Knowing The Unknowable God

In Knowing the Unknowable God, David Burrell traces the intellectual intermingling of Muslim, Jewish, and Christian traditions that made possible the medieval synthesis that served as the basis for Western theology. He shows how Aquinas's study of the Muslim philosopher Ibn-Sina and the Jewish thinker Moses Maimonides affected the disciplined use of language when speaking of divinity and influenced his doctrine of God.

Meet the God Who Is Greater Than Your Biggest Questions. The Bible never shies away from seeming contradictions. We are told both to resist our enemies and to love them, and that our all-knowing God can sometimes forget. Unable to reconcile such biblical paradoxes, some people abandon Christianity, while others pretend that the seeming contradictions don’t exist–preferring to believe in an uncomplicated, easy-to-comprehend God. Yet countless others are hungry for new insight into the God behind the Bible’s mysterious paradoxes. Responding to this spiritual hunger, James Lucas delves into the mysteries of Scripture, demonstrating that biblical “contradictions” are actually exquisite paradoxes that enlarge our understanding of God. With this book as your guide, you can embrace the paradoxes of Scripture and pursue honest answers to your hardest questions. The study of biblical paradox leads to greater devotion to the majestic God who makes himself known even while he surpasses human understanding. Today, you can begin Knowing the Unknowable God.

Most contemporary Christians are polytheists. They believe in many gods—unawares, of course. There is a Father-god, depicted old and white-haired; there is a Son-god, middle-aged, identified with Jesus of Nazareth; and there is a Spirit-god, symbolized by a dove. Many artists have depicted this trinity, like El Greco, who painted his "The Trinity" in 1578. These three gods are believed to constitute only one divinity, but very few ordinary Christians could explain how this could be the case. This plurality of gods is the reason why Christianity is reviled by Jews and Muslims who affirm steadfastly the unicity of God and who ban any pictorial representation of the divinity. The very first Christians, the family and friends of Jesus, who were Jews, would not have held such a pagan belief, but their writings were destroyed by later adherents, so we lack the evidence to prove this.Christians claim that the Trinity has been revealed, but the fact is that such revelation is disproved by science and philosophy. So why not transcend this trinity in a contemplation of the One Unknowable God of all? Why not learn to live without knowing what God is, being satisfied with the belief that God is neither male nor female, neither triad nor monad, but simply the Divine Incognito?

Albert Einstein once remarked that behind all observable things lay something quite unknowable. This book explores that special territory perceived by Einstein: where the unknown takes over from everything that is understandable, familiar, explicable

Christianity Today 2014 Book Award Winner How can I know God if he is incomprehensible? Is it possible to know God in a way that takes seriously the fact that he is beyond knowledge? Steven Boyer and Christopher Hall argue that the "mystery of God" has a rightful place in theological discourse. They contend that considering divine incomprehensibility invites reverence and humility in our thinking and living as Christians and clarifies a variety of theological topics. The authors begin by investigating the biblical, historical, and practical foundations for understanding the mystery of God. They then spell out its implications for theological issues and practices such as the incarnation, salvation, and prayer, rooting knowledge of God in a concrete life of faith. Evangelical yet ecumenical, this book will appeal to theology students, pastors, church leaders, and all who want intellectual and practical guidance for knowing the unknowable God.

Drawing on Islamic as well as Christian sources, David Burrell provocatively shows that Job does not explain the problem of evil.

Argues that the "mystery of God" has a rightful place in theological discourse and considers its impact on a variety of theological issues and practices.

Who is God? The variety of images of God tends to overwhelm us in the present age. Is 'God' a fiction of human construction, or a reality that makes claims upon how we practice 'faith in God'? How does this quest for an understanding of 'God' illumine who 'we' are?God in Postliberal Perspective presents an introduction to the doctrine and concept of God in contemporary philosophy and theology, exploring how some theologians and philosophers dare to speak of God as 'real' in our sceptical, pluralistic, and interfaith age. Robert Cathey tours the 'house of realism' as constructed by postliberal Christians (David Burrell, William Placher, Bruce Marshall), in conversation with living communities of faith and critical work in philosophy and theology, and develops a distinctive argument about the relation of realism and non-realism in constructing the doctrine of God in postliberal theology.Offering a reading of postliberal theology which is open to critical discussion with other types of theology, philosophy, and faith traditions, this book proposes a model of theological reflection that may be extended to the reality-claims of a wide range of doctrines and concepts.

In this book, David Burrell, one of the foremost philosophical theologians in the English-speaking world, presents the best of his work on creation and human freedom. A collection of writings by one of the foremost philosophers of religion in the English-speaking world. Brings together in one volume the best of David Burrell’s work on creation and human freedom from the last twenty years. Dismantles the ‘libertarian’ approach to freedom underlying Western political and economic systems. Engages with Islam, Judaism and Christianity, and with modern and pre-modern systems of thought. The author is noted for his rigorous approach, his wry humor, his intellectual subtlety and his generous spirit.

A thoughtful Christian theology of religions that emphasizes the no-compromise importance of faith in Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit in relation to others' beliefs.

The first part of Nicaea and its Legacy offers a narrative of the fourth-century trinitarian controversy. It does not assume that the controversy begins with Arius, but with tensions among existing theological strategies. Lewis Ayres argues that, just as we cannot speak of one `Arian' theology, so we cannot speak of one `Nicene' theology either, in 325 or in 381. The second part of the book offers an account of the theological practices and assumptions within whichpro-Nicene theologians assumed their short formulae and creeds were to be understood. Ayres also argues that there is no fundamental division between eastern and western trinitarian theologies at the end of the fourth century. The last section of the book challenges modern post-Hegelian trinitarian theology toengage with Nicaea more deeply.

The classical doctrine of God expresses that the God of the Bible is triune, a se, simple, immutable, impassible, eternal, and the sovereign Lord over his creation, which he created from himself. Modern streams of theology, within the evangelical circle, continue to promote a doctrine of God that sharply contrasts the classical view—the traditional view of God in Christian theism. Therefore, a critical response to such a theology is needed. This study is a comprehensive analysis and sustained critique of Thomas Jay Oord’s open/relational doctrine of God. Oord’s model substitutes process metaphysics for classical metaphysics, while attempting to retain foundational Christian doctrines that were established within a classical metaphysical framework.

The death of a friend is a source of pain and grief. For the author, it is also a chance to reflect on the role of friendship in our pursuit of truth. His essays explore friendship as the bond linking Christians, Muslims and Jews alike to the religious traditions embraced in the search for truth.

Distinguished scholar Matthew Levering examines the doctrine of creation and its contemporary theological implications, critically engaging with classical and modern views in dialogue with Orthodox and Reformed interlocutors, among others. Moving from the Trinity to Christology, Levering takes up a number of themes pertaining to the doctrine of creation and focuses on how creation impacts our understandings of both the immanent and the economic Trinity. He also engages newer trends such as ecological theology.