The Metaphysics of the Incarnation in Contemporary Analytic Philosophy of Religion

Marek Dobrzeniecki

Catholic Academy in Warsaw , Poland
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1992-3222


Abstract

The paper presents the latest achievements of analytic philosophers of religion in Christology. My goal is to defend the literal/metaphysical reading of the Chalcedonian dogma of the hypostatic union. Some of the contemporary Christian thinkers claim that the doctrine of Jesus Christ as both perfectly divine and perfectly human is self-contradictory (I present this point of view on the example of John Hick) and, therefore, it should be understood metaphorically. In order to defend the consistency of the conciliar theology, I refer to the work of, among others, Eleonore Stump, William Hasker, Peter Geach and Kevin Sharpe. As a result, I conclude that recent findings in analytic metaphysics provide an ontological scaffolding that explains away the objection of the incompatibility of the doctrine of the hypostatic union. In order to confirm this conclusion such metaphysical topics as properties attribution (what it means for an object to have a property), relation of identity (what it means for an object x to be identical with object y), and essentialism and kind membership (what it means for an object to belong necessarily to a kind) are scrutinized in detail.

Keywords:

the Chalcedonian dogma, Christology, Analytic Philosophy of Religion, the relative identity, the Incarnation, borrowed properties

Aristoteles, Metaphysica; English trans. C.D.C. Reeve: Aristotle. Metaphysics (ed. C.D.C. Reeves) (Indianapolis IN: Hackett 2016).

Beall, J.C., The Contradictory Christ (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2021). (Crossref)

Coakley, S., “What Does Chalcedon Solve and What Does It Not? Some Reflections on the Status and Meaning of the ‘Chalcedonian’ Definition,” The Incarnation. An Interdisciplinary Symposium on the Incarnation of the Son of God (eds. S.T. Davis – D. Kendall – G. O’Collins) (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2002) 143–163. (Crossref)

Conn, C.H., “Relative Identity, Singular Reference, and the Incarnation: A Response to Le Poidevin,” Religious Studies 48/1 (2012) 61–82. (Crossref)

Flint, T.P., “Should Concretists Part with Mereological Models of the Incarnation,” The Metaphysics

of the Incarnation (eds. A. Marmodoro – J. Hill) (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2011) 67–87.

Geach, P.T., Reference and Generality (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press 1980).

Hick, J., The Metaphor of the God Incarnate. Christology in a Pluralistic Age (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox 1993).

Hick, J., “Jesus and World Religions,” The Myth of God Incarnate (ed. J. Hick) (London: SCM 1977) 167–185.

Hasker, W., “A Compositional Incarnation,” Religious Studies 53/4 (2017) 433–447. (Crossref)

Hauser, C., “On Being Human and Divine: The Coherence of the Incarnation,” Faith and Philosophy

/1 (2020) 3–31.

van Inwagen, P., “And Yet They Are Not Three Gods, But One God,” Philosophy and the Christian Faith (ed. T.V. Morris) (Notre Dame, IN: Notre Dame University Press 1988) 241–278.

van Inwagen, P. – Sullivan, M., “Metaphysics,” The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (ed. E.N. Zalta) (Spring 2020 Edition) https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2020/entries/metaphysics/ [access: 16.05.2020].

Kripke, S., Naming and Necessity (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press 1972). (Crossref)

Le Poidevin, R., “Identity and the Composite Christ,” Religious Studies 45/2 (2009) 167–186. (Crossref)

Leftow, B., “Against Materialist Christology,” Christian Philosophy of Religion. Essays in Honor of Stephen T. Davis (ed. C.P. Ruloff) (Notre Dame, IN: Notre Dame University Press 2015) 65–94.

Leftow, B., “A Timeless God Incarnate,” The Incarnation. An Interdisciplinary Symposium on the Incarnation of the Son of God (eds. S.T. Davis – D. Kendall – G. O’Collins) (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2002) 274–300. (Crossref)

Leftow, B., “Composition and Christology,” Faith and Philosophy 28/3 (2011) 310–322. (Crossref)

Leftow, B., “The Humanity of God,” The Metaphysics of the Incarnation (eds. A. Marmodoro – J. Hill) (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2011) 20–44. (Crossref)

Loke, A., “Solving a Paradox Against Concrete-Composite Christology: A Modified Hylomorphic Proposal,” Religious Studies 47/4 (2011) 493–502. (Crossref)

Marmodoro, A., “The Metaphysics of the Extended Mind in Ontological Entanglements,” The Metaphysics of the Incarnation (eds. A. Marmodoro – J. Hill) (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2011) 205–227. (Crossref)

Marmodoro, A. – Hill, J., “Composition Models of the Incarnation: Unity and Unifying Relations,” Religious Studies 46/4 (2010) 469–488. (Crossref)

McCord Adams, M., Christ and Horrors. The Coherence of Christology (Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press 2006) (Crossref)

Pawl, T., In Defense of Conciliar Christology (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2016). (Crossref)

Pawl, T., In Defense of Extended Conciliar Christology. A Philosophical Essay (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2019). (Crossref)

Plantinga, A., “On Heresy, Mind and Truth,” Faith and Philosophy 16/2 (1999) 182–193. (Crossref)

Russell, B., “On Scientific Method in Philosophy,” Mysticism and Logic and Other Essays (ed. B. Russell) (London: Allen & Unwin 1917) 97–124. (Crossref)

Senor, T.D, “The Compositional Account of the Incarnation,” Faith and Philosophy 24/1 (2007) 52–71. (Crossref)

Sharpe, K., “The Incarnation, Soul-Free: Physicalism, Kind Membership, and the Incarnation,” Religious Studies 53/1 (2017) 117–131, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0034412515000530. (Crossref)

Stump, E., “Aquinas’ Metaphysics of the Incarnation,” The Incarnation. An Interdisciplinary Symposium on the Incarnation of the Son of God (eds. S.T. Davis – D. Kendall – G. O’Collins) (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2002) 197–217. (Crossref)

Download

Published
2021-06-30


Dobrzeniecki, M. (2021). The Metaphysics of the Incarnation in Contemporary Analytic Philosophy of Religion. Verbum Vitae, 39(2), 571–587. https://doi.org/10.31743/vv.12403

Marek Dobrzeniecki  mdobrzeniecki@pwtw.pl
Catholic Academy in Warsaw https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1992-3222



License

The author(s) grant (s) to the Licensee a non-exclusive and royalty-free license in accordance with the provisions of the Appendix: LICENSE TO USE THE WORK