According to the pre-modern Christian tradition, knowledge of God is mainly testimonial: we know ... more According to the pre-modern Christian tradition, knowledge of God is mainly testimonial: we know certain important truths about God and divine things because God himself has told them to us. In academic theology of late this view is often summarily dismissed. But to do so is a mistake, claims Mats Wahlberg, who argues in this book that the testimonial understanding of revelation is indispensable to Christian theology.
Criticizing the currently common idea that revelation should be construed exclusively in terms of God's self-manifestation in history or through inner experience, Wahlberg discusses the concept of divine testimony in the context of the debate about how any knowledge of God is possible. He draws on resources from contemporary analytic philosophy— especially John McDowell and Nicholas Wolterstorff — to argue for the intellectual viability of revelation as divine testimony.
Is nature creation or merely the product of non-intentional, natural processes? Mats Wahlberg arg... more Is nature creation or merely the product of non-intentional, natural processes? Mats Wahlberg argues that our perceptual experiences of nature can settle this question in favor of creation. He suggests that biological nature has expressive properties of a kind similar to human behavior and art. We may therefore be able to perceive – directly – nature as creation, i.e. as expressive of the mind of a creator. This idea resonates with the traditional Christian claim that God’s invisible nature can be ‘clearly perceived in the things that have been made’ (Rom 1:20). Wahlberg’s interpretation of this claim contradicts the common view that the existence of a creator must be established by inferential argument.
The book’s thesis is compatible with the fact that biological organisms have evolved by natural selection. Its viability depends, however, on the rejection of certain common assumptions about the nature of mind and perception – assumptions that may properly be called ‘Cartesian’. The author presents and defends an anti-Cartesian stance on mind and perception, inspired mainly by the work of the philosopher John McDowell. The philosophical resources provided by this stance are then drawn on to defend the book’s version of natural theology.
Neue Zeitschrift für Systematische Theologie und Religionsphilosophie , 2023
In this article, I first reflect on the background of the debate between myself and Eikrem and Sø... more In this article, I first reflect on the background of the debate between myself and Eikrem and Søvik and make some clarificatory remarks about the term "Only Way argument", which figured in the article that started the exchange. I then map areas of agreement and disagreement between us, with an eye to discerning promising and less promising paths forward in the field of evolutionary theodicy. Finally, I respond to Eikrem's and Søvik's criticism of my previous arguments about token-goods. Zusammenfassung In diesem Arikel reflektiere ich zunächst über den Hintergrund meiner Debate mit Eikrem und Søvik und mache einige verdeutlichende Bemerkungen zum Ausdruck "Only Way-Argument", der im ersten Artikel dieses Austausches eine Rolle spielte. Anschließend erläutere ich, in welchen Punkten wir einer Meinung sind und in welchen nicht, um dadurch vielversprechende von weniger vielversprechenden Ansätzen im Bereich der evolutionären Theodizee unterscheiden zu können. Zum Schluss antworte ich auf Eikrems und Søviks Kritik an meinen bisherigen Argumenten bezüglich token-Güter.
I artikeln ”Tidsandan och synen på Bibeln i offentligheten” (Svensk Kyrkotidning nr 5 och 6, 2019... more I artikeln ”Tidsandan och synen på Bibeln i offentligheten” (Svensk Kyrkotidning nr 5 och 6, 2019) diskuterar Mikael Winninge ”inomkyrklig sekularisering” och särskilt dess konsekvenser för bibelvetenskapen. Han menar att inomkyrklig sekularisering är någonting bra i den utsträckning som den befäster bibelvetenskapen som en disciplin på sekularistisk grund. Bibelvetare som gör anspråk på att vara riktiga historiker måste, enligt Winninge, på förhand utesluta möjligheten till mirakel samt alla typer av övernaturliga förklaringar (s.k. metodologisk naturalism). I två artiklar i Svensk teologisk kvartalskrift (STK) har jag argumenterat emot detta synsätt. Eftersom Winninge kritiserar mina bidrag, vill jag här ta tillfället i akt för en replik.
Vänskap/Friendship: Festschrift för Arne Rasmusson, 2021
With his magisterial tome The Church as Polis: From Political Theology to Theological Politics as... more With his magisterial tome The Church as Polis: From Political Theology to Theological Politics as Exemplified by Jürgen Moltmann and Stanley Hauerwas, Arne Rasmusson emerged as the world’s foremost expositor and defender of Stanley Hauerwas’s ecclesiology. Given the close relationship between Hauerwas’s and Rasmusson’s thought, it is appropriate to speak of an ecclesiological “Hauerwas-Rasmusson paradigm”, centered on the idea of the church as polis. This paradigm will be the object of critical attention in the present essay, where I will argue that the ecclesiological ideas of Hauerwas and Rasmusson are incompatible with the broadly ecumenical conception of “church” that the two authors promote. The inner logic of the Hauerwas-Rasmusson paradigm requires a well-defined notion of church, such as can be found, for example, in the Second Vatican Councils constitution Lumen Gentium.
Neue Zeitschrift für Systematische Theologie und Religionsphilosophie , 2022
How can the immense amount of suffering and waste inherent in the evolutionary process be reconci... more How can the immense amount of suffering and waste inherent in the evolutionary process be reconciled with the existence of a perfectly good and omnipotent God? A widely embraced proposal in the area of "evolutionary theodicy" is the so-called "Only Way"-argument. This argument contends that certain valuable goodsin particular, creaturely independence and human freedomcan only come about through a genuinely indeterministic and partly uncontrolled process of evolution. In a previous article, I have argued that the "Only Way"-argument can be defeated by a "Twin Earth"-thought experiment: If God is omnipotent, he could have createddirectly, without evolutioncreatures that are molecule-for-molecule identical to those that he actually created through evolution. If the creatures that he actually created have freedom and independence, there is no valid reason to deny that the non-evolved "twin creatures" would also be free and independent. Recently, Eikrem and Søvik (ES) have suggested a way of blocking my Twin Earth-argument by appealing to the distinction between type-values and token-values (or type-goods and tokengoods). While ES admit that the Twin Earth-argument shows the non-necessity of evolution for the existence of certain type-goods, they argue that an evolutionary creation can be justified by appeal to valuable token-goods (unique particulars) that could not have existed without evolution. In this article, I respond to ES's token-goods argument by showing that it is incompatible with a basic presupposition of "Only Way" evolutionary theodicies, namely the claim that the evolutionary process is genuinely indeterministic and partly uncontrolled.
David Bentley Hart has recently argued that universal salvation is a metaphysically necessary out... more David Bentley Hart has recently argued that universal salvation is a metaphysically necessary outcome of God's act of creating rational beings. A crucial premise of Hart's argument is a compatibilist view of free will, according to which God can determine human choices without taking away their freedom. This view constitutes common ground between Hart and the tradition of classical Thomism, which emphasizes the non-competitive relation between human freedom and God's universal causality. Unfortunately, Thomistic compatibilism undermines the so-called Free Will Defense, which is often considered to be the only viable way of responding to contemporary criticism of the doctrine of hell. Can the existence of hell be reconciled with God's goodness given a Thomistic conception of rational freedom? This question is of interest not only to followers of Aquinas but to anyone who rejects a 'zero-sum competition' between freedom and grace, and who also believes that divine revelation confirms the possibility of perdition. The present article proposes an alternative to the Free Will Defense-called The Thomistic Autonomy Defense-which aims to block Hart's arguments for the necessity of universal salvation.
In this article, I first interpret and evaluate the main argument of E.V.R. Kojonen's book, The C... more In this article, I first interpret and evaluate the main argument of E.V.R. Kojonen's book, The Compatibility of Evolution and Design. I then address a challenge against this argument (as well as against design arguments in general), namely the problem of seemingly malevolent and bad designs in nature. Evolutionary theodicists commonly deal with this problem by assuming that the evolutionary process is not fully under God's control. This solution, however, is deeply problematic from the perspective of classical theism. I therefore suggest another approach to the problem, inspired by the thought of Thomas Aquinas.
“Revelation” (lat. revelatio) is a translation of the Greek word apokalypsis, which means the rem... more “Revelation” (lat. revelatio) is a translation of the Greek word apokalypsis, which means the removal of a veil so that something can be seen. Many religions appeal to purported divine revelations in order to explain and justify their characteristic beliefs about God, and revelation has usually been understood as an epistemic notion. Paradigmatically, it refers to alleged instances of divine speaking or special divine acts in history, although in a more general sense “revelation” can denote any means of divine self-disclosure, for example through nature. The topic of divine revelation has been a long-standing and central focus in theology, and philosophical discussions have often taken their cues from Christian theological debates. This entry will treat theological perspectives only in so far as they are relevant for philosophical questions about the purported nature and means of divine revelation and the justification of revelatory claims.
Protestant critique of the Catholic idea of inherent righteousness has, since the time of the Ref... more Protestant critique of the Catholic idea of inherent righteousness has, since the time of the Reformation, given rise to counter-questions about the status of faith in Protestant theology. Is faith a human condition for justification (that is, a human act or inherent property that is necessary for justification), and why should not faith in that case be counted as a kind of work? Many Protestant theologians, however, view it as very important to dissociate faith from works. This article examines a number of Protestant attempts to explain why faith is not a work. The examined explanations rely on a number of ideas, for example that faith is not a work because faith is a gift of God, or because faith is non-voluntary, or because faith is not a condition of justification, or because faith does not merit justification, or because faith is union with Christ. The problem with many of these Protestant answers to the question of why faith is not a work is that they can equally well be used to explain why the supernatural virtue of love is not a work. The Reformers, however, strongly associated love with “works of the law”, and wanted to keep love out of the doctrine of justification. For Protestants who share this view of love, the present article poses a challenge. Is it possible to dissociate faith from works without at the same time dissociating love from works, thereby legitimizing the Tridentine understanding of justification? The author concludes that this is indeed possible, but only if an important identity marker for much Protestant theology is given up, namely the purely forensic understanding of the doctrine of justification.
A commonly heard claim is that the Catholic Church’s non-admission of women to the priesthood is ... more A commonly heard claim is that the Catholic Church’s non-admission of women to the priesthood is unjust. But what about the behavior of Christ, who selected only men when he constituted the group of the Twelve? Did Christ thereby violate justice? Most proponents of female ordination deny that he did. Typically, they argue that it would have been practically impossible – that is, extremely imprudent – for Christ to appoint women as religious leaders in a first century Jewish context. I argue that this defense of Christ’s behavior fails. If women objectively have a right to be considered for all religious leadership positions (as advocates of female ordination typically claim), then no prudential reasons can make it morally acceptable to deny them this right. It is equally problematic to defend Christ’s non-selection of women by appealing to his presumed ignorance of women’s rights, or by arguing that the moral norms were objectively different in his day. After having considered and rejected a number of suggested or conceivable ways to exonerate Christ without at the same time exonerating the Church, I conclude that there is no fundamental moral difference between Christ’s non-admission of women to the Twelve and the Church’s non-admission of women to the priesthood. Hence, if the Church violates gender justice, then so did Christ. Since the idea that Christ violated justice is very difficult to square with the Christian faith, I conclude that Christians cannot reasonably believe that the Church’s non-admission of women to the priesthood is unjust.
In this article, I clarify and deepen my criticism of methodological naturalism in biblical studi... more In this article, I clarify and deepen my criticism of methodological naturalism in biblical studies and other historical disciplines. Responding to Tobias Hägerland's and Cecilia Wassén's defense of this methodological paradigm, I make three main points. First, I argue that while methodological naturalism might be a reasonable posture in the natural sciences, the same is not the case in historical studies. The natural sciences study nature – natural mechanisms and laws – which means that supernatural and irreducibly personal causes (such as God) fall outside their purview. When it comes to the study of history, on the other hand, nothing that has impacted human culture in the past is by definition outside of the discipline's sphere of interest. This goes for supernatural as well as natural causes. History is the study of the past, not the study of the natural. Second, I scrutinize Hägerland's and Wassén's claim that methodological naturalism cannot be abandoned because this would complicate the process of testing historical hypotheses, thereby expanding the role of subjective judgment. This line of argument is fundamentally misconceived. If supernatural explanations are possibly true, it would be patently irrational to exclude them from scholarly consideration on the ground that they would complicate the process of testing and adjudicating between hypotheses. Third, I defend N.T. Wright's argument in favor of the historicity of the resurrection of Jesus against two interrelated lines of criticism.
Some New Testament scholars argue that as historians, they must reject all miracle reports a prio... more Some New Testament scholars argue that as historians, they must reject all miracle reports a priori. When asked to justify this view, the scholars usually appeal to some of the following philosophical claims:
1) Miracles are incompatible with our natural scientific knowledge.
2) Even though miracles are theoretically possible, we can never be rationally justified in believing that a reported miracle actually happened (Hume’s argument).
3) Miracles entail the existence of a supernatural realm, and the supernatural (God) cannot be the object of scientific or scholarly knowledge or study.
I argue that there are no good reasons to believe any of these claims, which should be regarded as “myths”. The first claim confuses science with a controversial philosophical theory – naturalism. The second claim is undermined by the devastating philosophical criticism that has been directed at Hume’s anti-miracle argument. The third claim entails that philosophers of religion who debate theistic arguments are wasting their time, since no theistic argument can ever succeed. It is very unclear, however, how anybody could possibly know that no theistic argument can ever succeed.
All three myths are exemplified in a recent book by Cecilia Wassén and Tobias Hägerland: Den okände Jesus: Berättelsen om en profet som misslyckades (The Unknown Jesus: The Story of a Prophet Who Failed). Taking this work as my point of departure, I discuss the myths with reference to a wider horizon of Swedish and international Jesus research. I also suggest a more reasonable framework for dealing with miracle reports in the context of historical scholarship.
In this article, I present a Leibnizian cosmological argument to the conclusion that either the t... more In this article, I present a Leibnizian cosmological argument to the conclusion that either the totality of physical beings has a non-physical cause, or a necessary being exists. The crucial premise of the argument is a restricted version of the Principle of Sufficient Reason, namely the claim that every contingent physical phenomenon has a sufficient cause (PSR-P). I defend this principle by comparing it with a causal principle that is fundamental for physicalism, namely the Causal Closure of Physics, which says that every physical effect has a sufficient physical cause (CC). I find that the evidence for Causal Closure is weaker than the evidence for PSR-P, which means that physicalists who take CC to be justified must concede that PSR-P is also justified, and to a higher degree. Since my Leibnizian cosmological argument succeeds if PSR-P is granted, I conclude that physicalists must either give up CC and thereby physicalism, or accept that a necessary being exists.
Cardinal Walter Kasper has presented a proposal according to which divorced and remarried Catholi... more Cardinal Walter Kasper has presented a proposal according to which divorced and remarried Catholics may receive Eucharistic Communion, provided that they satisfy certain conditions. He argues that his proposal is merely pastoral, and that it has no implications for the Catholic doctrine of marriage. This article demonstrates that Kasper's proposal in fact entails a significant revision of the doctrine of marriage by changing the meaning of the marriage commitment
According to the pre-modern Christian tradition, knowledge of God is mainly testimonial: we know ... more According to the pre-modern Christian tradition, knowledge of God is mainly testimonial: we know certain important truths about God and divine things because God himself has told them to us. In academic theology of late this view is often summarily dismissed. But to do so is a mistake, claims Mats Wahlberg, who argues in this book that the testimonial understanding of revelation is indispensable to Christian theology.
Criticizing the currently common idea that revelation should be construed exclusively in terms of God's self-manifestation in history or through inner experience, Wahlberg discusses the concept of divine testimony in the context of the debate about how any knowledge of God is possible. He draws on resources from contemporary analytic philosophy— especially John McDowell and Nicholas Wolterstorff — to argue for the intellectual viability of revelation as divine testimony.
Is nature creation or merely the product of non-intentional, natural processes? Mats Wahlberg arg... more Is nature creation or merely the product of non-intentional, natural processes? Mats Wahlberg argues that our perceptual experiences of nature can settle this question in favor of creation. He suggests that biological nature has expressive properties of a kind similar to human behavior and art. We may therefore be able to perceive – directly – nature as creation, i.e. as expressive of the mind of a creator. This idea resonates with the traditional Christian claim that God’s invisible nature can be ‘clearly perceived in the things that have been made’ (Rom 1:20). Wahlberg’s interpretation of this claim contradicts the common view that the existence of a creator must be established by inferential argument.
The book’s thesis is compatible with the fact that biological organisms have evolved by natural selection. Its viability depends, however, on the rejection of certain common assumptions about the nature of mind and perception – assumptions that may properly be called ‘Cartesian’. The author presents and defends an anti-Cartesian stance on mind and perception, inspired mainly by the work of the philosopher John McDowell. The philosophical resources provided by this stance are then drawn on to defend the book’s version of natural theology.
Neue Zeitschrift für Systematische Theologie und Religionsphilosophie , 2023
In this article, I first reflect on the background of the debate between myself and Eikrem and Sø... more In this article, I first reflect on the background of the debate between myself and Eikrem and Søvik and make some clarificatory remarks about the term "Only Way argument", which figured in the article that started the exchange. I then map areas of agreement and disagreement between us, with an eye to discerning promising and less promising paths forward in the field of evolutionary theodicy. Finally, I respond to Eikrem's and Søvik's criticism of my previous arguments about token-goods. Zusammenfassung In diesem Arikel reflektiere ich zunächst über den Hintergrund meiner Debate mit Eikrem und Søvik und mache einige verdeutlichende Bemerkungen zum Ausdruck "Only Way-Argument", der im ersten Artikel dieses Austausches eine Rolle spielte. Anschließend erläutere ich, in welchen Punkten wir einer Meinung sind und in welchen nicht, um dadurch vielversprechende von weniger vielversprechenden Ansätzen im Bereich der evolutionären Theodizee unterscheiden zu können. Zum Schluss antworte ich auf Eikrems und Søviks Kritik an meinen bisherigen Argumenten bezüglich token-Güter.
I artikeln ”Tidsandan och synen på Bibeln i offentligheten” (Svensk Kyrkotidning nr 5 och 6, 2019... more I artikeln ”Tidsandan och synen på Bibeln i offentligheten” (Svensk Kyrkotidning nr 5 och 6, 2019) diskuterar Mikael Winninge ”inomkyrklig sekularisering” och särskilt dess konsekvenser för bibelvetenskapen. Han menar att inomkyrklig sekularisering är någonting bra i den utsträckning som den befäster bibelvetenskapen som en disciplin på sekularistisk grund. Bibelvetare som gör anspråk på att vara riktiga historiker måste, enligt Winninge, på förhand utesluta möjligheten till mirakel samt alla typer av övernaturliga förklaringar (s.k. metodologisk naturalism). I två artiklar i Svensk teologisk kvartalskrift (STK) har jag argumenterat emot detta synsätt. Eftersom Winninge kritiserar mina bidrag, vill jag här ta tillfället i akt för en replik.
Vänskap/Friendship: Festschrift för Arne Rasmusson, 2021
With his magisterial tome The Church as Polis: From Political Theology to Theological Politics as... more With his magisterial tome The Church as Polis: From Political Theology to Theological Politics as Exemplified by Jürgen Moltmann and Stanley Hauerwas, Arne Rasmusson emerged as the world’s foremost expositor and defender of Stanley Hauerwas’s ecclesiology. Given the close relationship between Hauerwas’s and Rasmusson’s thought, it is appropriate to speak of an ecclesiological “Hauerwas-Rasmusson paradigm”, centered on the idea of the church as polis. This paradigm will be the object of critical attention in the present essay, where I will argue that the ecclesiological ideas of Hauerwas and Rasmusson are incompatible with the broadly ecumenical conception of “church” that the two authors promote. The inner logic of the Hauerwas-Rasmusson paradigm requires a well-defined notion of church, such as can be found, for example, in the Second Vatican Councils constitution Lumen Gentium.
Neue Zeitschrift für Systematische Theologie und Religionsphilosophie , 2022
How can the immense amount of suffering and waste inherent in the evolutionary process be reconci... more How can the immense amount of suffering and waste inherent in the evolutionary process be reconciled with the existence of a perfectly good and omnipotent God? A widely embraced proposal in the area of "evolutionary theodicy" is the so-called "Only Way"-argument. This argument contends that certain valuable goodsin particular, creaturely independence and human freedomcan only come about through a genuinely indeterministic and partly uncontrolled process of evolution. In a previous article, I have argued that the "Only Way"-argument can be defeated by a "Twin Earth"-thought experiment: If God is omnipotent, he could have createddirectly, without evolutioncreatures that are molecule-for-molecule identical to those that he actually created through evolution. If the creatures that he actually created have freedom and independence, there is no valid reason to deny that the non-evolved "twin creatures" would also be free and independent. Recently, Eikrem and Søvik (ES) have suggested a way of blocking my Twin Earth-argument by appealing to the distinction between type-values and token-values (or type-goods and tokengoods). While ES admit that the Twin Earth-argument shows the non-necessity of evolution for the existence of certain type-goods, they argue that an evolutionary creation can be justified by appeal to valuable token-goods (unique particulars) that could not have existed without evolution. In this article, I respond to ES's token-goods argument by showing that it is incompatible with a basic presupposition of "Only Way" evolutionary theodicies, namely the claim that the evolutionary process is genuinely indeterministic and partly uncontrolled.
David Bentley Hart has recently argued that universal salvation is a metaphysically necessary out... more David Bentley Hart has recently argued that universal salvation is a metaphysically necessary outcome of God's act of creating rational beings. A crucial premise of Hart's argument is a compatibilist view of free will, according to which God can determine human choices without taking away their freedom. This view constitutes common ground between Hart and the tradition of classical Thomism, which emphasizes the non-competitive relation between human freedom and God's universal causality. Unfortunately, Thomistic compatibilism undermines the so-called Free Will Defense, which is often considered to be the only viable way of responding to contemporary criticism of the doctrine of hell. Can the existence of hell be reconciled with God's goodness given a Thomistic conception of rational freedom? This question is of interest not only to followers of Aquinas but to anyone who rejects a 'zero-sum competition' between freedom and grace, and who also believes that divine revelation confirms the possibility of perdition. The present article proposes an alternative to the Free Will Defense-called The Thomistic Autonomy Defense-which aims to block Hart's arguments for the necessity of universal salvation.
In this article, I first interpret and evaluate the main argument of E.V.R. Kojonen's book, The C... more In this article, I first interpret and evaluate the main argument of E.V.R. Kojonen's book, The Compatibility of Evolution and Design. I then address a challenge against this argument (as well as against design arguments in general), namely the problem of seemingly malevolent and bad designs in nature. Evolutionary theodicists commonly deal with this problem by assuming that the evolutionary process is not fully under God's control. This solution, however, is deeply problematic from the perspective of classical theism. I therefore suggest another approach to the problem, inspired by the thought of Thomas Aquinas.
“Revelation” (lat. revelatio) is a translation of the Greek word apokalypsis, which means the rem... more “Revelation” (lat. revelatio) is a translation of the Greek word apokalypsis, which means the removal of a veil so that something can be seen. Many religions appeal to purported divine revelations in order to explain and justify their characteristic beliefs about God, and revelation has usually been understood as an epistemic notion. Paradigmatically, it refers to alleged instances of divine speaking or special divine acts in history, although in a more general sense “revelation” can denote any means of divine self-disclosure, for example through nature. The topic of divine revelation has been a long-standing and central focus in theology, and philosophical discussions have often taken their cues from Christian theological debates. This entry will treat theological perspectives only in so far as they are relevant for philosophical questions about the purported nature and means of divine revelation and the justification of revelatory claims.
Protestant critique of the Catholic idea of inherent righteousness has, since the time of the Ref... more Protestant critique of the Catholic idea of inherent righteousness has, since the time of the Reformation, given rise to counter-questions about the status of faith in Protestant theology. Is faith a human condition for justification (that is, a human act or inherent property that is necessary for justification), and why should not faith in that case be counted as a kind of work? Many Protestant theologians, however, view it as very important to dissociate faith from works. This article examines a number of Protestant attempts to explain why faith is not a work. The examined explanations rely on a number of ideas, for example that faith is not a work because faith is a gift of God, or because faith is non-voluntary, or because faith is not a condition of justification, or because faith does not merit justification, or because faith is union with Christ. The problem with many of these Protestant answers to the question of why faith is not a work is that they can equally well be used to explain why the supernatural virtue of love is not a work. The Reformers, however, strongly associated love with “works of the law”, and wanted to keep love out of the doctrine of justification. For Protestants who share this view of love, the present article poses a challenge. Is it possible to dissociate faith from works without at the same time dissociating love from works, thereby legitimizing the Tridentine understanding of justification? The author concludes that this is indeed possible, but only if an important identity marker for much Protestant theology is given up, namely the purely forensic understanding of the doctrine of justification.
A commonly heard claim is that the Catholic Church’s non-admission of women to the priesthood is ... more A commonly heard claim is that the Catholic Church’s non-admission of women to the priesthood is unjust. But what about the behavior of Christ, who selected only men when he constituted the group of the Twelve? Did Christ thereby violate justice? Most proponents of female ordination deny that he did. Typically, they argue that it would have been practically impossible – that is, extremely imprudent – for Christ to appoint women as religious leaders in a first century Jewish context. I argue that this defense of Christ’s behavior fails. If women objectively have a right to be considered for all religious leadership positions (as advocates of female ordination typically claim), then no prudential reasons can make it morally acceptable to deny them this right. It is equally problematic to defend Christ’s non-selection of women by appealing to his presumed ignorance of women’s rights, or by arguing that the moral norms were objectively different in his day. After having considered and rejected a number of suggested or conceivable ways to exonerate Christ without at the same time exonerating the Church, I conclude that there is no fundamental moral difference between Christ’s non-admission of women to the Twelve and the Church’s non-admission of women to the priesthood. Hence, if the Church violates gender justice, then so did Christ. Since the idea that Christ violated justice is very difficult to square with the Christian faith, I conclude that Christians cannot reasonably believe that the Church’s non-admission of women to the priesthood is unjust.
In this article, I clarify and deepen my criticism of methodological naturalism in biblical studi... more In this article, I clarify and deepen my criticism of methodological naturalism in biblical studies and other historical disciplines. Responding to Tobias Hägerland's and Cecilia Wassén's defense of this methodological paradigm, I make three main points. First, I argue that while methodological naturalism might be a reasonable posture in the natural sciences, the same is not the case in historical studies. The natural sciences study nature – natural mechanisms and laws – which means that supernatural and irreducibly personal causes (such as God) fall outside their purview. When it comes to the study of history, on the other hand, nothing that has impacted human culture in the past is by definition outside of the discipline's sphere of interest. This goes for supernatural as well as natural causes. History is the study of the past, not the study of the natural. Second, I scrutinize Hägerland's and Wassén's claim that methodological naturalism cannot be abandoned because this would complicate the process of testing historical hypotheses, thereby expanding the role of subjective judgment. This line of argument is fundamentally misconceived. If supernatural explanations are possibly true, it would be patently irrational to exclude them from scholarly consideration on the ground that they would complicate the process of testing and adjudicating between hypotheses. Third, I defend N.T. Wright's argument in favor of the historicity of the resurrection of Jesus against two interrelated lines of criticism.
Some New Testament scholars argue that as historians, they must reject all miracle reports a prio... more Some New Testament scholars argue that as historians, they must reject all miracle reports a priori. When asked to justify this view, the scholars usually appeal to some of the following philosophical claims:
1) Miracles are incompatible with our natural scientific knowledge.
2) Even though miracles are theoretically possible, we can never be rationally justified in believing that a reported miracle actually happened (Hume’s argument).
3) Miracles entail the existence of a supernatural realm, and the supernatural (God) cannot be the object of scientific or scholarly knowledge or study.
I argue that there are no good reasons to believe any of these claims, which should be regarded as “myths”. The first claim confuses science with a controversial philosophical theory – naturalism. The second claim is undermined by the devastating philosophical criticism that has been directed at Hume’s anti-miracle argument. The third claim entails that philosophers of religion who debate theistic arguments are wasting their time, since no theistic argument can ever succeed. It is very unclear, however, how anybody could possibly know that no theistic argument can ever succeed.
All three myths are exemplified in a recent book by Cecilia Wassén and Tobias Hägerland: Den okände Jesus: Berättelsen om en profet som misslyckades (The Unknown Jesus: The Story of a Prophet Who Failed). Taking this work as my point of departure, I discuss the myths with reference to a wider horizon of Swedish and international Jesus research. I also suggest a more reasonable framework for dealing with miracle reports in the context of historical scholarship.
In this article, I present a Leibnizian cosmological argument to the conclusion that either the t... more In this article, I present a Leibnizian cosmological argument to the conclusion that either the totality of physical beings has a non-physical cause, or a necessary being exists. The crucial premise of the argument is a restricted version of the Principle of Sufficient Reason, namely the claim that every contingent physical phenomenon has a sufficient cause (PSR-P). I defend this principle by comparing it with a causal principle that is fundamental for physicalism, namely the Causal Closure of Physics, which says that every physical effect has a sufficient physical cause (CC). I find that the evidence for Causal Closure is weaker than the evidence for PSR-P, which means that physicalists who take CC to be justified must concede that PSR-P is also justified, and to a higher degree. Since my Leibnizian cosmological argument succeeds if PSR-P is granted, I conclude that physicalists must either give up CC and thereby physicalism, or accept that a necessary being exists.
Cardinal Walter Kasper has presented a proposal according to which divorced and remarried Catholi... more Cardinal Walter Kasper has presented a proposal according to which divorced and remarried Catholics may receive Eucharistic Communion, provided that they satisfy certain conditions. He argues that his proposal is merely pastoral, and that it has no implications for the Catholic doctrine of marriage. This article demonstrates that Kasper's proposal in fact entails a significant revision of the doctrine of marriage by changing the meaning of the marriage commitment
Cardinal Walter Kasper has presented a proposal according to which divorced and remarried Catholi... more Cardinal Walter Kasper has presented a proposal according to which divorced and remarried Catholics may, under certain conditions, receive Holy Communion. “Traditionalists” in moral theology have firmly rejected the proposal on moral grounds, while “revisionists” have been more receptive to it. This article presents a method by which the question of the moral tolerability of second, civil marriages for divorced Catholics can be settled. The method is neutral between “traditionalists” and “revisionists” in the sense that it does not take for granted the truth of any traditionalist dogma, such as the existence of intrinsically evil acts. The method should, in fact, be more acceptable to “revisionists” than to “traditionalists”. Still, when the method is applied to the question of the moral tolerability of second, civil marriages, it gives a negative verdict. This leads to the conclusion that “revisionists” as well as “traditionalists” in moral theology have strong reason to reject Cardinal Kasper’s proposal.
International Journal for Philosophy of Religion, 2015
Evolutionary theodicies are attempts to explain how the enormous amount of suffering, premature d... more Evolutionary theodicies are attempts to explain how the enormous amount of suffering, premature death and extinction inherent in the evolutionary process can be reconciled with belief in a loving and almighty God. A common strategy in this area is to argue that certain very valuable creaturely attributes could only be exemplified by creatures that are produced by a partly random and uncontrolled process of evolution. Evolution, in other words, was the only possible way for God to create these kinds of creatures. This article presents and examines two versions of the “only way”-argument. The anthropocentric version tries to justify God’s use of evolution by reference to the value of human freedom, and argues that freedom presupposes that God lets go of full control over the process of creation (Arthur Peacocke, Nancey Murphy). The non-anthropocentric version presents a similar argument with respect to more inclusive creaturely properties, such as that of being “truly other” than God, or of being a “creaturely self” with a certain degree of autonomy in relation to God (John Polkinghorne, John Haught, Christopher Southgate). With the help of a number of thought-experiments of the “Twin-Earth”-type, the author argues that both the anthropocentric and the non-anthropocentric only way-arguments fail.
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Books by Mats Wahlberg
Criticizing the currently common idea that revelation should be construed exclusively in terms of God's self-manifestation in history or through inner experience, Wahlberg discusses the concept of divine testimony in the context of the debate about how any knowledge of God is possible. He draws on resources from contemporary analytic philosophy— especially John McDowell and Nicholas Wolterstorff — to argue for the intellectual viability of revelation as divine testimony.
The book’s thesis is compatible with the fact that biological organisms have evolved by natural selection. Its viability depends, however, on the rejection of certain common assumptions about the nature of mind and perception – assumptions that may properly be called ‘Cartesian’. The author presents and defends an anti-Cartesian stance on mind and perception, inspired mainly by the work of the philosopher John McDowell. The philosophical resources provided by this stance are then drawn on to defend the book’s version of natural theology.
Papers by Mats Wahlberg
1) Miracles are incompatible with our natural scientific knowledge.
2) Even though miracles are theoretically possible, we can never be rationally justified in believing that a reported miracle actually happened (Hume’s argument).
3) Miracles entail the existence of a supernatural realm, and the supernatural (God) cannot be the object of scientific or scholarly knowledge or study.
I argue that there are no good reasons to believe any of these claims, which should be regarded as “myths”. The first claim confuses science with a controversial philosophical theory – naturalism. The second claim is undermined by the devastating philosophical criticism that has been directed at Hume’s anti-miracle argument. The third claim entails that philosophers of religion who debate theistic arguments are wasting their time, since no theistic argument can ever succeed. It is very unclear, however, how anybody could possibly know that no theistic argument can ever succeed.
All three myths are exemplified in a recent book by Cecilia Wassén and Tobias Hägerland: Den okände Jesus: Berättelsen om en profet som misslyckades (The Unknown Jesus: The Story of a Prophet Who Failed). Taking this work as my point of departure, I discuss the myths with reference to a wider horizon of Swedish and international Jesus research. I also suggest a more reasonable framework for dealing with miracle reports in the context of historical scholarship.
Criticizing the currently common idea that revelation should be construed exclusively in terms of God's self-manifestation in history or through inner experience, Wahlberg discusses the concept of divine testimony in the context of the debate about how any knowledge of God is possible. He draws on resources from contemporary analytic philosophy— especially John McDowell and Nicholas Wolterstorff — to argue for the intellectual viability of revelation as divine testimony.
The book’s thesis is compatible with the fact that biological organisms have evolved by natural selection. Its viability depends, however, on the rejection of certain common assumptions about the nature of mind and perception – assumptions that may properly be called ‘Cartesian’. The author presents and defends an anti-Cartesian stance on mind and perception, inspired mainly by the work of the philosopher John McDowell. The philosophical resources provided by this stance are then drawn on to defend the book’s version of natural theology.
1) Miracles are incompatible with our natural scientific knowledge.
2) Even though miracles are theoretically possible, we can never be rationally justified in believing that a reported miracle actually happened (Hume’s argument).
3) Miracles entail the existence of a supernatural realm, and the supernatural (God) cannot be the object of scientific or scholarly knowledge or study.
I argue that there are no good reasons to believe any of these claims, which should be regarded as “myths”. The first claim confuses science with a controversial philosophical theory – naturalism. The second claim is undermined by the devastating philosophical criticism that has been directed at Hume’s anti-miracle argument. The third claim entails that philosophers of religion who debate theistic arguments are wasting their time, since no theistic argument can ever succeed. It is very unclear, however, how anybody could possibly know that no theistic argument can ever succeed.
All three myths are exemplified in a recent book by Cecilia Wassén and Tobias Hägerland: Den okände Jesus: Berättelsen om en profet som misslyckades (The Unknown Jesus: The Story of a Prophet Who Failed). Taking this work as my point of departure, I discuss the myths with reference to a wider horizon of Swedish and international Jesus research. I also suggest a more reasonable framework for dealing with miracle reports in the context of historical scholarship.