Christian Theodicy: A Critique of William Gass's Anti-Theology
This paper presents a justification for a Christian theodicy. It starts by critiquing William H. Gass’s depiction of Christianity as superstitious, ignorant, and evil. It shows that his view is based on a caricature (that is, God as a quasi-gnostic Demiurge) of the Christian understanding of God and...
Main Author: | |
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Format: | Electronic Article |
Language: | English |
Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
Journals Online & Print: | |
Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
Published: |
MDPI
2023
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In: |
Religions
Year: 2023, Volume: 14, Issue: 1 |
Further subjects: | B
Augustine
B William Gass B Theodicy B Barth B Anselm |
Online Access: |
Volltext (kostenfrei) Volltext (kostenfrei) |
Summary: | This paper presents a justification for a Christian theodicy. It starts by critiquing William H. Gass’s depiction of Christianity as superstitious, ignorant, and evil. It shows that his view is based on a caricature (that is, God as a quasi-gnostic Demiurge) of the Christian understanding of God and evil and totally ignores and misses the contributions of (what I call) the Classical View of theodicy within the Christian intellectual tradition (that is, from Origen to Karl Barth). I also evaluate the underlying nihilism of Gass’s writings as self-refuting and furthermore argue that a Christian theodicy overcomes this nihilism and encourages a “vocation of the good”. |
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ISSN: | 2077-1444 |
Contains: | Enthalten in: Religions
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Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.3390/rel14010002 |