Dallas Willard's Newest

Oddly enough, this book was released as an audiobook at Christianaudio.com nearly a month before it's paperbound release.

I downloaded it and listened to it a couple weeks ago. I really enjoyed it! It was a little more complex than his previous spiritual writing in terms of philosophical discussions, but worth the effort for those unfamiliar with philosophy.

The main questions put forth were:
1. What has historically constituted knowledge?
2. Who defines knowledge in current culture and society?
3. How does Christian knowledge fit?

He did a great job of answering these questions, while also critiquing the philosophical ignorance par excellence of some recent writers (and one well-known biologist) against religion. He also had some interesting critiques of the academy at large.

My one negative would be that I thought the section on Christian pluralism (while a good section) didn't seem to fit well with the rest of the discussion.

I've loved Willard since I first stumbled upon and read The Spirit of the Disciplines a number of years ago. In some ways, it seems to me that we have limited the number and types of things we call knowledge today in ways that often do not serve us. Among other things, we seem to often, for no reason, exclude the higher and more interesting questions as categories of knowledge.

The chapter described as Christian pluralism sounds very similar to the continuing Orthodox belief and the position to which the Roman Catholic church has returned. I'll be interested to see how much it actually does parallel that traditional belief.

Stop adding books to my list, I'm too poor for this!

Also, I'm pretty sure those are grapes.

Dang it, Scot. Yet another one to add to my stack (as I continue to slog through, for the third time, Richard Stearns' The Hole In Our Gospel).

That aside, I've always enjoyed Willard. His work is luminous, and I'm looking forward to reading this one.

I'm curious to see the footnotes. I wonder who he engages.

Contemporary philosophers (John Howard Yoder? Stanley Hauerwas? Alasdair MacIntyre? Alvin Plantinga? James K. A. Smith?)

or earlier philosophers (Aristotle? Augustine? Thomas Aquinas? Luther? Erasmus? Kant?)

or contemporary biblical scholars (N.T. Wright, Richard Hays, Scot McKnight, Craig Keener, Craig Blomberg, Doug Moo, Howard Marshall, Richard Bauckham, Anthony Thisleton, Markus Bockmuehl)

or theologians (John Calvin? Dietrich Bonhoeffer? Karl Barth? Hans Urs von Balthasar? James W. McClendon? Rowan Williams? Alister McGrath? John Milbank? Kevin Vanhoozer? Nancey Murphy? LeRon Shults?)

or Christian classics (Teresa of Avila, Thomas a Kempis?)

or pop culture?

This work of Willard's sounds very interesting. Scot if it is as you say that the "unifying theme of the book is that "knowledge" of Christ can be claimed as a genuine, intellectual, and responsible form of knowing in our world" then I am guessing and hoping really that his offering will include Michael Polanyi's philosophical perspective on "personal knowledge". Inherent to this discussion - in conjunction with the treatment that a dichotomy between faith and reason is epistemologically inaccurate (as it seems Willard will be hitting on) is the need to bring greater awareness to testimonial dependence in the knowing process.

"..in the current epistemological climate of postmodernity, justifying propositions is not enough. What needs to be validated is not only the propossitio but the entire speech act of testifying." (Vanhoozer, First Theology pg. 361)

"our reliance of testimony 'goes beyond anything that could be justified by personal observation.'...testimony is an irreducible form of knowledge." (Ibid pg. 361)

"Justification in a fiduciary scheme has to do not with "founding" the evidence given by a witness but with trusting it." (Ibid pg. 361)

"...we are only rational i trusting others who are reliable in showing us the way or in giving us the truth. Most to be trusted therefore are those who are demonstrably knowledgeable or wise" (Ibid pg. 360)

"The reliable and authoritative witness becomes a conduit of rationality." (Ibid pg. 363)

All these quotes to say I hope that Willard goes into this area when it comes down to "trusting in spiritual knowledge." It is a huge undertaking to have to deconstruct modern notions of knowing to a more holistic and intuitive sense that goes beyond the scientific method. (I am not against science by the way)

The conversation about Christ as a reliable and authoritative witness and/or conduit of rationality is the big idea here that needs to be asserted forward to wider culture. I believe and hope this is where Willard is going to some degree.

For an excellent book on Michael Polanyi's philosophy and its "tacit" accommodation to Biblical Theology check out Esther Light Meeks,
"Longing to Know: The Philosophy of Knowledge for Everyday People."

I wrote a post a while back Thoughts on Trust,Belief and Faith that go into this a bit further. I am totally armchair so forgive gross oversimplification of issues if you will, though I welcome dialogue. :)

http://miguelmesa.blogspot.com/2007/11/thoughts-on-trust-belief-and-faith.html

Scot will you being doing a series on this book or were you basically plugging it?

Charis & Shalom