The Craft of Theology: From Symbol to System, Expanded Edition

278 Pages·1995·6.129 MB·English

by  Avery Dulles

OF
From Symbol
to System
NEW EXPANDED EDITION
Susan M. Friedhaber-Hard
146 Sky view Dr.
Arcade, NY 14009
T H E C R A F T OF
THEOLOGY

T H E C R A F T O F
T H E O L O G Y
F R O M SYMBOL TO SYSTEM
— NE W E X P A N D E D E D I T I O N —
Avery Dulles, S.J.
CROSSROAD • NEW YORK
This printing: 1999
The Crossroad Publishing Company
370 Lexington Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Copyright © 1992 by Avery Dulles, S.J.
Chapters 13 and 14 copyright © 1995 by Avery Dulles, S.J.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a
retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic,
mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written
permission of The Crossroad Publishing Company.
Printed in the United States of America
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Dulles, Avery Robert, 1918—
The craft of theology : from symbol to system / Avery Dulles. —
New expanded ed.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-8245-1456-4
1. Theology. 2. Catholic Church—Doctrines. I. Title.
BR118.D85 1995
230’.2’01—dc20 9T39432
CIP
Nihil Obstat: Francis J. McAree, S.T.D., Censor Librorum
Imprimatur: + Patrick Sheridan, D.D., Vicar General,
Archdiocese of New York
Date: February 11, 1992; July 26, 1994
Contents
Introduction to the Expanded Edition.................................................. vii
Introduction........................................................................................... ix
Abbreviations........................................................................................ xiii
1. Toward a Postcritical Theology .................................................. 3
2. Theology and Symbolic Communication .................................... 17
3. The Problem of Method: From Scholasticism to Models.............. 41
4. Fundamental Theology and the Dynamics of Conversion......... 53
5. The Uses of Scripture in Theology................................................ 69
6. Tradition as a Theological Source ............................................. 87
7. The Magisterium and Theological Dissent................................. 105
8. Theology and Philosophy ............................................................ 119
9. Theology and the Physical Sciences............................................. 135
10. University Theology in Service to the Church ............................. 149
11. The Teaching Mission of the Church and Academic Freedom .. 165
12. Method in Ecumenical Theology ................................................ 179
13. Theology and Worship................................................................ 197
14. Historical Method and the Reality of Christ............................... 211
Notes .......................................................................................... 225
Sources .................................................................................................. 249
Index .................................................................................................... 253
v
L.
Introduction to the Expanded Edition
More than two years after its original appearance, this book is being
reissued in paperback. I have taken the occasion to add two new chap­
ters, which I believe will fill in some gaps in the earlier edition. These
chapters, composed as articles in 1992, were not published until af­
ter the original manuscript had gone to press, but now they can be
reprinted as chapters 13 and 14.
Chapter 13, dealing with liturgy and the “rule of prayer” as a the­
ological source, takes up a theme broached in the first chapter, but
insufficiently developed there. Chapter 14, devoted to the quest of the
historical Jesus, expands upon some material treated rather briefly in
chapter 5. Each of these new chapters, in my opinion, deals with cru­
cially important questions of method, sharply controverted in our
day.
I have felt a certain temptation to add further chapters discussing
subjects such as symbol ;uid dogma, magisterium and reception, re­
ligious experience and praxis. It is difficult to set limits to a book
on theological method, because that method is not a self-contained
discipline. If the method is truly theological and ecclesial, as I have
argued that it must be, it cannot be studied apart from disciplines
dealing with revelation, faith, and the Church. My ideas of these last
themes are expounded to some extent in other books, to which I refer
in my text or in footnotes. I may add now my recent book, The As­
surance of Things Hoped For: A Theology of Christian Faith (1994), which,
like my works on revelation and ecclesiology, provides background
for my reflections on method.
While recognizing the inevitable incompleteness of a book on
method such as this, I hope that it can, in combination with these
other works, supply the fundamental tools for the study of theology.
vii
viii / Introduction to the Expanded Edition
As any theologian knows, questions of method are never settled once
for all. The method is subject to continual modification as theology
grapples with new questions.
In this edition I have left chapters 1 through 12 unaltered. Even
the pagination remains the same.
Michaelmas, 1994 Avery Dulles, S.J.
Introduction
During the 1940s, when I was a student of philosophy, one of my
professors advised me against becoming a theologian on the ground
that theology gave no scope for original thought. Many Catholics,
I suspect, would have shared that assessment, but I found it rather
puzzling even at the time. In any case I did go into theology, and I
have found it an exciting and challenging career.
At Vatican II (1962-65) a certain number of theological opinions
that had previously been suspect seemed to win official endorsement.
This shift contributed to a new theological climate in which novelty
was not only tolerated but glorified. Many took it for granted that the
heterodoxy of today would become the orthodoxy of tomorrow. To
be a leader, then, was to venture onto new and dangerous territory,
and to say what no Catholic theologian had yet dared to say.
Abetted by journalists craving for headlines and publishers eager
to market their latest wares, certain “progressive” theologians have
been outdoing one another in originality. Practically every doctrine
that had been constitutive of Catholic orthodoxy has been contested
by some prominent author. Papal infallibility, the Immaculate Con­
ception of Mary, the Assumption of Mary, the virginal conception of
Jesus, his bodily resurrection, the divinity of Christ, and the Trinity
itself were either denied or radically reinterpreted to mean what they
had never before been thought to mean.
During the decade after Vatican II the Holy See and the bishops
were almost powerless to prevent the dismemberment and reconstruc­
tion of Catholic theology by revisionist theologians. Any efforts by
church authorities to set limits were denounced in certain quarters
as repressive and inquisitorial. Under Pope John Paul II, since 1978,
the papal and episcopal magisterium has in some measure reasserted
IX