Dennis B. posted an article on
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Oct 8, 2011, 9:28 am
Gotthold Ephriam Lessing (1729-81) is famous for a great many things, one being the authorship of the trenchant phrase, "the ugly broad ditch which I cannot get across."
Lessing's "broad ugly ditch" concerns the supposed jump Christian theology must make from the accidental truths of history to the ... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Sep 4, 2011, 3:14 pm
For some time now I have been interested in theological semantics. Reading Wittgenstein's Tractatus thirty years ago, made me acutely aware of the problems we encounter when we try to talk about extra-worldly" things. (I include any talk about a talking about extra-worldly things as itself an ex... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Jul 1, 2011, 10:23 am
As many of you know, I have had the opportunity these last years to serve as the founding president of the Institute of Lutheran Theology. I have been grateful to have been able to do this. The time came a few months ago, however, for me to reevaluate what it is that I can do and can't do. Wit... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Mar 17, 2011, 9:05 am
The general structure of cosmological arguments is well known: Starting from general features about the world (e.g., that there is movement), these arguments proceed by pointing out that these general features must have a cause, and this cause must have a cause, and since if there were no first caus... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Mar 11, 2011, 12:00 am
Joel 2:1-18 speaks of the "Day of the Lord." This day is "a day of darkness and gloom, a day of clouds and thick darkness! Like blackness spread upon the mountains a great and powerful army comes; their like has never been from of old, nor will be again after them in ages to come." The people a... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Mar 5, 2011, 5:01 pm
One of our assumptions at the Institute of Lutheran Theology is theological realism, the notion that God exists and has a definite contour apart from human awareness, perception, conception and language. While this would not be a surprising claim for most believers throughout Christian history, it... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Jan 8, 2011, 11:17 am
The German philosopher Martin Heidegger was fond of the seventeenth century Pietist phrase, “Denken ist Danken, (to think is to thank).” Heidegger writes, “Pure thanks lies in this, that we simply think that which is solely and properly to-be-thought.”
But what is it that properly ought to... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Nov 30, 2010, 12:07 am
For sometime now I have had the reoccurring thought that theology employs theories in much the same way as the natural sciences. Of course, with the natural sciences, theory construction and disconfirmation is patent. We know that if theory T has as a logical consequence P, and if ~P actually t... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Sep 3, 2010, 1:22 am
Some distinctions are so basic and simple that we denizens of North America tend, in general, to forget them. One such distinction is between the normative and the descriptive. While Hume famously taught that one cannot derive an "ought" from and "is," many no longer can grasp that statements ab... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Aug 16, 2010, 7:32 pm
In 1988 I attended my first Luther Congress. We met in Oslo, Norway. While there I met a young Finn named Risto Saarinen who gave me a copy of the book Thesarus Lutheri. Later I was given a copy of Luther und Theosis and I began to read.
In the early 1990s, I became quite interested in wheth... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Aug 15, 2010, 3:30 pm
To say that 'John wrecked the car' is to make a causal statement. It is to say that 'John caused the wrecking of the car'. To make such causal statements truthfully demands that there is some state of affairs (or some states of affairs), on the basis of which, it is true that 'John caused the wre... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Mar 28, 2010, 7:50 am
Oswald Bayer's Martin Luther's Theology: A Contemporary Interpretation is must reading for anyone interested in Luther and Lutheran theology generally. Ably translated by Thomas Trapp, this work was originally 30 hours of lectures for a general studies course at the University of Tuebingen in the Wi... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Mar 26, 2010, 11:08 am
Bayer believes that Luther's foundational thesis, Sacra scriptura "sui ipsius interpres," is not primarily a claim of the hermeneutical circle: the parts interpret the whole, and the whole interprets the parts. It is instead a statement of the effect the text has on one reading, hearing and inter... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Mar 20, 2010, 11:00 am
The words mean "the philosophical sign is a mark of an absent thing; the theological sign is a mark of a present thing." The proposition is recorded in the Tischreden of Luther (WATR 4.6666.8f), and it is used by Oswald Bayer (Martin Luther's Theology: A Contemporary Introduction to state a general... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Mar 14, 2010, 2:42 pm
It has become commonplace within Lutheran theology to downplay the notion and use of descriptive true/false statements. While it is true that in natural languages we regularly assign both intensions and extensions to account for meaning and truth-conditions, there is a strong recent tradition in ... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Feb 27, 2010, 12:50 pm
In the last two blog posts, I have discussed some possible advantages to understanding 'God' as used by Christians as a rigid designator. Spurning the descriptivist view that 'God' just means 'aliquid quo nihil maius cogitare possit', I have suggested we might move forward theologically by delimit... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Feb 26, 2010, 9:03 am
I had a conversation yesterday with someone following this blog about whether or not yesterday's post Luther, God, and Rigid Designation, somehow was in conflict with the things I have earlier said about Luther and ontology. I want to clarify. To say that the locution 'aliquid quo nihil maius co... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Feb 25, 2010, 7:16 am
Famously, Luther differed from Thomas in holding that God's power extended over the laws of logic. Thus, while Thomas could so that not even God could make a square circle, Luther denied this, holding that if God truly is an infinite being with infinite power, the laws of logic cannot dictate what... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Feb 18, 2010, 8:20 am
We often make identity statements where those things seemingly identified could have existed without being so identified. A putative example is 'The Morning Star is the Evening Star'. Presumably the identity here is contingent; while it is true that 'Morning Star' and 'Evening Star' pick out the... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Feb 15, 2010, 4:54 pm
One can talk about many things without claiming that those things exist. For instance, one can speak about imagined things (e.g., unicorns), fictitious characters (e.g, Sherlock Holmes), or even theoretical entities (e.g., charmed quarks). One can also talk about things that exist, but not in th... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Feb 14, 2010, 1:56 pm
To the question, "How do I know that my Redeemer lives?" some facilely respond "by faith." But what is this "by faith" whereby they know that there Redeemer lives? This is a question perhaps we have not explored deeply enough - - or at least not deeply enough in those areas which are by nature... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Feb 13, 2010, 12:14 pm
For a time 50 years ago the contingent identity thesis was all the rage in the philosophy of mind. The idea was simple. While mental terms and physical terms (brain language) did not mean the same thing, mental and brain language could still refer to the same thing. Just as 'Morning Star' and ... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Dec 15, 2009, 5:55 pm
It has been far too long since I have posted. What is the reason for this delay? It is, of course, that the Institute of Lutheran Theology has taken up far too much of my time. But what is this Institute of Lutheran Theology and why would I let it take up so much time?
I have been graced to be... Comment - Like
Dennis B. posted an article on
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Jun 16, 2009, 2:51 pm
This address was given at the ILT Theological Conference at Mt. Carmel on June 7 - 10.
Introduction
I want to say something today about the theological direction of the Institute of Lutheran Theology, and how that direction relates to preaching and teaching in the parish. This is a very impor... Comment - Like
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