Human Perfection, Transfiguration and Christian Ethics

Examining contemporary secular culture and the New Testament, this study explores the contradictions of the concept of human perfection.

Robin Gill (Author)

9781009476744, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 16 May 2024

262 pages
23.5 x 15.8 x 1.9 cm, 0.52 kg

'The idea of human perfection is crucial for Christian ethics, and this penetrating discussion revitalises a rather neglected topic in Christian ethics.' Keith Ward, Emeritus Regius Professor of Divinity, Oxford University

Most people would agree that human perfection is unattainable. Indeed, theologians have typically expressed ambivalence about the possibility of human perfection. Yet, paradoxically, depictions of human perfection are widespread. In this volume, Robin Gill offers an interdisciplinary study of human perfection in contemporary secular culture. He demonstrates that the language of perfection is present in church memorials, popular depictions of sport, food, music and art, liturgy, and philosophy. He contrasts these examples with the socio-psychological concept of 'maladaptive perfectionism', using commercial cosmetic surgery as an example, as well as the 'adaptive perfectionism' suggested in the lives of Henry Holland, Paul Farmer, and, more ambivalently, Ludwig Wittgenstein. Gill then provides an in-depth analysis of New Testament and Septuagint usage of teleios and theological debates about the human perfection of Jesus. He argues that the Synoptic accounts of the Transfiguration offer a template for a Christian understanding of perfection that has important ecumenical implications within social ethics.

Acknowledgements
Introduction
Part I. Human Perfection: 1. Homo perfectus
2. Glimpses of artistic perfection
3. Moral perfection
4. Perfectionism
Part II. Jesus' Perfection: 5. Be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect
6. Was Jesus perfect?
Part III. Transfiguration and Global Perfection: 7. Perfection and the transfiguration
8. Perfection: the transfiguration and Abrahamic trust
9. A perfect planet
Epilogue: the end of perfection?
Select Bibliography in Christian Ethics
Index.

Subject Areas: Religious ethics [HRAM1]