Journal of Analytic Theology
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat
<h1 class="entry-title" style="font-family: Roboto, sans-serif;"> </h1> <p>The Journal of Analytic Theology is an open access, international journal that publishes articles, book reviews, and book symposia that explore theological and meta-theological topics in a manner that prizes terminological clarity and argumentative rigor. This includes historical studies that seek to elucidate conceptual challenges or explore strategies for addressing them.</p>The Center for Philosophy of Religion at the University of Notre Dameen-USJournal of Analytic Theology2330-2380An Introduction to the Symposium on Mark Murphy’s <i>Divine Holiness and Divine Action</i>
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/574
<p>The purpose of this essay is to introduce the symposium within the <em>Journal of Analytic Theology </em>on Mark Murphy’s latest book, <em>Divine Holiness and Divine Action. </em>To this end, the main aims of Murphy’s book are presented and the essays within the symposium are summarized.</p>Jordan Wessling
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-251140040310.12978/jat.2023-11.091413220406Précis of <i>Divine Holiness and Divine Action</i>
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/575
<p>This article is a précis of Mark C. Murphy’s <em>Divine Holiness and Divine Action</em> (Oxford University Press, 2021), which offers an account of God’s holiness and of the difference this view of God’s holiness should make to our understanding of divine action. </p>Mark C. Murphy
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-251140441010.12978/jat.2023-11.120010122024Wholly Good, Holy God
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/576
<p>Mark Murphy dedicates <em>Divine Holiness and Divine Action</em> to answering two questions: What is divine holiness? And why does it matter for understanding divine action? According to Murphy, divine holiness consists in God’s having those features that make it appropriate for creatures to be simultaneously attracted to and repelled by God. This account, in turn, affords a novel framework for understanding divine action, one intended to avoid the pitfalls of alternative approaches emphasizing God’s moral goodness or lovingkindness. In this essay, we express agreement with Murphy’s idea that divine holiness is crucial for understanding divine action. But we find ourselves balking at two significant junctures. First, we contend that Murphy’s characterization of divine holiness requires revision, as appeal to attraction and repulsion doesn’t adequately capture attitudes such as awe and reverence that are central to experiences of the holy. And, second, we argue that the ‘holiness framework’ for divine action fails to accomplish its aims, largely because it rejects the claim that God’s perfect moral goodness and lovingkindness ground God’s holiness. We conclude that theorists should instead embrace a framework for action that integrates God’s perfect moral goodness, lovingkindness, and holiness.</p>Terence CuneoJada Twedt Strabbing
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-251141142310.12978/jat.2023-11.190400022006God’s Things
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/577
<p>This response to Mark Murphy’s <em>Divine Holiness and Divine Action</em> constructs an account of what Murphy calls “secondary holiness” — the holiness of everything other than God — oriented to the Jewish tradition. On the theory that differences come out most sharply against a background of similarities, an initial section lays out what the author shares with Murphy methodologically. The essay then offers a reading of the aesthetic and ethical significance of Jewish ritual practices that delimit holy objects and times. Central to the ethical aspect of this account is an analysis of what it might mean, in interpersonal relationships, to respect certain things as “sacred” to another; this leads to the suggestion that regarding certain things as sacred to God may be a basis on which to develop a personal relationship with God.</p>Samuel Fleischacker
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-251142443610.12978/jat.2023-11.180011051117God of Holy Love
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/578
<p>In the exceptional book <em>Divine Holiness and Divine Action</em>, Mark Murphy defends what he calls the <em>holiness framework </em>for divine action. The purpose of our essay-response to Murphy’s book is to consider an alternative framework for divine action, what we call the <em>agapist framework</em>. We argue that the latter framework is more probable than Murphy’s holiness framework with respect to<em> select </em>theological desiderata.</p>Jonathan C. RutledgeJordan Wessling
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-251143745610.12978/jat.2023-11.091413172006All Shall Love Me and Despair!
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/579
<p>In <em>Divine Holiness and Divine Action </em>Mark Murphy seeks to establish four key claims: first, that divine holiness consists in a supreme desirability of creaturely union with God and a commensurately supreme creaturely unfittingness for that union; second, that this holiness-concept is grounded in a value-gap between God and creatures which by default motivates God to withdraw from creatures rather than love us or seek our welfare; third, that the love and concern for creaturely welfare exhibited in God’s creating and redeeming is a contingent and freely chosen override of the default stance of holiness; and fourth, that God should be thanked and emulated in virtue of exhibiting a kind of humility in overriding the demands of holiness for our sakes, though not worshipped or praised for this humility, since these latter attitudes should be reserved for necessary rather than contingent features of God. I argue that each of these four claims is mistaken, and further that it is a good thing they are mistaken, because if Murphy’s account were right the appropriate response to God would be neither worship nor thanks but rather abject despair.</p>Sameer Yadav
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-251145746910.12978/jat.2023-11.180017240021The Difference Holiness Makes
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/580
<p>Terence Cuneo & Jada Twedt Strabbing, Samuel Fleischacker, Jonathan Rutledge & Jordan Wessling, and Sameer Yadav have generously engaged with the accounts of divine holiness and its implications offered in my <em>Divine Holiness and Divine Action</em> (2021), criticizing its arguments and in some cases offering attractive alternative accounts. Here I respond to some of their criticisms.</p>Mark C. Murphy
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-251147048810.12978/jat.2023-11.382636384650Andrew Ter Ern Loke. <i>Evil, Sin and Christian Theism</i>
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/562
T. Parker Haratine
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-251170070410.12978/jat.2023-11.19-5117070004Joshua Cockayne. <i>Explorations in Analytic Ecclesiology: That They May be One</i>
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/563
Steven Nemes
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-251170570910.12978/jat.2023-11.181913130418Drew Collins. <i>The Unique and Universal Christ: Refiguring the Theology of Religions</i>
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/564
Aaron Brian Davis
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-251171071510.12978/jat.2023-11.000013030018Brad East. <i>The Church’s Book: Theology of Scripture in Ecclesial Context</i>
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/565
Caleb Lindgren
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-251171672010.12978/jat.2023-11.020001110813Laura W. Ekstrom. <i>God, Suffering, and the Value of Free Will</i>
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/566
T. Ryan Byerly
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-251172172410.12978/jat.2023-11.19-5113012424Johannes Grössl and Klaus von Stosch, eds. <i>Impeccability and Temptation: Understanding Christ’s Divine and Human Will</i>
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/567
R. Lucas Stamps
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-251172572710.12978/jat.2023-11.17-5118181918Karen Kilby. <i>God, Evil and the Limits of Theology</i>
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/568
Mats Wahlberg
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-251172873410.12978/jat.2023-11.120018220006Jonathan L. Kvanvig. <i>Depicting Deity: A Metatheological Approach</i>
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/569
T. J. Mawson
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-251173573710.12978/jat.2023-11.19-51-51120013Patrick Todd. <i>The Open Future: Why Future Contingents are All False</i>
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/570
Alan R. Rhoda
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-251173874210.12978/jat.2023-11.0011-51170700Matthew A. Benton and Jonathan L. Kvanvig, eds. <i>Religious Disagreement and Pluralism</i>
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/571
Olli-Pekka Vainio
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-251174374510.12978/jat.2023-11.141100210014Edwin Chr. van Driel. <i>Rethinking Paul: Protestant Theology and Pauline Exegesis</i>
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/572
Andrew Torrance
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-251174674910.12978/jat.2023-11.001322191404The Ancestral Sin is not Pelagian
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/536
<p>Various thinkers are concerned that the Orthodox view of Ancestral Sin does not avoid the age-old Augustinian concern of Pelagianism. After all, the doctrine of Ancestral Sin maintains that fallen human beings do not necessarily or inevitably commit actual sins. In contemporary literature, this claim could be articulated as a denial of the ‘inevitability thesis.’ A denial of the inevitability thesis, so contemporary thinkers maintain, seems to imply both that human beings can place themselves in right relation to God as well as the Pelagian denial that all require Christ's work to attain this right relation to God. This article demonstrates that the Ancestral Sin, along with a denial of the inevitability thesis, is neither Pelagian nor Semi-Pelagian. I show that the doctrine of Ancestral Sin denies (Semi-) Pelagianism in various ways. I show that, for Ancestral Sin to entail (Semi-) Pelagianism, one must commit to several assumptions, each of which is plausibly deniable and none of which Orthodox thinkers affirm.</p>Parker Haratine
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-251111310.12978/jat.2023-11.1500-65070404The Divided Mind Model Defended
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/427
<p class="BodyofText" style="line-height: normal;">At the latter half of the twentieth century, Richard Swinburne proposed a model of the incarnation built upon Freud’s divided mind theory. Over the course of two publications, Tim Bayne has formulated the most robust critique of Swinburne’s model to date. In this paper, I argue that Bayne’s objections rest on key misinterpretations of Swinburne’s work. Moreover, when one properly understands the model, these objections lose their force. I begin by expositing Swinburne’s divided mind model (DM), highlighting its four foundational theses. Next, I respond to Bayne’s objections against DM, demonstrating they rest upon misconceptions of the model.</p>Drew Smith
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-2511142210.12978/jat.2023-11.031722181207Mere Social Trinitarianism, the Eternal Relations of Origin, and Models of God
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/520
<p>Social trinitarians are divided on whether the doctrine of the eternal relations of origin (DERO) should be maintained. In this paper, I focus on what social trinitarianism (ST) must affirm and cannot affirm by way of the divine attributes in order to maintain the DERO. First, I offer my own proposal for a mere ST before turning to the DERO, as the ST term currently suffers many uses and definitions. Second, I turn my attention to ST and the divine attributes. The DERO requires one to affirm other divine attributes of God, such as divine atemporality, divine immutability, and divine impassability. If the social trinitarian desires to maintain the DERO, then they have to maintain these other attributes. However, they will have to forgo the doctrine of divine simplicity because it is incompatible with ST. I conclude by bringing this discussion to bear on models of God and the divine attributes, arguing that the DERO-affirming social trinitarian only has one such model available to them.</p>Andrew Hollingsworth
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-2511234010.12978/jat.2023-11.001322071407Platonism as a Path to Palamism
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/478
<p>Palamism has long been enormously influential within Eastern Orthodox thought, and in recent years it has been gaining increased attention in non-Orthodox philosophical and theological circles as well. Here I develop an argument for one of Palamism's core commitments (the reality of at least one uncreated divine energy distint from the divine essence) based on platonism about abstract entities. </p>Travis Dumsday
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-2511416610.12978/jat.2023-11.191718032024The Symmetry Argument for Catholic Integralism
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/483
<p>Liberalism is taking a beating. Many regimes return to religious rationales for state authority. They increasingly oppose liberal institutions. This essay lays the groundwork for engaging these <em>religious anti-liberalisms</em>. In this essay, I assess the religious anti-liberalism known as Catholic integralism. This ancient doctrine challenged historic political philosophers like Thomas Hobbes and John Locke. Surprisingly, it has recently resurfaced in some Catholic intellectual circles.</p> <p>Integralists propose that governments exist to secure the common good: temporal and spiritual. God authorizes two powers to govern humankind. The state governs in matters temporal, the church in matters spiritual. When their missions intersect, the church is sovereign owing to its nobler purpose.</p> <p>Contemporary Catholic political philosophy rejects integralism. But it remains overwhelmingly perfectionist: states exist to promote the authentic individual and common good. These <em>natural law perfectionists</em> say that states should promote <em>natural </em>goods: goods, such as health and friendship, that anyone can see as such through the use of reason. States should <em>not</em> promote <em>supernatural </em>goods: goods, such as faith and hope, that we only grasp through revelation. Catholic perfectionists treat natural and supernatural goods <em>asymmetrically</em>.</p> <p>Integralists reject the asymmetry. God authorizes the church to promote supernatural goods, and the church may direct the state to advance its mission. On this basis, I argue that integralists can mount a powerful philosophical argument against standard natural law perfectionism—the <em>symmetry argument</em>. It claims that natural law perfectionists cannot justify their asymmetric treatment of goodness. Integralism, in contrast, treats the good symmetrically.</p>Kevin Vallier
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-2511678410.12978/jat.2022-11.100413210017Theodicy, Regress, and the Problem of Eternal Separation
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/467
<p>The problem of eternal separation is the problem of explaining how someone could be happy in heaven while knowing that his beloved is in hell. Some argue that this problem is insoluble, while others try to solve it through the lover, the beloved, or the love between them. I argue that the problem of eternal separation is really three problems, namely, of suffering, separation, and regret. I show that no existing reply solves these problems simultaneously. I then present a new approach through theodicy. I argue that, if we reflect on what it would take to defeat the suffering from losing one’s beloved to hell, a regress emerges, and an adequate solution to the problem of eternal separation is a solution to this regress. I articulate five replies to the regress and evaluate their prospects. The upshot is a roadmap to defending the traditional Christian view of heaven and hell. </p>Donald Bungum
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-25118510910.12978/jat.2023-11.0314-65012012The Toughest of Loves
https://jat-ojs-baylor.tdl.org/jat/article/view/493
<p>Some Christian theologians and philosophers maintain that God’s punishments are always (at least partly) motivated by redemptive love for those punished, even when these punishments are considerably severe (e.g., killings or damnations). However, advocates of such a conception of divine punishment face significant challenges. Perhaps most fundamentally, it is not entirely apparent how severe and loving features of divine punishment might be understood to fit together within a viable theological model. In this article this foundational issue is addressed. By culling resources from St. Gregory of Nyssa, the present aim is to proffer a contemporary model of divine punishment that naturally combines redemptive love for those punished with apparently harsh treatment.</p>Jordan Wessling
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Analytic Theology
2023-10-252023-10-251111013110.12978/jat.2023-12.091413220406