Kierkegaard and the Theology of the Nineteenth Century
The Paradox and the ‘Point of Contact’

This book situates Kierkegaard in the nineteenth-century debates which influenced him and discusses his relevance to contemporary Christian theology.

George Pattison (Author)

9781107540781, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 30 July 2015

252 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.3 cm, 0.45 kg

'George Pattison's detailed and illuminating work provides an important and welcome service to the field. … This expansive exposition of Kierkegaard and his context warrants an esteemed place as one of the first ports of call for any theological engagement with a great thinker whose time, even yet, has perhaps not fully arrived.' Simon D. Podmore, The Expository Times

This study shows how Kierkegaard's mature theological writings reflect his engagement with the wide range of theological positions which he encountered as a student, including German and Danish Romanticism, Hegelianism and the writings of Fichte and Schleiermacher. George Pattison draws on both major and lesser-known works to show the complexity and nuances of Kierkegaard's theological position, which remained closer to Schleiermacher's affirmation of religion as a 'feeling of absolute dependence' than to the Barthian denial of any 'point of contact', with which he is often associated. Pattison also explores ways in which Kierkegaard's theological thought can be related to thinkers such as Heidegger and John Henry Newman, and its continuing relevance to present-day debates about secular faith. His volume will be of great interest to scholars and students of philosophy and theology.

References to Kierkegaard's works
Introduction
1. Beginning with the beginning of modern theology
2. Speculative theology
3. David Friedrich Strauss
4. Immanence and transcendence
5. Out there with the lilies and the birds
6. Sin
7. Redemption
8. Proclaiming the Word
9. Christianity after the Church
10. Kierkegaard's hands
Bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: History of ideas [JFCX], Theology [HRLB], Western philosophy: c 1600 to c 1900 [HPCD], Philosophy [HP]