PAUL TILLICH BY RUSSELL RE MANNING

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[@dextergilford1498]

Tillich’s little volume “The Courage to Be” changed my entire view of what might be said to be fundamental to the human condition and by extension human nature (or vice versa).

[@8jcm4]

Excellent presentation, I must say.

[@mexidress]

Actually I stumbled upon the closing of a feminist bookstore when I was doing my thesis. I was thrilled to hear that anecdote.

[@valerieshields4126]

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[@tatsumakisempyukaku]

It seems to me that the unconditioned can or may be Plato’s One as discussed in Plato’s Parmenides. The conditioned is that which is other than The One. Other than one is many. Many are parts. And parts relate to whole, so each part is relative to each other part, and the all the parts relative back to the whole, and the whole relates to the parts. So the “world” of the many is the world of the conditioned ie dependence.

[@matthewkopp2391]

Growing up in the UCC the church itself was mostly traditional rituals that you did not take literally. You were taught for example that communion was not literal transubstantiation. As an adult I talked to a Catholic friend and I explained the difference. And ask her do you literally believe that communion transforms to Christ blood and body. Her response, "That's cannibalism!" Apparently I knew more about her church orthodoxy than she did. For her it was a ritual, one with an associated mood but not a single thought on what it meant. And she went to a private Catholic school. Later I read that the early Christians were accused multiple times of cannibalism. And in one record explained to a governor that the foods they ate were normal food and not human beings. Christianity has obviously had different interpretations and literalisms and different orthodoxy over time that every Christianity is now a blasphemy or heresy to every other Christianity. I personally reflexively understand things symbolically and not literally. But I also know that behind our material perception of the world is an eternal world. I don't need to have faith in this because I actually experienced it multiple times in my life. And in knowing this and experiencing this a symbol is more than just a symbol, it is a reality in and of itself. I try not to judge harshly how other people understand, and their faith, I think it is better for me to just offer how I have experienced things. But sometimes I judge religious literalism as similar to idolatry. The same idolatry that is described by Isaiah. Are you stuck to the idol, the image, the literal? Or is God much more than that? For me Tillich resonated because it was already what I was experiencing.

[@justinporath7295]

Great summary. Many thanks.

[@fitrep]

There seem to be parallels between the concept of "unconditioned" with Lacanin notion of "the real" as it is encountered though the imaginary and the symbolic. There maybe a paper here...hmmm.

[@DeadEndFrog]

I'm technically an 'ignostic' atheist, and find this immensly interesting, owershadows the new christian movments, such as with the symbolists and jorden peterson ect. I always found kirkegaard too be the perfecton of religious reasoning (leap of faith), and do find jorden peterson to have an interestting conception of the religious, with the same failings as kiregaard (unable to follow his own view) which brings me to an issue i see with tillich too, and maybe someone could anwser me this. What makes the christian religion the neccesetator of such a view, or why one should even call oneself christian when the god is so devoid of the christian methaphysics, this applies to both peterson and thillich The whole ignostic issue is blatent in most of these definitions of god, and there doesn't seem to be a way to distinguish as to why one should be christian rather then muslim or jewish when it comes to the conception of god as the grounds for excistance

[@11Valde93]

I agree with the parallels to the likes of Jordan Peterson. Neatly spotted. Your question is of great importance and holds a profound criticism of liberal/eksistential theology. I would say that the answer to your question "What makes the christian religion the neccesetator of such a view" would be, simply, "thruth". Not a truth that makes it possible for the christian mind to argue is any more of a truth than that of the muslims or budists, but a thruth that can be experienced in faith.

[@nicolajbertelsen]

I'm new to this but it seems to me the answer to your question can be found in Tillichs 'protestant princible'.

[@chipwrecker]

I don't know enough about Islam to comment on that, but between Judaism and Christianity, Tillich identifies more as Christian because it emphasizes forgiveness, which Tillich calls "accepting the unacceptable" in others and the self. The New Testament "agape" love, to him, is a form of presence or listening that approaches the unconditionally nonjudgmental.

[@DeadEndFrog]

What worries me about christianity is that there are so many denominations that one is bound to find a way to interprate god in a Christian way, it seems almost post-modern in its conception. And every time i Ask this question i seem to Get slightly diffrent anwsers. I personally can’t see anything special about christianity, especially if you do any research into other religions, you will notice examples of each and every principle, and sometimes made Even earlier then christianity, especially within hindu history, as they too where very prolific in their god and religious creations. As for myself, being an ignostic, its easier to deal with definitions of god that are precise and concise, but im not that much into mistery and ill-defined concepts. As mistery often is there to obscure truth, rather then add to it

[@noorkhadim844]

@@DeadEndFrog you raise a very good point here about the fact that Christianity has allowed as many interpretations of God there are believers. In defence of Christianity, one could argue that the thing which distinguishes it is the idea of Jesus as a bridge between man and God over the chasm that is sin. I'm a committed Muslim, but Tillich is one of my favourite authors on God. As you've pointed out, his model of God is not really religion-specific. I recommend you to do some research into 'the perennial philosophy', for example the works of Frithjof Schuon, Rene Guenon, Coomaraswamy and Dr. Seyyed Hossein Nasr (who also has talks on youtube). I do not follow this philosophy, however you may find it interesting

[@aquinas2124]

In this video from 5:14 to 5:50, Prof. Manning expresses some doubts about the accuracy and veracity of Tillich's story about finding a rare first edition of Schelling's Collected Works in a used bookstore in Berlin during Tillich's student years in Berlin. I disagree with Prof. Manning's doubts about this story. I have seen this story (or information or testimony) in Tillich's writings (probably somewhere in his History of Christian Thought or else somewhere in his Systematic Theology). I see no reason for doubting this story from Tillich's student years, and this kind of event or episode (where a student or a graduate student makes a very helpful pleasant discovery for their studies in a bookstore or library) is a fairly common event or episode in the history of academia generally.

[@HansLiu23]

Doubting his story was unnecessary.

[@TheGuiltsOfUs]

"When sophisticated theologians talk about god, one quickly finds oneself wandering around in a rhetorical fog in which god becomes a constantly shape-shifting entity described by metaphors whose meanings are always just beyond one’s grasp. One has to struggle to understand what they are talking about because what these sophisticated thinkers imagine to be god is so far removed from what any ordinary person thinks that I have long suspected that they are actually atheists struggling to find a way to salvage belief in something transcendental that would not be seen as manifestly anti-science or otherwise ridiculous in the circle of intellectuals amongst whom they move." - Mano Singham

[@tarmbruster1]

The "unprethinkable" yeahhhhh, I get it

[@StefanTravis]

Interesting how so many theologins grope towards atheism and humanism, diluting their notion of god till it becomes an irrelevance, and emphasising human morality in the concrete situation ... but they can never _quite_ let go.

[@victoradams61]

I don't understand how he can basically say that the historical figure of Jesus, whether he did certain things, or even lived at all, is secondary to the impact of the faith. I mean, if that faith, which is so exhaustively analyzed and valued, is based on something that isn't true, how do you get past that point (of the historical facts not mattering all that much)? Something essential is lacking, at least to my simple mind, in this view of religion.

[@dettoist]

From my understanding, Tillich believes that the historical Jesus, and all of Christianity, is a symbolic representation of the human condition. His "theology" is existential in nature. The Gospel is understood as a message of man understanding his own predicament. I think this presenter overstates that Tillich doesn't believe the historical existence of Jesus was not important. It was VERY important, but in a philosophical sense as a representation of "God" coming into human existence (incarnation). In this way, Tillich was very philosophically Hegelian. Tillich did not follow the kind of "atonement" based Christianity that there was a transactional "need" for Jesus' death for the salvation of mankind based in the "justice" of an omnipotent God. Tillich believed that the only faithful response to that kind of God was atheism. For Tillich, God was NOT A BEING. God was the ground of existence; man's ultimate concern. the language of historical Christianity was and is a symbolic representation for this ultimate concern which is man's predicament. There is a connection between Tillich and the "death of God" theology that followed to even the post-modern representations of what is happening under the name of God. Christianity is seen as the highest expression of the "Spirit" or religion where we (and God) move away from the mythical Gods to a single God to the ultimate death of God in Christianity, and his "re-birth"(incarnation) into the world in Christ. There is a secularization of the mythical to a birth of God in the secular world of human existence. There is no supernaturalism in this view. No divine interventions. No magic. No vicarious imputed (or infused) righteousness. God's death was inevitable and necessary but not in the transactional sense in saving mankind. It was necessary to ground man's ultimate concern in the predicament in which he find himself; to enflesh the Gospel in a way to bring the Kingdom of God (love) into existence.

[@dettoist]

It is basically Tillich. Much of what I laid out can be found in various chapters of Theology and Culture. The post-modern theologists have adopted much of Tillich. Zizek has some good ideas but I think he centers his philosophy/theology too much on Lacan. Gianni Vattimo and John Caputo (particularly Caputo in the Weakness of God) go beyond the Death of God theologies of Thomas Altizer and William Hamilton popularized in the 60s. Maybe you can find some joy in reading After the Death of God www.amazon.com/After-Death-God-Insurrections-Critical/dp/0231141254 or the Insistence of God: A Theology of Perhaps. www.amazon.com/Insistence-God-Theology-Philosophy-Religion/dp/0253010071/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1423613063&sr=1-1&keywords=insistence+of+god But the above is really basic Paul Tillich in today's post-modern context.

[@drkurtknecht]

dettoist I think it would be better to say that Tillich was Kierkegaardian rather than Hegelian. Like Kierkegaard, my reading of Tillich suggests that the "historical Jesus" is an objective figure that can never be the subject of ultimate concern. That would be just as true for the 1st disciples as it is for us. His atonement theology is definitely not either transactional sacrifice or Christus Victor. It's the moral exemplar theory which is why he is always focussed on the "New Being". Also, this is the best youtube comment thread I've read in years.

[@dettoist]

I would agree that Tillich can be seen more descriptively as a Kierkegaardian until Kierkegaard lost his mind and decided that he wanted to live forever in eternity. LOL. In the end, Kierkegaard's theology was too strong and overpowered the way the self related to itself by its relating to the unconditional commitment (or in Tillich's terminology, the ultimate concern). K saw the God-man as a crucial focal point as the way to relate to the eternal by the temporal reality of Jesus. There was no other access to God (the Ultimate concern). Contra to your correct (IMO) reading of Tillich that the historical Jesus could never be the subject of ultimate concern, for K, this is reversed. The historical(temporal) Jesus (God--man) is the ultimate access to the ultimate concern: With the unconditional commitment to the temporal (historical) God-man (Jesus) one could stand in eternity (life without death). It is a dream at a cost. A flight into an orthodoxy that eventually leaves Kierkegaard himself behind. This is why I think Tillich is "more" Hegelian. Death gives value to life. Life remains on the plane of immanence without illusions, but charged with the radiance and hope of bringing God into existence.

[@dettoist]

I have little competence, or interest, in Hegelian dialectics in themselves. But Kojeve's interpretation attempts to avoid the idealism of Hegel and root its dialectic in the class struggle and the end of history. Kojeve "reverses" the idealist - materialist split but doesn't overcome it. My personal opinion is that Kojeve's materialist interpretation of Hegel is "in line" with the recent turn to materialism and speculative realism. Other than what he said in “Logic and Existence”, I don't know enough about Hyppolite's reading to comment. I think (for what I can tell) that it is easier to transition Hegel to the Post-structuralist view as Hegel is "used" in Derrida and Deleuze. But I am just guessing. Quite honestly, none of this interests me. I am not an academic or professional Hegelian philosopher. I am a poor schmuck looking for a truth to live by. But you may want to read Pierre Macherey's "Hegal or Spinoza" for a good discussion and commentary on Kojeve's interpretation of Hegel. Of the types of Anxiety of Nonbeing Tillich identifies (Fate and Death, Emptiness and Meaninglessness; and Guilt and Condemation) the proper interpretation of Hegel doesn't "show up" . LOL.

[@MarkSmith-mj6oo]

Yah. Yah. Yah. Repeat.

[@TheGuiltsOfUs]

Nothing but obscurantism

[@TRE601]

Sophisticated ideas are always reserved for those willing to contemplate.

[@alfredhitchcock45]

Majority, if not all, of Philosophical Ides are just like that. Much ado about Nothing. Flowery superfluous words that mean exactly nothing!

[@AL_THOMAS_777]

@@TRE601 🙌 👏 🙏 🤝 👍 only for the noble core of humanity . . . .