Kaufmann: Faith of a Heretic

[Metacrock]

I find Kaufmann is a real asshole when it comes to his stupid attacks on theology. He's just an amateur and he's not even willing to study theology on its own terms. the things he's saying are no better than the average message board atheist.


103 of the book he starts by defining theology from Websters and then he falls back on Gibbon. Gibbon was a professional God hater. he was they liar who started the story that Eusebius said it's ok to lie for the faith. When you study the origin of that quote you find Gibbon made it up and attributed it to Eusebus with no backing. This is the jerk that Kaufmann takes as the big authroity on what theology is.

Of cousre he's avoiding using the real source. any definitions in theology should be takne from the Westminster dictionary. that's like discussing law and not consulting Blacks Law Dictionary. Ne never even says anything about faith seeking understanding or participation in a tradition. Those are the two major definitions.

I wish I could copy from the source but they wont let you. make it a lot easier to quote. more tomorrow.

[mdsimpson92]

103 of the book he starts by defining theology from Websters and then he falls back on Gibbon. Gibbon was a professional God hater. he was they liar who started the story that Eusebius said it's ok to lie for the faith. When you study the origin of that quote you find Gibbon made it up and attributed it to Eusebus with no backing. This is the jerk that Kaufmann takes as the big authroity on what theology is.

I believe that Gibbon was still Christian (protestant that briefly became catholic and then became a protestant again), just one that distrusted the Church (I read his work as well.) But then again he was friends with Hume.

[mdsimpson92]

Also, in the previous chapter, he does give a criticism of Tillich's concept of religion as "the object of ultimate concern." He doesn't explicitely bring up Tillich but it is there.

[moksha]

I find Kaufmann is a real asshole when it comes to his stupid attacks on theology. He's just an amateur and he's not even willing to study theology on its own terms. the things he's saying are no better than the average message board atheist.


103 of the book he starts by defining theology from Websters and then he falls back on Gibbon. Gibbon was a professional God hater. he was they liar who started the story that Eusebius said it's ok to lie for the faith. When you study the origin of that quote you find Gibbon made it up and attributed it to Eusebus with no backing. This is the jerk that Kaufmann takes as the big authroity on what theology is.

Of cousre he's avoiding using the real source. any definitions in theology should be takne from the Westminster dictionary. that's like discussing law and not consulting Blacks Law Dictionary. Ne never even says anything about faith seeking understanding or participation in a tradition. Those are the two major definitions.

I wish I could copy from the source but they wont let you. make it a lot easier to quote. more tomorrow.

Kaufmann's "Faith of a Heretic" came out in 1961. Was the 'Westminster dictionary' around then? (I've personally never heard of it but that's no surprise.)
How does it define Theology?

[doxaws]

I find Kaufmann is a real asshole when it comes to his stupid attacks on theology. He's just an amateur and he's not even willing to study theology on its own terms. the things he's saying are no better than the average message board atheist.


103 of the book he starts by defining theology from Websters and then he falls back on Gibbon. Gibbon was a professional God hater. he was they liar who started the story that Eusebius said it's ok to lie for the faith. When you study the origin of that quote you find Gibbon made it up and attributed it to Eusebus with no backing. This is the jerk that Kaufmann takes as the big authroity on what theology is.

Of cousre he's avoiding using the real source. any definitions in theology should be takne from the Westminster dictionary. that's like discussing law and not consulting Blacks Law Dictionary. Ne never even says anything about faith seeking understanding or participation in a tradition. Those are the two major definitions.

I wish I could copy from the source but they wont let you. make it a lot easier to quote. more tomorrow.

Kaufmann's "Faith of a Heretic" came out in 1961. Was the 'Westminster dictionary' around then? (I've personally never heard of it but that's no surprise.)
How does it define Theology?

yes it's been around since the 1800s. you haven't heard of it becuase you didn't go to a major seminary.

[Metacrock]

this is quite a let down. I don't see him saying anything more about Tillich than what I deal with below which is surface level, inarticulate, spiteful and wrongheaded.

My estimation of this guy has really come down since reading these pats of his book. I have no respect for him at all know. read below.

[Metacrock]

http://www.scribd.com/doc/24729241/Faith-of-a-Heretic

p 111

Here he begins to spout the line about there's so little agreement, so much diversity of opinion. If this was truth we should have so much uniformity. I find this the height of hypocrisy. An existentialist complain about diversity of opion and demanding uniformity of truth, what a hypocrite! He can't even take Tillich on his own terms as a modern example of existentialism and apply what he should have already known at that point from SK to Sartre about non-systematic views.

Utter hypocrisy! He can't allow Tillich to be an existentialist because that would legitimize religious bleief. He probalby just had it in for Tillich for being German.

then the has the gall to make the point that people like Tillich and Niebuhr don't' share the views of fundamentalist which is somehow partled into "they are not in line with Luther." As though all the fundies really represent Luther. Tillich knew a lot more about Luther than Kaufmann or the fundies. The more I read of this guy the more I think he's a game player. If he really had the intellectual balls he would have read Tillich's systematic and there's no way to read that (or History of Christian faith) without seeing how deeply influenced he was by Luther and Augustine and the figures that Kaufmann says' he's "nothing like."

Tillich was looking at what the views meant abstractly and universally and the intellectual ramification of them, and Kaumann, if sincere at all which I doubt is merely expecting rule agreeing literalistic agreement.

He attacks their off putting academicese. "they say no in ways that sound like yes." that may be a valid criticism but Kaufmann is no one to talk about, especially with Nietzsche. boy I am sure Glad Nietzsche was never veg about anything hu? If he wasn't Kaufmann wouldn't have had a way to get famous.

[mdsimpson92]

Yikes, granted I haven't read any luther, but you sure are ripping into him aren't you. . . . Want me to try to play devil's advocate?

[Metacrock]

Yikes, granted I haven't read any luther, but you sure are ripping into him aren't you. . . . Want me to try to play devil's advocate?

he doesn't' really say all that much. His criticisms are only about 2 pages at most. If you read Tillich's history of Christian thought and see the love and patience with which he loving unfolds Luther's project you see Luther was a huge influence and big hero in his life. probably his most obscurity book which I can't even remember the tile of is all about interpreting Luther. He takes a lot of care in doing it and he has much more sympathy for Luther than most modern theolgoians. There's Kaufmann saying stuff like he has nothing in common with Luther. that makes me think has he actually read Tillich? Or Luther for that matter?

I agree with is criticisms of Baultmann, I don't like Baultmann much. I agree that most modern theology has that off putting specialist lingo that you have to enter its world an study before you get it.That's one thing I don't like about theology. Although it was something that turned me on about it at first. I don't know why latter I began to feel this is not inclusive it's off putting for non specialists.

On the other hand that's the kind of criticism you have to make carefully in deploying because while aspects of it will be true of all modern theolgoians, it just a pedagogy how deeply can you take a criticism based upon pedagogy?

It is true that the lectures that became History of Christian Thought were complied and published after the Kaufmann book. One can find the same ideas and material in lots of earlier Tillich writings.

[mdsimpson92]

The only work of Tillich's that I can definitely assume that Kaufmann read was Dynamics of Faith. I am not sure of the others.