Religion within the Limits of History Alone

Demian Wheeler

Description

Among the greatest challenges facing religious thinkers today is that created by historicism, the notion that human beings and their myriad understandings of reality are utterly historical, conditioned by contingent circumstances and tied to particular contexts. In this book, Demian Wheeler confronts the historicist challenge by delineating and defending a particular trajectory of historicist thought known as pragmatic historicism. Rooted in the German Enlightenment and fully developed within the early Chicago school of theology, pragmatic historicism is a predominantly American tradition that was philosophically nurtured by classical pragmatism and its intellectual siblings, naturalism and radical empiricism. Religion within the Limits of History Alone not only undertakes a detailed genealogy of this pragmatic historicist lineage but also sets forth a constructive program for contemporary theology by charting a path for its future development. Wheeler shows that pragmatic historicism is an underdeveloped resource for contemporary theology since it offers a model for normative religious thought that is theologically compelling yet wholly nonsupernaturalistic, deeply pluralistic, unflinchingly liberal, and radically historicist.
Acknowledgments

Introduction

1. What Is Historicism? A Multileveled Definition

2. Historical Particularity and the Problem of Insularity: Pragmatic Historicism as a Bigger Historicism

3. Particularist Mutualism: Toward a Pragmatic Historicist Theology of Religions

4. After Incommensurability: Pragmatic Historicism as an Impetus for Meaningful Interreligious Engagement

5. Beyond Amnesia and Nostalgia: Pragmatic Historicism and the Authority of the Past

6. Truth Reconsidered: Building Blocks of a Paleopragmatic Historicism

7. Theological Truth Reconsidered: Four Traits of a Paleopragmatic Historicist Theology

8. Sacred Conventions, Sacred Nature: Toward a Pragmatic Historicist Theology of the Divine

Conclusion

Notes
Bibliography
Index

Sujets

• History of religions
• Philosophy of religion
• Theology
• Pragmatism

Informations

• Publié par: State University of New York Press
• Date de parution: 01 septembre 2020
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781438479354
• Langue: English

Extrait

Religion within the Limits of History Alone
Religion within the Limits of History Alone
Pragmatic Historicism and the Future of Theology
DEMIAN WHEELER
Cover image: In a Relationship by Susan Cohen Thompson. Reprinted with permission.
Published by State University of New York Press, Albany
© 2020 State University of New York
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission. No part of this book may be stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means including electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission in writing of the publisher.
For information, contact State University of New York Press, Albany, NY
www.sunypress.edu
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Name: Wheeler, Demian, author.
Title: Religion within the limits of history alone: pragmatic historicism and the future of theology / Demian Wheeler, author.
Description: Albany : State University of New York Press, [2020] | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: ISBN 971438479330 (hardcover : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781438479354 (ebook)
Further information is available at the Library of Congress.
Library of Congress Control Number: 2020937134
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
To Victoria and Shailer
Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Chapter 1 What Is Historicism? A Multileveled Definition
Chapter 2 Historical Particularity and the Problem of Insularity: Pragmatic Historicism as a Bigger Historicism
Chapter 3 Particularist Mutualism: Toward a Pragmatic Historicist Theology of Religions
Chapter 4 After Incommensurability: Pragmatic Historicism as an Impetus for Meaningful Interreligious Engagement
Chapter 5 Beyond Amnesia and Nostalgia: Pragmatic Historicism and the Authority of the Past
Chapter 6 Truth Reconsidered: Building Blocks of a Paleopragmatic Historicism
Chapter 7 Theological Truth Reconsidered: Four Traits of a Paleopragmatic Historicist Theology
Chapter 8 Sacred Conventions, Sacred Nature: Toward a Pragmatic Historicist Theology of the Divine
Conclusion
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Acknowledgments
If historicism is the notion that all phenomena are indelibly shaped by their histories and contexts, then acknowledging one’s debts is a decidedly historicist activity.
Many thanks to the editorial staff at SUNY Press, especially Christopher Ahn, Amanda Lanne-Camilli, and James Peltz, as well as to the two anonymous reviewers who read an earlier draft of the manuscript and offered a number of helpful comments, criticisms, and suggestions. I am also grateful to Susan Cohen-Thompson for supplying the artwork for the book cover and to David Prout for preparing the index.
Religion within the Limits of History Alone is the culmination of several years of research, having originated as my dissertation at Union Theological Seminary. Thus, I want to express my deepest gratitude to the director of my dissertation, my PhD advisor, Gary Dorrien. I knew I wanted to work with Gary as early as 2002, the year I read the first volume of his magisterial trilogy on American liberal theology; and in 2007, he turned that dream into a reality and accepted me as his doctoral student. Since then, Gary has provided incomparable guidance, reassurance, wisdom, and support—both intellectual and personal. I have greatly benefited as well from his ongoing critical feedback—ever incisive, but always pastoral and genuinely constructive. Most of all, he has reminded me again and again that if I am going to call myself a historicist, I ought to grasp the history of the field I am entering. And, without a doubt, nobody has helped me grasp that history more than he has. Gary is, by far, the most learned and accomplished scholar I have ever encountered—John Thatamanil often quips that he is as close to omniscient as a fallible human being can get—and to have studied under him has been one of the highlights of my life.
I am also enormously indebted to the three other members of my dissertation committee: Paul Knitter, who became one of my primary mentors at Union and (persistently but gently) prodded me to wear my pluralist badge proudly; John Thatamanil, who is one of the most cutting-edge, groundbreaking, exciting, and constructively ambitious comparative and philosophical theologians on the contemporary scene; and Sheila Davaney, who was my MA advisor and teacher at the Iliff School of Theology and is one of the leading experts on and exponents of pragmatic historicism. It was profoundly humbling and gratifying to have scholars of such immense acuity, creativity, and luminosity read, critique, and evaluate my first book-length work.
Sheila Davaney was actually one of three historicist theologians with whom I closely worked while I was a master’s student at Iliff. The other two were the late Delwin Brown, whose scholarship initially drew me to Iliff, and William Dean, whose steadfast mentorship, encouragement, and inspiration have sustained me for almost two decades. The “Iliff historicists” influenced my intellectual formation more than anyone else, introducing me to the Chicago school and, more broadly, to the traditions of American theological and philosophical thought that have become the focus of my own research and scholarship: empirical theology, religious naturalism, process philosophy, and, of course, pragmatic historicism. Deciding to move to Colorado to study with Sheila, Bill, and Del was one of the best decisions I ever made. I hope this book is a fitting tribute to them.
I have had the privilege of learning from several other exceptional teachers and scholars along the way, all of whom have played a significant role in my academic development. I wish to especially thank Antony Alumkal, Mary Boys, Euan Cameron, Roger Haight, Thomas Hall, Albert Hernández, Bruce Marino, Gregory Miller, Christopher Morse, Wayne Proudfoot, Hal Taussig, and the late James Cone.
In 2008, I joined the Institute for American Religious and Philosophical Thought (formerly the Highlands Institute for American Religious and Philosophical Thought), the institutional locus of most of my scholarly interests: the Chicago school, theological liberalism in America, and naturalist, empiricist, process, pragmatist, and historicist approaches to philosophy and theology. It has been an honor to share my work with this esteemed group of scholars, some of whom make an appearance in the pages to follow. I am particularly grateful to David Conner, Robert Corrington, Donald Crosby, Nancy Frankenberry, and Michael Hogue, who have become mentors, as well as to several other IARPTers who have offered indispensable criticisms, insights, and suggestions over the last few years, including Randy Auxier, Tom Byrnes, Linell Cady, Pamela Crosby, William Hart, Andrew Irvine, Jennifer Jesse, Robert King, Bob Mesle, Barbara Hiles Mesle, Wade Mitchell, Les Muray (in memoriam), Robert Neville, Dan Ott, Creighton Peden (in memoriam), Karl Peters, Michael Raposa, Austin Roberts, David Rohr, LeRon Shults, Rob Smid, Jerome Stone, and Wesley Wildman. My conversations with these brilliant thinkers have helped hone many of the ideas fleshed out in this volume.
I met some of my closest intellectual companions during my time at Union, including Timothy Becker (in loving memory), Jason VonWachenfeldt, and Thurman Todd Willison. My friendships with these three extraordinary individuals have pushed me and sharpened me beyond compare. Many other friends at Union also had a decisive impact on my thinking: Roberto Alejandro, Nkosi Anderson, Chris Ashley, Nick Astraeus, Joel Berning, Preston Davis, Jeremy Kirk, Celene Lillie, Jenn Lindsay, Rob Loring, Amy Meverden, David Orr, Elijah Prewitt-Davis, Nate Smith, A. J. Turner, Marvin Wickware, and Michael Wissa.
I would like to thank a few other friends as well, specifically, Art Bucher, Kevin Clark, Rich Eby, John Gray, Alfred Haase, Jeremiah Kitchen, Andrew Light, Caleb Maskell, Kathy Maskell, Clarissa Roberts, Chip Sprouse, and Mary Ward-Bucher. All of these remarkable people have enriched me in countless ways. I am profoundly thankful for my lifelong friendship with Andrew Arena, which has kept me grounded through this arduous but rewarding process.
I want to thank Terry Muck, Edwin Aponte, and the Louisville Institute for awarding me a postdoctoral fellowship in 2015. I am especially grateful for the other members of my postdoctoral cohort, Chris Hoklotubbe, Han-luen Kantzer Komline, David Turnbloom, and Sunggu Yang, and for our cohort leader, Grace Ji-Sun Kim. Without their urging and advice, I am not sure this project would have seen the light of publication.
A big thank you to the community of United Theological Seminary of the Twin Cities, which has become my academic and spiritual home. First and foremost, I want to thank Paul Capetz, who represents the very best of the liberal Protestant tradition and whose own scholarship embodies the spirit of nineteenth-century historicism. Paul is a treasured friend, colleague, and mentor and, as he often says, my closest theological Gesprächspartner . He read every word of this volume—endnotes included!—and provided extensive, substantive, and invaluable critical feedback. It was Paul who helped me revise my dissertation and turn it into a book, and his pointed queries, corrections, and reflections certainly made it a better book.
I feel extremely fortunate to work with so many talented and lovely faculty colleagues, among them: Jennifer Awes-Freeman, Dale Dobias, Eleazar Fernandez, Gary Green, Cindi Beth Johnson, J