Over the past several decades, postmodernist and postcolonial challenges to traditional theories and methods have revolutionized the social sciences. The discipline of religious studies, however, has been relatively slow to confront these developments, continuing to rely heavily on textual methods and a framework that privileges belief over practice, doctrine over performance, text over context, and inner emotion over public ritual. Recently, however, developments in social theory have begun to transform the study of religion. In this book, Manuel Vasquez maps out the dynamics of this paradigm shift, exploring systematically the epistemological and methodological challenges contemporary social theory poses for traditional approaches to religious studies. Offering a panoramic view of key debates on identity, culture, and society across the social sciences, he assesses the impact of these debates on the study of religion, offering specific examples of how they are shaping the study of particular religious traditions. He concludes by proposing a robust yet flexible materialist approach to the study of religion that will be capable of addressing the increasing complexity of religious life.

This book provides a recipe for healthy moral and personal transformation. Belliotti takes seriously Dante's deepest yearnings: to guide human well-being; to elevate social and political communities; to remedy the poisons spewed by the seven capital vices; and to celebrate the connections between human self-interest, virtuous living, and spiritual salvation. By closely examining and analyzing five of Dante's more vivid characters in hell-Piero della Vigna, Brunetto Latini, Farinata degli Uberti, Cavalcante de' Cavalcanti, and Guido da Montefeltro-and extracting the moral lessons Dante intends them to convey, and by conceptually analyzing envy, arrogance, pride, and human flourishing, the author challenges readers to interrogate and refine their modes of living.

This unique introduction fully engages and clearly explains pragmatism, an approach to knowledge and philosophy that rejects outmoded conceptions of objectivity while avoiding relativism and subjectivism. It follows pragmatism's focus on the process of inquiry rather than on abstract justifications meant to appease the skeptic. According to pragmatists, getting to know the world is a creative human enterprise, wherein we fashion our concepts in terms of how they affect us practically, including in future inquiry. This book fully illuminates that enterprise and the resulting radical rethinking of basic philosophical conceptions like truth, reality, and reason. Author Cornelis de Waal helps the reader recognize, understand, and assess classical and current pragmatist contributions-from Charles S. Peirce to Cornel West-evaluate existing views from a pragmatist angle, formulate pragmatist critiques, and develop a pragmatist viewpoint on a specific issue. The book discusses: Classical pragmatists, including Peirce, James, Dewey, and Addams; Contemporary figures, including Rorty, Putnam, Haack, and West; Connections with other twentieth-century approaches, including phenomenology, critical theory, and logical positivism; Peirce's pragmatic maxim and its relation to James's Will to Believe; Applications to philosophy of law, feminism, and issues of race and racism.

Infinite regresses (e.g., event3 caused event2, event2 caused event1, ad infinitum; statement3 justifies statement2, statement2 justifies statement1, ad infinitum) have been used as premises in arguments on a great variety of topics in both Eastern and Western philosophy since ancient times. They are part of a philosopher's tool kit of argumentation. But how sharp or strong is this tool? How effectively is it used? The typical presentation of infinite regress arguments throughout history is so succinct and has so many gaps that it is often unclear how an infinite regress is derived, and why an infinite regress is logically problematic, and as a result, it is often difficult to evaluate infinite regress arguments. These prevalent consequences indicate that there is a need for a theory to re-orient our practice. After well over two thousand years of using infinite regresses as premises, one would have expected that at least some theory of infinite regress arguments would have emerged. None exists. There have been only a few articles on infinite regress arguments, but they are based on the examination of only a small number of examples, discuss only a few logical or rhetorical aspects of infinite regress arguments, and so they help to meet the need for a theory in only a limited way.

Given the situation, I examined many infinite regress arguments to clarify the various aspects of the derivation of infinite regresses, and explain the different ways in which certain infinite regresses are unacceptable. My general approach consisted of collecting and evaluating as many infinite regress arguments as possible, comparing and contrasting many of the formal and non-formal properties, looking for recurring patterns, and identifying the properties that appeared essential to those patterns. The six chapters of this book gradually emerged from this approach. Two very general questions guided this work: (1) How are infinite regresses generated in infinite regress arguments? (2) How do infinite regresses logically function in an argument? In answering these questions I avoided as much as possible addressing the philosophical content and historical background of the arguments examined. Due to the already extensive work done on causal regresses and regresses of justification, only a few references are made to them. However, the focus is on other issues that have been neglected, and that do contribute to a general theory of infinite regress arguments: I clarify the notion of an infinite regress; identify different logical forms of infinite regresses; describe different kinds of infinite regress arguments; distinguish the rhetoric from the logic in infinite regress arguments; and discuss the function of infinite regresses in arguments. The unexamined derivation of infinite regresses is worth deriving to discover what we have kept hidden from ourselves, improve our ways of constructing and evaluating these arguments, and sharpen and strengthen one of our argumentative tools. This work is one example of empirical logic applied to infinite regress arguments: "the attempt to formulate, to test, to clarify, and to systematize concepts and principles for the interpretation, the evaluation, and the sound practice of reasoning" (Finocchiaro, M. Arguments about Arguments, Systematic, Critical and Historical Essays in Logical Theory. P48). "

In discussion with Martin Buber, Franz Rosenzweig, Abraham Joshua Heschel, Franz Fischer and Emmanuel Levinas, Ephraim Meir outlines a novel conception of a selfhood that is grounded in dialogical thought. He focuses on the shaping of identity in present day societies and offers a new view on identity around the concepts of self-transcendence, self-difference, and trans-difference. Subjectivity is seen as the concrete possibility of relating to an open identity, which receives and hosts alterity. Self-difference is the crown upon the I; it is the result of a dialogical life, a life of passing to the other. The religious I is perceived as in dialogue with secularity, with its own past and with other persons. It is suggested that with a dialogical approach one may discover what unites people in pluralist societies.

Bacon's memorable insight is specially significant when applied to the wide range of works by some of the world's most renowned writers, poets, philosophers, and intellectuals - men and women whose determination to espouse and defend the cause of humanism and freethought, interpreted broadly, has given us a well-endowed repository of the wisdom of the ages. In "A Celebration of Humanism and Freethought", author David Allen Williams has mined this vast body of literature. The result is this priceless treasury of poetry and prose draped in art and rare steel engravings from more than a century ago.Amid its beauty, readers will find a unified call to reason, tolerance, and freedom of expression in opposition to the forces of ignorance, supernaturalism, superstition, and dogmatism. The words of over eighty of the world's most often read and frequently quoted authors are included: among them Aristotle, Matthew Arnold, Marcus Aurelius, Francis Bacon, Cicero, Joseph Conrad, Charles Darwin, Diogenes, John Donne, Will Durant, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Epicurus, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Edith Hamilton, Eric Hoffer, Homer, Robert Ingersoll, Thomas Jefferson, Lucretius, Bertrand Russell, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, George Santayana, William Shakespeare, Mark Twain, Voltaire, H.G. Wells, and many others. This is a remarkable collection of compelling ideas and impressive art that deserves a place on every bookshelf.

A historical and contemporary exploration of Phenomenology of Religion as a method in the study of religion.This book of twelve chapters may be conceptually divided into three parts, each consisting of four chapters. The connotations of the term 'Phenomenology of Religion' are subjected to a detailed analysis in the first part; in the second part the phenomenological method is located within the general methodological framework of religious studies, while the current debate around this method is spelled out in the last part, with the author making his own contribution to the debate in the last chapter.

Reflection on religion inevitably involves consideration of its relation to morality. When great evil is done to human beings, we may feel that something absolute has been violated. Can that sense, which is related to gratitude for existence, be expressed without religious concepts? Can we express central religious concerns, such as losing the self, while abandoning any religious metaphysic? Is moral obligation itself dependent on divine commands if it is to be objective, or is morality not only independent of religion, but its accuser if God is said to allow horrendous evils? In any case, what happens to the absolute claims of religion in what is, undeniably, a morally pluralistic world? These are the central questions discussed by philosophers of religion and moral philosophers in this collection. They do so in ways which bring new aspects to bear on these traditional issues.

The Grail Family of the Da Vinci Code and End Time events of the Left Behind series decoded to reveal the Descendants of Jesus down to today.

Da Vinci Code detailed a fictional account of the Holy Grail family descending down to today in a thin line coming down to the heroine of the story.

Who really descends from that Holy Grail family?

Which US Presidents, Which First Ladies, Which VPs?

What other people? Do YOU Descend from Grail Family?

Do these Grail Descendants relate to the Second Coming long predicted in the Bible?

The concern of The Moral Philosophy of Judaism is with the first principles that underlie the approach of Judaic ethics to the manifold issues confronting mankind generally and adherents of Judaism in particular in the contemporary world. The book explores the fundamental biblical concept of man's moral autonomy and its implications, the meaning and significance of the fundamental biblical doctrine of man being created 'in the image of God, ' the nature of an individual's moral judgment, the complex issue of the relationship between natural morality and law and between law and justice in Judaism, the concept of imitatio Dei and its implications, the meaning of 'good' and 'evil' from a Judaic perspective, and biblical formulation of the Golden Rule and the reasons for its reformulation in later rabbinic literature as a general guide to the establishment of a socially harmonious moral and just society.

This book is concerned with Kierkegaard's 'apophaticism', i.e. with those elements of Kierkegaard's thought which emphasize the incapacity of human reason and the hiddenness of God. Apophaticism is an important underlying strand in Kierkegaard's thought and colours many of his key concepts. Despite its importance, however, it has until now been largely ignored by Kierkegaardian scholarship. In this book, the author argues that apophatic elements can be detected in every aspect of Kierkegaard's thought and that, despite proceeding from different presuppositions, he can therefore be regarded as a negative theologian. Indeed, the book concludes by arguing that Kierkegaard's refusal to make the transition from the via negativa to the via mystica means that he is more apophatic than the negative theologians themselves.

As the century draws to its close, how should we think of religion? Some see it as the survival in our midst of an outmoded, primitive way of thinking, while others accuse the critics of simply being blind to the meaning of religious belief. From a different perspective, the clash between belief and unbelief is not seen as a matter of identifying incoherent systems of thought, but as a clash between different demands made on us by divergent ways of looking at the world. Criticisms will flow between these perspectives. There is, however, another kind of interest in this situation: an interest in giving just characterizations of these different voices, so that the nature of allegiances and oppositions to religion may be better understood.