Henry Nelson Wieman

Empiricism in Religious Philosophy

The religious philosophy of William Ernest Hocking is empirical in the sense that he finds in human experience the reality which calls for worship and religious commitment. This reality is our awareness of a total, unifying whole. In our daily life we strive for ends unattained, we encounter diversities which seem irreconcilable, we engage in futile conflicts, we come to meaningless dead ends. But we could not distinguish these for what they are if we did not experience them against the background of a “whole idea.” This awareness of a comprehensive whole is brought to consciousness by reflection and most vividly experienced by the mystic. This comprehensive unity is the goal of all our strivings; and in worship we can apprehend its living presence, revealing the ultimate significance of our lives. In summary Hocking writes: “Religion…. is the present attainment in a single experience of those objects which in the course of nature are reached only at the end of infinite progression. Religion is anticipated attainment.” 1

LONG, EDWARD LEROY, JR. Conscience and Compromise: An Approach to Protestant Casuistry. Pp. 166. Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1954.

newer French cultural philosophers who often write discerning social psychology under the head of &dquo;metaphysics.&dquo; As for the general American reader who has recently been acutely interested by the books of Kinsey and Riesman on related topics, Harding’s book will do much to save him from the dilemma of a faqade of calculation combined with moral dullness or aesthetic vision in which fantasy tends to replace rational estimates. HENRY A. FINCH

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answer is not very convincing to this reviewer. In the end he concedes that the A.A. in principle is essentially correct, and that it is an &dquo;almost perfect analogy of true religion, which is unique in its claims.&dquo; But elsewhere he expresses some grave doubts with what appear to him as trends toward institutionalization and more formalization of A.A. Could our author be pointing at what may be a weakening aspect of the formalized and institutionalized religion of the Christian Church? This is recommended reading for all church folk and all drinkers. True Christians and A.A. members only can afford to skip it. This will not be too serious to either publisher or author. W. I. NEWSTETTER University of Pittsburgh

WILD, JOHN. Plato's Modern Enemies and the Theory of Natural Law. Pp. xi, 259. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1953.

P ROBLEMS OF TWO SORTS confront the teacher of religion. You can divide them into fifty seven varieties if you like. First are the problems inescapable, involved in the daily work. One cannot teach at all unless he solves them to some degree. If he mastered them completely and perfectly he would be a great teacher in the sense that he would shape the lives of his students with power and even mould his local institution and associated colleagues to a considerable measure. But if he did all this, still his work in the long run would come to nothing if the second kind of problem, here to be discussed, is not solved. This second kind pertains to the whole religious and social situation of our time.

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ONSCIOUSLY and clearly formulated norms for appraising ones own religion and that of others have not been used in the past. Throughout the civilized portion of history religion has been criticized, corrected, and transformed by some standards or other. But these standards were not deliberately developed with a view to liberating the critical judgment from the bias and limitation of patterns set by traditional authority, by felt needs, by wishful thinking, and by undisciplined intuitive insight. These standards were not fashioned with a view to making the critic sensitive and appreciative toward all the important factors involved which might improve or impair that outreach of man called religion. They were not based on principles brought to light through a study of the nature of religion and of its place amid all the other activities of human living. One source of criticism accepted as authoritative in many different times has been the intuitive insight of men who have been hailed as prophets. Sometimes these insights have been noble and illuminating and sometimes the opposite. They range all the way from the prophetic utterances of Jeremiah, Jesus, and Paul to Brigham Young, Mary Baker Eddy, Aimee Semple McPherson, Voliva, and a host of obscure founders of sects. The difficulty with this kind of criticism and authority is that it does not carry in itself any principles by which to determine its merit. It is potent and far reaching according to the magnetic appeal or other kind of power wielded by the one who makes the

VI THE COMPREHENSIVE PROBLEM OF Religious Instruction

IN ORDER to know a street car or anything else we must have before us the right data. Then we must connect these data together in the right way. In the case of the street car the data are a loud noise of a certain quality, a blurred mass moving in a straight line, and much else. But connecting the data in the right way is just as important as getting the right data. The loud noise must be connected with the blurred mass, and the straight movement of this mass must be connected with the steel rails. This right way of connecting the data we shall call the pattern. The philosophical word for it is con-

Authority and the Normative Approach

gious problem is that of setting up help-gaining relations with the cosmic activities which produce and foster personality; these activities we must conceive in a personal pattern. The existence of personality-producing activities can alone account for man. If the conception of spirit no longer has place in our psychology, we must turn to that of the living organism. In our choice of a pattern, we must keep to the frontier of our knowledge of psychology and be true to our understanding of the cosmos. Hence the

Values: Primary Data for Religious Inquiry

three chapters are devoted to the important years under Cromwell and the Restoration. In these years of unrest the Independents stood firmly by their principle of liberty as over against enforced uniformity. With the passage of the Toleration Act (1689) there began a period of religious decline which lasted until the evangelical revival. Congregationalism, during these years, manifested a narrow separatism. They still were subject to certain disabilities, such as exclusion from the national universities; and this seemed to give them little inclination to concern themselves with the well-being of the people at large. The Wesleyan revival gave them new life and imbued them with a new spirit, a spirit which has remained with them to the present.

Religion as Knowledge and as Love

possibilities. Furthermore, the forms which religion has taken have been remarkably diversified, even to the extent of being mutually opposed at certain points. Thus religion with some persons has been predominantly practical, and with others it has been predominantly mystical. It has emphasized the individual, and it has also emphasized the social group. When dealing largely with the individual, it has advocated self-development and also self-repression. It has been emphatically ethical and also subordinately ethical. In one formulation re-

A Psychological Study of Wesley and Methodism

This article undertakes to show some of the implications of the conception of meaningless experience. This type of experience is first defined. The place of meanings in experience is then discussed. It is shown that meanings normally point to definite events. If, however, a system of meanings be developed without reference to the concrete events to which they should point, we may have a closed system of concepts pointing to nothing outside itself; and hence practically meaningless. Finally, the significance of mysticism is discussed, particularly with reference to the situation in which old meanings have been abandoned, while new meanings have not yet been discerned. Mysticism provides a way of feeling meanings which have not yet been formulated. It is thus an important factor in the development of new meanings. Religion fosters this creative mysticism, and hence is a source of originality in interpretations of reality. Worship brings us into direct relations with the whole of reality in such a way as to break up our shallow conventionalities and to suggest new and more profound interpretations.