"To Act or not": Milton's Conception of Divine Freedom

Fallon, Stephen M.

doi:10.2307/2709486

Cited by 10 publications

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“…The relationship between God's freedom and the good, and the implications of this relationship for humans, was a topic that was carefully debated by a wide range of theologians and philosophers, including Aquinas, Arminius, Hobbes, and Spinoza. See Fallon () for a thorough yet accessible discussion.…”

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Wesleyan Sanctification and the Ethic of Self‐Realization

Stromberg¹

2015

Ethos

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Among the related but distinct ideas that comprise contemporary American individualism is the ethic of self-realization, the belief that each person has the moral duty to develop their own characteristic talents and potentialities. Here I argue that although the intellectual sources of this belief are well-understood, we have little knowledge of how this idea became an ethic, how it acquired the emotional force of a moral directive. I suggest that this development can be explained in part by exploring the history of the Wesleyan doctrine of Sanctification, the conviction that the Christian believer can achieve a state of perfection. In the 19th century, debates erupted over whether Sanctification-originally an ecstatic experience occurring in revivals-could also take place as a gradual process, the development of Christian character. By the early 20th century, broader cultural forces conditioned a theological shift whereby Sanctification was increasingly understood in liberal thought as realization of the divinity that dwells within each individual soul. Along this path, Sanctification progressively permeated certain routines of daily life. This history provides an example of gradual transformation within Christianity, an example that can help to refine understandings of the processes of continuity and discontinuity that have been central to discussion in the Anthropology of Christianity. [Concept of Person, Christianity, Self-Realization, Cultural Change, Liberal Protestantism]One of the most important components of contemporary American subjectivity is the conviction that each individual has the right, indeed the moral duty, to cultivate and eventually to realize their own characteristic suite of temperaments, abilities, and talents. Carl Rogers, quoting Kierkegaard, neatly summarizes the belief when he says that the purpose of life is "to be that self which one truly is" (1961:166). This faith in the importance of self-realization is at the foundation of our economy and polity. More broadly, self-realization is a central element of a conception of person that lies at the very heart of our convictions about what human life is about. 1

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confidence: 99%