The ancient doctrine of negative theology or apophasis-the attempt to describe God by speaking only of what cannot be said about the divine perfection and goodness-has taken on new life in the concern with language and its limits that preoccupies much postmodern philosophy, theology, and related disciplines. How does this mystical tradition intersect with the concern with material bodies that is simultaneously a focus in these areas? This volume pursues the unlikely conjunction of apophasis and the body, not for the cachet of the cutting edgebut rather out of an ethical passion for the integrity of all creaturely bodies as they are caughtup in various ideological mechanisms-religious, theological, political, economic-that threaten their dignity and material well-being. The contributors, a diverse collection of scholars in theology, philosophy, history, and biblical studies, rethink the relationship between the concrete tradition of negative theology and apophatic discourses widely construed. They further endeavor to link these to the theological theme of incarnation and more general issues of embodiment, sexuality, and cosmology. Along the way, they engage and deploy the resources of contextual and liberation theology, post-structuralism, postcolonialism, process thought, and feminism.The result not only recasts the nature and possibilities of theological discourse but explores the possibilities of academic discussion across and beyond disciplines in concrete engagement with the well-being of bodies, both organic and inorganic. The volume interrogates the complex capacities of religious discourse both to threaten and positively to draw upon the material well-being of creation.
Author(s): Chris Boesel (editor), Catherine Keller (editor)
Series: Transdisciplinary Theological Colloquia 3
Publisher: Fordham University Press
Year: 2009
Language: English
Pages: 448
APOPHATIC BODIES: Negative Theology, Incarnation and Relationality......Page 6
CONTENTS......Page 8
Acknowledgments......Page 10
APOPHATIC BODIES......Page 12
Intoduction | Chris Boesel and Catherine Keller......Page 14
NEGATIVE THEOLOGY: UNFOLDING TRADITIONS......Page 36
The Cloud of the Impossible: Embodiment and Apophasis | Catherine Keller......Page 38
Subtle Embodiments: Imagining the Holy in Late Antiquity | Patricia Cox Miller......Page 58
“Being Neither Oneself Nor Someone Else”: The Apophatic Antropology of Dionysius the Areopagite | Charles M. Stang......Page 72
INCARNATIONS: BODY/IMAGE......Page 90
Bodies without Wholes: Apophatic Excess and Fragmentation in Augustine’s City of God | Virginia Burrus and Karmen MacKendrick......Page 92
Bodies Still Unrisen, Events Still Unsaid: A Hermeneutic of Bodies without Flesh | John D. Caputo......Page 107
In the Image of the Invisible | Kathryn Tanner......Page 130
MORE MYSTERIOUS BODIES: VEILS, VOIDS, VISIONS......Page 148
“The Body Is No Body” | David L. Miller......Page 150
Revisioning the Body Apophatically: Incarnation and the Acosmic Naturalism of Habad Hasidism | Elliot R. Wolfson......Page 160
Bodies of the Void: Polyphilia and Theoplicity | Roland Faber......Page 213
APOPHATIC ETHICS: WHOSE BODY, WHOSE SPEECH?......Page 238
The Metaphysics of the Body | Graham Ward......Page 240
Emptying Apophasis of Deception: Considering a Duplicitous Kierkegaardian Declaration | T. Wilson Dickinson......Page 264
Feminist Theology and the Sensible Unsaying of Mysticism | Sigridur Gudmarsdottir......Page 286
The Infinite Found in Human Form: Intertwinings of Cosmology and Incarnation | Philip Clayton......Page 299
LOVE STORIES: UNSPEAKABLE RELATIONS, INFINITE FREEDOM......Page 318
The Apophasis of Divine Freedom: Saving “the Name” and the Neighbor from Human Mastery | Chris Boesel......Page 320
Let It Be: Finding Grace with God through the Gelassenheit of the Annunciation | Rose Ellen Dunn......Page 342
Intimate Mysteries: The Apophatics of Sensible Love | Krista E. Hughes......Page 362
INTRODUCTION......Page 380
THE CLOUD OF THE IMPOSSIBLE: EMBODIMENT AND APOPHASIS......Page 381
SUBTLE EMBODIMENTS: IMAGINING THE HOLY IN LATE ANTIQUITY......Page 390
‘‘BEING NEITHER ONESELF NOR SOMEONE ELSE’’......Page 394
BODIES WITHOUT WHOLES......Page 403
BODIES STILL UNRISEN, EVENTS STILL UNSAID......Page 408
IN THE IMAGE OF THE INVISIBLE......Page 409
‘‘THE BODY IS NO BODY’’......Page 410
REVISIONING THE BODY APOPHATICALLY......Page 414
BODIES OF THE VOID......Page 439
THE METAPHYSICS OF THE BODY......Page 445
EMPTYING APOPHASIS OF DECEPTION......Page 448
FEMINIST THEOLOGY AND THE SENSIBLE UNSAYING OF MYSTICISM......Page 456
THE INFINITE FOUND IN HUMAN FORM......Page 458
THE APOPHASIS OF DIVINE FREEDOM......Page 461
LET IT BE......Page 468
INTIMATE MYSTERIES......Page 473
List of Contributors......Page 478
