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3. Whitehead's Philosophical Synthesis, Robert L. Bloom, Basil L. Crapster, Harold L. Dunkelberger, Charles H. Glatfelter, Richard T. Mara, Norman E. Richardson, W. Richard Schubart

Section XXII: Philosophical Meaning

In Alfred North Whitehead (1861-1947) we meet a philosopher who was born an Englishman and died an American, and whose thought combined the major recent philosophical contributions of both countries in a radically new and startling metaphysical synthesis. Unlike both Dewey and Russell, he sees in philosophy neither the individual nor the social creation of meaning, but rather adventurous exploration in the discovery of meaning. His approach, like Russell's, is individualistic and, like Dewey's, total rather than partial or limited. He drew both on the English analytical interest in psychology and sociology, while at the same time maintaining his own …

2. The Instrumentalism Of John Dewey, Robert L. Bloom, Basil L. Crapster, Harold A. Dunkelberger, Charles H. Glatfelter, Richard T. Mara, Norman E. Richardson, W. Richard Schubart

Section XXII: Philosophical Meaning

The approach of John Dewey to philosophy, while influenced by many of the same factors which were important to Russell, and despite his agreement with Russell on many social issues, takes a radically different direction. Dewey sees a person's philosophy as more intimately and internally related to the social processes than does Russell. Instead of viewing it as primarily a means of analysis and clarification, Dewey sees the role of philosophy as a method of social reconstruction, and logic as a method of inquiry rather than a means of exploring the implications of analytical definitions and empirical facts. It is …

1. Main Movements And Thought Patterns Of The Churches Since The French Revolution, Robert L. Bloom, Basil L. Crapster, Harold L. Dunkelberger, Charles H. Glatfelter, Richard T. Mara, Norman E. Richardson, W. Richard Schubart

Section XXIII: Theological Meaning

Of all the churches, the Roman Catholic was most seriously threatened by the French Revolution. Characteristically, she associated herself with the traditional monarchs and supported the rule of legitimate lords, be they bishops or kings, against the rising tide of liberty, equality, and fraternity. As these liberal democratic ideas became more and more popular, the Roman Catholic church became more and more defensive. This defense made popular an old movement for complete centralization of power in the papacy, a movement called ultramontanism, which saw its fulfillment in the decisions of the Vatican Council (1869-1870). [excerpt]

4. Martin Buber, Robert L. Bloom, Basil L. Crapster, Harold L. Dunkelberger, Charles H. Glatfelter, Richard T. Mara, Norman E. Richardson, W. Richard Schubart

Section XXIII: Theological Meaning

In 1957 a little man of about eighty years gave a series of lectures at the Washington School of Psychiatry. He had come to the United States from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem to speak under the auspices of an institution concerned with restoring to health the mentally ill or aberrant. The guest was a philosopher, not a renowned therapist. Yet for Martin Buber (1878- ) himself such a designation is both acceptable and unacceptable. On the one hand he concerns himself with the objective world as philosophy conceptualizes it. On the other hand his primary concern is not speaking …

2. Meaning As A Problem In Contemporary Religious Thought, Robert L. Bloom, Basil L. Crapster, Harold L. Dunkelberger, Charles H. Glatfelter, Richard T. Mara, Norman E. Richardson, W. Richard Schubart

Section XXIII: Theological Meaning

To judge from the public voice and countenance of religion in America at least, there is a preoccupation in religion with happiness at the expense of meaning. But between the two poles of happiness and meaning there is considerable distance. This chapter accepts the problem of meaning as more urgent than the problem of happiness. For over against the hopeful prescriptions for the integration of the personality and of social life through religion there stands the experience of disintegration of the structure of past confidence. Desperately, theologians wrestle with ancient symbols to wrest from them new significance or reference, or …

6. Ian T. Ramsey, Robert L. Bloom, Basil L. Crapster, Harold L. Dunkelberger, Charles H. Glatfelter, Richard T. Mara, Norman E. Richardson, W. Richard Schubart

Section XXIII: Theological Meaning

In view of the requirement of verifiability that is demanded by certain philosophical schools, there seems little justification for what are conventionally recognized as theological statements. Certainly no one man has yet succeeded, except perhaps to his own satisfaction, in expressing religious notions in such language and in verifying by such a method that universal consent is gained for the validity of his system. If the charm of empirical verification is not invoked, then for some minds there is little reason to say anything. Obviously, given such rigid requirements for securing a sympathetic audience, theological discussion may find itself standing …

7. Charles Hartshorne, Robert L. Bloom, Basil L. Crapster, Harold L. Dunkelberger, Charles H. Glatfelter, Richard T. Mara, Norman E. Richardson, W. Richard Schubart

Section XXIII: Theological Meaning

Theology differs from philosophical or scientific inquiry in general by being concerned about man in relationship to God. The existentialist says with distressing simplicity that "existence precedes essence" and hence he concerns himself with man in his concrete situation rather than with the abstract idea of man. We have also seen that Protestant theologians have for the most part abandoned the scholastic urge to circumscribe experience in a logical system. In fact, we see nowadays almost a systematic effort to avoid constructing self-contained schematizations. There is in contemporary Protestant theology a general protest against the rigidity seemingly required by the …

5. Paul Tillich, Robert L. Bloom, Basil L. Crapster, Harold L. Dunkelberger, Charles H. Glatfelter, Richard T. Mara, Norman E. Richardson, W. Richard Schubart

Section XXIII: Theological Meaning

Paul Tillich (1886) left his native Germany because of the Nazis about the same time as Karl Earth, but Tillich came to the United States and became a faculty member of Union Theological Seminary, New York. He had spent World War I as a Lutheran chaplain in the German trenches and came out of it looking for something better than the theology that could not explain or help the trench soldier.

His resulting work, primarily expounded since his adoption of English, has led some to proclaim him as the Protestant theologian of our time. Others have branded him heretical. This …

3. Soren Kierkegaard And Karl Barth, Robert L. Bloom, Basil L. Crapster, Harold L. Dunkelberger, Charles H. Glatfelter, Richard T. Mara, Norman E. Richardson, W. Richard Schubart

Section XXIII: Theological Meaning

Soren Kierkegaard (1813-1855) seldom left his native city, Copenhagen, and, except for two brief visits to Berlin, never left Denmark. The externals of his life were rather ordinary for the son of a wealthy hosier. He always employed at least one servant and dressed in the best of fashion, but his death found him with the last of his income in his pocket. He was a lonely man seeking only one or two intimate friends, passing the daily pleasantries with everyone, but warding off with his masterful use of irony most of those who tried to befriend him. When he …