- 著者
-
棚次 正和
- 出版者
- 宗教哲学会
- 雑誌
- 宗教哲学研究 (ISSN:02897105)
- 巻号頁・発行日
- vol.9, pp.30-50, 1992 (Released:2018-03-21)
The position of P. Tillich’s theology is symbolically shown by the expression “on the boundary.” His theological thought gains its depth and width, in his standing on the several boundaries between ‘theology and philosophy,’ ‘church and society,’ and ‘religion and culture,’ etc. According to his book Dynamics of Faith (1957), faith is defined as the ultimate concern. Faith should not be considered only as a cognitive function nor as an emotional action, but is the most centered act of the human mind.
In the act of faith, what is the source of this act is present beyond the cleavage of subject and object. Tillich understands that the act of faith is derived from the position of being human; namely, one’s standing between one’s finitude and one’s potential infinity, and from there necessarily come doubts, distortions and symbols that appear in the act of faith.
Tillich supposes that there are at least two types of faith, among the many forms of living faith. One is the ‘ontological type’ as the presence of the holy here and now, and the other is the ‘moral type,’ in which the holy is the judgment over everything that is. The former is related to the holiness of being, and the latter to the holiness of what ought to be. The dynamics of faith within and between the religions are largely determined by these two types, their interdependence and their conflicts.
It seems that the diversity of faith denies the claim of truth in the act of faith. This is what has been called the matter of ‘faith and reason.’ Tillich suggests that, if reason is regarded as the meaningful structure of mind and reality, not as a technical tool, reason is the precondition of faith; faith is the act in which reason reaches ecstatically beyond itself. One criterion of the truth of faith is whether its symbols are alive or not, and the other criterion is that symbols express the ultimate which is really ultimate, not idolatrous.
Through the encounter of the world religions and dialogues with them, Tillich’s theology is led to put itself in an open field of spirituality. To take some examples, he searches of a direction of Christianity to negating itself as a particular religion and realizing its true universalism, and intends to apply the method used in studies of the history of religions to systematic theology.