Abstract ‘Biblical Reasoning’ is an experimental practice of shared scriptural reading amongst Christians from different churches. A central motivation for its development was the hope that it might provide a space within which ecumenical differences could be explored, and in which strands of deep mutual learning could grow across those differences. Some recent experiments in Biblical Reasoning have not worked out in quite this way, however: the ecumenical differences of the participants have seldom risen to the surface, and the forms of discussion sustained have neither taken us deep into those differences, nor created explicit possibilities for learning across them. They have certainly provided opportunities for the deepening of trust and for enriching interpersonal relationships, but the differences that they have brought most visibly to the surface have been differences in participants’ assessment of the status of lectio ‐like practices of shared reading, and of their capacity to be the site for the generation of authentic readings of scripture.
Abstract This article aims to nuance the widespread view that embodied experience plays a secondary role in the acquisition of human knowledge in Nicholas of Cusa's thought. With a focus on De mente (1450), I contend that the body is not limited to being a necessary stimulus to provoke the mind's activity, but rather that finite, material experience enters into such a fertile conversation with the human mind in such a way that the unfolding of its creative power acquires the character of an event. I begin by examining the mind's creativity achieved by abstraction from the body, whereby concepts and mathematical entities are produced. I claim that Cusanus's view on human creativity as epistemological stems from his original conception of an internal mathematical structure of the mind. Subsequently, I turn to the artisan's production of a spoon as an illuminating case for identifying the defining features of an embodied creativity . Unlike abstract creativity, the creation of ideas does not necessarily make an artefact creative, since Cusanus ultimately does not conceive of the artefact's conception in terms of a sheer imposition of a mental form on matter. Instead, I contend that the novelty of such an artefact occurs at the level of implementation, where the artisan precisely fails to embody perfectly the mental idea of the spoon. I conclude by situating this example within Cusanus's broader anthropological framework in De mente , arguing for a soul‐body unity that supports the view that human knowledge generated through making has intrinsic epistemic value. It is through such an embodied unfolding of their creativity that human beings find a legitimate and personal way to imitate Christ.
Abstract Contemporary kenoticist Christologies reach an impasse when they conflate metaphorical and analogical predication. Interpreting divine “self‐emptying” in analogical terms—as divine self‐divestment—generates ethical concerns as well as philosophical, exegetical, and doctrinal difficulties. Drawing on historical‐critical scholarship on Philippians 2:6‐11, this study revisits the semantic field of the Pauline language of kenosis and challenges key methodological presuppositions of kenoticism. Rather than articulating a metaphysical theory of the Incarnation, the hymn's language is better understood as poetic and metaphorical—though in a way that remains open to later metaphysical development. Building on Bernard Lonergan's account of theological method, the article proposes that the metaphor of kenosis functions heuristically within Christian theology, generating distinct questions across biblical exegesis, doctrinal theology, and systematics. Interpreted in this way, the kenosis hymn offers a hermeneutical lens for Christology capable of moving beyond the kenoticist impasse while also suggesting its implications for Christian discipleship.
Abstract How might Pentecostal and Charismatic hermeneutics, and particularly an approach to Pentecostal group Bible study, be brought into dialogue with the practice of Biblical Reasoning as a development of Scriptural Reasoning? The discussion outlines the nature of both Scriptural Reasoning, focusing on the ‘rules for reading’ identified by Steven Kepnes, and key points associated with Biblical Reasoning. The work of Jackie David Johns and Cheryl Bridges Johns is used to capture the dynamic of a Pentecostal approach to group Bible study that reflects key aspects of Pentecostal and Charismatic hermeneutics. Once this is achieved, a comparison of the similarities and differences between these two practices of textual study is made. Finally, in keeping with both the integrity and receptivity approach of Biblical Reasoning, points of mutual enrichment for both types of practice are identified and discussed.
Abstract In what follows, I consider Lonergan's account of the nature of religious experience in comparison with the work of contemporary phenomenologist and philosopher of religion Jean‐Luc Marion, arguing that despite important differences in philosophical method both authors conclude that a particular form of love is the defining characteristic of such experience. Considered in light of one another, the radicalness of Lonergan's proposal is better appreciated despite its compact formulation, while Marion's account of the saturated phenomenon is better appreciated as describing a range of experiences beyond his most common examples, which tend to be ones of excess. A principal indication of this unexpected philosophical sympathy is the recurring appeal both authors make to Blaise Pascal's reasons of the heart, which both interpret as signaling a key reversal of interior life characteristic of religious experience. Following Pascal, both interpret the heart as the seat of willing which, in the case of religious experience, reverses the normal priority of knowing and loving. With Pascal as a cypher, we discover that what appear to be incommensurate, if not opposed, positions on knowing, being, and loving, nevertheless prove mutually illuminating.
