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This thesis asks: can a spiritual teacher be said to teach with authority, as much of the Christian tradition holds and, indeed, requires to continue itself? To answer this question, a secondary question is pursued: what is the relationship of spiritual authority to other types of authoritative teaching? The spiritual pedagogue attempts to form others to live according to God's will, which is mysterious in principle. Unlike most other disciplines, the spiritual teacher cannot claim authoritative knowledge of the essence of her discipline. Nevertheless, I argue that spiritual teaching authority is a legitimate though limited form of authority, and that a sign of such authority is a self-consciousness of its own limitations. Drawing on Wittgenstein and Aquinas, I argue that spiritual teaching authority is a riddling form of prudential counsel. Wittgenstein's account of language within shared activities provides the "rough ground" to speak of the activities associated with spiritual pedagogy while distinguishing the inarticulable mystery at the heart of such teaching. The language of spiritual pedagogy is riddling in Cora Diamond's sense in that such language fails to make sense but lies within a cultivated, intelligible set of questions and activities. This Wittgensteinian account is joined with Thomas's two rules for prudential human action, the eternal law of God's own being, and human reason. The eternal law is, in principle, mysterious yet it formally orders human reason. The spiritual pedagogue becomes authoritative by becoming riddling herself, i.e., by being transformed through her engagement with scripture and tradition in community. This ongoing transformation allows her to creatively and richly speak and act around the riddle of God without ever claiming to solve that riddle.

A commitment to the Chalcedonian standard implies a logical difficulty for Christology: a single person, in virtue of existing in two natures, exemplifies apparently incompatible attributes. This 'problem of contradictory Christological predication' threatens the truth of the doctrine of the Incarnation by calling its logical coherence into question. In this thesis, I take this problem as the subject of discussion. I present this project as a work of philosophical theology, conducted in an analytic-cum-scholastic mode, whose purpose is to give greater intelligibility to the Incarnation doctrine without compromising its irreducible mystery. In the first chapter of the thesis, I locate my project in the domain of analytic theology, a style of theological speculation which places a high priority on linguistic precision. I then lay a foundation in scholastic metaphysics, many of the central categories of which are vital to giving intelligibility to the doctrine of the Incarnation. Finally, I consider the place of mystery in a project of this kind. I suggest that the mystery of the Incarnation need not impede our progression in knowledge and understanding of the doctrine, but nor should we consider the Incarnation as merely one further instance of a mundane or creaturely phenomenon. To say that the Incarnation is a 'mystery' is not to say that it is intellectually inaccessible, but that it defies absolute cognitive reduction. In the second and third chapters of the dissertation, I provide a metaphysical foundation for the traditional teaching that Christ is one divine person who exists in two natures. First, I consider issues relating to the divine person and divine nature, such as what it means for Christ to be 'consubstantial' with the Father, how God relates to the created order in general, what a divine person is and how the second person alone may be the subject of the Incarnation in light of the inseparability of Trinitarian operations. Next, I consider issues relating to the assumed human nature, such as whether the human nature is concrete or abstract, how the human nature relates to its properties and what place, if any, the language of 'composition' should have in the metaphysical analysis of the hypostatic union. On these various topics, I align most closely to a 'Latin' or scholastic position, though I eschew the language of composition which proved popular among the medievals. In the fourth and fifth chapters, I survey the various ways in which the problem of contradictory Christological predication has been treated in the tradition. One way in which the problem has been addressed, and the first which I consider, is that of 'jettisoning' either the divine or human side of a given pair of contradictory predicates, so that the divinity of Christ must 'give way' so as to accommodate the humanity, or vice versa. This family of approaches, which I term 'limitation strategies', I find irredeemably problematic, particularly as they have been given expression in a number of recent analytic treatments. I then consider the alternative family of strategies, 'classical strategies', which seek to preserve coherence by 'segregating' the divine and human attributes only to the nature to which they correspond. While I am persuaded that some form of classical strategy is the correct approach, I conclude that most of the prevailing classical manoeuvres are deficient in some respect. In the final chapter, I propose a semantic and metaphysical strategy for addressing the problem. The human nature relates to the divine person according to a relation of ontological dependence that is entirely unique, and the sense in which the person may be said to be the subject of human properties is one that is irreducibly qualified by this unique dependence-relation. The Word is thus the subject of both divine and human properties, though the sense of 'property exemplification' that is at work is not univocal, and therefore does not give rise to contradiction. I associate this semantic strategy with a renovated habitus theory of the hypostatic union, which understands the human nature's relation to the Word as one that is entirely extrinsic to the divine person, bringing about no internal change to the Word in its divinity, while maintaining, contra compositional accounts, that the Incarnation does not give rise to a product which includes the divine person and human nature as parts. Thus, my approach preserves a strong identity between 'Christ' and 'the Word'. Importantly, the human nature's dependence upon the person is unique in a sense that satisfies the requirements of 'mystery', for it does not reduce the hypostatic union to an instance of a more general metaphysical phenomenon.

Logic and theology were once spoken of together in a divine speech with which we spoke of God, even as God spoke to us, in one and the same sacred speech. Logic had been conceived as a simulation of speech in argument from the divine Logos. Yet logic has since been repeatedly separated from theology by Aristotle, Ockham, and Kant, just as often as it has been re-united by Plotinus, Cusa, and Hegel. Each separation has resulted in the successive construction of logic into more articulate forms of argument and inference. Origen of Alexandria (fl. AD 184-253/4) has contributed the first Christian theological interpretation of logic. He has, beginning in his systematic theology On First Principles, interpreted logic as a simulation of the Logos, communicated by Christ, in and through the divine hypostases of God as Trinity. And he has, in his scriptural commentaries, shown how, beginning in the 'spiritual sense', logic is virtually 'interwoven' in all the philosophical sciences, and supremely through the mystical or 'epoptic' science of theology. This 'theology of logic' announces a new way to study the subject of logic for theology. It should be doubly distinguished, on the one hand, from theoretical or philosophical logic, which asks what are the rules of logic, and on the other hand, from practical or applied logic, which asks how these rules of logic can be used to demonstrate the conclusions of any science. It thus starts with no standing presumption as to the absolute necessity of logic, but, rather and more radically, asks the prior question of the contingent grounds for our very belief in the truth of logic. It raises the most originary questions of the beginning and end of logic before any separation from theology. This discovery has, however, since been submerged and silenced, first due to the Origenist controversies, but finally due to the progressive formalization of logic in medieval and modern logic, culminating in the 'pure analytic' of mathematical logic. Once it has reduced the living spirit of speech to the dead letters of writing, and suspended this spirit in an artificial syntax, the logical can lapse into the formalization of a secular logic. Logic then tends to forget and frustrate its own formality as it signifies without speaking of its first formalization. It has thus tended to render logic a-theological, theology a-logical, and both altogether inarticulate. Yet so long as logic remains separate from God, theology can never demonstrate its conclusions, and logic may never come to know its highest truths. Origen can, as this dissertation will show, be read by a theological interpretation of logic, or a theology of logic, which asks theological questions of the fundamental assumptions of any possible form of logic. He had, in contrast to later secular, formal, and mathematical logics, shown how logic can be simulated as it is spoken in and from the higher ground of the divine Logos, and communicated by Christ in God as Trinity. We may, with Origen, begin to weave each exercise of logic through all the sciences, in this speech that may be spoken, as it ever is spoken, in one and the same sacred speech.

Lewis's modal realism is the view that possible worlds are maximal mereological sums of spatiotemporally connected individuals. Classical theism is the view that God is necessary, unitary, omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent, simple, and the creator and sustainer of all existence. Lewisian theism is the conjunction of modal realism with classical theism. In my thesis by interrelated papers, I argue, firstly, that Lewisian theism is consistent, provided certain theoretical revisions are made to modal realism, and, secondly, that Lewisian theism has the resources to solve certain philosophico-theological problems. In the prologue, I introduce the thesis and expound Lewisian theism. In the first substantive paper, I argue that God's necessity is incompatible with counterpart theory; but, in the second, I argue, contra the dominant view in the literature, that if we eschew counterpart theory for analysing God's necessity, Lewisian theism is consistent. The third and fourth papers concern material adequacy; the third concerns the existence of evil worlds, wherein I argue that Lewisian theists can non-problematically deny the existence of such worlds; and the fourth concerns the existence of an empty world, wherein I argue that Lewisian theists can supply such a world. The fifth paper concerns Lewisian theism's ability to solve a philosophico-theological problem; herein, I argue, firstly, that a valid version of the contingency argument against divine simplicity can be supplied (contra some philosophers), and secondly that Lewisian theism has the resources to render this argument unsound. The last paper contains an abductive argument for the existence of God from modal realism; I argue that the best way to account for the truths of advanced modal claims is to posit the existence of God.

This thesis integrates theology, philosophy, and film studies in a theological analysis of the filmography of Belgian filmmakers Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne. I propose that the Dardenne brothers create post-secular cinematic parables which may evoke theological and ethical responses in audiences' imaginations through a distinct filmmaking style I call "transcendent realism." In Part I, I outline a method for theological interpretations of cinema. Chapter 1 draws from the fields of theology, philosophy, and film theory in order to propose a dynamic interdisciplinary approach for greater appreciation of the Dardennes' "post-secular" cinema. Chapter 2 presents an original phenomenological hermeneutic for cinema based on philosopher Paul Ricoeur's description of "parable" and his concepts regarding the world behind, of, and in front of the film. I then apply this Ricoeurian parabolic hermeneutic to the Dardennes' filmography in Part II. Chapter 3 attends to the world behind the films: the Dardennes' biography, their early films, and Luc's philosophical and theological ideas found in his writings. I give particular attention to the apparent influence of philosopher Ernst Bloch on the Dardennes. Chapter 4 addresses the world of the films through close formal analysis of 'The Son' (2002), 'The Kid with a Bike' (2011), and 'Young Ahmed' (2019); I outline the distinctive traits of the Dardennes' transcendent realism. Chapter 5 explores the world in front of the films-that is, how the Dardennes' parables may reorient audiences' imaginations through affective states and cinematic ethics. I demonstrate three Dardennean theo-ethical themes through pairings of the brothers' six remaining major films. In the conclusion, I suggest that the Dardennes' cinematic parables are doing theology, what I call "theocinematics".

This thesis offers a contribution to debates regarding the nature of human finitude by drawing on the early writings of the French philosopher Paul Ricœur (1913-2005). Ricœur's concept of finitude has several unique features which distinguish it from many that were (and still are) prevalent in French philosophical discourse, almost all of which draw significantly on the work of Martin Heidegger (1889-1976). In Ricœur's philosophy, human finitude cannot be described from a metaphysically or religiously neutral perspective; one's implicit answers to questions concerning religion, God, and the origin of the world will affect how the human condition is understood. Each of the four chapters examines Ricœurian finitude in relation to a specific area: truth, transcendence, evil, and creation. Chapter One shows that for Ricœur, our finite capacities mean that philosophy is a search for truth, motivated by the hope of participating in the truth but without ever claiming to have achieved systematic completion. Chapter Two argues that, where Heideggerian finitude is total immanence and therefore nothing but finitude, Ricœurian finitude is paradoxically joined to an infinitude that enables an openness to transcendence. Chapter Three similarly contrasts prevalent conceptions of finitude as intrinsically guilty with Ricœur's careful efforts to distinguish finitude from evil, sin and guilt. Ricœur uses the productive faculty of the imagination to offer a picture of innocent finitude prior to its corruption. Finally, Chapter Four makes the case that Ricœur's 'picture of innocence' comes from the Biblical account of creation. Creation, for Ricœur, is a 'symbol', meaning an idea drawn from outside philosophy that nonetheless stimulates thought and illuminates philosophical understanding. I conclude by suggesting ways in which this study contributes to the ongoing debate on the relationship between philosophy and religion in Ricœur's work. This study is restricted to a consideration of Ricœur's writings prior to his post-1960 'hermeneutic turn' and his engagement with Freud. Methodologically, it contextualises Ricœur's thought against the backdrop of three major influences: Gabriel Marcel (1889-1973), Karl Jaspers (1883-1969), and the French reflexive school of philosophy. This three-fold backdrop has the benefit of highlighting elements in Ricœur's philosophy that are often overlooked when the focus is on his phenomenological heritage.

This study is a constructive account of Søren Kierkegaard’s theological anthropology. In it I show that according to Kierkegaard: (1) human being consists in the continual task of becoming; (2) this becoming demands that we continually begin again; and (3) beginning is a kenotic art executed through the spiritual exercise of faculties such as anxiety and silence. Such practices return the human being to a state of graceful nothing, which Kierkegaard names “primitivity”. From this state, the human being may repeatedly (re-)begin her becoming. This study contributes to Kierkegaard scholarship in several ways. Notably, it: (1) subverts the reduction of Kierkegaardian faith to an irrational (MacIntyre) or violent (Lévinas) moment through elevating the status of beginning; (2) recovers the Platonic vision of the good underpinning Kierkegaard’s anthropology; (3) theologically rehabilitates those Kierkegaardian categories (i.e. nothingness, silence, anxiety) which are commonly read through a secular existentialist or postmodern lens; and (4) resists the related tendency to bifurcate the philosophical and theological dimensions of Kierkegaard’s thought. In terms of enduring issues in wider philosophical theology and philosophy of religion, this study: (1) uses a methodology of reading with, which deploys close textual readings as the tools through which to critique historical-critical readings; (2) thereby opens Kierkegaard’s authorship to contemporary theo-poetic and constructive theological approaches; and (3) contributes to theological reflections on the good, anxiety, silence and grace. In the Prelude I sketch the scope, purpose and methodology of this study. In Chapter One, I reassess Kierkegaard’s relationship to Plato and Aristotle, recovering the centrality of the Christian-Platonic good to Kierkegaard’s anthropology, and presenting Kierkegaardian metaphysics as an existential pursuit. In Chapters Two and Three, I present anxiety and silence as kenotic spiritual practices through which the individual recovers her capacity for the good. My readings of Kierkegaard’s construals of both categories accentuate the sense in which: (1) Kierkegaardian nothing or primitivity is always gracefully fulsome; and (2) Kierkegaard’s texts are not just dialectical or descriptive, but formational and performative. In Chapter Four, I: (1) reflect explicitly on the prevenient grace which implicitly inflects the categories (nothing, good, anxiety, silence) considered throughout the rest of the study; and (2) explore how Kierkegaard pseudonymously heightens and veronymously relaxes the paradox of grace, his authorship as a whole inducting his reader into grace as not a problem to solve but a task to undertake.

This dissertation brings a new philosophical perspective to an important topic in the contemporary theology and science dialogue, specifically the theological reception of multiverse thought in modern cosmology. In light of recent cosmological speculation about the plausibility of a 'multiverse,' a cosmic ensemble in which our own universe is just one of many, theological responses have largely focused on the question of whether such a multiverse might be an alternative to divine design (or might itself be compatible with divine design). However, this approach neglects the fundamental metaphysical issues entailed in the multiverse proposal, including its entanglement of the one and the many (a paradox which has itself been a central concern of theological reflection), as well as its intimations of cosmic multiplicity, diversity, and infinity. In this dissertation I provide the first systematic theological engagement with these metaphysical implications. My approach is to draw on ancient and medieval resources (neglected not only in multiverse discussions but also in the theology and science field more generally) to show that the concept of metaphysical participation provides a particularly fertile ground on which theology can engage constructively with multiverse thought. To that end, I focus specifically on the participatory thought of Plato, Aquinas, and Nicholas of Cusa, each of whom seek to understand how a physical cosmos of complexity and immensity might share in divine existence of unity and simplicity. I bring their insights into interaction with a diverse range of contemporary theological, philosophical, and scientific figures to demonstrate that a participatory account of the relationship between God and creation argues for greater continuity between theology and the multiverse proposal in modern cosmology.

Recent scholarship has increasingly recognized the unity of Herman Bavinck's (1854-1921) thought, shedding the once-predominant reading that Bavinck was a conflicted thinker caught between modernity and orthodoxy. There were 'two Bavincks', the secondary literature claimed. The catalyst of unity for Bavinck's thinking is located in his deployment of organic language to characterize particular theological loci. The organic motif stems from Bavinck's Trinitarian doctrine of God, according to which God exists as the archetypal and self-existent Three-in-One. Creation, then, is an ectypal reflection of the triune Godhead, and as such can be described as an organism comprising of many unities-in-diversities. This new reading, propelled by James Eglinton, argued that for Bavinck the Trinity ad intra leads to an organic cosmology ad extra. Though this reading has showcased the unity of Bavinck's thought in general, current scholarship on Bavinck's theological epistemology remains fractured along the lines of the 'two Bavinck' thesis, with two sides that emphasize, respectively, the modern strand of Bavinck's thinking or his classical, orthodox, side. This thesis reinvestigates the primary texts in which Bavinck discusses epistemology and argues that the organic motif is also the lens through which his epistemology is to be read. In doing so, this thesis argues that the organic motif allowed Bavinck to utilize both classical (Thomistic) and post-Kantian sources in a way that produces coherence rather than inconsistency. Thus, it is unnecessary to pit Bavinck's use of classical sources against his use of modern sources: particular deployment is not systematic endorsement. The thesis, then, is that a Trinitarian doctrine of God ad intra produces not merely an organic cosmology ad extra, but also an organic epistemology. It then proceeds to demonstrate this in two ways. First, the thesis observes that Bavinck characterizes the sciences (wetenschappen) as a single organism made up of a unity-in-diversity. The specialization and divisions of the sciences mean that each field has its own sphere of existence with unique grounds and methodologies, but there is an underlying theological unity between them that relativizes that diversity precisely because all of the sciences are theological. Second, for Bavinck subjective knowledge can organically correspond with objects because both participate in a larger, organic universe. Mental representations connect with the world because all of creation is primordially interconnected by way of God's organic design. In each of these steps Bavinck's eclectic use of sources and overall creativity and unity are displayed. This thesis also relates his discussion both to his interlocutors and contemporary philosophical and analytic epistemology. Hence, this thesis not only demonstrates the overall coherence of Bavinck's thought, thereby further eradicating ill-conceived notions of there being 'two-Bavincks', but also showcases potentially generative insights concerning the place of theology within the university and the resources theology might provide for philosophical epistemology.

In the wake of Lynne White's 1967 thesis contending Christianity is the historical root of our environmental crises, theologians have struggled to articulate an environmentally friendly theology. These efforts, while substantive, have proven insufficient to reorient Christian environmental ethics and practice en mass. Pope Francis argues in Laudato Si, that dogma, doctrine, and arguments are always insufficient for redeeming human relations and instead calls for an ecological conversion via a wild spirituality. I answer this call by offering a phenomenological theology of wilderness spirituality that grounds environmental ethics in the experience of encountering God in the wilderness. I use the existential phenomenology of American philosopher Henry Bugbee and Czech phenomenologist Erazim Kohák to map phenomenological practice as spiritual discipline. By engaging in lived, practical, and embodied practices bracketing one's intellectual and physical common-sense attitudes, the practitioner is opened to and made receptive to the redeeming work of God. This topology of phenomenology as spiritual discipline illustrates how wilderness functions in scripture. In conversation with Dietrich Bonhoeffer's reading of the Genesis 3 curse as both curse and promise I argue that wilderness functions by killing sicut-deus-humanity and thereby becomes the site of redemption, healing, and benediction. This spiritual and ethical function of wilderness is also evident in the early desert monks and grounds their praxis and ethical development. Ultimately, it is by being made vulnerable and receptive in the wilderness that the early desert monks were able to participate in the reestablishment of the paradisaical innocence. This suggests that redeemed relations between humanity and the non-human world is dependent upon the sanctifying experience of wilderness deconstruction and encounter and thus the efficacy of environmental ethics depends upon the invitation to practice a wilderness spirituality.

This thesis proposes that Søren Kierkegaard's thought - in particular, his theological anthropology - is undergirded by an inchoate metaphysics of modality. It focuses on the concept of possibility (Danish: Mulighed), arguing that possibility is a primary ingredient of the Kierkegaardian self and serves as a kind of 'engine' for the development of the individual before God. Accordingly, viewing Kierkegaard's works through the lens of possibility is a fruitful way to gain new insights into his beliefs, and clarifies what he sought to express in his authorship. Kierkegaard, I argue, formulates a multilayered account of possibility that, while not abandoning metaphysics, re-frames possibility existentially, in terms of what the self may actually become, not only in and for itself but also in relation to God. One's selfhood and one's relation to God both require an ontology of possibility. His existential concerns arise from this metaphysical footing. This thesis then considers how possibility is integral to human selfhood. Genuine selfhood is an openness towards God's eternal possibility, rather than the self's attempting to create its own eternal possibilities via some other means of actualization. If the human person, by faith, becomes 'grounded in the absolute', then that person is becoming a self precisely because God is actualizing her possibilities. God is for Kierkegaard the source of all possibility. Theologically, Kierkegaard's conception of possibility presents us with ideas that may be fruitful in further discussion of God's attributes and the ways in which God is understood to relate to the created world. Anthropology, ontology, and theology are thus inextricably linked.

In this thesis, my purpose is to determine why Augustine’s theory of knowledge by illumination was rejected by Franciscan theologians at the end of the thirteenth century. My main methodological assumption is that Medieval accounts of divine illumination must be interpreted in a theological context, or with attention to a scholar’s underlying doctrines of God and of the human mind as the image of God, inasmuch as the latter doctrine determines one’s understanding of the nature of the mind’s cognitive work, and illumination illustrates cognition. In the first chapter, I show how Augustine’s understanding of illumination derives from his Trinitarian theology. In the second chapter, I use the same theological methods of inquiry to identify continuity of thought on illumination in Augustine and Anselm. The third chapter covers the events of the twelfth and early thirteenth centuries that had an impact on the interpretation of illumination, including the Greek and Arabic translation movements and the founding of universities and mendicant orders. In this chapter, I explain how the first Franciscan scholars transformed St. Francis of Assisi’s spiritual ideals into a theological and philosophical system, appropriating the Trinitarian theology of Richard of St. Victor and the philosophy of the Arab scholar Avicenna in the process. Bonaventure is typically hailed the great synthesizer of early Franciscan thought and the last and best proponent of traditional Medieval Augustinian thought. In the fourth chapter, I demonstrate that Bonaventure’s Victorine doctrine of the Trinity both enabled and motivated him to assign originally Avicennian meanings to philosophical arguments of Augustine and Anselm that were incompatible with the original ones. In the name of Augustine, in other words, Bonaventure introduced a theory of knowledge that is not Augustinian. In the fifth chapter, my aim is to throw the non-Augustinian character of Bonaventure’s illumination theory into sharper relief through a discussion of knowledge and illumination in the thought of his Dominican contemporary Thomas Aquinas. Although Aquinas is usually supposed to reject illumination theory, I show that he only objects to the Franciscan interpretation of the account, even while he bolsters a genuinely Augustinian account of knowledge and illumination by updating it in the Aristotelian forms of philosophical argumentation that were current at the time. In the final chapter, I explain why late thirteenth-century Franciscans challenged illumination theory, even after Bonaventure had enthusiastically championed it. In this context, I explain that that they did not reject their predecessor’s standard of knowledge outright, but only sought to eradicate the intellectually offensive interference of illumination, as he had defined it, which they perceived as inconsistent with the standard, in the interest of promulgating it. In concluding, I reiterate the importance of interpreting illumination as a function of Trinitarian theology. This approach throws the function of illumination in Augustine’s thought into relief and facilitates the effort to identify continuity and discontinuity amongst Augustine and his Medieval readers, which in turn makes it possible to identify the reasons for the late Medieval decline of divine illumination theory and the rise of an altogether unprecedented epistemological standard.

In this thesis I present a critical explication of Barth’s doctrine of providence in Church Dogmatics III.3. I argue that Karl Barth’s doctrine of providence developed throughout CD III.3 represents a ‘personalist’ revision of Reformed orthodoxy which can only be understood through his ad hoc use of philosophical resources. I claim that critics and supporters alike have missed the depth of Barth’s revision of Reformed providence by failing to perceive his ad hoc use of contemporaneous philosophical tools of the personal. Barth’s doctrine of providence remains theology proper, and not philosophy, but cannot be understood without philosophy. By setting Barth in conversation with three philosophical theologians, Vincent Brümmer, John Macmurray and Austin Farrer, I attempt to show how far Barth is from pre-modern understandings in his articulation of the doctrine of providence. These conversations equip the reader to discern continuities and discontinuities of Barth’s thought with 20th century personal, relational philosophy, thereby making sense of many of Barth’s counterintuitive claims. For Barth, human life is the continual double-agency of human self-determination and divine determination. This life in covenant before God (coram Deo) constitutes the Godgiven opportunity of human personhood. Seen in dialogue with personalist philosophical thinkers, Barth’s doctrine of providence overcomes problematic aspects of traditional Reformed views and grants limited time and space for personal development. Providence sheds light on Barth’s ‘eternalizing’ eschatology in that election establishes the objective reality of salvation for all creatures, while providence explicates God’s active lordship in the human’s self-determination of personal identity in history (the subjective formation of the person who is objectively saved). Election describes God’s salvific work on behalf of creation solely in the work of Jesus Christ. Providence determines the identity of those creatures in relation with the personal God. The conversations I propose with philosophical theologians enable the reader to discern a greater philosophical coherence in Barth’s doctrine of providence. Through contrast with the philosophical theologians, Barth’s christocentric and Trinitarian articulation gains clarity and significance. Building on these philosophical comparisons, I attempt to assess Barth’s elaborations on entrenched debates concerning history as determined by divine action, human freedom under divine providence, and the problem of evil in world-occurrence. I argue that Barth’s ‘personalist’ post-Enlightenment providence as seen in the whole of III.3 points to absolute confidence in God’s determination of all world-occurrence, limited human autonomy of action under God’s universal providence, and an explication of evil that strengthens the Christian in the face of suffering and injustice.

The central aim of this thesis is to analyse the influence of Kierkegaard on Bonhoeffer. This relationship has been almost universally recognized. And yet this area has received no comprehensive study, limited within the secondary literature to footnotes, digressions, and the occasional paper. Furthermore, what little literature there is has been plagued by several stereotypes. First, discussion is often limited to Discipleship. Second, Kierkegaard has been identified as an individualist and acosmist who rejected the church, leading many to consider Bonhoeffer the ecumenist and ecclesiologist as selectively agreeing with Kierkegaard, but ultimately rejecting his overall stance. This thesis will argue that neither stereotype is true, and suggest (a), that Kierkegaard’s influence can be found throughout Bonhoeffer’s work, and (b) that although a more stereotypical perspective may be present in SC, by the end of his life Bonhoeffer had gained a far deeper understanding across the breadth of Kierkegaard’s work. The importance of this thesis is not simply to ‘plug the gap’ of scholarship in this area, but also to suggest the importance of analysing Kierkegaard and Bonhoeffer together. This will focus on three specific areas. First, alongside the influence of Kierkegaard on Bonhoeffer, it will argue for the importance of using Bonhoeffer as an interpretive tool for understanding Kierkegaard. This thesis will show how Bonhoeffer adopted and adapted Kierkegaard’s work to his own situation, forcing Kierkegaard to answer questions that were not present during his own life. In this way, we are led to compare Kierkegaard and Bonhoeffer as individuals, and not simply their static declarations. Secondly, against the tendency to consider Kierkegaard and Bonhoeffer’s final attacks on Christendom as unfortunate endings to otherwise profound careers, it will be suggested that these attacks stand as the fulfilment of their earlier thought. It will be argued that despite their different contexts, both Kierkegaard and Bonhoeffer were led to the same conclusions concerning Christendom. Thirdly, given Kierkegaard’s submission to indirect communication and his somewhat 'prophetic' proclamations concerning one who will come after him and reform, this thesis will ask whether Bonhoeffer stands as something of a fulfilment to Kierkegaard’s thought in the guise of a Kierkegaardian ‘reformer’.

One of the prevalent themes in recent theologies and philosophies of religion, especially those with a sensitivity to continental philosophy and theory more broadly, has been the problem of 'metaphysics'. This thesis seeks to explore the possibility of theology in a post-metaphysical mode. One of the main issues is whether theology requires some sort of framework for its articulation which can be characterized as having metaphysical-like features. This framework we call the 'heir' to metaphysics. The problem of metaphysics also appears within two, on the surface, quite different problems for theology: that of the relation of different 'domains' or 'spaces' (such as 'Church' and 'world', 'sacred' and 'profane', 'religious' and 'secular'); and this latter issue is also involved with the common view that human beings perceive and organize their world in terms of 'worldviews' or 'schema'. This thesis sets out to challenge both of these ideas. But unlike many previous attempts to work in a 'post-metaphysical' mode, the 'heir' to metaphysics is one which seeks to emphasize three distinct aspects, often previously overlooked: firstly, the embodied situated character of all human doing and thinking. This is explored through a re-exploration of the phenomenological tradition, not least because much of the impetus for 'postmetaphysical' theology has come from the so-called 'theological turn' of French phenomenology, such as Jean-Luc Marion and Jean-Yves Lacoste, both of whose work is examined in this thesis. We suggest that it is Maurice Merleau-Ponty whose philosophy offers the best place to re-think phenomenology, however, rather than these more recent approaches. Secondly, this situated character of human doing and thinking is organized by way of human practices: this praxeological turn is explored primarily through the work of Pierre Bourdieu and Theodore Schatzki. Thirdly, the implications of a recursive or dialectical structure to human situatedness which both Bourdieu and Schatzki emphasize, and which is articulated through practices, is extended into a topology, a redefinition of traditional ontology which is capable of taking account of the complexity and interwoven character of human life. It is this topology that is the principal organizing feature of the 'heir' to metaphysics. We then set out what this topology might be like through an exploration of the shape of what we call, following Barry Smith and Jan Patoc̆ka, the 'mesoscopic' world. By focussing on a conceptual distinction between 'situational practices' and 'practices of thematization' suggestions of new ways of thinking about the structure of human situations arise. Flow such an 'heir' might interact with theology and religious practices more broadly is the focus of the latter part of the thesis. This is done through examining 'ritualization' as a practice which is common within religious communities. How such ritualization practices are conceptualized in a particularly Christian way is explored through the sacramental theology of Louis-Marie Chauvet and through the tradition of liturgical theology typified by Alexander Schmemann, whose notion of leitourgia is used to broaden out how we might speak about situated mesoscopic experience in a theological way without opposing Church and world, sacred and profane, or the religious and the secular.

This thesis proposes that Robert W. Jenson's identification of the triune God faithfully describes the persons and being of God. To support this I examine the most basic argument of Jenson's 'Systematic Theology',: that God is freely but truly identified by and with Jesus Christ. This includes discussion of Jenson's starting point, his formal description of the three persons of God, and the theological ontology that this entails. Throughout I argue that Jenson's trinitarian description and theological ontology is rightly controlled by an a posteriori logic of response to the triune God's actual life with and for his people. Central to this is the way that Jenson creatively and courageously uses Jesus Christ's life and person as the controlling criterion of all dogmatic statements about God. Finally, this thesis proposes that Jenson's basic insights are made more exact when Jesus Christ is recognized in his perfect relation with the Father and Spirit before, in and after created history. To elucidate this suggestion the nature of the triune God's election and self-determination is reconsidered in light of Jenson's critical insight that the persons are mutually, not identically, perfect in deity. This in turn leads to a brief description of the eternity and freedom of the triune conversation that begins and ends with the Word who is Jesus Christ.

Part One examines the general structure of Kant's System. Chapter I argues that his System cannot be fully understood without appreciating its radically theological orientation. Chapter II introduces the 'principle of perspective', and defines perspective as the 'context of or 'way of considering' a philosophical question and standpoint as the subject-matter which is under consideration. Chapter III suggests that a fixed, architectonic pattern gives Kant's System its 'Gopernican' character. Part Two investigates the epistemological underpinnings of Kant's System. Chapter IV defines his four main perspectives (the transcendental, empirical, logical, and practical) as dealing with the synthetic a priori, the synthetic a posteriori, the analytic a priori, and the analytic a posteriori, respectively. Chapter V applies this perspectival framework to Kant's six primary 'object-terms': 'thing in itself, 'transcendental object', and 'appearance' denote the object as viewed from the transcendental perspective; 'phenomenon', 'negative noumenon', and 'positive noumenon' denote the object as viewed from the empirical perspective. Chapter VT argues that faith in the thing in itself is the necessary starting point for Kant's System. Part Three uses the formal principles established in Parts One and Two to interpret the Critical System itself. Chapters VII-IX regard the three Critiques as systems based, respectively, on theoretical, practical, and empirical standpoints. Part Four discusses the theological implications of Kant's System. Chapter X portrays his theology as he himself regarded it: as a theism which urges a right respect for God by denying the possibility of human knowledge of His existence, yet allows for an adequately certain belief through moral and teleological arguments. Chapter XI interprets Kant's philosophy of religion as an experiment designed to prove that Christianity can serve as the universal religion of mankind. Chapter XII demonstrates Kant's deep concern for religious experience, and argues that the Critical System as a whole was intended to pave the way for a Critical mysticism.

The thesis seeks to set the question "Can God act in history" in a Whiteheadian perspective, but first seeks to clarify the question itself. The first chapter examines the concept of action in general terms, and goes on to explore Whitehead's understanding of it, before applying the 'findings' to talk of God's action. The second chapter similarly addresses the notion of history, asking what procedures the historian follows in giving his account of the past, and whether God could be properly used as a referent within such constraints. Again Whitehead's view on the subject is examined. Chapter Three examines more overtly theological issues necessary for consideration of divine action, such as the concepts of violation, intervention, and 'willing' and 'permitting', before reviewing the work of Farmer, Farrer and Peacocke. The fourth and fifth chapters serve to direct our attention to Whitehead's cosmological system. The briefest biographical outline is followed by a selective exposition of his mature doctrines, and then an attempt to discern any movement or development in his thought through his corpus of writings. The whole of Chapter Five is then given over to an examination of particularly relevant interpretive problems in the system. In order to see what use has been made of Whiteheadian resources in answering our question we next examine a pair of Process Theologians in each of Chapters Six and Seven. Firstly, Ogden and Williams are found to give too passive an impression of God's activity which struggles to accommodate the findings of our earlier chapters. Cobb and Griffin are, however, found to give more satisfactory accounts. In the final chapter we pursue our own position, first by discussing the suitable components of a definition of miracle, then by considering the problem of theodicy in dialogue with Griffin. A brief conclusion follows.