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Philosophy and theology are alike in that they are both proximately oriented, not by an intellectual question, but by an existential question -- and question—and the same existential question at that, i.e., the existential question about the ultimate meaning of human existence. And this is so even though they are both constituted as such, as distinct from being oriented, not by any vital question, existential or intellectual, but by certain theoretical questions: philosophy, by questions about the real meaning and validity of religion and culture generally; theology, by questions about the real meaning and validity of specifically Christian religion and culture, which is to say, Christian witness, explicit and also implicit.

But philosophy and theology are also alike in that, in order to answer their constitutive questions, they both must have recourse to science. Although being alike oriented, proximately as well as remotely, by the existential question, they are both matters of wisdom (sapientia), as distinct from science (scientia), they are nonetheless dependent on science -- and science—and that in different respects.

Thus, for example, in respect to its work as historical philosophy, or history of philosophy, philosophy is dependent on empirical-historical science and also the science of hermeneutics. Or, again, in respect to its work as systematic philosophy, it is dependent on both metaphysics and ethics in determining what is to count as the truth about human existence and thus as authentic self-understanding/ understanding of existence and life-praxis. And so, too, with theology, which is similarly dependent -- on dependent—on both empirical-historical science and the science of hermeneutics, in one respect, and on metaphysics and ethics as well as other empirical sciences, in another.

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