God in Creation: A Consideration of Natural Selection as the Sacrificial Means of a Free Creation:
If the Christian God is creator of all things and revealed in Christ to be costly love, then how can divine agency in creation be understood in light of scientific discoveries revealing that biological warfare undergirds Darwinian evolution by natural selection? To explore this challenge, I look to...
Main Author: | |
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Format: | Electronic Article |
Language: | English |
Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
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Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
Published: |
Sage
[2019]
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In: |
Studies in religion
Year: 2019, Volume: 48, Issue: 2, Pages: 216-236 |
Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains: | B
Hefner, Philip 1932-
/ Immanence
/ Image of God
/ Hick, John 1922-2012
/ Irenics
/ Theodicy
/ Creation
/ Natural selection
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RelBib Classification: | AB Philosophy of religion; criticism of religion; atheism NBC Doctrine of God |
Further subjects: | B
John H. Hick's Irenaean theodicy
B téléologie et providence B teleology and providence B le Christ et la création B Féminisme B Christianity B Philip Hefner B Christ and creation B Feminism B Théodicée Irénéenne de John H. Hick, Judith Plaskow B evolution by natural selection B évolution par sélection naturelle B Sacrifice B Christianisme B Judith Plaskow |
Online Access: |
Volltext (Resolving-System) Volltext (doi) |
Summary: | If the Christian God is creator of all things and revealed in Christ to be costly love, then how can divine agency in creation be understood in light of scientific discoveries revealing that biological warfare undergirds Darwinian evolution by natural selection? To explore this challenge, I look to Philip Hefner's teleonomic axiom as a measure for divine agency in the fulfillment and survival of natural structures and processes. Drawing on this criterion and the feminist writing of Judith Plaskow, I conclude that Hefner's attempt to understand divine immanence using the metaphor of sacrifice with John Hick's Irenaean Theodicy can support a risky model for the human as made in God's image by justifying the instrumental subjugation and exploitation of creaturely life and specifically women. Considering the God crucified in Christ, I recommend the metaphor of a fallen creation to acknowledge the inexplicable and unacceptable magnitude of harm suffered by individual creatures. |
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ISSN: | 2042-0587 |
Contains: | Enthalten in: Studies in religion
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Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1177/0008429819830356 |