On the Conversion of Philosophy: The Problems and Promise of Emmanuel Falque’s Theology of Philosophy

Abstract

Emmanuel Falque's recent account of the relationship between philosophy and theology in the context of French phenomenology establishes a methodology for the use of theology in phenomenology and vice versa. His Crossing the Rubicon: The Borderlands of Philosophy and Theology advocates for what he describes as a 'tiling' or overlaying approach to the two disciplines whereby the common foundation laid by philosophy is overlaid by theology, which performs a conversion of the philosophical description of human finitude by means of theology. 1 This approach, while drawing on the time-honored model of Thomas Aquinas, seeks renewed application by means of fresh engagements between philosophy and theology. Far from hesitating before the 'theological turn' in French phenomenology, Falque argues that making one's theological and philosophical claims explicit not only makes clear the boundaries between them but also enriches the content of those claims. 2 Nevertheless, Falque does grant a privileged status to the discipline of theology, insofar as the truth of revelation, which theology alone knows, is the goal toward which philosophy unknowingly points. While philosophy plays the role of an honored guide for the theologian along the path of humanity, theology ultimately has the final say in philosophy's claims, in which case the philosopher will always be subservient to the theologian. In this article, I engage two opposed readings of Falque's project in order to help situate Falque's claims. Bradley Onishi argues that Falque's articulation of the relationship between philosophy and theology should not be thought of as a relationship of conversion but rather one of transformative encounter. Joseph O'Leary, by contrast, argues that Falque's approach is so much a conversion of philosophy into theology that philosophy in the process becomes wholly consumed. Against these readings, I argue that Falque does claim a conversion of philosophy by theology, but it is a conversion of the meaning of its central object: humanity. In clarifying Falque's argument, it will be important to note that his account operates at two levels: at the disciplinary level of philosophy and theology, as fields of study and research, and at the level of the individual practitioner-the philosopher and the theologian. While Falque's proposal at the disciplinary level faces both philosophical and theological objections, his proposal for the practitioners of these disciplines is much more promising. READINGS OF FALQUE Falque's endeavor to 'rediscover the conjunction of the disciplines' of philosophy and theology, 'beyond the disjunction or the leap carried out so frequently today,' 3 has induced both criticism and commendation, as the contested nature of the relationship between the disciplines