By Schubert Ogden
The Notebooks of Schubert Ogden
I find it interesting that, in "Theology in the University" (On Theology: 121-133), I so define "theology" that it can be said to have to do with either of two different things: either, speaking "more metaphysically," with "the structure of ultimate reality in itself," or, speaking "more existentially," with "the meaning of ultimate reality for us." But what is this if not to allow for a distinction between "metaphysical theology," on the one hand, and "philosophical theology," on the other, where "philosophical theology" means not only (as it does in this essay) theological reflection constituted by human existence simply as such, but also theological reflection oriented by the existential question about the meaning of ultimate reality for us, rather than, as in the case of "metaphysical theology," by the intellectual question about the structure of ultimate reality in itself?
No less interesting is that I also so define "theology" as to allow for its meaning either, more narrowly, "critical reflection on the meaning and truth of thought and speech about God," or, more broadly, "critical reflection on the meaning and truth of thought and speech about the ultimate reality about which 'God' itself is a way of thinking and speaking." But what is this if not to obviate any question of whether "philosophical theology" should be defined as narrowly as I defined it earlier, as in effect synonymous with "theistic metaphysics" (cf., e.g., 88), or as broadly as I have more recently tended to use it?
28 October 1998
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