This thesis examines some major attempts made during the twentieth century to defend the doctrine of hell in the light of charges made against it. It aims to provide a survey of major statements of the doctrine, evaluate the coherence of the various arguments involved, and then determine what is the most adequate and coherent defence of the doctrine. The second and third chapters provide a backdrop to the rest of the thesis, detailing the traditional model of hell as presented in the works of St. Augustine and Jonathan Edwards, and then examining the modern reaction against hell as eternal retributive punishment. Chapter four addresses the question of whether Karl Barth was a universalist, and concludes that because he cannot logically avoid the charge of universalism, his theology is not able to provide an adequate defence of the doctrine of hell. The Roman Catholic theologians Hans Küng, Karl Rahner, and Hans Urs von Balthasar are examined in the fifth chapter. They provide a wealth of information on topics dealing with hell, and although hopeful that there will be a universal outcome in the eschaton, they defend the possibility of hell. The sixth chapter looks at the impact and influence of C.S.Lewis' work on hell, whilst the seventh addresses a recent debate concerning whether or not those in hell will cease to exist. Although the position known as conditional immortality may be viable, as a defence of hell in itself it is insufficient. The eighth and ninth chapters examine arguments used in the philosophy of religion. William Lane Craig and Thomas Talbott have debated the possibility of hell using the concept of Middle Knowledge. While Middle Knowledge is found wanting, this debate is particularly helpful in highlighting the issues involved in defending hell, and these are then considered in more detail in the ninth chapter which examines free will defences of hell. Finally, the conclusion argues that the most adequate and coherent defence of hell available to the modern mind rests itself on the principle of free will. When this defence addresses particular issues highlighted throughout the rest of the thesis, then a coherent defence of the doctrine of hell can be provided.

No description available.

No description available.

Thesis (M. Div.)--St. Vladimir's Orthodox Theological Seminary, 1982. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 124-125).

No description available.

Did the women of the First Four Christian Centuries have any influence upon the roles they were permitted to follow in the Early Church, or use the institution to increase their worldly consequence? The sources indicate that many used their new "spiritual" status of virgin or widow to free themselves from the normal social function expected of them as women. This thesis seeks to explore these and other methods of "self-realization" which Catholic authors, hereseologists and polemicists claimed were open to Christian women; namely active participation in the variety of non-orthodox Christian movements which sprang up in the Patristic Period, and in the "acceptable routes" of the Catholic ministry, chastity and continence. A preoccupation with the problems of femininity may be found in both orthodox and heretical writers. This emphasis takes - several forms: investigations into the role of Eve in the original Creation myth and an apportioning of blame to the chief characters of the Fall drama; a cosmological theorising which equates femininity with the created world order and masculinity with the realm of the spiritual; and delineations of the limits established to the participation of women in such fields as the ministry of the Church. It will emerge from this discussion that many Church leaders had a somewhat ambivalent attitude to womankind. Women would find themselves spurned for their bodily femaleness yet encouraged to abandon their spiritual weakness (which was of necessity- linked to their physical state) and to reach for eternal heights. Once these heights were achieved a woman was spiritually equal- to a man, yet her physical characteristics continued to limit the roles she could play in the institution of the Church. In order to understand these differing attitudes to women, which could be held simultaneously by Church leaders, this work investigates the influence of such factors as social pressure, varying cultural influences, and theological study upon the formulation of the doctrines of womanhood and their position in society. What was the stance of the non-orthodox movements on these aspects of belief and practice? Their foes derided those movements which appeared to place undue emphasis upon the teachings or ministry of women, yet further investigation of those sects most often named as "guilty parties" indicates that the majority had as traditional a view of women as did their orthodox opponents.

No description available.

This thesis identifies in the Relations des Jésuites de la Nouvelle-France (Relations), written between 1632 and 1650, a comprehensive rhetoric of total selfoffering to Jesus Christ, a rhetoric of martyrdom, rooted in their authors' particular experience of the Christian tradition, their praying with the Spiritual Exercises (1548) of Ignatius Loyola (1491-1556), their encounters with the spirituality of the French Jesuit Louis Lallemant (1578-1635), and their exposure to various forms of Jesuit mission literature from around the world. Published annually, these Relations were the only consistent account of the unfolding French colonial project in Nouvelle- France, and a popular read among the noblesse, ecclesiastics, and pious Christians of the kingdom. Today they form an essential collection of primary sources that continue to provide a doorway into the earliest days of Canada's history. Identifying this rhetoric throughout the narratives, this study endeavours to provide a deeper historical understanding of these Relations by contextualising their content within the particular all-encompassing religious worldview of the authors who wrote them. The religious imaginations of these Jesuit authors, Paul Le Jeune (1591-1664), Jean de Brébeuf (1593-1649), Françoise-Joseph Le Mercier (1604-90), Barthélemy Vimont (1594-1667), Jérôme Lalemant (1593-1673), Isaac Jogues (1607-1673) and Paul Ragueneau (1608-1680), thus gives birth to a rhetoric in the Relations that presents Nouvelle-France as a land filled with Amerindian peoples who would only truly embrace Christianity if all of the missionaries lovingly offer their lives to Jesus Christ; just as He had done for the salvation of the entire world from sin and evil. They do so by placing their efforts on a metaphysical plane. There, the missionaries are presented as having been invited by God to join Christ crucified on a mission into a land filled with suffering and death. Where the Amerindians they evangelise must choose between a barbarous life of selfish material interest that is thought to imbue their traditions and a more human life of self-offering modelled on the Christian God. At the same time Satan, the devil, labours hard not to lose his grip on a part of the world that was as yet unaware of its true divine origins. The 'divine', the 'missionary', 'Satan', and the 'Amerindians', locked in this cosmic battle for souls that can only be won through a self-sacrificing union with Jesus Christ, combine to form the rhetoric of martyrdom in the narratives that reaches its summit as the authors describe the murders of eight of their fallen comrades, tortured and killed by some of the very people they had come to evangelise. This rhetoric, present throughout the narratives, has yet to be acknowledged, analysed, and interpreted by historians. In doing so, it is hoped that this study will deepen any reading of the Relations, advancing our understanding of their full import for both the early modern and the present-day reader.

The concept of God as it is set forth in Charles Hartshorne's panentheism is undoubtedly influenced by the work of Alfred North Whitehead. This is generally acknowledged. What is not fully appreciated, or at least has not been systematized, is that Whitehead's philosophy was not radically novel, but belonged to a particular philosophical perspective, namely British neo-realism. Whitehead's roots in British neo-realism can be demonstrated by a comparative study which includes contemporaries of Whitehead who also belonged to the neo-realistic school. Such a study demonstrates that Samuel Alexander, C. Lloyd Morgan and Whitehead all had similar viewpoints concerning such matters as ultimate reality, a theory of emergence, the dipolarity of nature, and God. Thus, an affinity of thought in these philosophers can be clearly seen. It is therefore the case that Whitehead's influence on Hartshorne was not merely the influence of one man but was also the influence of the philosophical perspective to which that one man belonged, namely British neo-realism. Consequently, Whitehead's influence on Hartshorne resulted in an affinity of thought not only in two men, but also in two philosophies, British neo-realism and American panentheism This research systematically sets forth this affinity in these two schools of thought. Both British neo-realism and American panentheism belong to the wider context of Anglo-American process philosophy. This philosophical perspective is found under examination to be a synthesis of realism and idealism. Thus the British neo-realists, Alexander, Morgan and Whitehead qualify their realism by retaining the concept of "mind" as central to their cosmology. All three philosophers expound a pan-psychistic view of the universe. In America, Hartshorne's panentheism is likewise panpsychistic in viewpoint, and is also a synthesis of realism and idealism. The major influences on Hartshorne were Whitehead and William Ernest Hocking, the American idealist. Hartshorne's panentheism may then best be understood as a synthesis of British neo-realism (from Whitehead) and American idealism (from Hocking). On the basis of the metaphysical principles of process philosophy, we must conclude that the God who is presented is finite. In conjunction with this, while the process concept of God allows explanation for the temporal process, it allows no explanation for temporal or contingent existence. While such must be regarded as a deficiency, nonetheless the process philosophers rightly remind us of the importance of the topic concerning the nature of God.

Irenaeus has a relationship with two different traditions: the tradition of Valentinian Gnosticism and others such as Marcion, a tradition which he opposed vehemently, and the ecclesiastical tradition which he was intent on defending. In his attack on the one and defence of the other Irenaeus expresses his own theological view-point, a dominant characteristic of which is the concept of Christocentrio salvation history. The present work is a study of the relationship between these three, the two traditions and the Christocentric salvation history. Part one is concerned mainly with methodology. Chapter one is a survey of recent studies of Irenaeus with particular reference to the problems of source materials in Irenaeus, the effect of his polemical task on his thought and writings, and the significance for him of salvation history. In chapter two the two traditions are examined and a sharp division of them into orthodoxy and heresy is rejected. The concept of salvation history is also examined in some detail. Part two is devoted to a study of the ecclesiastical tradition before Irenaeus, in order to see how his predecessors thought of history and of the role of Christ in it. Chapter three is concerned with the Apostolic Fathers, chapter four with some apocryphal writings, and chapter five with the Greek Apologists. While numerous elements of the tradition that are taken up by Irenaeus are to be found in the ecclesiastical tradition, and indeed some outlines of salvation history can also be discerned, the fully integrated concept of a Christocentric salvation history is not present there. Part three is a study of the salvation drama in Valentinian Gnosticism. Chapter six is concerned with the sources, chapter seven with an analysis of the drama, and chapter eight exposes the threat the drama posed to the ecclesiastical tradition, which may be described as the threat of a complete and coherent drama that gives to the believer the security of knowing whence he has come, whither he is going, and where he now is. The task of any opponent is to replace this false knowledge with the true knowledge. In part four we turn to Irenaeus. In chapter nine the Christocentric salvation history of Irenaeus is examined in detail. As a result of this examination we reach the conclusion in chapter ten that in the materials gathered from his own tradition, developed from a number of different sources, and woven together into a coherent and comprehensive historical drama of which Christ is the centre, Irenaeus finds an adequate reply to the coherent and comprehensive drama of Valentinian Gnosticism, and therefore, by his Christocentric salvation history, makes a significant contribution to the polarisation of the ecclesiastieal and Gnostic traditions.