Description
Book SynopsisThis book explores the role of aesthetic experience in our perception and understanding of the holy. Richard Viladesau''s goal is to articulate a theology of revelation, examined in relation to three principal dimensions of the aesthetic realm: feeling and imagination; beauty (or taste); and the arts. After briefly considering ways in which theology itself can be imaginative or beautiful, Viladesau concentrates on the theological significance of aesthetic data provided by each of the three major spheres of aesthetic perception and response. Throughout the work, the underlying question is how each of these spheres serves as a source (however ambiguous) of revelation. Although he frames much of his argument in terms of Catholic theology--from the Church Fathers to Karl Rahner, Hans urs von Balthasar, Bernard Lonergan, and David Tracy--Viladesau also makes extensive use of ideas from the Protestant theologian of the arts Gerardus van der Leeuw, and draws insights from such diverse thinker
Trade Reviewwell-produced * British Journal of Aesthetics, Vol.41, No.2 *
a valuable anthology on the subject ... This study ... opens up a field that is important to us all. * J.B. Bates, The Expository Times, Sept. 00. *
Table of ContentsAbbreviations ; 1. Theology and Aesthetics ; 2. God in Thought and in Imagination: Representing the Unimaginable ; 3. Divine Revelation and Human Perception ; 4. God and the Beautiful: Beautiful as a Way to God ; 5. Art and the Sacred ; 6. The Beautiful and the Good ; Appendix: Original Texts of Poetry Quoted in Translation ; Notes ; Index
