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Abstract: This essay addresses the relationship between Kierkegaard and natural law afresh. First, I exposit Thomas's natural law doctrine in the Summa, particularly its theological emphasis on the God‐human relationship, which often goes underappreciated. Then, I argue that natural law doctrine downstream from Thomas suffers from an acute vulnerability: its natural aspect is emphasised so much that the divine‐human relationship at the heart of natural law falls away. Next, I argue Problema II of Fear and Trembling deals with this same issue and theologically criticises ethics' secularising tendency. I then argue that Fear and Trembling and other writings of Kierkegaard's corpus claim a universal law similar to Thomas's doctrine: each individual must relate absolutely to God. Thereby, Kierkegaard transforms natural law from a general norm prone to secularisation into a gift and theological task for everyone, grounding the possibility of ethics in the divine‐human relationship. For regular dogmatic purposes, I suggest this shifts natural law to the doctrines of justification and sanctification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article investigates stories of holiness which have ascetics or monastics as their hero(in)es and which develop based on a careful interlocking of two concepts: wanderings in urban or desert environments and self‐confinement in enclosed or secluded spaces. Through a close reading of two saints' Lives (i.e., the Life of Mary of Egypt and the Life of Matrona of Perge) dating to the early and middle Byzantine periods, the present analysis uncovers the tripartite relationship between movement, confinement, and spiritual advancement from a literary‐narrative point of view, thus deepening our understanding of asceticism and monasticism in Byzantine contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Beginning from an intriguing essay by the mid‐twentieth century Jewish thinker Leon Roth, I offer here an account of what "holiness" might mean for Jews by moving between readings of specifically Jewish texts and a series of general desiderata for any account of holiness. My proposal involves attending closely to but also moving away from the particulars of God's world. Holiness consists in this process, not in any of the particulars themselves. I suggest that the point of Jewish law is to engage us in such a process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Few debates in late seventeenth‐century Muscovy were as heated as the controversy over the naming of the Resurrection "New Jerusalem" Monastery (1656). This essay draws attention to an overlooked sixteenth‐century source, a letter by the Greek‐born Slavic translator Maksim Grek (d. 1556), which played an important role in shaping the Church's thinking. Maksim's letter helps to explain why Jerusalem ideology took a very different path in Russia than it did in Western Europe, and why replications of the Holy Sepulcher are only very rarely encountered in Muscovy. Maksim's letter introduces several themes which foreshadow the course of the later debate: the irrevocability of Jerusalem's name; the inalienable holiness of the loca sancta; and the connection between the holy sites and churches built on them. These themes, in turn, invite a reconsideration of the success of Jerusalem ideology in Muscovy, which has often been taken for granted. We first situate this contrarian text in its original context and then trace its mediation through important Ruthenian authors who guaranteed its wide reception in Moscow. Our study demonstrates that the Russian clergy and the Moscow Synod of 1666/67 based their critiques of the 'New Jerusalem' Monastery's name on a reading of Maksim's letter and its mediators. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Kant's argument for belief in the immortality of the soul appears tenuous. The standard interpretation suggests that immortality is necessary because agents need an endless time in order to become holy (i.e., incapable of deviation from the moral law). Yet Kant elsewhere argues that sensible beings cannot be holy. This interpretation thus cannot make sense of Kant's insistence that agents become holy, supposing instead that this is an error on Kant's part. Against this reading, I argue that progress toward holiness is simply a definition of virtue, and that Kant's reference to it does not contradict itself by implying that sensible beings must become holy at some point in time. Drawing on Kant's account of the Gesinnung in the Religion, I then proceed to offer a novel reading as to why immortality is needed to secure the complete conformity of a disposition with the moral law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers information on the heightened attention the Qur'an has received in Sweden, a country often considered very secular. Topics include theological discussions on holiness, the distinction between a true Qur'an and a replica, and public discussions on the role of Prophet Muhammad and interpretations of Surahs. It discusses the tension between freedom of speech and the Law against Incitement to Hatred in the context of public demonstrations involving the burning of the Qur'an.

A table of contents for the periodical is presented along with editors, journal customer services, and editorial board members.

The article discusses the value of the metaphysical imagination in the pursuit of holiness in the wake of Rowan Williams. It mentions that holy lives and communities make visible the ontological dependence of all things on God. It reveals that Williams has given expression to Christian faith in generative ways, through the language of excess and through contemplating excess in narrative and identity of Christ.

This article presents holiness as actuality, a concept that analogically connects God as pure infinite act to our own finite actualization as human agents. Grace constitutes the means by which we become holy. That is, grace will be construed as an actualizing relation. This relation regenerates and purifies fallen human nature, but it also perfects our nature according to humanity's original, creational telos. The communicable contours of holiness provided by Leviticus 19 will ground the discussion, and these contours will be canonically coordinated with the Gospel of Matthew. Throughout, the article will draw deeply from the theology of Thomas Aquinas in bridging divine holiness with God's unique mode of agency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

John Henry Newman has reached a new pinnacle of his career with his canonization by Pope Francis on October 13, 2019. These books allow us to see how Newman cultivated "the beauty of holiness" from his early youth in steady, intense theological reflection, putting his own personality and biography at the center of his evangelical effort, and eventually becoming a radiant icon for the Church of England and for the Roman Catholic world. A key moment was the publication of the Apologia in 1864, which established him as a beloved, serene Eminent Victorian, dispelling the mockery of the failing "muscular Christians" and the hostility of many former coreligionists he had bruised on his path to Rome. The Oxford Handbook shows how deeply his holiness was indebted to the Evangelical sources his mature church identity covered over: the letters show that sanctity is compatible with thorniness in family and collegial relationships, and Gracewing's annotated reeditions of his works show how sedulously he retrieved and rewrote his earlier literary output. Together they offer a repristinated image of Newman, illuminating in depth his place in intellectual and ecumenical history. Above all, they may herald a new emergence of Newman as theologian, released from the excessive focus on his biography. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines Egeria's pilgrimage in the 380s as emblemising the fourth‐century Constantinian conception of the Holy Land as a sacred space. Egeria's account is the second‐oldest surviving pilgrim itinerarium and her writing helped pioneer the development and codification of pilgrimage as a lived religious practice. Egeria embarked on pilgrimage with the belief that holiness was accessible through an immersion within the sacred Palestinian landscape. She expressed two desires: to engage closely with holy sites and to see how monastic communities were living and praying within the landscape. This liminal landscape was a ritual site where prayers brought the past into the present. Although she travelled with a deep belief in Constantine's legacy of holy places, a routinisation of pilgrimage had not yet occurred. With no scriptural, doctrinal or theological definition of the practice, she was autonomous in defining the meaning of holy landscapes within her own context. This article finds in Egeria's account an early example of the transformative and liminal phenomenon of pilgrimage through the eyes of an independent, devout, and pioneering female pilgrim. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With respect to the property of holiness, Mittleman reminds that the contrary to holiness is not the profane, but rather the unclean. The project of holiness moves humans more deeply, more strongly to pursue the good of the other because holiness tells us that there is a "good beyond our own good" (p. 137). If one is able to cultivate these practices, perhaps in the trout stream Mittleman admits to frequenting, then it will become clear that the Judaism's concern with holiness need not condone violence. [Extracted from the article]

The article presents the discussion on communion of faith. Topics include explicit covenants between servant and church, spouse and partner, and the de facto covenant between citizen and state; enduring full communion of holiness and humanity happening only in Christ; and theologies and ministry in general undertheologizing contemporary moments of trauma.

The descriptive moment in ethical reflection is helpfully informed by a careful consideration of what religious bodies have said about moral issues such as climate change. As a case study, this article identifies and interprets primary documents of The United Methodist Church (UMC) and its predecessor institutions, providing a detailed examination of the historical development of this denomination's environmental witness statements. Methodism's long‐standing engagement with environmental ethics, out of which a concern for anthropogenic climate change incrementally emerged, includes significant institutional policies and practices. The history of Methodist environmental witness evidences a creative, faithful response by a religious denomination learning to grapple with the overwhelming problem of climate change. Describing and interpreting this history enables religious ethicists to engage Methodist environmental witness as they develop constructive models for addressing this problem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This paper attempts a cross‐examination of divine holiness and transcendence. Contemporary continental philosophy shows both concern and embarrassment when dealing with God's transcendence. It is often interpreted as an exclusion from this world. The underlying projection belongs to some residual Deism of our age. By analyzing three biblical accounts of holiness (Hosea 11; Isaiah 6; Exodus 3), this paper proposes a requalification of transcendence according to the narratives through which it is revealed and addressed to three specific partners of God. Ultimately, holiness proves to be the transforming power of God. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Biblical law has had a profound influence on Western culture, but it must be understood in its historical context. It arose in the context of the tradition of Mesopotamian law, where scribes exhibited their flair for justice by writing statutes on a repertoire of traditional cases, of which the most outstanding example is the Laws of Hammurabi. Rarely did legal texts explicitly discuss legal principles. Three collections of formal legal statutes are found in the Hebrew Bible. The Book of the Covenant is most like Mesopotamian law in dealing with disputes arising in an agrarian society. The priestly law consists of two sources, the priestly source that aims at protecting the welfare of the people by the performance of sacred rituals and the Holiness source that seeks to sanctify the everyday activities of the people. Deuteronomy aims at ritual and social reforms. Among the most debated issues in scholarship today is biblical law's view of women. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this essay, I will argue that a political theology of human work can provide the sacramental principle underlying the theology of labor. This principle could complement the foundations of Catholic social teaching, since the sacramental aspects of work have not been made very explicit in the ethical framework of the Church's theology of work. The view of labor as the active participation in God's future is an important aspect of such a theology. In order to serve as a foundation for faith-based labor organizing, I will claim that it needs to be complemented by a sacramental view of labor as art, a labor-aesthetic that undergirds a labor-ethic, in which labor itself becomes a sign and instrument of the way the Church becomes God's work in the world. First, I will sketch an outline of some of the major positions on labor in modern Catholic theology. Then, I will draw on the writings of the British poet and painter David Jones to explore a sacramental view of human work, arguing that a sacramental view of work could support the Church's social criticism of laborer's circumstances. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In contemporary Christian theology, Pietism denotes a form of Christianity that rejects mediation in favor of the Holy Spirit's direct, unmediated infusion of grace into the human heart. In this article, I contend that this reading of Pietism is deeply flawed. Drawing on recent scholarship, I show that Pietism, especially in its Methodist, Wesleyan-holiness and Pentecostal forms, embraces and promotes mediation through a wide range of places, materials, persons and practices. From a Pietist perspective, God's holiness precludes presumption, not mediation per se. It also leads Pietists to underscore the significance of waiting for the Christian life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the importance of models in practicing the virtue of holiness. It references the book of Aristotle entitled "Nicomachean Ethics" where he states that model are crucial for virtuous individuals who acquire the virtue. Moreover, Aristotle said that in the absence of models, individuals would not be able to exemplify the character.

This article first speaks briefly of prayer in general and its essence; and then discusses various kinds of prayer in the Orthodox Christian tradition, chief among which is personal prayer made in private, and liturgical prayer celebrated in church. There is also spontaneous prayer, less favored in Orthodoxy, where the model prayer is the Lord's Prayer. The main part of the article examines the petitions that make up the Lord's Prayer and the interpretation given to them by patristic writers. It concludes by affirming the unique character of the prayer, which can be regarded as the perfect summary of the Christian message. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article analyzes the Biblical phenomenon of consecration using the tools of contemporary philosophy of language. It offers a brief introduction of philosopher William Alston's account of speech act theory. It shows that the separation of an object for god's use occurs in a linguistic community, but that object becomes owned by God in a stronger sense than his general ownership of the cosmos.

This article reflects theologically on the 400th anniversary of the King James Version of the English Bible under the rubric 'translating holiness'. A first section examines the notion of theology as translation as well as the general challenge of translation: saying the same thing in other words. The second section examines the KJV as an essentially literal, nation-building translation. The final section asks whether translation can be considered a fourth form of the Word of God and suggests that its proper dogmatic location is the triune economy of translation in which the Spirit communicates righteousness, forming Christ through the ministry of the Word. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While holiness is one of the motifs in theological discourse that can legitimately be said to entwine many others, the coinage it receives for such honour is being largely exiled from discussion. Thus, any contribution that could be made by considering Jesus Christ as the defining revelation of holiness is sidelined. Beginning with some biblical observations, and enlisting some help from Scottish Congregationalist P.T. Forsyth, this article seeks to encourage a reclaiming of holiness vocabulary as a distinctly christological reality and gift that finds expression first in the unique incarnate life and death of the Son, and then in the life and mission of the community created and sustained by that same Son. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay applies recent scholarly insights on disillusionment as a cultural and psychological phenomenon to the problem of religious disillusionment as experienced by US Catholics in the wake of scandals of clergy sexual abuse. First, it sets forth disillusionment as a category for exploring the theological issue of sinfulness in the church. Second, it considers examples of how Vatican documents and acts of reconciliation in the last decade have been careful to draw distinctions between the faults of individual Christians and the holiness of the Church itself. Third, it presents Augustine as one for whom significant disillusionment, even with the Church, became an avenue for embracing the cross in the broadest ecclesiological context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While much has been written about Levinas's conception of ethics, very little has been said about the connection between ethics and holiness in his work. Yet, throughout much of his corpus, Levinas consistently links the two. The first part of my article addresses the important distinction that Levinas establishes between the sacred ("le sacré") and holiness ("la sainteté"). According to Levinas, several influential thinkers conflate these two categories. Holiness, Levinas suggests, represents a kind of antidote to the sacred. The second part examines the various ways that holiness is manifest in ethicality. The key, I suggest, for properly understanding the link between ethical regard and sanctification revolves around an appreciation of Levinas's frequent appeal to the notion of straightforwardness ("droiture"). For Levinas, the complex relations that bind the self, Other, and God, involve essential conditions of rectitude and uprightness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present article sets out to examine Spenser's claim in the Letter to Raleigh to have established the poetic argument of The Faerie Qveene on a basis of Aristotelian moral philosophy by seeking to relate the moral virtue of holiness (the expressed subject of Book I) to the great issues of faith and humility that dominate the opening cantos of the poem. The poetic focus on faith and humility is not a sign that Spenser himself has lost his way in expounding in allegorical form the nature of holiness as a moral virtue, but rather is an argument in itself for faith and humility together as constituting the irreducible context in which the moral virtue of holiness is to be discovered and by which it is informed. The evidence of this analysis is that the poetic representation of the fights against Error and Sansfoy (cantos 1 and 2) and of the sojourn in the House of Pride (cantos 4 and 5) fully justifies Spenser's claim for the identification of holiness as a moral virtue within an Aristotelian setting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

I argue for the centrality of the concepts of biophysical and human nature in science-and-religion studies, consider five different metaphors, or “visions,” of nature, and explore possibilities and challenges in reconciling them. These visions include (a) evolutionary nature, built on the powerful explanatory framework of evolutionary theory; (b) emergent nature, arising from recent research in complex systems and self-organization; (c) malleable nature, indicating both the recombinant potential of biotechnology and the postmodern challenge to a fixed ontology; (d) nature as sacred, a diffuse popular concept fundamental to cultural analysis; and (e) nature as culture, an admission of epistemological constructivism. These multiple visions suggest the famous story of the blind men and the elephant, in which each man made the classic mistake of part-whole substitution in believing that what he grasped (the tail, for example) represented the elephant as a whole. Indeed, given the inescapability of metaphor, we may have to admit that the ultimate truth about the “elephant” (nature, or the reality toward which science and religion point) is a mystery, and the best we can hope for is to confess the limitations of any particular vision. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Explains that the ecumenical movement affirms the value of righteousness in its mission of unity for all Christian churches. Correlation between justice and righteousness; Contention that righteousness is a value that holds a significant place in Judeo-Christian life and thought for centuries; Argument that righteousness means right relationship with God.

In the view of Hans Urs von Balthasar, what is needed to bring a human life to fulfilment—to become ‘whole’—is the death of one's ‘personality’, and the acquisition of one's specific ‘personhood’, which is given to one, along with one's mission, by God. Moreover, according to von Balthasar, a human being becomes a ‘unique person’ when encountering God in contemplative prayer. And it is within contemplative prayer that one comes into contact with one's ‘Idea’, which is actualised when one' personal identity is fully developed, and which it is one's mission to conform to. Thus this article shows how the fundamental components of von Balthasar's distinctive phenomenological model of human holiness fit together, in actual practice as lived, around his core concept of ‘mission’. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a theory of serpent-handling sects (SHS) that uses a psychodynamic theory of symbol to complement Sundén's role theory as developed and popularized in America. The legitimization of serpent handling is described in terms of attributions derived from a literal interpretation of the King James Bible. Psychodynamic symbol theory is used to argue for the universality of the serpent as a source of body projections ultimately linked not simply to the phallus, but to death and resurrection. Role theory explains how SHS emerged from the initial actions of a charismatic figure who first acted out repressions symbolized in texts dealing with the serpent. The cultural transmission of serpent handling as a sod ally constructed religious practice thus builds upon the universal appeal of the serpent base upon body symbolization. Theoretically grounded empirical studies of the differential attraction to and rejection of serpent handling are recommended both to account for the maintenance of this tradition and for its rejection by groups who once supported the practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This case study examines the relationship between the testimony and the belief system of a holiness-pentecostal sect The step-by-step structure of their traditional fundamentalist theology, a lack of formal passage rites promoting moves between steps, and a belief in spiritual growth through a series of private transformation experiences, create the need for some identity work in this sectarian community Testimony is shown to address this need in its capacity to locate individuals ritually in the social matrix of the group, while concomitantly affirming their desire to change social positions through a more intimate encounter with the spirit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An account of character is developed on the basis of Ricoeur's philosophy of the will. Particular attention is paid to the role of the bodily involuntary in the process of character-formation. This augments the interpretation of the moral meaning of sanctification developed by Hauerwas. When interpreted in light of corporeality, sanctification entails not only a perceptual transformation but also an affective change in the agent's value orientation, the competent retraining of the agent's emotions, and the gracious triggering of an adoptive disposition toward the agent's incarnate situation. Finally, the rootedness of character in embodiment, with the attendant problem of automatism, indicates the limits of the usefulness of an “ethics of character” for moral theology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The notion that “the holy reality wills it” can provide both the rational justification (the move from “is” to “ought”) and the psychological motivation for acting morally. But can the will of God be the criterion for the morally right? Although what is right cannot be reduced to what God wills (due to the perceptual aspect of the meaning of “right”), it can be deduced from it, given an understanding of perception that implies that an omniscient perceiver would necessarily be an impartial sympathizer. This, however, presupposes the ideal observer criterion of rightness, which is based upon an appeal to holiness. Recognizing that the criteriological and religious meanings of moral terms are finally identical overcomes the problems of justification and motivation inevitable in apparently non-religious moral theories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

After critiquing those views of ethics which sharply segregate moral reflection from both social theory and from theological concerns, this paper argues that in dealing with the problem of justification for basic moral stances, an appeal to the “holy” is required The key debates at this level of moral discourse, thus, are not whether theological matters are revolved but how the “holy” is identified or “located” This problem attends both religious and nonreligious views, and inevitably leads ethics to apologetics. Since this is the problem, the question is what the major alternatives are for locating the “holy.” The middle part of the paper thus focuses on a “map” whereby we can discern the major options Finally, the implications of the map are traced out so that its utility in both descriptive and in prescriptive dimensions of moral discourse can be seen. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The grouping together of Holiness and Pentecostal religion for purposes of sociological analysis is not justified. Despite the common theological base and forms of anti-worldliness which they share, Pentecostalism and Holiness religion are distinguishable from one another in terms of the types of religious experience they emphasize. Considerable differences are found in the extent to which their doctrines are distinctive, their organizations exclusive, their meetings inspirational, and their following from the lowest social strata. These differences suggest a greater tendency for Pentecostalism than for Holiness movements to generate sects. The differences are attributed primarily to the highly subjective and invisible nature of Holiness religious experience which has few implications for separatism and enables many Holiness movements to remain interdenominational. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The true mystic is one who seeks to reconstitute the fragmented elements of experience, not to arrive at a conceptual synthesis, but to replace normal consciousness with spiritual chaos. In this state the mystic is able to renew himself by regression to an undifferentiated state of consciousness, in which there is no longer self or "other." It is only by regression to the most archaic levels of religious feeling that one can penetrate the disguises of God, experiencing him as reality, and not as mythical hero or benign father-figure. In this sense, mysticism is different from the attitude of ritual devotion, which stubbornly refuses to repudiate its Adamic nature. The mystic dares to cast off his ego, and along with it, the Adamic nature. The mystic dares to cast off his ego, and along with it, the expectations of others. In this way he replaces the tyranny of the self and of others by the absolute freedom of his surrender to holiness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author explains how ecumenism became the test case of religious faith. He asserts that being ecumenical allows one to practice unity, holiness and apostolicity while expressing peace. With regard to the deficit of peace, he cites faith, love and hope as its important prerequisites. He also stresses the irrelevance of a Christianity that not only lacks credibility but also fails to relate to the increasing need of peace of mankind.

In this article, the author reflects on the holiness of several religious places he visited during his tour to Israel and Palestine including the Western Wall, Church of the Nativity, and the Jordan River. He talks about the Jewish tradition of writing their prayers on a paper and putting them into the Western Wall. He futher talks about the holiness of the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem and the Jordan River.

The article offers a list of books received including "Acts in Its Ancient History," by Alexander Loveday, "Living the Death of God," by Thomas J. J. Altizer, and "Hospitality as Holiness," by Luke Bretherton.

Editorial. Examines several articles on theology published in the July 2002 issue of 'International Journal of Systematic Theology.' Reflection on how holiness determine the shape of public theology; Wesley's doctrine of grace in relation to experimental and practical holiness; Account of concursus which refuses to bifurcate divine and human freedom.

The article reviews the book "Holiness As a Liberal Art," edited by Daniel Castelo.