ABSTRACT
In this short introductory article the origin of this special issue in a Cambridge conference in 2019 is briefly sketched. Moreover, the specific approach which the organizers wanted to highlight is elucidated. Also, a preview is offered of the various contributions to this special issue.
‘Sisters in Arms. Reinventing the Bond Between Philosophy and Theology After the “Empirical Turn”’ – that was the programmatic title of our conference in celebration of the 80th anniversary of the International Journal of Philosophy and Theology in 2019Footnote1. The conference was based on an international call and organized in cooperation with the Centre Peter Giles at the University of Antwerp, the Von Hügel Institute in Cambridge and the Institute for Hermeneutics at the University of Bonn. The conference title may perhaps sound a bit extravagant as the idea of ‘reinventing’ the bond between philosophy and theology turned out to be slightly too ambitious. But the subtitle was supposed to indicate a major problem in ongoing debates, research policies and funding programs which we indeed managed to ‘reconsider’ from manifold perspectives and many different methodological and stylistic approaches. Although fundamental research is still in high esteem, it is clear that all academic disciplines meet the challenge of the so-called empirical turn. This implies that research should deal with what is often labelled as ‘real-life problems’ and be relevant to society at large. An empirical basis or component of the research should guarantee this relevance.
On another level, it seems that philosophy and theology have received more competition from other humanities than ever before. While some decades ago civil society looked at philosophers and theologians for moral guidance, nowadays disciplines like psychology, sociology and evolutionary studies have taken over this role to a certain extent. These disciplines (at least in the majority of their representatives) collect empirical data to arrive at descriptions of the present situation. These are subsequently often used to answer topical questions, whether this was originally intended by the research or not. In this last step the descriptive research often takes on a normative weight.
Given this climate, what is the specific strength of fundamental or speculative reflection like it has been developed traditionally in philosophy and theology? Is it in danger of becoming obsolete? Is it still meaningful to keep on aiming for a bond between philosophy and theology as strengthening both disciplines? Or should one rather aspire an empirical turn, as slogans like ‘lived theology’ or ‘lived philosophy’ seem to indicate – and which further interdisciplinary approaches would that have to include? Or are ‘lived’ theologies and philosophies more apt to phenomenological or even psychological research than to empirical data – and what exactly would be their difference in the wake of ‘the empirical turn’s’ consequences?
These questions are all the more urgent insofar as religion is concerned. The comeback of religion and metaphysics in philosophy of the last decades has led to models of reflection with a highly speculative appearance which seem to have lost interest in engaging in societal debates. In the meantime, theology is under severe attack from religious studies approaches for its abstract or dogmatic character. The call for a theological turn to ‘lived religion’ is widespread and comes along with new theoretical approaches like theories of performativity, narrativity, or atmospheres and situatedness. And still, are the times of an obvious bond between philosophy and theology past? What do the disciplines have to offer each other, as critical sparring partners in times in which their academic position is all but self-evident, as is the position of religion itself? Is the divide between analytical and continental varieties of both disciplines symptomatic for the trend mentioned before or is there a chance for mutual reinforcement? Can theology and philosophy perhaps reinvent their coalition as one of ‘sisters in arms’, that is, of aiming for unfashionable approaches of academically neglected questions?
We are happy to announce that our call for papers was answered by researchers of all generations, coming from various disciplines and countries, most of them associated with European research traditions. At the conference high quality papers were shared that started stimulating discussions, and it is with utmost pleasure that we are able to present at least some of these papers here in this volume:
The collection is opened with Lydia Schumacher’s key note on ‘The History and Future of Philosophy’s Relationship with Theology’, addressing major historical milestones and developmental dynamics between philosophy and theology. While the key note provides a somewhat general overview of their sometimes conflictive, sometimes friendly relation, the following papers all focus on exemplary key concepts or areas of research.
The paper by David Jasper e.g. focuses on the key concept of fiction in a specific historical context: ‘The Nineteenth Century Novel and the Rhetoric of Fiction’ while the paper by Jessica Eastwood combines the key concepts of fiction and emotion, now in the modern version of emotional responses: ‘Can Fictionalists Have a Genuine Emotional Response to Religious Discourse?’ An equally classical yet almost opposite approach is contributed by Simon Hewitt who poses a question for rational speculation: ‘Does Living Christianity Support Personhood Theism?’ The next paper provides another change of perspective which might include an alternative aspect to both, fictionality as well as rational speculation: Jamie Howard questions the key concept of ‘Intuition’, asking whether it might provide ‘A Potential Life Raft for Philosophy and Theology?’ By that the paper creates an interesting discourse with Martín Grassi, who in an exceptionally stylistic essay on ‘Archaeological Discourses and the Building of Our World: An Essay on Philosophy and Theology’ presents a quite poetic and existentialist way of considering the role of philosophy and theology for human life in general.
In the last section of the special issue, we offer three papers who all deal with vulnerability, powerlessness and resilience as a specialized area of research, demanding a broad variety of conceptual and methodological approaches which present themselves in very different literary styles: Thiemo Breyer offers a perfect example of how phenomenology can help to investigate fundamental problems of human life: ‘Resilience. Its Connections to Vulnerability and Crisis from Analytic and Phenomenological Perspectives’. Susanne Heine, coming from a slightly different, yet related tradition in the humanities, and cooperating with psychology, asks for ‘Philosophical Implications in Psychological Concepts Regarding Powerlessness and Enhancement’. David Batho, last but not least, prefers a ‘scientific’ approach and turns to empirical research on ‘Experiences of Powerlessness and the Limits of Control’.
In the whole, all papers of this special issue as well as it’s overall topic will for sure raise as many concerns and complaints as supporting and encouraging comments, it will raise further debates on what should be called ‘scientific’ and what not, on how to define the aims, purposes, boundaries and limitations of both the humanities as well as the empirical disciplines. All readers can feel invited to enter the debate because that is exactly the purpose of our international journal!
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Cornelia Richter
Cornelia Richter has been Professor for Systematic Theology and Hermeneutics at the Faculty of Protestant Theology of the University of Bonn since 2012. She is co-director of the Bonn Institute for Hermeneutics. Since 2019, she is spokesperson of the interdisciplinary research group DFG-FOR 2686 ‘Resilience in Religion and Spirituality’. In April 2020 she took over as Dean of the Faculty of Protestant Theology at the University of Bonn.
Notes
1. The conference in celebration of the 80th anniversary of this journal was held in the Møller Centre, Cambridge (UK) on 9, 10 and 11 January 2019. Members of the organizing committee were: W. Van Herck, P. Schaafsma, L. Schumacher, T. Scrutton, C. Richter, M. Sarot, G. Vanheeswijck, J. Geldhof, G.-J. van der Heiden, Ph. McCosker.