DIALOGUES BETWEEN FAITH AND REASON: THE DEATH OF GOD AND THE RETURN OF RELIGION

Book ID/图书代码： 03360010B43257

English Summary/英文概要： The contemporary theologian Hans Küng has asked if the "death of God," proclaimed by Nietzsche as the event of modernity, was inevitable. Did the empowering of new forms of rationality in Western culture beginning around 1500 lead necessarily to the reduction or privatization of faith? In Dialogues between Faith and Reason, John H. Smith traces a major line in the history of theology and the philosophy of religion down the "slippery slope" of secularization—from Luther and Erasmus, through Idealism, to Nietzsche, Heidegger, and contemporary theory such as that of Derrida, Habermas, Vattimo, and Asad. At the same time, Smith points to the persistence of a tradition that grew out of the Reformation and continues in the mostly Protestant philosophical reflection on whether and how faith can be justified by reason. In this accessible and vigorously argued book, Smith posits that faith and reason have long been locked in mutual engagement in which they productively challenge each other as partners in an ongoing "dialogue."

Smith is struck by the fact that although in the secularized West the death of God is said to be fundamental to the modern condition, our current post-modernity is often characterized as a "postsecular" time. For Smith, this means not only that we are experiencing a broad-based "return of religion" but also, and more important for his argument, that we are now able to recognize the role of religion within the history of modernity. Emphasizing that, thanks to the logos located "in the beginning," the death of God is part of the inner logic of the Christian tradition, he argues that this same strand of reasoning also ensures that God will always "return" (often in new forms). In Smith’s view, rational reflection on God has both undermined and justified faith, while faith has rejected and relied on rational argument. Neither a defense of atheism nor a call to belief, his book explores the long history of their interaction in modern religious and philosophical thought.

Chinese Summary/中文概要： 当尼采宣称“上帝已死”并将之作为一个现代事件，当代神学家孔汉斯对此提出质疑，这一现象是否真的不可避免。在1500年左右开始的，当西方文化被赋予全新形态的理性观点，使得信仰必然地骤减甚至被剥夺。在《信仰与理性间的对话》一书中，约翰•H •史密斯追溯了神学历史及哲学领域的主线，甚至溯及世俗化了的“滑坡谬误”---从路德与伊拉斯谟，到理想主义，再到尼采，黑格尔，以及德里达、哈贝马斯、瓦蒂莫和阿萨德等当代理论家。与此同时，史密斯指出了一种传统的坚持，这种坚持起源于改革，并以最为新教式的方式，对于信仰是否能为理性所证明？如何证明？这样一种哲学反思的形式延续了下去。在这本能够为大多数人所接受，同时又极具辩论活力的作品中，史密斯假设信仰与理性长期以来均被禁锢在各自的囚笼之中，他们把对方当做同伴，以一种不断进行的‘对话’方式相互挑战。史密斯因此震惊的发现：尽管在世俗化了的西方世界中，“上帝已死”被称为是现代化的基础，或者说我们当下所谓的“后现代”时期其实常常会被界定为“后世俗”时期。然而对史密斯而言，这不仅仅意味着我们正经历着一种广阔意义上的“宗教回归”，同时更重要的是支持了他的理论，即我们如今能够从现代历史的角度去重新认识宗教的角色。要想强调这一论断，还多亏了最初的理念，上帝已死是基督教传统内部逻辑的一部分，他认为这样的一种推理同样确保了上帝的’回归"（通常会以一种全新的形式）。在史密斯看来，对上帝的理性反思及削弱了信仰，同时却也让信仰能够得到公正的评价，而信仰一方面拒绝理性论断，一方面又依赖于理性论断。本书既不是对无神论的维护，也并不是在呼吁人们去相信，作者只是在书中对于两者之间的漫长历史以及他们在现代宗教领域和哲学思想领域的相互关系进行了深刻的探索。（DC）

Awards/获奖情况："《信仰与理性间的对话》是一本是分可怕的书籍。它用一种极度开放和清晰的方式为我们呈现了错综复杂的思想和历史，并且使得这些思想直击如今世界所面临的紧迫问题。此书文风优美，概念强而有力，将以一种真诚之态邀请你进入书中的对话。"—肯尼斯•雷哈德, 加州大学洛杉矶分校

"不论是在德国文学、思想史还是哲学领域，约翰•H •史密斯都为我们提供了学习研究历史思想的简明方法。在辨证看待信仰与理性的过程中，他述及了许多相反的论点，探索了一系列令人着迷的问题，并使得许多复杂的视角变得简明清晰，一目了然，使我们不仅能了解那些帮助建立了目前有关于上帝存在与否观点的伟大德国思想家，并且能够使我们从中有所学。—马克•W•罗什，圣母大学

"Dialogues between Faith and Reason is a terrific book. It presents complicated ideas and histories in an extremely open, clear fashion and it makes those ideas speak to pressing issues facing the world today. It is beautifully written, conceptually powerful, and an authentic invitation to dialogue."—Kenneth Reinhard, UCLA

"Equally at home in German literature, intellectual history, and philosophy, John H. Smith offers a learned and lucid study in the history of ideas. He narrates many ironic turns in the dialectic of faith and reason, exploring a set of engaging questions and making transparent a variety of complex positions that allow us to learn not only about, but also from, the great German thinkers who helped to form our current debates about the presence and absence of God."—Mark W. Roche, University of Notre Dame

About the Author/作者介绍： 约翰•H •史密斯是加利福尼亚大学的一名德语教授。著有《辩证的意志：现代德国和法国思想中的自由、力量和理解》《灵性与其字母：黑格尔教化哲学中的修辞循迹》。

John H. Smith is Professor of German at the University of California, Irvine. He is the author of Dialectics of the Will: Freedom, Power, and Understanding in Modern German and French Thought and The Spirit and Its Letter: Traces of Rhetoric in Hegel’s Philosophy of Bildung.

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