ebook img

An Analysis of Dallas Willard's Theology of Emotion in Light of Contemporary Neuropsychology PDF

311 Pages·2016·1.35 MB·English
by  
Save to my drive
Quick download
Download
Most books are stored in the elastic cloud where traffic is expensive. For this reason, we have a limit on daily download.

Preview An Analysis of Dallas Willard's Theology of Emotion in Light of Contemporary Neuropsychology

An Analysis of Dallas Willard's Theology of Emotion in Light of Contemporary Neuropsychology by Matthew Robert Green A Thesis submitted to the Faculty of Regis College and the Pastoral Department of the Toronto School of Theology In partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Theology awarded by the University of St. Michael's College © Copyright by Matthew Robert Green 2016 An Analysis of Dallas Willard's Theology of Emotion in Light of Contemporary Neuropsychology Matthew Robert Green Doctor of Philosophy in Theology Regis College and the University of St. Michael’s College 2016 Abstract This thesis considers Dr. Dallas Willard’s theological and practical response to late twentieth century expressions of evangelicalism in America as the through-line of his pastoral writing. It details the cultural and theological evolution of specific issues against which Willard took a stance and explicates how his writings sought to counter them. It then narrows to consider specifically his theological anthropology, focusing on his psychology of emotion and its role in the Christian spiritual life. This latter piece is considered in depth, analyzing how he understood emotion’s proper role, the manner in which it is distorted by sin and misunderstanding, and the means by which one may gradually restore it to God’s intention for the human person. Dr. Willard’s understanding of emotion is then examined in light of the research of contemporary neuropsychologists Antonio Damasio, Joseph LeDoux, and Jaak Panksepp. The scientific research is used as a means of providing some correction, but also additional specificity and clarity to Willard’s work, which in turn provides a theological character and teleological orientation to the neuropsychologists’ work. The result is a revision of Willard’s spirituality that coincides more closely to contemporary neuropsychological perspectives on emotion, thought, and volition. ii Table of Contents Table of Contents ………………………………………………………………………...iii Introduction ………………………………………………………………………………. 1 1 Methodology ...……………………………………………………………………… 3 2 Procedure …………………………………………………………………………… 6 3 Contributions to the Field …………………………………………………………. 12 4 Preliminary Definitions ……………………………………………………………. 14 5 Summary ………………………………………………………………………...… 23 Chapter 1: Historical Development of Elements Critiqued by Willard ………………… 25 1 Conversionism …………………………………………………………………….. 27 2 The Application of the Will ……………………………………………………….. 43 3 Morality: Love Versus Code of Law ……………………………………………… 47 4 Dispensationalism and Objectivism ……………………………………………….. 55 5 Supernaturalism …………………………………………………………………… 62 6 Summary …………………………………………………………………………... 70 Chapter 2: Willard’s Critique of Twentieth Century Evangelicalism ………………….. 73 1 The Gospel as Gradually Transformative …………………………………………. 75 2 The Will as Limited and Dependent ………………………………………………. 91 3 Love as the Apex of the Christian Life ……………………………………………. 97 4 God as Personal and Presently Interactive ……………………………………….. 105 5 Christianity as Relevant to Everyday Life ……………………………………….. 110 Chapter 3: Willard’s Affective Psychology ………………………………………….... 117 1 Willard’s Theological Anthropology …………………………………………….. 119 iii 2 Willard’s Affective Psychology ……………………………………………….…. 131 3 Willard’s Affective Telos ………………………………………………………… 144 4 Issues with Willard’s Psychology ………………………………………………... 168 Chapter 4: The Affective Neuropsychology of Antonio Damasio and Jaak Panksepp .. 171 1 The Nature of Emotion ………………………………………………………...… 172 2 Emotion and Thought …………………………………………………………….. 183 3 Emotion and Volition …………………………………………………………….. 193 4 Emotion and the Self ……………………………………………………………... 201 5 Regulation and Alteration of Emotion …………………………………………… 205 Chapter 5: A Re-Examination of Willard’s Theology in Light of Affective Neuropsychology ………………………………………………………………214 1 Categories of Emotion …………………………………………………………… 217 2 Mind, Body, Emotion, and Feeling ………………………………………………. 220 3 Emotion, Will, and Behaviour ………………………………………………….... 225 4 Emotion and Thought …………………………………………………………….. 242 Chapter 6: A Revised Willardian Spirituality and Further Implications of the Research …………………………………………………………………253 1 Emotion and Spiritual Development ……………………………………………... 253 2 Emotions and Spiritual Disciplines ………………………………………………. 267 3 A Recapitulation of Willard’s Spirituality ……………………………………….. 275 4 Conclusion and Directions for Further Research ………………………………… 281 Bibliography …………………………………………………………………………... 287 iv Introduction When neo-evangelicalism blossomed in America in the 1950's, it began to broaden the range through which American evangelicals could express and expand their spirituality. One of the more significant expressions of this changing spirituality has loosely coalesced into what is called the spiritual formation movement, and one of the key figures in this movement was Dallas Willard (1935 – 2013), a philosopher and pastor whose writings formed the intellectual foundation for many evangelicals to understand the dynamics of their spirituality. While his pastoral works are directed primarily at the popular level, the growing influence of the spiritual formation movement combined with Willard's intellect and academic credentials has expanded their presence to more professional and academic levels. Numerous seminaries such as Biola University and training programs such as those of Renovare use them in courses on spirituality and faith development.1 Willard believed that American evangelicalism has misunderstood the nature and character of the gospel and sought to correct a number of weaknesses that he believed had become characteristic of the culture of churches within his tradition. A wrong understanding, he argued, was hampering the church and robbing Christians of what God intended for them. “Those who operate on wrong information,” he argued, “are likely never to know the reality of God's presence ... and will miss the constant divine companionship for which their souls 1 E.g., Mike Brimmage, “SEED570 Introduction to Spiritual Formation,” accessed March 31, 2014, http://media1.biola.edu/education/downloads/ctc/syllabi/SEED%20570%20Fall%2009 .pdf. “The Renovare Institute for Spiritual Formation,” accessed March 31, 2014, http://www.renovare.org/what-we-do/institute-for-spiritual-formation. 1 2 were made,”2 and “A lack of understanding does weaken faith and misdirect life – sometimes disastrously.”3 Much of his work, then, was dedicated to the explication of the gospel as an invitation to transformation, describing the process that the Christian experiences and undertakes in order to fulfil God's intention for the individual person. Because Willard was quite practical and concrete in his theology, such a description was grounded in and focused at various points on the actual workings of the human person. He saw the evangelical church as “without a psychology of the spiritual life”4 and part of his role as developing or at least describing, “a psychologically sound theology of the spiritual life…”5 His theology, as Gary Black notes, was based in his theological anthropology,6 and this anthropological and psychological focus necessarily described the function and role of emotion as well as the process of emotional transformation. Ultimately, his ideal Christian was characterized primarily by love while he understood anger to be a major root of disorder in the soul and of spiritual ruination. However, his discussions of emotion and its relationship to other faculties and the spiritual life are not always clear and could, at times, contradict one another. Additionally, his views of emotion seemed to be at times grounded in more popular psychology than in more scholarly research and study, which, while not necessarily incorrect or unhelpful, offers an 2 Dallas Willard, Hearing God: Developing a Conversational Relationship with God (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1999), 10. 3 Ibid, 77. 4 Ibid, 226. 5 Dallas Willard, The Spirit of the Disciplines: Understanding How God Changes Lives (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1988), xi, 112-3. 6 Gary Black, Jr. The Theology of Dallas Willard: Discovering Protoevangelical Faith (Eugene, Or: Pickwick Publications, 2013), 98. 3 opportunity for analysis, clarification, and adjustment. In summary, Dallas Willard provided in his writing a robust structure for contemporary American evangelical spirituality, prescribing a number of correctives to weaknesses in the milieu. However, his theological anthropology did not incorporate a great deal of current neurological and psychological research that would have bolstered his thought on emotion and the spiritual life. This thesis will explore Willard’s interpretation of evangelical spirituality via comparison with a particular segment of neuropsychological research so as to produce a psychology of emotion that fits with current knowledge of human functioning and thereby offers a more accurate basis for Willard’s framework of spirituality for evangelicals. 1 Methodology In considering Willard's theology and psychology, of greatest significance will be his own writings in spirituality. This thesis will principally consider his first four theological books as they provide the broadest and most comprehensive platform to consider his theology and, in particular, his understanding of emotion. Four additional texts were available at the time of this writing: The Great Omission,7 Knowing Christ Today8, and two post-humorously published books, Living in Christ's Presence with John Ortberg9 and The Divine Conspiracy Continued.with Gary Black.10 While these will be considered as part of his full corpus, The 7 Dallas Willard, The Great Omission: Reclaiming Jesus' Essential teachings on Discipleship (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 2006). 8 Dallas Willard, Knowing Christ Today: Why We Can Trust Spiritual Knowledge (New York: HarperOne, 2009). 9 Dallas Willard and John Ortberg, Living in Christ's Presence: Final Words on Heaven and the Kingdom of God (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Books, 2014). 10 Dallas Willard and Gary Black, Jr., The Divine Conspiracy Continued: Fulfilling God's Kingdom on 4 Great Omission and two final books published after his death are either anthologies of shorter essays or collaborative works aimed at clarification of his practical theology and do not significantly add to his thought beyond the previous books. The other book, Knowing Christ Today is primarily an apologetic and therefore contributes to his spirituality only in a minor fashion. His first book, Hearing God, formerly titled, In Search of Guidance, describes his philosophy of personal engagement and communication with God, which he eventually connects to the development of a holy lifestyle. This sets the stage for The Spirit of the Disciplines, which is essentially a depiction of Christian virtue ethics and the responsibility of the individual to actively engage his or her body and mind in active movement toward a lifestyle in which personal engagement with God is possible. In The Divine Conspiracy11, Willard attempts to correct what he understands to be the church's faulty conceptualization of the gospel, which he replaces with an analysis of the Sermon on the Mount. Finally, Renovation of the Heart12 is largely his theological anthropology aimed at describing the process by which the individual components of the human person may be changed and the final goal of each transformation. This research will assay each of these books, and to a lesser extent Willard's other writings, on two levels. First, it will analyze them in a broad fashion for the purpose of determining Willard's overall corrective to evangelical theology and spirituality, largely dominated by his Earth (San Francisco: HarperOne, 2014). 11 Dallas Willard, The Divine Conspiracy: Rediscovering Our Hidden Life in God (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1997). 12 Dallas Willard, Renovation of the Heart: Putting on the Character of Christ (Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress, 2002). 5 focus on spiritual development, resulting in categories of critique and recommendation to Christians and the evangelical church in particular. Second, it will examine each in detail, extracting references to emotion and the nature of the will and desire, which he connects intimately to human emotion. In this, it will highlight potential internal conflicts in his understanding of emotion with some attempt to reconcile them, though some conflicts must remain unresolved. This second, more detailed analysis will be performed in light of the first, Willard's larger project of amending evangelical spirituality, so as to understand his perspective on emotion in spirituality and development, especially insofar as emotions are themselves to be developed or act as catalysts for development. A second set of primary sources will be necessary for the neuropsychological analysis of emotion in light of which the project will evaluate Willard's thought. First, Antonio Damasio's first and most recent books, Descartes' Error13 and Self Comes to Mind14 depict a distinction between instinctive and conscious emotion (emotion vs. feeling) and a description of the manner in which emotion is connected to social dynamics. The data here will be used to assess Willard's understanding of will and desire and the process of intentionality toward transformation. Second, Jaak Panksepp's books, Affective Neuroscience15 and Archaeology of Mind16, as well as various journal articles, provide neurological bases for specific emotional 13 Antonio Damasio R., Descartes' Error: Emotional, Reason, and the Human Brain (New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1994). 14 Antonio Damasio R. Self Comes to Mind: Constructing the Conscious Brain (New York: Pantheon Books, 2010). 15 Jaak Panksepp, Affective Neuroscience: The Foundations of Human and Animal Emotions (New York: Oxford University Pres, 1998). 16 Jaak Panksepp and Lucy Biven. The Archaeology of Mind: Neuroevolutionary Origins of Human Emotions (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2012). 6 systems and, to a lesser extent, describe levels of emotional processing, which give greater sharpness to Willard's definitions of emotion and the manner in which he sees God having designed emotion at a fundamental level. The thesis will also incorporate Joseph LeDoux's book, The Emotional Brain17, as a foundation for and overall depiction of the neurobiology of emotion and its basis in psychological function. LeDoux's writing provides a broad understanding of the brain's role in emotion on which the other authors' analyses rest, though the focus is primarily on Panksepp and Damasio's theories as the framework through which to assess Willard's thought. 2 Procedure Given that much of Willard's work was intended as a corrective for American evangelical spirituality, it is appropriate to begin with an overview of the history and character that led to the elements of that spiritual culture that needed correction. This employs analysis of secondary sources18 so as to provide the context out of which Willard arose. Split into two sections, the first examines the overall progression of evangelical history, though it must be understood that a complete history is not possible in this short space, while the second specifically considers the development of those elements that Willard sought to amend. One element is a strong, perhaps over-emphasis on conversion as integral to the Christian life, eventually leading to an emphasis on conversion as the only necessary catalyst for personal change. A second is the development of premillennial dispensationalism as a dominant 17 Joseph LeDoux, The Emotional Brain: The Mysterious Underpinnings of Emotional Life (New York: Touchstone, 1996). 18 Including but not limited to works by Randall Balmer, David Bebbington, Christopher Catherwood, Stanley Grenz, Barry Hankins, Evan Howard, Mark Noll, and Ian Randall.

See more

The list of books you might like

Most books are stored in the elastic cloud where traffic is expensive. For this reason, we have a limit on daily download.