Philosophy, Religion and the Spiritual Life

Explores such topics as the nature of selfhood, non-conceptual awareness, and the nature of love and its relation to attention.

Michael McGhee (Author)

9780521421966, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 28 August 1992

262 pages
23.2 x 15.9 x 1.5 cm, 0.421 kg

An alternative agenda for the philosophy of religion emerges from this interdisciplinary collection. Going outside the traditional concerns of natural theology, the distinguished contributors to this volume explore such topics as the nature of selfhood and its images in the ancient, the medieval and the modern world; the role of philosophy as a route to wisdom; non-conceptual awareness; and the nature of love and its relation to attention. Discussion focuses on the figures of Plato and Augustine, William James and the Absolute Idealist F. H. Bradley, Kierkegaard and Heidegger, as well as leading figures of the Tibetan Buddhist tradition.

Introduction Michael McGhee
1. Philosophy and religion in the thought of Kierkegaard Michael Weston
2. De Consolatione Philosophiae John Haldane
3. The real or the Real? Chardin or Rothco Anthony O'Hear
4. Love and attention Janet Martin Soskice
5. Descartes' debt to Augustine Stephen R. L. Clark
6. Visions of the self in late Medieval Christianity: some cross-disciplinary reflections Sarah Coakley
7. Refined and crass supernaturalism R. L .S. Sprigge
8. Religious imagination Ronald W. Hepburn
9. Moral values as religious absolutes James P. Mackey
10. Revealing the scapegoat mechanism: Christianity after Girard Fergus Kerr
11. Philosophy vs. mysticism: an Islamic controversy Oliver Leaman
12. Non-conceptuality, critical reasoning and religious experience: some Tibetan Buddhist discussions Paul Williams
13. 'Know Thyself': what kind of an injunction? Rowan Williams
14. Facing truths: ethics and the spiritual life Michael McGhee
Index.

Subject Areas: Philosophy of religion [HRAB]