Who is Saved?Who is Saved?Faith in a Religiously Plural Faith in a Religiously Plural

WorldWorldTheology in Context 5Theology in Context 5

Approaches to TheologyApproaches to Theology

Session 12Session 12

Session OverviewSession Overview

• Christianity’s historic encounter with other faiths

• The 4-fold Paradigm– Exclusivisms– Inclusivisms– Pluralisms– Particularisms

• Seminar: Hick and Rahner• The Exam – an overview

The Christian Encounter with Other The Christian Encounter with Other FaithsFaiths

• Christianity was born into a religiously plural world– Early encounters with paganisms, and other salvation faiths, Orphic

Mysteries, Mithraism– Mixed relationships: positive and negative

• In the C4th – C5th CE the world of Christian Europe became increasingly mono-traditional– Other faiths were ‘banned’– Contact with paganisms as Christianity spread – conversion– Significant tendency to ‘adopt’ other faiths

• In the Middle Ages the only other significant ‘religions’ were Islam and Judaism– Jews were seen as those who had not recognized their messiah and as

guilty of deicide– Muhammad was believed to have been an embittered Cardinal, and

hence was simply a another heretical wing of Christianity• From C18th, but especially C19th, growing knowledge of other faiths

– Various patterns as to how to respond– Generally, missionary response, but this could lead to appreciation

Christian Approaches to Other Christian Approaches to Other FaithsFaiths

• Categorizing Christian approaches to other faiths:

– 3-fold typology:– Alan Race, Christians and Religious Pluralism, 1983:

• Exclusivism• Inclusivism• Pluralism

– Reaffirmed: D’Costa and others– Karkainnen (ecclesiocentric, christocentric, reality centirc)

– 4-fold typology:– Hedges, ‘The Inter-Relationship of Religions: A Critical Examination

of the Concept of Particularity’, World Faiths Encounter, 2003– Knitter, P., An Introduction to the Theology of Religions, 2005– Hedges, ‘A Reflection on Typologies for the Theology of Religions’’,

in Hedges and Race, Christian Approaches to Other Faiths, 2008• Exclusivisms• Inclusivisms• Pluralisms• Particularities

Exclusivism 1:Exclusivism 1:What is it?What is it?

• “The Gospel of Jesus Christ comes to us with a built-in prejudgement of all other faiths so that we know in advance of our study what we must ultimately conclude about them. They give meanings to life apart from that which God has given in the biblical story culminating with Jesus Christ, and they organize life outside the covenant community of Jesus Christ. Therefore, devoid of this saving knowledge and power of God, they actually lead men away from God and hold them captive before God. This definitive and blanket judgement… is not derived from our investigation of the religions but is given in the structure and content of Gospel faith itself.”– (Edmund Perry, The Gospel in Dispute, pp. 18 f.)

Exclusivism 3:Exclusivism 3:VarietiesVarieties

• ‘I am the way’– Acts 4.12: “And there is no salvation in no one else,

for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved”

– John 14:6: “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but by me”

• Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus– “We are required by faith to believe and hold that

there is one holy, catholic and apostolic Church; we firmly believe in it; outside it there is neither salvation nor remission of sins…” (Pope Boniface VIII)

Exclusivism 4:Exclusivism 4:ProblemsProblems

• Saints– How to explain obviously holy people in other faiths?

• Not universally held– It is not the only early Christian/ Biblical paradigm

• How do you know?– Why say this one rather than that one?

• Against God’s love– Denies the Christian loving God – can S/He want most people to

burn in hell?– Stanley Samartha: “Can it be that it is the will of God that many

religions should continue in the world?” (One Christ – Many Religions, p. 49)

Exclusivism 5:Exclusivism 5:What do you think?What do you think?

• Does religion (Christianity – the Bible) explicitly say all other religions are false?

• How do we explain why people brought up in these faiths are damned to hell?

• Is this the traditional (religious/ Christian) viewpoint which should be stuck to in the face of ‘politically correct’ multi-cultural clap-trap?

Inclusivism 1:Inclusivism 1:What is it?What is it?

• “Inclusivism in the Christian theology of religion is both an acceptance and a rejection of the other faiths, a dialectical ‘yes’ and ‘no’. On the one hand it accepts the spiritual power and depth manifest in them, so that they can properly be called a locus of divine presence. On the other hand, it rejects them as not being sufficient for salvation apart from Christ, for Christ alone is saviour.”– (Alan Race, Christians and Religious Pluralism, p. 38)

Inclusivism 2:Inclusivism 2:Biblical SupportBiblical Support

• Biblical Support– “Truly I percieve that God shows no partiality, but in

every nation any one who fears Him and does what is right is acceptable to Him” (Peter in Acts 10:35)

– “In past generations he allowed all the nations to walk in their own ways; yet he did not leave himself without witness…” (Paul in Acts 14.16f)

– “… to an unknown God…” (Paul in Acts 17:22-31)– “That was the true Light, which lighteth every man

that cometh into the world.” (John 1:9)

Inclusivism 3a:Inclusivism 3a: Fulfilment Theology (1) Fulfilment Theology (1)

• Biblical analogies– “Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto

Christ” (Galatians 3:24)– “Think not that I have come to destroy the law and the prophets,

rather I have come to fulfil them” (Matthew– Likewise: other faiths lead people/ are preparations for

Christianity• Their main ideas lead onto Jesus/ Christian faith

• Principle proponents:– Rowland Williams, F.D. Maurice, Cardinal Newman, Max Muller– The Edinburgh Missionary Conference, 1910– J N Farquhar, The Crown of Hinduism, 1913

• Often mistakenly called the ‘founder’

Inclusivism 3b:Inclusivism 3b:Fulfilment Theology (2)Fulfilment Theology (2)

• “When I [Monier-Williams] began the study of Hinduism, I imagined that certain elementary Christian conceptions – such as the Fatherhood of God, the Brotherhood of God, and the Indwelling of God in the human heart – were not to be found there, but a closer examination has enabled me to detect not only these, but almost every other rudimentary idea of our holy religion.”

• Monier Monier-Williams, Religious Thought and Life in India, 1887, p. 234.

Inclusivism 3c:Inclusivism 3c:Fulfilment Theology 3Fulfilment Theology 3

• “The ordinary Hindu wants a temple near his home, that he may be able to see his god at any moment, to make him an offering of food, to ask for his help in distress or in danger, to pour out his heart in prayer or in praise. It is the living, present god that the human heart adores with rapture and gratitude. This is the reason for the limitless multiplication of temples, for the idols of the home and the little shrines by the roadside. The Hindu must have a living god to turn to wherever he is.”

• Farquhar, The Crown of Hinduism, pp. 340-1

• “It is one of the marvels of Christ that He is able to make such an appeal and to make it effectively; so that the man who has been used to the accessibility of idols and the joy and passion of their worship finds in Him, in purest spiritual form, more than all the emotion and stimulus to reverent adoration which their vividness used to bring him.”

• Ibid., p. 343.

Inclusivism 4:Inclusivism 4:Other InclusivismsOther Inclusivisms

• Early Inclusivisms– Justin Martyr, Origen, Augustine, Thomas Aquinas

• “We have been taught that Christ is the first-born of God, and we have declared above that He is the Word of whom every race of men are partakers; and those who have lived reasonably are Christians.” (Justin Martyr, Apology I, XLVI)

• “… for whatever law-givers or philosophers uttered well, they elaborated by finding and contemplating some part of the Word [Logos/Jesus].

• “For each man spoke well in proportion to the share he had of the spermatic word…” (Apology II, X & XIII)

• Anonymous Christians– Karl Rahner – Vatican II

• Mainstream RC thought– The Unknown Christ of Hinduism – Pannikar

Inclusivism 5Inclusivism 5Problems with inclusivismProblems with inclusivism

• Again, exclusive– how do you know one is right?

• Patronizing– Your religion is good, as far as it goes…

• Raises question: why convert?

Inclusivism 6:Inclusivism 6:what do you think?what do you think?

• Is it a more ‘Christian’ doctrine than exclusivism?

• Does it water-down the radical demands of faith and commitment?

Pluralism 1Pluralism 1What is pluralism?What is pluralism?

• Believes full understanding of God’s mercy means all must be saved

• Further, it is parochial to see God’s revelation as just being in one tradition

• No way, except belief/ prejudice to see one tradition (“my own”) as superior to any other (“yours”)– No external criteria for judging; ethical values –

shared; metaphysics – don’t know• Believes all major religions are various

responses to one absolute

Pluralism 2:Pluralism 2:John HickJohn Hick

• John Hick (1922-)– Evangelical Presbyterian – exclusivist– Meets people of other faiths (Birmingham)

• Growing understanding of other faiths:– Christian God > God > The Real

• Main works:– The Myth of Christian Uniqueness

• suggests incarnation not essential– An Interpretation of Religion

• fullest expression of his pluralism– The Rainbow of Faiths

• answers his critics

Pluralism 3: Hick’s PluralismPluralism 3: Hick’s Pluralism• Main streams of thought:

– Copernican Shift• From mono – multi tradition/cultural perspective

– Christology• Reject Chalcedon formula, for NT vision

– Noumenal & Phenomenal• God/ The Real ein sich• God/ The Real as mediated/ experienced

– Truth claims and doctrine• Some claims: non-essential: cosmogenic myths• Some claims: traditionally essential, only eschatologically verifiable

– Non-salvifically essential

– Salvation• All religions from ‘self-centredness’ to ‘reality-centredness’

– Evidence• All religions produce ‘saints’, no access to ‘reality’, so must make

sense

Pluralism 4:Pluralism 4:CritiqueCritique

• Not true to the Christian tradition/ scriptural norms– Clear indications of ‘sole’ turth

• Presupposes that all religions are wrong – inserts a new religion in their place– Actually a form of exclusivism/ inclusivism

• Based in a colonialist, Western, Enlightenment paradigm– Reduces religion to ethics, and oppresses/ denies the ‘Other’

• A viewpoint of those who are not ‘religious’• Ignores the very real differences between faiths – they

are not aimed at similar ends, actually incompatible ends– Different ‘salvations’

• How do you know all are true?

Pluralism 5:Pluralism 5:What do you think?What do you think?

• Is it/ can it be authentically Christian?

• Is it viable to see all religions as paths up the same mountain?

• Does it subvert varied religious narratives to a Western enlightenment narrative?

• Has our knowledge/ awareness/ understanding of other faiths grown so that pluralism is now the only plausible (Christian) story of religious plurality?

Particularity 1:Particularity 1:What is it?What is it?

• “Each faith is unique; alterity is stressed over similarity, therefore seeming common elements in religious experience or doctrine are regarded as superficial.

• “It is only possible to speak from a specific tradition; there can be no pluralistic interpretation.

• “The Holy Spirit may be at work in other faiths, requiring them to be regarded with respect and dignity.

• “No salvific potency resides in other faiths; they are somehow involved in God’s plans for humanity, but in ways we cannot know.

• “Particularity is based in a post-modern and post-liberal worldview.

• “The Trinity and Christ are grounding points from which to do theology and approach other faiths.”– Hedges, ‘Particularities’, in Hedges and Race, 2008

Particularity 2: Particularity 2: who and what?who and what?

• Who?– Gavin D’Costa– Alistair McGrath– Rowan Williams– John Milbank– George Lindbeck– J. A. DiNoia– Kevin Vanhoozer– <Links with>

• Pope John Paul II• Pope Benedict XVI• Hans Urs von Balthasar• Karl Barth

• What?– Every faith is unique

• common elements (religious experience/ doctrine) = superficial

– Can only speak from a specific tradition

• no pluralistic interpretation.– Holy Spirit may be at work in

other faiths• regard with respect and

dignity.– No salvific potency in other

faiths• somehow involved in God’s

plans– Trinity and Christ central

• Basis to approach other faiths

Particularity 3:Particularity 3:CritiqueCritique

• Claim that every cultural system/ religion is a ‘closed book’ = wrong

• Absolute difference just as totalizing as similarity• Based in a secular agenda• It violates religious truth claims of similarity• Language of ‘respect’ hides an agenda of

arrogant supremacy• Postcolonial response to retain supremacy

against the ‘other’

SeminarSeminar

• Rahner:– What’s he on about?

• Hick:– What’s he on about?

Why focus on inclusivism and Why focus on inclusivism and pluralism?pluralism?

• All mainstream Christian traditions have rejected exclusivism and embraced inclusivism– RC, Orthodox, Anglican, Lutheran– Exclusivistic traditions: parts of the Reformed

tradition, evangelical groups/ tendencies

• The main challenge to this is pluralism– Particularity is too academic and, I think, flawed: also

tends to inclusive or exclusive forms– A way to relate to the religious world of post-

modernity

RahnerRahner• Following Vatican II, RC accepted the possibility of grace outside

Christianity (Catholicism)• Sets out 4 theses:

– Christianity alone is true• Only salvation is that found through Christ• Has a history and beginning• Therefore not universal always

– Non-Christian religions can have both natural and supernatural knowledge of God

• Plausible that grace was given elsewhere prior to Christianity• Other faiths = grace and depravity• Cannot say what opposes God’s will in them• Become unlawful when in real contact with Christianity

– We meet anonymous Christians in other faiths• Meet others already touched by grace• May meet salvation through this route – but this is via Christ

– Religious plurality will continue• May be hoped religious plurality will disappear• But as they contain anonymous Christians, church should not see its bounds

as fixed• Therefore expect both pragmatically and theologically that religious pluralism

will continue

HickHick

• Copernican Revolution– All revolve around divine

• Belief in real as is and as perceived– Examples from every tradition

• Interaction of divine reality and streams of human culture = religious traditions

– Different views of deity and impersonal– Elements of human distortion: wars, slaughter, etc.

• Possibility of same reality = personal & impersonal?– Light waves and particles

• Scientific way to understand variations in divine

• Different experiments to find God– Different results: theistic worship or meditation

• Does not downplay very real differences• Basic similarity: all salvation focused

– Problem – answer – path– Self-centredness > reality-centeredness

DiscussionDiscussion

• Is exclusivism un-Christian? Does the Christian God create most people as destined for hell?

• Should we see inclusivism as the best Christian solution? Is it true to belief in Jesus as Christ and a loving God?

• Does the post-modern world require us to accept pluralism? Do we simply have no viable way to determine which faith is true?

• Which solution do you prefer and why? Or none of these – explain.

Session OverviewSession Overview

• Understand the 4fold typology of approaches to other faiths

• Know the main arguments for and against exclusivism, inclusivism, pluralism

• Know about Rahner’s anonymous Christian proposal and Hick’s pluralism

• Have an understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of both the above