Negative Theology and!

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Volume 3, Issue 2 | Spring 2006

Negative Theology andTheological HermeneuticsThe !articularity o" Naming #od

Lieven BoeveCatholic University of Leuven

This article will be included in a forthcoming

volume titled The Name of God (consisting ofcontributions to a recent conference of the same

title), published by Mohr Siebeck (Tbingen)!

"#S thanks the publisher for permission to

include it in this issue!

Introduction

n this contribution, I will undertake ananalysis, both from a cultural theological

and a fundamental theological perspective,of the revival of religion in current esternsociety and philosophy! In so doing, I willtry to uncover how a kind of cultural andphilosophical apophaticism is at work in thisreligious revival! I will indeed point to a

negative theological trend, which posesserious challenges for a repositioning ofChristian faith on today"s religious scene,and provide a reflection thereon! Thetheological #uestion is basically thefollowing$ does the cultural transformationof religion in %urope, to which the religiousrevival points, and its reflection incontemporary philosophy, also induce atransformation of Christian faith& In otherwords, is negative theology the future of allChristian theology&

I

In the following, I will first develop howthe transformation of religion in %urope canbe analysed in terms of a kind of culturallymotivated apophaticism, e'pressing anembarrassment with religious traditions thatare too particular and determined, especiallyas regards to Christianity! (econdly, I willfocus on the reintroduction of religion incontemporary, so)called continental

philosophy! In this movement, there is astrong apophatic drive that can bedistinguished, which reduces religion andthe truth claims ventured in it todeparticularised basic structures of religiousdesire! *inally, I will deal with the challenge

these cultural and philosophicaldevelopments put forward for contemporaryChristian theology! Is negative theologyindeed the future of religion, of Christianity,in %urope&

1. Cultural Apophaticism

*irst, I would like to point out atendency in our contemporary conte't thatseems to be of ma+or importance for the wayin which people today, including many

Christians, perceive religion and religiosity!This tendency, which I have coined culturalapophaticism-, would seem to be a productof the processes of detraditionalisation andpluralisation, which have changed thereligious landscape of %urope over the lasthalf century! .oth processes seem to fosterthe development of a broadly)spread, vaguereligiosity that does away with someparticular beliefs of Christian faith and isopen to alternative e'pressions!/

Detraditionalisation and the longingfor something more

The processes of detraditionalisationhave not led to the disappearance of religionin %urope, but to its transformation!0 Thecontinuing institutional and mentaldechristianisation of %urope have not led toa secular culture and society, but to a newkind of vague religiosity! (ome have termedthis phenomenon something)ism-, referringto its rather indeterminable acceptance that

there is something more- to life than factsand figures! (ome claim that this religiosityis not an infantile waste product ofcontemporary secular culture, but a newshape of humanity-s religiousconsciousness, resulting from thedisenchantment with secular rationality andutopia, and reacting against the nihilism inpost)secular society!1 Confronted with the

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Lieven .oeve Negative Theology and Theological 3ermeneutics

contingency and meaninglessness of theire'istence, people develop a new type ofreligiosity with special attention to personale'periences and responsibility, while beingaverse to traditional orthodo' religions! It isthe e'pression of a religious longing,

ade#uate to the contemporary conte't, forthe hope that there is more to life than whatscientific worldviews maintain! To beunderstood most likely as the backside ofthis something)ism is the vivid and profuseoff)piste- religious imagination, whichgives rise to new religious movementsborrowing from %astern religions, therenaissance of ancient Celtic religion, allkinds of syncretisms, etc! To be sure, thisevacuation or deconstruction- of specificChristian beliefs, rituals and practices is not

only visible with those who have taken leaveof Christianity, but also manifests itselfwithin and at the borders of the Christianchurches!

4s a matter of fact, what is apparent inthese strains of religiosity is a kind ofculturally motivated negative theology! Itstrives at relativising elements of theChristian tradition, especially those aspectsit denounces as over)determining,dominating and even oppressing thereligious openness of human beings! The

result is a spirituality with ample attentionfor diversity, freedom, power, energy,positivism, and so on! 5eligiosity thenbecomes a source of +oy and happiness, andat the same time provides strength to copewith life-s dark sides!6This apophatic move,one could say, prompts a scrapping ofencumbering old religious images and ideasin order to start fresh, making room for newand more fitting religious images and ideas,giving shape to a religious longing forharmony, cohesion, etc!

This vague religiosity can be analysedas both the symptom of and the solution tothe crisis of the modern sub+ect, who hasbecome conscious of the fact that he7she isno longer the master of him7herself! In asearch for identity, meaning, harmony,stability, security, the human sub+ectengages in a movement of self)transcendence towards something other, the

divine, which both reveals the limits of thesub+ect as well as enables it to cope withthese limits! The growing number of thosewho believe in life after death reinforces thisline of thought!8 .ecause of the fact thatmeaning is located in the auto)construction

of the self, people cannot situate their owndeath! 5eligion, as self)divinisation ofdecenteredness-, again seems to be first andforemost a mastery of contingency, theopening of a comforting and hospitablehori9on in which everything finds itslegitimate place, and everything is related toeverything else! This would e'plain why thiscultural apophasis sometimes swings in thedirection of an overabundant religiousimagination fed by the diversity of thereligious market, leading to beliefs in

angels, miracles, paranormal powers, andother phenomena, all of which, in someChristian theological circles, have beenabandoned and demythologised in moderntimes!

It is, I suppose, a legitimate #uestion toask why people in their search for religionare not returning to Christianity, especiallywhen one acknowledges that many of themare still nominally Christian! There is ofcourse, due to detraditionalisation, no longeran immediate cultural link between

religiosity and Christianity$ the factualoverlap between the Christian hori9on ofmeaning and contemporary culture hasfaded away! :oreover, Christianity stillsuffers on many occasions from its owncultural)hegemonic past, and in this regardis called to account for seemingly stillunsettled bills! (ome, for e'ample, such asthe ;utch empirical theologian 3ans van der2en, will venture that the language of theChristian tradition, the structures ofChristian churches, etc! are outdated and

should be renewed!a? as regards to God-sotherness, and what is revealed in thisotherness and >b? as regards to the revelationof God in the particularity and contingencyof history@ thus, as regards to the way in

which God is revealed!>a? *irst, those in search for religiosity

often e'perience difficulties with theotherness of God, of a God who from Godsdifference with history comes towardshistory and engages it! They seem to beunable to conceive of >and accordinglybelieve in, or surrender to? a transcendencethat is really distinguished from and anteriorto the human sub+ect! This inability onlybecomes stronger when conceiving of thistranscendence implies the belief in a

personal God making an appeal on people,challenging, perturbing, +udging, lovingthem, etc! The embarrassment thus concernsthe structure of faith, and the inability tocome to faith, as an answer to an anteriorand provocative appeal!

>b? 3owever, this embarrassment notonly concerns God as =ther vis))vishistory, but also the way in which this Godreveals Godself in the particularity ofhistory! Christian knowledge about God isintrinsically linked with an interpretation of

concrete events and stories, embedded inparticular histories of interpretation, andlived by specific communities ofinterpretation! 4 number of contemporariesin search for spirituality appear to havemany difficulties with the irreducible linkbetween revelation and particular history,that is, with a faith tradition that makesconcrete history and remains indissolublybound to it! Christians indeed profess thatGod reveals Godself in a definitive anduni#ue way, unrepeatably, in specific events

on particular occasions! The culminatingpoint here is the profession that the concretehuman being Besus of Na9areth is the Christand that in this Besus Christ, God hasbecome known to us in an incomparableway! *rom the perspective of history,however, these events and occasions are ascontingent and particular as any otherhistorical matter!

I will now try to show how this kind ofcultural apophaticism would seem to bereflected in contemporary, so)calledcontinental philosophy! *or, after decades inwhich mainstream philosophy showed a lackof interest in religion and was very critical

of any turn to religion- H often denouncedas a theological turn- H it appears thatreligion is back in philosophical circles inthe work of prominent thinkers such as %!Levinas, B! ;errida, B!)L! :arion, G!2attimo, (! iJek, and others! 4lso herereligion and negative theology appear to gohand in hand! Aerhaps one could say that thestrong apophatic tendencies apparent in boththe religious revival in contemporary%uropean society and the cultural apophasisconstitute the socio)cultural basis for this

renewed philosophical interest in religiousapophatic thinking patterns!

2. Philosophical Apophaticism

Indeed, a wide range of philosophers,belonging to the phenomenological and7orhermeneutical tradition H denoted ascontinental philosophy- across the 4tlanticH have placed the theme of religion on theirphilosophical agenda, and this often inrelation to their attempt to overcome

ontotheology-, namely, the philosophicalattempt to ground >and signify? the whole ofbeing in an ultimate being, a first causewhich is its own cause, God!/K It isnoteworthy that in this turn to religion, thesephilosophers often introduce negative)theological thinking patterns, now and thenwith e'plicit reference to the Bewish)Christian apophatical traditions! I will verybriefly point to three different approachesfrom Christian thinkers, which all in oneway or another can be analysed from this

angle!Jean!uc "arion: Phenomenology before

#ermeneutics and the Pragmatics of

$aming God

Bean)Luc :arion-s phenomenology ofgivenness,//for instance, takes as its point ofdeparture the saturated phenomenon-!:arion considers the saturated

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phenomenon- to be the prime instance, theparadigm, to speak of reality as a whole Hreality then phenomenologically reduced tothat which appears- as always and alreadygiven, as a gift! In phenomenologicallanguage, this implies that for the sub+ect as

regards to what appears, the intuition isalways greater than the intention, andsupersedes the intentional dynamic of theknowing sub+ect towards the phenomenon!4s a conse#uence, the sub+ect falls short inhis or her attempt to apprehend what isappearing in the phenomenon! The sub+ect isbeda99led in and through the overwhelmingintuition, and is therefore incapable ofgiving a clear and precise signification to thephenomenon! Instead of the nominativecase, in which the sub+ect-s mastery is

acknowledged with regard to theinterpretation and signification of thephenomenon, the sub+ect is turned into thedative case! The sub+ect is the one to whomit is given to-, and who, in this reception,also receives him) or herself! Therefore, thehuman response is always and alreadysecondary, and consists in nothing morethan this responding to the reception ofoneself from givenness! This structure ofappeal and response is, according to :arion,>a? given, and therefore prior to language

and hermeneutics! (o language serves as therecognition of the givenness of that which isgiven in the phenomenon$ not what is beingsaid is of real importance, but thatsomething is said!

*or :arion, this dynamics of appeal andresponse, and the relationship it constitutes,also structures the nature of divinerevelation, and the role of religiouslanguage! Therefore, it is not as much ahermeneutical approach to religion andreligious language that teaches us how to

understand >Christian? religion and religioustruth, but a radicalised phenomenologicalapproach$ i!e! a phenomenology whichserves as a heuristic that is able to reduceparticularity and language to its essentialstructure >autant de reduction, autant dedonation- H the more reduction, the moregivenness?!/0 =nly insofar as a particularreligious discourse e'presses this universal

structure is it discovered to be meaningful!The concrete discourse of this merelypragmatic and performative! 4nd in order tostress that this structure is not specific forreligious language, :arion compares thefunction of religious language with the role

of language in the discourse of lovers! henone, over and over again, asks to one-s lover;o you love me&- and affirms to this otherI love youM-, is this language not alsopredicative&That is, it helps in a radicallypragmatic way to sustain the relationshipbetween one and the other$ nous nousmettons >pragmati#uement? l-un en face del-autre, l-un sous l-effet >perlocutoire? del-autre, dans la distance #ui la fois noussOpare et nous unitP!/1 :arion-s argumentwith regard to negative >or better, mystical/6?

theology displays a similar concern$Christian God)language is not graspedbetween the saying- and unsaying- of whatis proper to God but involves a third way,beyond kataphasis and apophasis,radicalement autre et hyperboli#ue! Car ellene redouble pas la nOgation d-uneaffirmation supOrieure, dOguisOe ou avouOe,mais arrache le discours la prOdication il s-agit de passer d-un usage constatif >etprOdicatif? du langage son usagestrictement pragmati#ueP!/8 %very form of

prayer and praise is reduced to a radicallypragmatic and performative speaking of theGod who is beyond being and discourse ! Itis no longer a matter of naming orattributing something to something, but ofaiming in the direction of, of relating to, of comporting oneself towards, ofreckoning with Qin short of dealingwithP!/


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he wants to overcome! In order words,:arion-s attempt to overcome linguisticpositioning is itself positioned! ;errida, onthe other hand, tries to radicalise thehermeneutical turn of philosophy! *or him,only a hermeneutics that deconstructs all

signification to an originary differentialspace >diffOrance-?, which is presupposedby and makes possible all discourse, isradical enough!/D The later ;errida, hereinemphatically accompanied by Bohn Caputoand others, e'presses the dynamics ofdeconstruction, and the correspondingcritical consciousness, in e'plicitly religiousvocabularies! This results in a so)calledradical hermeneutics of religion- that seeksto determine the religious- in terms ofreligion without religion-, which reduces

religion to a universal structure of religiousdesire! 4s another way of e'pressing thisstructure of religious desire ;errida andCaputo indicate the messianic structure-recognised in, but at the same timedistinguished from the various particularmessianisms! 4s a matter of fact, this radicalhermeneutics results H at least in Caputo-sreception H in a kind of >philosophical?negative theology that e'presses, beyondconcrete discourse and particularity, areligiously being related tothat which lies

at the origin of every particular religiousdiscourse, but is betrayed in every attempt toname it!/ECaputo indeed strives to uncoverthe structure of pure prayer-, that is, arelation of the sub+ect to a Rou- while at thesame time deferring the #uestion whetherthis Rou- in effect e'ists!/F3e is concerned,as it were, with retrieving a form ofspirituality uncontaminated withparticularity and narrativity to the point ofdropping >reducing? the presupposition thatthere is a Rou- to whom or to which the

prayer is directed! Aure religion makespraying etsi ;eus daretur-, not knowingwhether there is a God at the other side- ofthe address! This results in a complete doingaway with all positivity, Christiannarrativity and even negative theology-sultimate limit)affirmation- that there is an=ther, albeit ineffable andincomprehensible! 4t other occasions, Ihave called this movement a kind of

practice often seems to turn into a practicalatheism, because it wants to retain the formof a God)oriented relationship without,nevertheless and parado'ically, adhering tothe God- of this relationship! Committedagnosticism concerns itself with cultivating

the religious attitude in all its purity, i!e!without the linguistic contamination of aparticular narrative and of speculationsconcerning the beyond to which thenarrative is committed to! The passion forunknowing amounts to a passionate refusalto choose between theism H an option for arelation with God H and atheism!

;espite this passion, however, Caputo isalso aware of the fact that neither ;erridanor he himself escapes from linguisticcontamination! In the end, he avows that the

distinction between the messianic- and thediverse messianism cannot be rigorouslymaintained e are always involved withstructures whose historical pedigree we cantrace if we read them carefully enoughThat is no less true of deconstructionitself If we search it carefully enough, wediscover that it, too, is another concretemessianism, which is the only thinglivableP!0/4s for his own position, Caputowould concede that he practices a Christiandeconstruction, but the one which is very

closely tied to Besus the Bew, the Budaism ofBesusP H before its integration inChristianity!00

#ermeneutics of Religion %ccording to

Richard 'earney

It is 5ichard earney, an author whohas difficulties deciding between ahermeneutical, phenomenological ordeconstructionist approach, who hascriticised the tendencies to con#uerontotheology with philosophical negative

theology! In agreement with Aaul 5icoeur,earney resists the short)cut- approaches ofboth phenomenology and deconstruction andtheir respective negative)theologicaloutcome! This outcome reduces the narrativethickness of religious reality to the rathermeagre result of an unknowable anduntouchable transcendence >whichaccording to him might be divine as well as

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monstrous01? to describe the depth)structureof religious realities! earney e'plicitlyrelates the constitution of signification to thelong detour- of a hermeneutic of te'ts and,in so doing, points to the hermeneuticalpresuppositions of the short)cut

approaches!06 =n the other hand, differingfrom 5icoeur and relying on Caputo and;errida, earney is more aware that hisaccount is situated in a particular discourseand that his hermeneutic of religious te'ts,i!e! te'ts from the Bewish)Christian tradition,therefore, entails a certain wager-!08

In The $od %ho May Be0Christian&?religion! To come to such an understanding,he engages a reading of key te'ts from thebiblical tradition! 3is intentions are, wellillustrated when he, for e'ample, offers aninterpretation of the &ehyeh &asher &ehyehof%'odus 1, the story of the self)revelation ofGod in the burning bush! 4gainst anontological reading which conSates Rahwehwith the supreme .eing >ipsum esse? of thephilosophers >leading to ontotheology?,earney furthers H in line with a number of

contemporary e'egetes H an alternativeeschatological reading$ I will be who I willbe-! *or God is not being nor non)being buta self)generating event! God is what he willbe when he becomes his ingdom and hisingdom comes on earth! I am who maybe-$ it is a performative rather than aconstative e'pression, invoking mutualanswerability and co)creationP!0D The Godwho may be is not the almighty, all)knowing, omnipresent God of onto)theology, but remains a God engaged in

history, unconditionally loving and giving,calling us to pra'is of love and +ustice! Thesame eschatological)hermeneutical drivebecomes manifest in earney-s reading ofthe transguration narrative on :ountThabor! The transfigured Christ interruptsthe limits of intentional consciousness andreaches beyond perception, imagination andsignification! :oreover, he is

eschatologically profiled as the way, not theterminus@ the narrative warns against apremature taking into possession! Therefore,we are left with the ethical choice betweentransfiguration and fi'ation$ either totransform our world according to the

Christic icon of the end)to)come@ or to fi'Christ as a fetish whose only end is itselfP!0E

Arecisely because of this eschatologicaltransfiguration, any claim of christo)centrice'clusivism, vis))vis other messianic andnon)messianic religions, is illegitimate!%ven more, perhaps inspired by the;erridean distinction between the messianicand messianisms, earney radicalises thiseschatological reserve, and ultimately Halthough they are his primary sources Hrefuses to acknowledge any de iure

epistemological priority of the biblical te'tsfor his phenomenological)hermeneuticalretrieval of religion! It is at this point thatearney also tends to reduce religionultimately to a #uasi)universal ethico)religious structure, while placing at risk hisown starting point$ that only a hermeneuticaldetour through the narrative thickness ofparticular religious traditions leads to abetter understanding of religion and itsdealings with God!0FThis is well illustratedby his view on the plurality of religions,

which resembles more or less what Idescribed earlier as the cultural way ofconceiving of it! In the end, for earney, allreligious traditions, in one way or another,share the same- caring for +ustice andpeace, for human wholeness and fulfilment,and they all convey narrative wisdom inorder to realise this fulfilment! The God)who)may)be is revealed in and witnessed toin many traditions, of which the insightsmay well be analogous or complimentary!1K

It follows from this that religious truth lies

in what religions have in common H evenunder different hermeneutical perspectives Hrather than in what differentiates them! Thisis the reason earney opposes the verye'plicit confessionally partisan-1/ truthclaims of religions@ and, for earney, theuni#ueness and definitiveness of the fullnessof God-s revelation in the Incarnation inBesus Christ #ualifies to be such a claim!

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regards to the #uestions coming fromphilosophical apophaticism$ can we stillhold to the incarnation to conceive of thereligious truth claim of Christianity& =r isthe belief in the incarnation an a priorihindrance to religious truth and naming

God, rather than the way to do so& In thislast part, I address these theological#uestions from both perspectives!

Cultural %&o&haticism and the $aming of

the God of #istory

*irst of all, I would like to evaluatecultural apophaticism as the e'ponent of apost)Christian religiosity rather than thefuture of Christian faith itself!10 The sameverdict applies to philosophicalapophaticism as well in so far as it reflects

this cultural sensibility, which is the resultof detraditionalisation and pluralisation!

Indeed, as already developed above, Ifear that the two intrinsically interwovenconstitutive elements of Christian faith areunderrepresented or absent in it$ first, thefaith in God as the =ther of history,#ualified by the constitutive differencebetween God and humanity@ and second, theinscription of the involvement of God withhuman beings and history in the veryparticularity of history! It is to these two

elements that the living Christian traditionbears witness, in narratives and pra'is,prayers and rituals, doctrines and reflections!Combined, they give rise to a specificallyChristian critical)hermeneuticalconsciousness! *aith, then, is the option>made from a comple' interplay ofinitiation, will and intellect? to look athistory and society from the perspective ofthis God and to interpret them accordingly!

This precludes a very facileidentification between cultural apophaticism

and Christian apophatic theology! Indeed,some theologians do claim that preciselyhere, a close connection could be madeagain between culture and Christiantradition! (ome would argue that throughthis vague religious apophatic sensibility apossibility arises to conte'tually anchoranew the relevance and plausibility ofChristian faith, to correlate Christian

tradition and the post)secular conte't, inorder to reach a culturally accepted andtheologically legitimate Christian faith!3owever, because of detraditionalisationand pluralisation, reconte'tualisation todayshould be wary of a too easy postulation of

continuity, and should rather develop asensibility for difference and discontinuity!The cultural apophaticism indeed challengesChristian theology, but not to recuperate itbecause of a familiarity with its ownapophatic consciousness! =n the contrary,cultural apophaticism rather leads Christiantheology to rediscover anew the specificityof its own position, including its apophatic)theological dimension! In a Christian radicalhermeneutical consciousness, apophasis isnot doing away with kataphasis, but is

intrinsically at work in it! I will here try tomake this point somewhat clearer!

Christian hermeneutical consciousnessis a resolutely theological consciousness,which aims at a continuous radicalhermeneutics of history from faith in a Godat work in it! This hermeneutic originated inthe =ld Testament, where for the Bewishpeople the e'odus event became thetheological key for reading God-s activity inhistory! The continued theologicalinterpretation of the e'odus event functioned

both in an aetiological >because then,therefore now-? and in a paradigmatic >likethen, so also now-? perspective! In thetheological hermeneutics of the present forthe Bewish people, the e'odus event formedthe structuring pattern for new e'periencesof God-s salutary involvement in history,e'periences which simultaneously gave newshape to the e'odus)God)e'perience!11 Thetransmitted past informed their reading ofthe present@ the lived and interpreted presentre)actualised the salutary e'periences of the

past!It is precisely in this kind ofhermeneutic that the Bewish)Christianapophatic)theological consciousness is to besituated! 5evelation of God in history andthe prohibition to make images of God gohand)in)hand$ the revelation of God to:oses at the burning bush$ I am there foryou- >%'! 1$/6?, leads to the Rou shall not

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make images- on :ount (inai >%'! 0K$6?,for I am the Lord your God, who hasbrought you out of the land of %gypt, out ofthe house of slavery- >%'! 0K$0?! Thenegative)theological critical consciousness,then, does not distract from history,

separating God from the historical andparticular, but rather #ualifies the way inwhich history is theologically interpreted!The God active in history cannot becomprised by history@ every pointing toGod-s activity in history and every witnessto it in narratives and pra'is are thereforesub+ect to an uninterrupted hermeneutics! Inresponse to 5ichard earney$ .iblicaleschatology in no way implies an escapefrom particularity and history, but strictlybinds God-s revelation to it!

The same critical consciousness is atwork in the New Testament! 3ere, from thevery start, the Christological reading keyunderlying the theological hermeneutics ofhistory is apophatic)theologicallyradicalised! Likewise here, this radicalhermeneutic does not distract God and thosebelieving in God from history, but rather tothe contrary! The transfiguration story >:kF$0)/K par!?, e!g! in which Besus is presentedas the glorified Christ in dialogue with%li+ah and :oses, is revealing! hen Aeter,

full of awe, suggests to build three tents, heindeed does not know what to say >:k F$


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to some of the philosophical criticisms, theincarnation, as the anchor point of aconstitutive Christology, is not the end, butthe motor of radical hermeneutics! The alltoo particular is not an obstacle for therevelation of God, but its very condition!

This is what a hermeneutical retrieval of theChristological dogma of Chalcedon pointsto$ the affirmation that Besus Christ is bothGod and human >unmi'ed, unchanged,undivided, unseparated? means proclaimingthat in person, life, speech, and deeds, hewas the definitive hermeneutics of God, butthat he H himself being God H only can beapproached in a radical)hermeneutical way!3e is the definitive revelation of God, andthis precisely in the parado'ical relation ofGod and humanity established in his person!

In so far as Besus Christ is a signification ofthe divine reality, the same religioushermeneutical)critical proviso applies to himas to all other religious discourse! Thehomoousiousof the (on indeed implies thenthat precisely in his person, life and words,Besus Christ is considered by believers to bethe definitive signification >revelation? ofGod H hoever sees me, sees the *ather->cf! Bn /6,F?! This implies at the same timethat his person, life and words, being thesignification of God, can only be known as

the word about the Logos, while standing ina relationship to the Logos! In other words,God-s superfluous love has been revealed ina particular life story that does not e'haustthis love, but nevertheless signifies it in adefinitive way! 4s a particular life story,Besus- narrative bears, entangled inparticularity, witness to the universality ofgrace, which as such can never bearticulated!18

Indeed, incarnation presupposes anongoing radical hermeneutics- that prevents

one from lapsing into either a universalismwithout particularity or a closedparticularism >fundamentalism?! In thisperspective, negative theology assumes arole very different from the onedemonstrated in the aforementionedthinkers$ its aim is no longer to take leavefrom the narrativity of religious discourse,but rather to raise one-s awareness of this

narrativity to the utmost! 4pophatictheology does not abandon cataphatictheology, but #ualifies it!

Aut #uite boldly$ the truth of theincarnation is the incarnation of the truth!This indeed could be the contribution of a

theological concept of religious truth to thecontemporary philosophical debate onreligion! Language does not need to be acontamination or a fall that would make anyreligious concept of truth in the endimpossible and that would compelhermeneutics to leave its entanglement withparticularity behind in the direction of apure, but nonetheless untenable, religioustruth claim! 4 hermeneutic of religion doesnot lead beyond-, let alone behind-,language, but to language itself$ to the

concrete stories, practices, te'ts andtraditions in which religious truth is livedand e'perienced! =nly in these can one findboth the ground and the content of religioustruth claims! It is only from the awareness ofthe entanglement of religious truth with thisconcrete particularity that religious believerscan become more conscious of their beingpositioned in a conte't of religious plurality!4s participants in the interreligiousconversation, they venture, together withothers, religious truth claims, each of which

come from their own particular religiousnarratives and practices!

This may lead to a renewed, radicalhermeneutics of religion that fully takesparticularity as its point of departure, andthat, in order not to fall prey to the pitfalls ofa closed particularism or fundamentalism,develops a critical consciousness preciselyfrom withinparticularity! It is because of theirreducible particularity of religious truthclaims that an ongoing hermeneuticalprocess is called for, a process that, in its

determination of religious truth today, nolonger abandons, but holds fast to preciselythis very particularity!

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Notes

/! *or these paragraphs, I also refer to a longertreatment of this phenomenon in my Cultural4pophaticism$ 4 Challenge for ContemporaryTheology,- in *! .akker >ed?, 'ethinking

cumenism! Strategies for the *st +entury >*(3outepen?, oetermeer$ :einema, 0KK6, DF)F0!0! Cf! e!g! R! Lambert, 4 Turning Aoint in5eligious %volution in %urope-, in "ournal of+ontemporary 'eligion, /F >0KK6? /, 0F)68, andfurther$ 3! Co', The :yth of the TwentiethCentury! The 5ise and *all of (ecularisation--,in G! .aum >ed!?, The Twentieth +entury! Theological -verview, New Rork$ =rbis, /FFF,/18)/61@ A! .erger, The ;esecularisation of theorld$ 4 Global =verview-, in id! >ed!?, The

.esecularisation of the %orld! 'esurgent

'eligion and %orld #olitics, Grand 5apids$%erdmans /FFF, /)/E! (ee also my 5eligionafter ;etraditionalisation$ Christian *aith inAost)(ecular %urope-, in /rish Theological0uarterlyDK >0KK8?!1! Cf! (!! Couwenberg, =nttovering van hetgeloof en het ietsisme- als eigenti+dse uiting vanreligieus verlangen-, Streven >Ban! 0KK6? /K)0K@G! Groot, $eloven en geluk1 over het krediet vaneen religieu2e cultuur >4lfrinkle9ing 0KK6?,2ught$ 5adboudstichting, 0KK6, 8)00!6! (ee also the analyses made by 4! van3arskamp in 3et nieuw4religieu2e verlangen,ampen$ ok, 0KKK!8! Cf! Lambert, Turning Aoint-, p! 61!

3uman 'esponses to the Transcendent, London$:acmillan Aress, /FEF, among others pp! 0FF)1/8, 1EK@ A!*! nitter, -ne arth Many

'eligions! Multifaith .ialogue 7 $lobal

'esponsibility, :aryknoll$ =rbis .ooks, /FF8,18)1D!E! (ee e!g! B! 3ick, The Metaphor of $od

/ncarnate, London$ (C:, /FF1!

F! (! Aainadath, ;iversity of 5eligions, Unity in(pirituality-, in L! .oeve, R! ;e :aeseneer V (!2an den .ossche >eds!?, 'eligious 6perienceand +ontemporary Theological pistemology

>Leuven$ Aeeters Aress, 0KK8!/K! .roadly speaking, the ontotheologicalendeavour seeks an ultimate reason that canaccount for the totality of beings! Its point ofdeparture ) beings ) forbids that ontotheology

encounters anything other, at the end of the chainof beings, than a being! =ntotheology proclaimsthat a being is what it is only insofar as itscontingent mode of being corresponds, and isthereby grounded by, the essence of this

particular being! This essence of a being,however, stands itself in need of a foundation,since the essence of a being, in one way oranother, is dependent upon the >material?e'istence of the being of which it is the essence>in the same way as one abstracts a unifiedessence from diverse empirical tables ?! *or this,ontotheology has recourse to God as the one whosupposedly un)founded or founded in andthrough Godself, grounds the essence of beings,

by simply thinking them or by creating these>imperfect? beings of which God is said to havethe perfect idea eternally! God- can thus onlyappear here in the light of a correspondencetheory, as that being, be it the highest, whoassures a perfect fit between the essence or thebeing- of a being and the empirical being itself!=ntotheology-s obsession with ob+ects decides inadvance how God will enter philosophicaldiscourse@ historically, God is that infiniteinstance that grounds and accounts for thecontingency of particular beings! This God-,then, is often modelled after causal andmathematical theories ) as much as each housere#uires an architect as its cause, the totality anddiversity of beings re#uires a prima causa-, a*irst .eing! God is an instrument used, by

philosophy, to ground finitude and to give

reasons for it! God must be a foundation! Godcannot be anything else than that instance thatsaves the finite system from its own contingencyand incoherency! 4nd yes, this is what we allcall God or, rather, this is what we all calledGodP, from B! (chri+vers, =ntotheologicalTurnings&- inModern Theology00 >0KK


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radical >perlocutoire?$ ni dire ni nier #uel#uechose de #uel#ue chose, mais agir sur autrui et lelaisser agir sur moiP!/6! Ibidem, p! all ellipsesin the original?!/D! Cf! B! ;errida, L&8criture et la diff8rence,Aaris$ (euil, /Feds!?, La religion! S8minaire de+apri sous la direction de "ac:ues .errida et$ianni ;attimo, Aaris$ Xditions du (euil, /FF0KK8? No! 6!0

3ermeneutic of 'eligion, Indiana$ IndianaUniversity Aress, 0KK/!0D! Ibidem, p! 1K!0E! Ibidem, p! 66!0F! 4s already mentioned, I elaborated on thiscriticism in my God, Aarticularity and3ermeneutics! 4 Critical Theological ;ialoguewith 5ichard earney on ContinentalAhilosophy-s Turn >in?to 5eligion-!1K! Cf!, e!g!, ibidem, p! 0, with hints in thisdirection as regards to .uddhism andChristianity >in reference to .ede Griffith?@ The$od %ho May Be, p! < >with reference toCharles Taylor?@ Strangers, $ods and Monsters,

p! 68 >in reference to Thomas :erton?@ and, inrelation to Budaism, Christianity and Islam, againInterreligious ;iscourse H ar or Aeace&-, p! D,and to all religions, ibidem, p! E!1/! 5! earney, Strangers, $ods and Monsters,

p! 6/!10! *or these paragraphs, see also my$ Cultural4pophaticism$ 4 Challenge for ContemporaryTheology-, in *! .akker >ed!?, 'ethinking

cumenism! Strategies for the *st +entury >*(

3outepen?, oetermeer$ :einema, 0KK6, DF)F0!11! *or a clear presentation of this, see$ ;!(attler, and Th! (chneider, Gotteslehre-, in Th!(chneider >ed!?, 3andbuch der .ogmatik,;[sseldorf$ Aatmos, /FF0, 8/)//F, pp! 86)D8!16! ords and deeds that in reference to thescriptures H beginning with :oses H throughreconte'tualisation e'plain the complete Besus)narrative!18! (ee my Christus Aostmodernus$ 4n 4ttemptat 4pophatic Christology- in$ T! :errigan and B!3aers >eds?, The Myriad +hrist1 #lurality andthe 0uest for ?nity in +ontemporary

+hristology>.%TL, /80?, Leuven$ Aeeters Aress,0KKK, 8DD)8F1!

"ournal of #hilosophy and Scripture 2ol! 1 Issue 0, page /1

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