Search results for ""University of Notre Dame Press""

In 2009, Ignacio Walker—scholar, politician, and one of Latin America’s leading public intellectuals—published La Democracia en América Latina. Now available in English, with a new prologue, and significantly revised and updated for an English-speaking audience, Democracy in Latin America: Between Hope and Despair contributes to the necessary and urgent task of exploring both the possibilities and difficulties of establishing a stable democracy in Latin America. Walker argues that, throughout the past century, Latin American history has been marked by the search for responses or alternatives to the crisis of oligarchic rule and the struggle to replace the oligarchic order with a democratic one. After reviewing some of the principal theories of democracy based on an analysis of the interactions of political, economic, and social factors, Walker maintains that it is primarily the actors, institutions, and public policies—not structural determinants—that create progress or regression in Latin American democracy.

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This bilingual edition of the Vita Nuova is the first facing-page translation of this text to be available in over 50 years. Dino S. Cervigni and Edward Vasta have translated Dante's lyrics into line-by-line free verse that seeks to reproduce Dante's lyrical complexities of meaning, form, and style. The three-part introduction covers Dante's life and work, the form and content of the Vita Nuova, and the theory and practice adopted for the translation. A full concordance with glossary of the Italian text and a detailed index to the English translation will assist Dante scholars, college students, and educated readers alike.

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This collection of poems explores wayfaring, both in a spiritual sense and in the sense of knowledge navigation in an information age. It explores American history, encompassing writing and identity in the figures of Emily Dickinson and Willard Gibbs, the country's first mathematical physicist.

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From the time they first met as undergraduates at Columbia College in New York City in the mid-1930s, the noted editor Robert Giroux (1914–2008) and the Trappist monk and writer Thomas Merton (1915–1968) became friends. The Letters of Robert Giroux and Thomas Merton capture their personal and professional relationship, extending from the time of the publication of Merton's 1948 best-selling spiritual autobiography, The Seven Storey Mountain, until a few months before Merton's untimely death in December 1968. As editor-in-chief at Harcourt, Brace & Company and then at Farrar, Straus & Giroux, Giroux not only edited twenty-six of Merton's books but served as an adviser to Merton as he dealt with unexpected problems with his religious superiors at the Abbey of Our Lady of Gethsemani in Kentucky, as well as those in France and Italy. These letters, arranged chronologically, offer invaluable insights into the publishing process that brought some of Merton's most important writings to his readers. Patrick Samway, S.J., had unparalleled access not only to the materials assembled here but to Giroux's unpublished talks about Merton, which he uses to his advantage, especially in his beautifully crafted introduction that interweaves the stories of both men with a chronicle of their personal and collaborative relationship. The result is a rich and rewarding volume, which shows how Giroux helped Merton to become one of the greatest spiritual writers of the twentieth century.

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In Truthfulness and Tragedy Stanley Hauerwas provides an account of moral existence and ethical rationality that shows how Christian convictions operate, or should operate, to form and direct lives. In attempting to conceptualize the basis of Christian ethics in a manner that will render Christian convictions morally intelligible, the author casts fresh light on traditional theoretical issues and articulates the distinctive Christian response to contemporary concerns such as suicide, medical ethics, and child care. The first section of the book deals with methodological issues: the meaning and nature of practical reason, obligation claims, natural law, and self deception, and the affinity of story and ethics. It focuses on the relation of truthfulness and tragedy and the need for a story—a set of religious convictions or “grammar of theology”—that does justice to the tragic character of human existence. The second section addresses substantive issues: suicide, euthanasia, and the value of survival; the moral limits of population growth; the definition of “person” for medical reasons; and social involvement and Christian ethics. The overall theme is the need for a community in which truthfulness is a way of life. In the final section, devoted to the problem of how to care for disabled children, the implications of the author’s ethical position are given concrete expression. He discusses the assumptions underlying the willingness to have children, criteria for humanness, medical ethics, and how truthful communities deal with suffering. In Truthfulness and Tragedy Stanley Hauerwas extends and clarifies the ethical position set forth in his earlier books Character and the Christian Life and Vision and Virtue.

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Adventures in Philosophy at Notre Dame recounts the fascinating history of the University of Notre Dame's Department of Philosophy, chronicling the challenges, difficulties, and tensions that accompanied its transition from an obscure outpost of scholasticism in the 1940s into one of the more distinguished philosophy departments in the world today. Its author, Kenneth Sayre, who has been a faculty member for over five decades, focuses on the people of the department, describing what they were like, how they got along with each other, and how their personal predilections and ambitions affected the affairs of the department overall. The book follows the department’s transition from its early Thomism to the philosophical pluralism of the 1970s, then traces its drift from pluralism to what Sayre terms "professionalism,” resulting in what some perceive as a severance from its Catholic roots by the turn of the century. Each chapter includes an extensive biography of an especially prominent department member, along with biographical sketches of other philosophers arriving during the period it covers. Central to the story overall are the charismatic Irishmen Ernan McMullin and Ralph McInerny, whose interaction dominated affairs in the department in the 1960s and 1970s, and who continued to play major roles in the following decades. Philosophers throughout the English-speaking world will find Adventures in Philosophy at Notre Dame essential reading. The book will also appeal to readers interested in the history of the University of Notre Dame and of American higher education generally.

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As the Church seeks to understand its life and mission in an increasingly secular context, the worldwide experiences of small Christian communities offer significant insights into the Church of the future. This book presents the findings of a theological consultation held at the University of Notre Dame in 1996 among 45 theologians, pastoral leaders and lay members of small communities from five continents. What emerges here is a careful, candid and positive view of how small communities can enrich the life of the Church by drawing together people of diverse cultures and economic situations for spiritual renewal based on a sense of mission to the poor and the excluded. The theology and lived experience presented here offer profound insights into finding and living the reality of Christ in the contemporary world. This book demonstrates how and why the formation and fervor of small Christian communities may well be the leaven for the Church of the future.

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The Star of Redemption is widely recognized as a key document of modern existential thought and a significant contribution to Jewish theology in the twentieth century. An affirmation of what Rosenzweig called “the new thinking,” the work ensconces common sense in the place of abstract, conceptual philosophizing and posits the validity of the concrete, individual human being over that of “humanity” in general. Fusing philosophy and theology, it assigns both Judaism and Christianity distinct but equally important roles in the spiritual structure of the world, and finds in both biblical religions approaches toward a comprehension of reality.

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Sin, like death, is an unassailable fact of life. It is also one of the last great taboos for public debate. In this compelling book, the Henry Fairlie shows that it is possible and necessary to talk about sin in ways that enrich our societies and our personal lives. Fairlie relates these ancient sins to the central issues of contemporary life: liberal vs. conservative politics, discrimination, pornography, abortion, the vistas of modern science, and especially the pop-psychologies that confirm the narcissism of our age.

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In this volume of essays John Howard Yoder projects a vision of Christian social ethics rooted in historical community and illuminated by scripture. Drawing upon scriptural accounts of the early church, he demonstrates the Christian community's constant need for reform and change. Yoder first examines the scriptural and theoretical foundations of Christian social ethics. While personally committed to the "radical reformation" tradition, he eschews "denominational" categorization and addresses Christians in general. The status of Christian community, he argues, cannot be separated from the doctrinal content of beliefs and the moral understanding of discipleship. As a result, the Christian's voluntary commitment to a particular community, as distinct from secular society, offers him valuable resources for practical moral reasoning. From a historical perspective, Yoder reviews the efforts of sixteenth-century radical (or Anabaptist) reformers to return to the fundamental ethical standards of the New Testament, and to disengage the community, as a biblically rooted call to faith that does not imply withdrawal from the pluralistic world. Rather, radical commitment to Christianity strengthens and renews the authentic human interests and values of the whole society. His analyses of democracy and of civil religion illustrate how Christianity must challenge and embrace the wider world.

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In Philosophy and the Christian Faith, Thomas V. Morris brings together prominent contemporary philosophers to examine a number of doctrines central to traditional Christian theology. The essays straddle a complete spectrum of topics such as original sin, salvation, the Trinity, and eschatological pragmatism, all to the end of launching new philosophical research into the foundational ideas of Christian faith. The perspectives peculiar to Christianity on human nature and the reality of God richly reward this philosophic investigation.

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From the beginning, the implications of quantum theory for our most general understanding of the world have been a matter of intense debate. Einstein argues that the theory had to be regarded as fundamentally incomplete. Its inability, for example, to predict the exact time of decay of a single radioactive atom had to be due to a failure of the theory and not due to a permanent inability on our part or a fundamental indeterminism in nature itself. In 1964, John Bell derived a theorem which showed that any deterministic theory which preserved "locality" (i.e., which rejected action at a distance) would have certain consequences for measurements performed at a distance from one another. An experimental check seems to show that these consequences are not, in fact, realized. The correlation between the sets of events is much stronger than any "local" deterministic theory could allow. What is more, this stronger correlation is precisely that which is predicted by quantum theory. The astonishing result is that local deterministic theories of the classical sort seem to be permanently excluded. Not only can the individual decay not be predicted, but no future theory can ever predict it. The contributors in this volume wrestle with this conclusion. Some welcome it; others leave open a return to at lease some kind of deterministic world, one which must however allow something like action-at-a distance. How much lit it? And how can one avoid violating relativity theory, which excludes action-at-a-distance? How can a clash between the two fundamental theories of modern physics, relativity and quantum theory, be avoided? What are the consequences for the traditional philosophic issue of causality explanation and objectivity? One thing is certain; we can never return to the comfortable Newtonian world where everything that happened was, in principle, predictable and where what happened at one measurement site could not affect another set of measurements being performed light-years away, at a distance that a light-signal could not bridge. Contributors: James T. Cushing, Abner Shimony, N. David Mermin, Jon P. Jarrett, Linda Wessels, Bas C. van Fraassen, Jeremy Butterfield, Michael L. G. Redhead, Henry P. Stapp, Arthur Fine, R. I. G. Hughes, Paul Teller, Don Howard, Henry J. Folse, and Ernan McMullin.

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In The Natural Rights Republic, renowned political theorist Michael P. Zuckert examines the natural rights philosophy as expressed in sources like the Declaration of Independence and aims to counter contemporary confusion by offering an insightful study of the concept that dominated the mindset of the founding generation of the United States.

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Contending that Marxism achieved its unique position in part by adopting the content and functions of Christianity, MacIntyre details the religious attitudes and modes of belief that appear in Marxist doctrine as it developed historically from the philosophies of Hegel and Feuerbach, and as it has been carried on by latter-day interpreters from Rosa Luxemburg and Trotsky to Kautsky and Lukacs. The result is a lucid exposition of Marxism and an incisive account of its persistence and continuing importance.

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"This volume contains fourteen essays written by the foremost Maimonidean scholars of this generation and the last, as well as an introduction and bibliography prepared by the editor. It seeks to present a modern, philosophically-sophisticated audience with the best in English-language scholarship on Maimonides's philosophy.... It is well suited as a textbook for students of medieval thought and of Medieval Judaism.” —Critical Review

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The advent of the twenty-first century marks a significant moment in the history of Latinos in the United States. The “fourth wave” of immigration to America is primarily Latino, and the last decades of the twentieth century saw a significant increase in the number of Latino migrants, a diversification of the nations contributing to this migration, and an increase in the size of the native-born Latino population. A backlash against unauthorized immigration, which may indict all Latinos, is also underway. Understanding the growing Latino population, especially its immigrant dimensions, is therefore a key task for researchers in the social sciences and humanities. The contributors to Immigration and the Border address immigration and border politics and policies, focusing on the U.S. side of the border. The volume editors have arranged the essays into five sections. The two chapters in the first section set the stage and discuss the binational lives of Mexican migrants; chapters in the subsequent sections highlight specific political and policy themes: civic engagement, public policies, political reactions against immigrants, and immigrant leadership. Because the immigration experience encompasses many facets of political life and public policy, the varied perspectives of the contributors offer a mosaic that contextualizes the impact of and contributions by contemporary Latino immigrants. Their research will appeal not only to scholars but to policymakers and the public and will inform contentious debates about migration and migrants.

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In these lively and incisive essays André Vauchez explores the religious beliefs and devotional practices of laypeople in medieval Europe and grapples with some of the most difficult issues in medieval history: the nature of popular devotion, the role of religion in civic life, the sociology of religious attitudes and practices, and the relationship between the intersecting spheres of lay and clerical culture.

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Since 1974 there has been an unprecedented wave of democratization in the world. This trend has been particularly extensive in South America. But the problems confronting these new democracies are staggering, and the prospects for building consolidated democratic regimes are far from uniformly good. Focusing primarily on recent South American cases, Issues in Democratic Consolidation examines some of the difficulties of constructing consolidated democracies and provides a critical examination of the major issues involved. A prominent theme running through this collection is that the transitions from authoritative rule to civilian government may be arrested by political, economic, and social constraints. The articles contain analyses of the varied modalities and complex processes related to the transitions. The first transition begins with the initial stirrings of crisis under authoritarian rule that generate some form of political opening and greater respect for basic civil rights, and ends with the establishment of a government elected in an open, competitive contest. The volume's primary focus, however, is on the second transition, which begins with the inauguration of a democratic government and ends-if all goes well-with the establishment of a consolidated democratic regime.

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In this classic work, Frederick C. Copleston, S.J., outlines the development of philosophical reflection in Christian, Islamic, and Jewish thought from the ancient world to the late medieval period. A History of Medieval Philosophy is an invaluable general introduction that also includes longer treatments of such leading thinkers as Aquinas, Scotus, and Ockham.

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The volume The Many Faces of Beauty joins the rich debate on beauty and aesthetic theory by presenting an ambitious, interdisciplinary examination of various facets of beauty in nature and human society. The contributors ask such questions as, Is there beauty in mathematical theories? What is the function of arts in the economy of cultures? What are the main steps in the historical evolution of aesthetic theories from ancient civilizations to the present? What is the function of the ugly in enhancing the expressivity of art? and What constitutes beauty in film? The sixteen essays, by eminent scientists, critics, scholars, and artists, are divided into five parts. In the first, a mathematician, physicist, and two philosophers address beauty in mathematics and nature. In the second, an anthropologist, psychologist, historian of law, and economist address the place of beauty in the human mind and in society. Explicit philosophical reflections on notoriously vexing issues, such as the historicity of aesthetics itself, interculturality, and the place of the ugly, are themes of the third part. In the fourth, practicing artists discuss beauty in painting, music, poetry, and film. The final essay, by a theologian, reflects on the relation between beauty and God. Contributors: Vittorio Hösle, Robert P. Langlands, Mario Livio, Dieter Wandschneider, Christian Illies, Francesco Pellizzi, Bjarne Sode Funch, Peter Landau, Holger Bonus, Pradeep A. Dhillon, Mark W. Roche, Maxim Kantor, Claus-Steffen Mahnkopf, Mary Kinzie, Dudley Andrew, and Cyril O’Regan.

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Since the beginning of conscious thought the human animal has questioned the meaning of its existence. Although qualified in numerous ways by time and circumstance, the question has remained. In modern times it has assumed an unusual urgency due to the disintegration of self-understanding caused in part by the Industrial Revolution and the destruction and degradation of this century’s wars. We ask again, “What is the nature of human life?” “What qualifies as a meaningful life?” and “How shall we come to understand ourselves in the future?” Using the resources of anthropology, biological research, ad philosophy to plumb the essence of humanity, The Human Situation renews this quest for understanding. Gerh Haeffner leads the reader through an examination of the different levels of human consciousness, beginning with the techniques of biology and the human sciences. Through this approach the reader is progressively made aware of the central question of “What is it to be human?” and is led to an understanding of the unity of human life, the central realities of conscience and freedom, and finally the question of the meaning of life. Other considerations include the basic dimensions of human existence, the mental element of the act, and the unity of human life and its meaning. This work is an excellent general introduction to philosophical anthropology for students in a variety of disciplines, with emphasis on developing issues and problems with a phenomenological method rather than presenting its material within a formal historical framework. Though dealing with concepts that are challenging and demanding, the writing is never technical and is appropriate for undergraduates.

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Portrays four charismatic leaders of the eighteenth and nineteenth-century Hasidic movement in Eastern Europe.

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The work of the lay Catholic philosopher Jacques Maritain (1882-1973) continues to provoke and inspire readers to engage in a Thomistic approach to many of the questions facing the world today. Maritain’s wide-ranging thought touched on many fields, including aesthetics, anthropology, educational theory, moral philosophy, and ethics, as well as Thomism and its relationship to other philosophical stances. In Being in the World: A Quotable Maritain Reader, Mario O. D’Souza, C.S.B., has selected seven hundred and fifty of the most salient quotations found in the English translations of fifty-four works by Jacques Maritain. Organized into forty thematic chapters, ordered alphabetically, the book serves as an overview of the areas that Maritain's writings addressed. By referring to entries in Being in the World, readers can quickly locate key passages in Maritain’s writing on a given topic and then turn elsewhere to the full texts for more in-depth study. Complete with a detailed index of key terms, the Reader will be an essential reference tool for the study of Maritain in English.

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Eleven papers drawn from a May 1997 conference of the same name (sponsored by the U. of Wisconsin's Center for Latin America and Center for International Studies) are presented by Handelman (political science, U. of Wisconsin) and Tessler (political science, U. of Arizona). Somehow managing to avoid a detailed discussion of U.S. foreign policy, the papers discuss structural and cultural factors that limit progress towards procedural democracy in different parts of the world. Specific countries examined include China, Korea, Brazil, the Philippines, and Mexico, while other contributions discuss regional characteristics of Latin America, the Middle East, and elsewhere.

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Gilbert Dahan offers a compact overview of Jewish conditions in medieval Western Christendom, then moves to a discussion of the changing patterns of Christian-Jewish polemical confrontation. Dahan lays particular emphasis on the shift during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries from a fairly open exchange of views to a concerted Christian effort to convert the Jews. After establishing this context, Dahan analyzes the most common literary genres (including disputatio) in which these arguments were couched, their underlying structures and the most important recurring themes. This volume is particularly useful for its clear delineation of the historical phases of Christian polemicizing, its cogent analysis of key aspects of Christian polemical literature, and its rich citation of illustrative texts. Whether it be shared examination of the sacred texts or impassioned discussion over the theses belonging to each of the two religions, the Judeo-Christian "dispute" continued throughout the Middle Ages, and seems to be carried on in some way even in the Judeo-Christian dialogue of today.

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Contemporary Catholic higher education finds itself at a crucial crossroad. The issues are many and complex. How is the Catholic character of the university to be preserved and fostered while avoiding secularization on the one hand and insular sectarianism on the other? Must a majority of the faculty in a college or department be Catholic? How is Catholic to be defined in terms of culture, belief, or practice? What is the level of commitment to intellectual inquiry and the possibility of dissent that must be present on a Catholic campus? These are some of the issues that prompted Fr. Theodore M. Hesburgh, C.S.C., to write a position paper and invite 29 distinguished members of the faculty and administration at the University of Notre Dame to address as they strive to envision and create a great Catholic university. The contributors explore these issues from a wide variety of religious and academic perspectives, and although their backgrounds and fields of study differ widely, they agree on a number of points. First, a great Catholic university must begin by being a great university that is also Catholic. Second, the catholicity, or universality, of a Catholic university fosters the centrality of philosophy and particularly theology as legitimate intellectual concerns, especially as they challenge the disintegration and turmoil of our modern predicament. Finally, how a Catholic university is seen as a community of service is also examined in both its intellectual and practical applications. Throughout, these essays describe a university community where reason and faith intersect and reinforce each other as they grapple with all the problems that face the transmission and growth of knowledge and the multiplication of new and complex moral problems.

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Selected by Christianity Today as one of the 100 most important books on religion of the twentieth century. Leading theological ethicist Stanley Hauerwas shows how discussions of Christology and the authority of scripture involve questions about what kind of community the church must be to rightly tell the stories of God. He challenges the dominant assumption of contemporary Christian social ethics that there is a special relation between Christianity and some form of liberal democratic social system.

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Lawrence A. Hoffman’s inquiry into the reasons for the canonization of the Jewish style synagogue service between the eighth and eleventh centuries presents a novel reinterpretation of the available evidence that will have repercussions for studies of Jewish and Christian liturgy. The author suggests that Babylonian Jewish authorities attempted to fix Jewish liturgy during the height of the geonic period (c. 750-1025 A. D.) in response to changing social and economic conditions, and that this period, customarily considered as a whole, should be divided instead into three distinct eras. Because the changing attitude toward liturgical canonization during this period reflects the Jewish community’s self-perception and its view of other groups with whom it dealt, Professor Hoffman’s findings cast fresh light on such important matters as the Karaite schism and the condition of the medieval Palestinian community. In addition, many of the ancient liturgical alternatives discussed provide essential background for studies of both Jewish and Christian liturgies of antiquity. To enhance usefulness of the book for nonexperts, this volume contains a glossary of liturgical terms and rubrics, introductory surveys of the history of the prayers discussed, and full biography and notes for further reading.

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Jay P. Dolan's Catholic Revivalism: The American Experience, 1830–1900 details the history of the Catholic Church in America by showing that revivalism, traditionally viewed as a Protestant phenomenon, was also a central feature of Catholic life and activity in the 19th century. To cope with the widespread social disorganization caused by large numbers of Catholic immigrants, the Church sponsored parish missions during which famous preachers gave a series of emotional sermons aimed at calling sinners back to their God and their Church. Dolan documents the extent of Catholic revivalism, its European roots, and its success in reaching the working class.

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Back to the Rough Ground is a philosophical investigation of practical knowledge, with major import for professional practice and the ethical life in modern society. Its purpose is to clarify the kind of knowledge that informs good practice in a range of disciplines such as education, psychotherapy, medicine, management, and law. Through reflection on key modern thinkers who have revived cardinal insights of Aristotle, and a sustained engagement with the Philosopher himself, it presents a radical challenge to the scientistic assumptions that have dominated how these professional domains have been conceived, practiced, and institutionalized.

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This brief interpretation of the Apostles' Creed enables readers to thoroughly understand the Creed, structurally and theologically, in the face of widespread contemporary misreading.

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This collection of essays is a compilation of the thought and work of W. Norris Clarke, S.J., a philosopher inspired by the Thomistic tradition, who in 45 years of teaching and writing has delved into many of the central problems of perennial philosophy and made a significant contribution to the ongoing history of American Thomism. The essays presented here reflect an internal unity-each essay deliberately building on the positions put forth in the preceding ones-as they progress systematically through the themes of metaphysics and philosophy of God. Clarke begins with an overall survey of what in Aquinas's metaphysics is most relevant for today, and then suggests the most fruitful starting point for a contemporary presentation of such a metaphysics. The next five essays discuss key positions in metaphysics and are followed by two essays on the philosophy of God. The final essay illuminates key themes in Clarke's most recent work on the human person. Clarke's examination of topics in all these areas is especially concerned with the notions of action and participation in existence as being central to the metaphysical study of reality. This then leads to a close study of the often misunderstood Thomistic doctrine of analogy and how it functions in the construction of a viable philosophy of God. The overall spirit that permeates the volume is Clarke's firm conviction that the philosophical thought of St. Thomas Aquinas is an inexhaustibly rich and profound resource, and his purpose is to share this conviction with contemporary philosophers. In so doing Clarke both reflects and triggers significant new directions in contemporary Thomistic thought.

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Today in five Southwestern states there are more than four million Spanish-speaking Americans. It is the largest ethnic group in the five-state area of California, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and Colorado and among the largest minorities in the United States. The action potential of this group is so great that area politicians refer to it as the "sleeping giant."The purpose of this book is to bring together a summary of material about this group in the related subjects of religion, political activity, civil rights, and the emerging middle class. This compilation attempts a general assessment of the current status of the Spanish-speaking people of the Southwest and implication of their future growth and development. The circumstances of history formed this minority. The colonizing efforts of Spain in North and South America, the mission chains, Indian resistance, the assimilation of the conquerors, the open Mexican Border, and the elements of resistance and aggression were so strongly persistent that sixteenth-century Spain and modern Mexico survive today in the Southwest. Isolation was geographic as well as ethnic, and the main stream of Anglo-American political thought and historical evolution bypasses this part of the world. Through the Mexican War the United States acquired a substantial part of Mexican territory. Although the Spanish-speaking people have gone through a triple integration of essentially Spanish-Mexican and are still in many instances highly resistant to complete acculturation. The plan of presentation in this study includes the areas of history, church participation, labor problems, living conditions, education, civil rights status, and the difficulty minority groups encounter in participating in the politics of a dominant society. In this research in one of the largest ethnic groups in the United States today, past, present, and future are thoroughly examined and the conclusion is one of current activity and future development. The results of this study indicate that the Spanish-speaking people are achieving a new sophistication in terms of education, the labor market, action programs, minority status, and language.

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The Bible is the most widely read book in the world. From the transcription of the Old Testament to Greek, to the collection of the Gospels, the Bible has always been in a state of literary and scholarly transition. In her classic work, The Study of the Bible in the Middle Ages, Beryl Smalley describes the changes in the organization, technique, and purpose of Bible studies in northwestern Europe from the Carolingian renaissance to about 1300. This was the period when the emergence of Aristotelian thought inspired medieval scholars to take a fresh look at the Scriptures. The large number of medieval commentaries on the Bible confirms that they did so and that they expressed their reactions in writing. Medieval historians and students of literature will find special value in this book: they will learn, in systematic fashion, what earlier scholars have accomplished in the field of exegesis; and they will be enabled to employ the history of biblical interpretation recounted here as a mirror for the social and cultural upheavals that were taking place simultaneously.

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The first full-length biography of William Still, one of the most important leaders of the Underground Railroad. William Still: The Underground Railroad and the Angel at Philadelphia is the first major biography of the free Black abolitionist William Still, who coordinated the Eastern Line of the Underground Railroad and was a pillar of the Railroad as a whole. Based in Philadelphia, Still built a reputation as a courageous leader, writer, philanthropist, and guide for fugitive enslaved people. This monumental work details Still’s life story beginning with his parents’ escape from bondage in the early nineteenth century and continuing through his youth and adulthood as one of the nation’s most important Underground Railroad agents and, later, as an early civil rights pioneer. Still worked personally with Harriet Tubman, assisted the family of John Brown, helped Brown’s associates escape from Harper’s Ferry after their famous raid, and was a rival to Frederick Douglass among nationally prominent African American abolitionists. Still’s life story is told in the broader context of the anti-slavery movement, Philadelphia Quaker and free black history, and the generational conflict that occurred between Still and a younger group of free black activists led by Octavius Catto. Unique to this book is an accessible and detailed database of the 995 fugitives Still helped escape from the South to the North and Canada between 1853 and 1861. The database contains twenty different fields—including name, age, gender, skin color, date of escape, place of origin, mode of transportation, and literacy—and serves as a valuable aid for scholars by offering the opportunity to find new information, and therefore a new perspective, on runaway enslaved people who escaped on the Eastern Line of the Underground Railroad. Based on Still’s own writings and a multivariate statistical analysis of the database of the runaways he assisted on their escape to freedom, the book challenges previously accepted interpretations of the Underground Railroad. The audience for William Still is a diverse one, including scholars and general readers interested in the history of the anti-slavery movement and the operation of the Underground Railroad, as well as genealogists tracing African American ancestors.

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Elie Wiesel, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, studies four different rebbes in eighteenth-century Eastern Europe, delving into their lives, their work, and their impact on the Hasidic movement and beyond. In Four Hasidic Masters and Their Struggle against Melancholy, Jewish author, philosopher, and humanist Elie Wiesel presents the stories of four Hasidic masters, framing their biographies in the context of his own life, with direct attention to their premonitions of the tragedy of the Holocaust. These four leaders—Rebbe Pinhas of Koretz, Rebbe Barukh of Medzebozh, the Holy Seer of Lublin, and Rebbe Naphtali of Ropshitz—are each charismatic and important figures in Eastern European Hasidism. Through careful study and consideration, Wiesel shows how each of these men were human, fallible, and susceptible to anger, melancholy, and despair. We are invited to truly understand their work both as religious figures studying and pursuing the divine and as humans trying their best to survive in a world rampant with pain and suffering. This new edition of Four Hasidic Masters, originally published in 1978, includes a new text design, cover, the original foreword by Theodore M. Hesburgh, C.S.C., and a new introduction by Rabbi Irving Greenberg, introducing Wiesel’s work to a new generation of readers.

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Written centuries before Christ, the Psalms of the Hebrew Bible have been prayed by Christians since the founding of the Church. The early church fathers expounded the psalms in the light of the mystery of Christ, his death and resurrection, and his saving redemption. In this book, a Benedictine monk examines the Christian praying of the Psalms, taking into account modern and contemporary research on the Psalms. Working from the Hebrew text, Fr. Laurence Kriegshauser offers a verse-by-verse commentary on each of the one hundred and fifty psalms, highlighting poetic features such as imagery, rhythm, structure, and vocabulary, as well as theological and spiritual dimensions and the relation of psalms to each other in the smaller collections that make up the whole. The book attempts to integrate modern scholarship on the Psalms with the act of prayer and help Christians pray the psalms with greater understanding of their Christological meaning. The book contains an introduction, a glossary of terms, an index of topics, a table of English renderings of selected Hebrew words, and an index of biblical citations. Praying the Psalms in Christ will be welcomed by students of theology and liturgy, by priests, religious, and laypeople who pray the Liturgy of the Hours, and by all Christians who seek to pray the Psalms with greater profit and fervor.

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Retrieving Freedom is a provocative, big-picture book, taking a long view of the “rise and fall” of the classical understanding of freedom. In response to the evident shortcomings of the notion of freedom that dominates contemporary discourse, Retrieving Freedom seeks to return to the sources of the Western tradition to recover a more adequate understanding. This book begins by setting forth the ancient Greek conception—summarized from the conclusion of D. C. Schindler’s previous tour de force of political and moral reasoning, Freedom from Reality—and the ancient Hebrew conception, arguing that at the heart of the Christian vision of humanity is a novel synthesis of the apparently opposed views of the Greeks and Jews. This synthesis is then taken as a measure that guides an in-depth exploration of landmark figures framing the history of the Christian appropriation of the classical tradition. Schindler conducts his investigation through five different historical periods, focusing in each case on a polarity, a pair of figures who represent the spectrum of views from that time: Plotinus and Augustine from late antiquity, Dionysius the Areopagite and Maximus the Confessor from the patristic period, Anselm and Bernard from the early middle ages, Bonaventure and Aquinas from the high middle ages, and, finally, Godfrey of Fontaines and John Duns Scotus from the late middle ages. In the end, we rediscover dimensions of freedom that have gone missing in contemporary discourse, and thereby identify tasks that remain to be accomplished. Schindler’s masterful study will interest philosophers, political theorists, and students and scholars of intellectual history, especially those who seek an alternative to contemporary philosophical understandings of freedom.

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This in-depth study examines the social, religious, and philosophical thought of Simone Weil. Simone Weil for the Twenty-First Century presents a comprehensive analysis of Weil’s interdisciplinary thought, focusing especially on the depth of its challenge to contemporary philosophical and religious studies. In a world where little is seen to have real meaning, Eric O. Springsted presents a critique of the unfocused nature of postmodern philosophy and argues that Weil’s thought is more significant than ever in showing how the world in which we live is, in fact, a world of mysteries. Springsted brings into focus the challenges of Weil’s original (and sometimes surprising) starting points, such as an Augustinian priority of goodness and love over being and intellect, and the importance of the Crucifixion. Springsted demonstrates how the mystical and spiritual aspects of Weil’s writings influence her social thought. For Weil, social and political questions cannot be separated from the supernatural. For her, rather, the world has a sacramental quality, such that life in the world is always a matter of life in God—and life in God, necessarily a way of life in the world. Simone Weil for the Twenty-First Century is not simply a guide or introduction to Simone Weil. Rather, it is above all an argument for the importance of Weil’s thought in the contemporary world, showing how she helps us to understand the nature of our belonging to God (sometimes in very strange and unexpected ways), the importance of attention and love as the root of both the love of God and neighbor, the importance of being rooted in culture (and culture’s service to the soul in rooting it in the universe), and the need for human beings to understand themselves as communal beings, not as isolated thinkers or willers. It will be essential reading for scholars of Weil, and will also be of interest to philosophers and theologians.

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This new edition of the English translation of Maurice Blondel’s Action (1893) remains a philosophical classic. Action was once a common theme in philosophical reflection. It figured prominently in Aristotelian philosophy, and the medieval Scholastics built some of their key adages around it. But by the time French philosopher Maurice Blondel came to focus on it at the end of the nineteenth century, it had all but disappeared from the philosophical vocabulary. Today, it is no longer possible or legitimate to ignore action in philosophy as it was when Blondel defended and published his doctoral dissertation and most influential work, L’Action: Essai d’une critique de la vie et d’une science de la pratique (1893). Oliva Blanchette’s definitive English translation of Action was first published in 1984 to critical acclaim. This new edition contains Blanchette’s translation, corrections of minor errors in the first edition, and a new preface from the translator, describing what makes this early version of Action unique in all of Blondel’s writings and what has kept it in the forefront of those interested in studying Blondel and his philosophy of Christian religion. Action (1893) will appeal to philosophers, theologians, and those looking for spiritual reading, and it is an excellent study in reasoning for the more scientifically inclined.

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Godsends is William Desmond’s newest addition to his masterwork on the borderlines between philosophy and theology. For many years, William Desmond has been patiently constructing a philosophical project—replete with its own terminology, idiom, grammar, dialectic, and its metaxological transformation—in an attempt to reopen certain boundaries: between metaphysics and phenomenology, between philosophy of religion and philosophical theology, between the apocalyptic and the speculative, and between religious passion and systematic reasoning. In Godsends, Desmond’s newest addition to his ambitious masterwork, he presents an original reflection on what he calls the “companioning” of philosophy and religion. Throughout the book, he follows an itinerary that has something of an Augustinian likeness: from the exterior to the interior, from the inferior to the superior. The stations along the way include a grappling with the default atheism prevalent in contemporary intellectual culture; an exploration of the middle space, the metaxu between the finite and the infinite; a dwelling with solitudes as thresholds between selving and the sacred; a meditation on idiot wisdom and transcendence in an East-West perspective; an exploration of the different stresses in the mysticisms of Aurobindo and the Arnhem Mystical Sermons; a dream monologue of autonomy, a suite of Kantian and post-Kantian variations on the story of the prodigal son; a meditation on the beatitudes as exceeding virtue, in light of Aquinas’s understanding; and culminating in an exploration of Godsends as telling us something significant about the surprise of revelation in word, idea, and story. Godsends is written for thoughtful persons and scholars perplexed about the place of religion in our time and hopeful for some illuminating companionship from relevant philosophers. It will also interest students of philosophy and religion, especially philosophical theology and philosophical metaphysics.

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Publishers Weekly Best Book in Religion 2020 Foreword Review's INDIES Book of the Year Award, Religion In Theological Territories, David Bentley Hart, one of America's most eminent contemporary writers on religion, reflects on the state of theology "at the borders" of other fields of discourse—metaphysics, philosophy of mind, science, the arts, ethics, and biblical hermeneutics in particular. The book advances many of Hart's larger theological projects, developing and deepening numerous dimensions of his previous work. Theological Territories constitutes something of a manifesto regarding the manner in which theology should engage other fields of concern and scholarship. The essays are divided into five sections on the nature of theology, the relations between theology and science, the connections between gospel and culture, literary representations of and engagements with transcendence, and the New Testament. Hart responds to influential books, theologians, philosophers, and poets, including Rowan Williams, Jean-Luc Marion, Tomáš Halík, Sergei Bulgakov, Jennifer Newsome Martin, and David Jones, among others. The twenty-six chapters are drawn from live addresses delivered in various settings. Most of the material has never been printed before, and those parts that have appear here in expanded form. Throughout, these essays show how Hart's mind works with the academic veneer of more formal pieces stripped away. The book will appeal to both academic and non-academic readers interested in the place of theology in the modern world.

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Dark Faith: New Essays on Flannery O'Connor's The Violent Bear It Away is a rich study of O'Connor's second novel by nine scholars in the fields of American literature, theology, and religious studies. Each essay is a penetrating look at the complexity of O'Connor's religious vision, taking seriously the darker turns of faith, the meaning of violence, and the centrality of love in her work. The thematic approach to the novel makes this an excellent companion to The Violent Bear It Away. Students and general readers alike will find new insights and thoughtful analyses of O'Connor's haunting novel. Richard Giannone's opening essay sets the tone with a study of three of O'Connor's most memorable characters, Hazel Motes, The Misfit, and Francis Tarwater, and their spiritual struggles to find meaning amid the darkness of their unbelief. John F. Desmond and Gary M. Ciuba address the complex question of family relations. Jason Peters analyzes abstraction in the novel, and Ruthann Knechel Johansen compares O'Connor's work with essays by Simone Weil on the topic of affliction. Scott Huelin approaches the novel from the perspective of theological ethics. P. Travis Kroeker and Karl E. Martin explore its biblical themes, and Susan Srigley ends the collection with a study of the relationships between the living and the dead. Contributors: Susan Srigley, Richard Giannone, John F. Desmond, Gary M. Ciuba, Jason Peters, Ruthann Knechel Johansen, Scott Huelin, P. Travis Kroeker, and Karl E. Martin.

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In The Priority of the Person, world-class philosopher David Walsh advances the argument set forth in his highly original philosophic meditation Politics of the Person as the Politics of Being (2015), that “person” is the central category of modern political thought and philosophy. The present volume is divided into three main parts. It begins with the political discovery of the inexhaustibility of persons, explores the philosophic differentiation of the idea of the “person,” and finally traces the historical emergence of the concept through art, science, and faith. Walsh argues that, although the roots of the idea of “person” are found in the Greek concept of the mind and in the Christian conception of the soul, this notion is ultimately a distinctly modern achievement, because it is only the modern turn toward interiority that illuminated the unique nature of persons as each being a world unto him- or herself. As Walsh shows, it is precisely this feature of persons that makes it possible for us to know and communicate with others, for we can only give and receive one another as persons. In this way alone can we become friends and, in friendship, build community. By showing how the person is modernity’s central preoccupation, David Walsh’s The Priority of the Person makes an important contribution to current discussions in both political theory and philosophy. It will also appeal to students and scholars of theology and literature, and any groups interested in the person and personalism.

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This award-winning biography, now available for the first time in English, presents an illuminating introduction to Alasdair MacIntyre and locates his thinking in the intellectual milieu of twentieth-century philosophy. Winner of the prestigious 2005 Philippe Habert Prize, the late Émile Perreau-Saussine’s Alasdair MacIntyre: Une biographie intellectuelle stands as a definitive introduction to the life and work of one of today’s leading moral philosophers. With Nathan J. Pinkoski’s translation, this long-awaited, critical examination of MacIntyre’s thought is now available to English readers for the first time, including a foreword by renowned philosopher Pierre Manent. Amid the confusions and contradictions of our present philosophical landscape, few have provided the clarity of thought and shrewdness of diagnosis like Alasdair MacIntyre. In this study, Perreau-Saussine guides his readers through MacIntyre’s lifelong project by tracking his responses to liberalism’s limitations in light of the human search for what is good and true in politics, philosophy, and theology. The portrait that emerges is one of an intellectual giant who comes to oppose modern liberal individualism’s arguably singular focus on averting evil at the expense of a concerted pursuit of human goods founded upon moral and practical reasoning. Although throughout his career MacIntyre would engage with a number of theoretical and practical standpoints in service of his critique of liberalism, not the least of which was his early and later abandoned dalliance with Marxism, Perreau-Saussine convincingly shows how the Scottish philosopher came to hold that Aristotelian Thomism provides the best resources to counter what he perceives as the failure of the liberal project. Readers of MacIntyre’s works, as well as scholars and students of moral philosophy, the history of philosophy, and theology, will find this translation to be an essential addition to their collection.

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Despite the fact that we all die, humans do not share the same view of death. In Death: A Reader, Mary Ann G. Cutter explores prominent themes that emerge and reemerge in the history of ideas regarding the nature of death from prominent global perspectives that span ancient to contemporary discussions. Thirteen themes are presented in order to convey a sense of major views of death that are found in the philosophical and sacred literature of Asia, the Near and Middle East, and the West. Each chapter contains the context of the theme, primary source selections, reflections, and suggestions for further reading. Four features of this volume distinguish it from other philosophical texts on death. First, Cutter provides a culturally diverse selection of primary source readings on the nature of death. Second, along with the more traditional discussions of death, she provides discussion on emerging topics in death studies—namely, medical immortality and digital immortality. Third, she presents some of the key ethical issues regarding death, notably suicide, treatment refusal, and physician-assisted suicide, through the lens of the nature of death. Finally, she offers engaging practical exercises that challenge readers to think through their own personal and legal wishes regarding death and dying.

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