Creatures of Possibility: The Theological Basis of Human Freedom
Digital Logos Edition
Overview
Preeminent scholar and theologian Ingolf Dalferth offers mature reflections on what it means to be human, a topic at the forefront of contemporary Christian thought. Dalferth argues that humans should be defined not as deficient beings--who must compensate for the weaknesses of their biological nature by means of technology, morals, media, religion, and culture--but as creatures of possibility. He understands human beings by reference to their capacity to live a truly humane life. Dalferth explores the sheer gratuitousness of God's agency in justifying and sanctifying the human person, defining humans not by what we do or achieve but by God's creative and saving action. In the gospel, we are set free to interact with the world and creation.
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- Explores questions of human life and existence
- Seeks to look at humans nos as deficient biengs but as creatures of possibility
- Reconsiders the thesis that humans are what they are -technologically, morally or religiously- because they must compensate for their biological deficiencies
- Preface to the 2016 English Edition
- Preface to the 2011 German Edition
- From Deficient Being to Beings of Possibility: An Introduction
- Of Humanity and God: The Perspective of Reason and the Wider Perspective of Faith
- Mere Passive: The Passivity of Gift in Luther’s Theology
- All for Nothing: On the Art of Giving and the Limitations of Gift
- Self-Offering: From the Act of Violence to the Passion of Love
- Becoming Human: Compensation for a Deficiency or Excess of Love?
- Creative Passivity: The Self-Belittlement of Human Beings
Few Protestant theologians today write with the authoritative grasp of the theological tradition that Ingolf Dalferth demonstrates in Creatures of Possibility. Fewer still are capable of bringing this tradition into such an extensive constructive and critical engagement with contemporary thought. Through a series of expositions of Luther, Marion, Derrida, Blumenberg, and Nietzsche, Dalferth shows that the Christian account of human beings as fundamentally passive is so far from being a conservative recoil in the face of modernity's promotion of autonomous rational agency as to be, instead, the founding charter of our creaturely creative possibilities. Creatures of Possibility will surely prove essential reading for anyone concerned with theological anthropology.
George Pattison, chair of divinity, University of Glasgow
With impressive conceptual precision and insight, Dalferth explores how being created by God invites a deeper appreciation of human giftedness, possibility, and becoming. Christian faith is not a response to an experience of lack; instead, it is an exciting way (initiated by God) to relate to God, God’s creation, my fellow human beings, and my own emerging self in this world. This is truly engaging theology.
Werner G. Jeanrond, University of Oxford
In this brilliant and provocative study, Dalferth argues against the dominant (and tired) view of human nature as deficient to courageously reimagine what it means to be human in terms of possibility.
Regina Mara Schwartz, professor, Northwestern University