1st Edition

'What is Truth?' Towards a Theological Poetics

By Andrew Shanks Copyright 2001
    208 Pages
    by Routledge

    208 Pages
    by Routledge

    In a culture where institutional religion is in decline there is a pressing need for new theological strategies. Andrew Shanks argues for a fresh 'theological poetics', providing an eloquent first step towards meeting these needs and an alternative strategy for reconciling Christian theology with poetic truth.

    Part I First principles; Chapter 1 Faith: poetry versus metaphysical opinion; Chapter 2 Confessions of a traitorous clerc; Chapter 3 The ‘pathos of shakenness’; Chapter 4 ‘Mythic theology’; Part II Case studies; Chapter 5 The heritage of Amos; Chapter 6 A shaken sacramentalism; Chapter 7 Blake; Chapter 8 Hölderlin; Chapter 9 ‘After Auschwitz’; Part III Conclusion; Chapter 10 Incredulity and liturgy; Chapter 11 Envoi;

    Biography

    Andrew Shanks is a Church of England priest in North yorkshire. He is the author of God and Modernity (Routledge, 2000), Civil Society, Civil Religion (Blackwell, 1995) and Hegel's Political Economy (Cambridge University Press, 1991).

    'Where Shanks, in this thoughtful, cultured book, is right, and so is needed, is getting us to see that certain works of art, not just the poets he discusses, have the effect on us that sacred scripture and Christian truths ought to have, and often fail to have because we have packaged them too neatly, without any sense of shakenness.' - The Rt Revd Richard Harris, Bishop of Oxford, Church Times

    'One can only hope that this book will not be overlooked ... it would be tragic if such a timely and impassioned appeal to the Church to step out of its grave-clothes went unheard.' - John Pridmore, Modern Believing

    'A highly teachable book for seminarians and one with insights to offer literary criticism and continental philosophy.' - Cleo Kearns, Religious Studies Review