Defining Religion: Essays in Philosophy of Religion

Description

Provides a new orientation to philosophy of religion and a new theory of how religion ought to be defined. Contents List of Tables Preface Notes Part One: Heuristics Preliminary Remarks Chapter One Problems of Definition Confusions of Definition Defining Religion as a Harmony Ecologies of Harmonies Tunnels of Definition Notes Chapter Two A Heuristic Definition of Religion On Definition Ultimacy and Engagement in Religion Five Problematics of Religion Components of Authentic Religion Notes Chapter Three Theory of Religion in a Pragmatic Philosophical Theology Ultimate Realities Cognitive Articulations Existential Identifications Religious Life Notes Chapter Four Modeling Ultimate Reality: God, Consciousness, and Emergence Introduction Personhood, Consciousness, and Emergence The Ontological Creative Act Semiotics of Symbolic Engagement Notes Part Two: Pragmatics Preliminary Remarks Chapter Five A Pragmatic Approach to Religious Experience Religious Experience Engagement and Reference What Makes Religious Symbols Religious? Reductionism Notes Chapter Six Semiotics versus Phenomenology: Existential and Hermeneutic Dimensions Defining Religious Experience: Phenomenology and Semiotics Existential Dimensions of Religious Experience Hermeneutic Dimensions: Intentionality Hermeneutic Dimensions: Signs Notes Chapter Seven Hermeneutic and Validity Dimensions of Religious Experience Hermeneutic Dimensions: Reference Hermeneutic Dimensions: Context Validity Dimensions Summary Dimensions of Religious Experience in Semiotic Analysis Notes Chapter Eight Self-Reliance and the Portability of Pragmatism American Philosophical Exceptionalism Transcendental Philosophy Putting Nature First The Pragmatic Model Notes Part Three: Religious Studies Preliminary Remarks Chapter Nine Why All Theology Should Be Comparative A Logic of Comparison The Social Organization of Theological Comparison Motive for Theological Comparison Normativeness in Comparative Theology Notes Chapter Ten Does the Study of Religion Need Philosophy? Kinds of Philosophy in Religion Philosophy in the Definition of Religion Philosophy and Religious Symbolism Philosophy and Ultimate Reality Chapter Eleven Some Recommendations for the Future of Liberal Theology A New Framework Pragmatic Inquiry Pragmatic Realism Religious Experience Metaphysics and Apophatic Theology Notes Chapter Twelve Naturalism: So Easily Wrong Introduction The Positive Thesis The Unfrankenberry Thesis The Unwildman Thesis Notes Part Four: Philosophical Theology Preliminary Remarks Chapter Thirteen A Respectful Alternative to Process Theology: A Letter of Grateful and Affectionate Response to David Ray Griffin’s Whitehead’s Radically Different Postmodern Philosophy: An Argument for Its Contemporary Relevance Ontology Intimate Religious Sensibility Conceptions of God as Religiously Available Religious Language and Metaphysics Notes Chapter Fourteen The Triune God and Creation ex Nihilo, or “The One and the Many” Strikes Again Creativity According to Joseph Bracken The Problem of the One and the Many Eternal Creation An Eternal Act of Creation Ex Nihilo Notes Chapter Fifteen Perpetual Apophasis and the Existential Implosion of Worldviews On Religion Sacred Worldviews Apophatic Theology Existential Implosions Notes Chapter Sixteen Ultimate Realities for the Sciences and Humanities Ontological Ultimate Realities Cosmological Ultimate Realities Topics for Research Summary and Conclusion Notes Part Five: Players Preliminary Remarks Chapter Seventeen John E. Smith: Doing Something with American Philosophy European and American Philosophy A New Theory of Experience Philosophy of Religion Ambiguities of Philosophical Ambition Notes Chapter Eighteen Richard Rorty: Pragmatism, Metaphysics, Comparison, and Realism Pragmatism Metaphysics Comparison Realism Notes Chapter Nineteen William Desmond’s Philosophical Theology Metaxology Harmony The Infinity of Respects of Interpretation Methods Compared Determinateness and the Ontological Ground of Mutual Relevance: God Being and Beings Ontological Creation God The Divine Nature Comparisons In Desmond’s Mirror Notes Chapter Twenty Nancy Frankenberry: Philosopher of Religion, Radical Empiricist, Herald of Contingency Introduction Frankenberry, Whitehead, and Davidson The Linguistic Turn Frankenberry’s Vision Notes Index