Ben Quash

Fields of Faith : Theology and Religious Studies for the Twenty-first Century

Introduction David F. Ford Part I. The End of the Enlightenments Neutral Ground: 1. The study of religion and the rise of atheism: conflict or confirmation? Michael J. Buckley S. J. 2. Doing theology in the university Denys Turner 3. Shaping the field: a transatlantic perspective Sarah Coakley 4. The study of religion as corrective reading Gavin Flood Part II. Meetings on Common Ground Section 1: Understanding Faith: 5. God Rowan Williams 6. Love Julius Lipner 7. Scripture Peter Ochs 8. Worship Eamon Duffy Section 2: The Practice of Justice and Love: 9. Argument Nicholas Adams 10. Reconciliation John W. de Gruchy 11. Friendship Janet Martin Soskice 12. Justice Maleiha Malik Response: Fields of Faith: An experiment in the study of theology and the religions Nicholas Adams, Oliver Davies and Ben Quash.

If We be Dead with Christ: Christian Visualisations of Death

Sixteenth-century Florentines have left us a visual legacy showing them capable of imagining even the executions of criminals as redemptive deaths, with artistic representations of Christ’s own death and the martyrdoms of saints serving such interpretations. This article will look in detail at one such case, before asking whether there might be analogies to this construction of executions as ‘good deaths’ where other, less obviously dramatic kinds of dying are concerned. The comfort that Christian art about dying can give to the dying is its ability to help them imagine their union with Christ in whatever death they must undergo. On the premise that art about dying can be of fundamental assistance to the art of dying, the article proposes examples of works of Christian art that may address the ‘long dying’ so common in our own medically advanced societies, thereby proclaiming the reach and inclusiveness of the hope of redemption.

Fields of Faith: Frontmatter

Introduction David F. Ford Part I. The End of the Enlightenments Neutral Ground: 1. The study of religion and the rise of atheism: conflict or confirmation? Michael J. Buckley S. J. 2. Doing theology in the university Denys Turner 3. Shaping the field: a transatlantic perspective Sarah Coakley 4. The study of religion as corrective reading Gavin Flood Part II. Meetings on Common Ground Section 1: Understanding Faith: 5. God Rowan Williams 6. Love Julius Lipner 7. Scripture Peter Ochs 8. Worship Eamon Duffy Section 2: The Practice of Justice and Love: 9. Argument Nicholas Adams 10. Reconciliation John W. de Gruchy 11. Friendship Janet Martin Soskice 12. Justice Maleiha Malik Response: Fields of Faith: An experiment in the study of theology and the religions Nicholas Adams, Oliver Davies and Ben Quash.

Fields of Faith: MEETINGS ON MUTUAL GROUND

Introduction David F. Ford Part I. The End of the Enlightenments Neutral Ground: 1. The study of religion and the rise of atheism: conflict or confirmation? Michael J. Buckley S. J. 2. Doing theology in the university Denys Turner 3. Shaping the field: a transatlantic perspective Sarah Coakley 4. The study of religion as corrective reading Gavin Flood Part II. Meetings on Common Ground Section 1: Understanding Faith: 5. God Rowan Williams 6. Love Julius Lipner 7. Scripture Peter Ochs 8. Worship Eamon Duffy Section 2: The Practice of Justice and Love: 9. Argument Nicholas Adams 10. Reconciliation John W. de Gruchy 11. Friendship Janet Martin Soskice 12. Justice Maleiha Malik Response: Fields of Faith: An experiment in the study of theology and the religions Nicholas Adams, Oliver Davies and Ben Quash.

Book Review: Nature, God and Humanity: Envisioning an Ethics of Nature

© The Continuum Publishing Group Ltd 2004. of how to deal with the past. Most, if not all, the essays are shaped by theological presuppositions. Biggar makes this explicit in his treatment of the relationship between punishment, justice and dealing with the past in order to secure the future. At the end of his paper Biggar raises the question of whether the pursuit of reconciliation and forgiveness, and the calling into question of a straightforward retributive view of justice, are inescapably bound up with Christian commitments, especially an eschatological view of the necessary provisionality of the justice available in this age. It is a question which hangs over the book but is left unexamined, except in passing by Biggar and by Forsberg in Chapter 4. It is a question the analysis of which the case studies unspokenly clamour for. For each case study is focused on, more or less, Christendom contexts: that is, countries in which the political institutions (in so far as they exist) and political discourse are directly influenced by the Church and in which the majority faith tradition is Christianity. The unfashionable question that needs to be asked is: what is it about South Africa, as compared with Cambodia or Afghanistan, that makes a Truth and Reconciliation Commission possible? This of course raises the broader question, which is beyond the scope of this book but which lurks in its background, namely: do different religions necessarily give rise to different political responses and formations? Most political pundits, especially in the wake of the attacks on New York and Washington in 2001, assume that there is such a thing as a relationship between ‘religion’ (conceived of in singular terms) and politics — a relationship which is generally seen in negative terms. Yet the veiled implication of this book, and much other work in the area, of post-settlement peacebuilding and the formation of civil society, is that far closer attention needs to be paid to the relationship between various ‘religions’ and politics. In conclusion, the book addresses a vital area and for anyone interested in the theology and practice of forgiveness and reconciliation and how it can be mapped onto concrete political contexts, this book is an important resource.

Book Reviews : Lost Icons: Reflections on Cultural Bereavement, by Rowan Williams. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 2000.190 pp. pb. £12.95. ISBN 0-567-08722-0

Finally, it seemed to me that the overall discussion was rather too long, and the interaction with other Old Testament specialists rather too extensive, for a book aimed in significant part at ethicists. While other Old Testament scholars will appreciate Brown’s extensive interactions, the non-specialist is likely to find much of it a little tedious. This is, of course, a major problem for anyone who seeks to be interdisciplinary how does one communicate effectively with other disciplines without forfeiting integrity or credibility within one’s own? and there are no easy answers. Nonetheless the balance of Brown’s book does not feel quite right in this regard. The real and considerable strengths of Brown’s book remain. Although my guess is that it is more likely to help Old Testament specialists to develop a broader understanding of Israel’s ethics than it is to help ethicists today to appropriate the Old Testament as scripture, I may be underestimating its potential and if so I shall

News of Books

A good book deserves a good reprint and here is one good FB enough for two. Celebrating fifty years since its first appearance in Germany, Josef Pieper’s essay Leisure: The Basis of Culture (Musse und Kult) is apparently reissued from two sources simultaneously, both in Indiana, which seems to be a hive of Pieper enthusiasm. We have received the paperback from St Augustine’s Press of South Bend, which commissioned a new translation from