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| AUSTRALASIAN THEOLOGICAL STUDIES |
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| AUSTRALASIAN THEOLOGICAL STUDIES |
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Volume 15, Number 1, February 2002 Contents, Abstracts, Notes on Contributors Articles ANNE ELVEY Abstract: In conversation with feminist interpretations of pregnancy and birth this article offers a re-reading of Luke 2:1-20. The article sets out to read this passage with an eye to the representation and narrative function of the mother – especially the body of the mother – both before and after birth. The focus is on the transformation of the mother, Mary of Nazareth. The article considers ways in which the narrative represents three births: the birth of the child, a birth to or for the shepherds and the birth of the mother. These births suggest a logic of gestation, which finds its paradigm in the connective “keeping” (2:19, 51) activity of Mary. In Luke 2:1-20 the birth of the child is also the birth of the mother as a keeping woman.
Abstract:
The discussion of the use of the expression “the Jews” in the Fourth
Gospel continues to draw the attention of many scholars.
Publications abound, and this scholarly activity is justified, given
the overall hostility of the Johannine Jesus to “the Jews”.
Most scholarship, understandably, starts from the 71 uses of the
expression in the Gospel, and attempts to formulate some historical, literary
or theological explanation for the hostility between the Johannine Jesus,
Johannine Christians, and “the Jews”.
The present study focuses initially on other related, but less used,
expressions: “Israel”, “the nation”, and “the people”.
Only after this analysis are some questions asked of the use of “the
Jews” in the Fourth Gospel, suggesting that the fundamental argument of the
Fourth Gospel is that people from all ethnic backgrounds, Jew and Gentile,
have been called to form “Israel”, the people of God.
Abstract: Given the politics and publicity surrounding Jacques Dupuis’ Toward a Christian Theology of Religious Pluralism, his contribution to the developing theology of religious pluralism deserves closer scrutiny. The general question guiding this discussion is the following: does Jacques Dupuis provide adequate resources for claiming both the authenticity of Christian revelation and a genuinely positive acceptance of religious pluralism? This article outlines Dupuis’ interreligious hermeneutical methodology, enquires into his understanding of the uniqueness of Jesus Christ, and examines the implications of his Trinitarian Christology for a theology of religious pluralism. Dupuis’ contribution is then assessed from the dual perspectives of Christian theology and theological rhetoric. Finally, the issue of Christian universalism is brought to hermeneutical attention.
LAWRENCE CROSS Abstract: This article offers a possible answer to ecumenism’s problematical question as to how to arrive at a common theological language in which the particular Christian traditions can recognise themselves. Drawing upon insights from thinkers such as Mikhail Bakhtin and Anton Ugolnik, it proposes that the language of the on-going Dialogue of Love between the Church of Rome and the Patriarchate of Constantinople makes it possible to recognise the language of the other as a possible system of expression of the meta-language of Revelation.
Abstract: John Shelby Spong has
recently advocated belief in a “God beyond theism”.
While rejecting traditional theism, he also distinguishes his position
from atheism. Spong suggests that
there is a divine reality, which may be described as “being itself” and
which reveals itself in our commitment to unconditional ideals.
It is argued that this notion of God is vacuous, the product of a
confused belief that “being” is a characteristic of individual beings
which may be universalised. Belief
in such a God is also unmotivated, since there exist naturalistic explanations
of the phenomena to which Spong appeals.
Abstract: This article attempts to account for the astonishing diversity of reactions to Bishop John Shelby Spong. It argues that, while Spong is undoubtedly reaching many people both inside and outside the churches, in his treatment of some of the central doctrines of the Christian Faith he poses some false either/ors.
Anne Elvey is an honorary research associate in the Centre for Women’s Studies and Gender Research at Monash University. Her research interests are in the areas of ecological, feminist and postcolonial biblical interpretation and theology. Francis J. Moloney S. D. B., AM, foundation Professor of Theology at the Australian Catholic University and a member for many years of the International Theological Commission of the Catholic Church, is currently Professor of New Testament at the Catholic University of America, Washington, DC. Author of numerous books and articles on the Fourth Gospel, his most recent publication is a collection entitled “A Hard Saying”: The Gospel and Culture (Collegeville: Glazier, 2001). A commentary on the Gospel of Mark is nearing completion. Gerard Hall S.M. is currently Head of the School of Theology at the McAuley (Brisbane) Campus of the Australian Catholic University. He completed his graduate studies in systematic theology and theological hermeneutics at the Catholic University of America in 1994. His doctoral thesis examined the contribution of interreligious scholar, Raimon Panikkar, to the developing theology of religious pluralism. Gregory W. Dawes completed graduate studies at the Pontifical Biblical Institute in Rome before returning to New Zealand to complete a Ph.D. (1995) in Biblical Studies at the University of Otago. He now holds the position of Senior Lecturer in Religious Studies at the University of Otago. His most recent book is The Historical Jesus Question: The Challenge of History to Religious Authority (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2001) and his current research includes a study of the biblical hermeneutics of Galileo Galilei. Professor Emeritus Nigel Watson has had thirty years’ experience of teaching the New Testament, mostly within the United Faculty of Theology in Melbourne. He has also taught in Fiji.
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