History and Eschatology : Jesus and the Promise of Natural Theology

How can we know about God? That question increasingly bothered scientists and philosophers in the modern period as they chipped away at previously imagined "certainties." They refused to take on trust the "special revelation" of the Christian Bible, trying instead to argue up to God from the "natural" world. That is the theme of the Gifford Lectures, inaugurated over 130 years ago. This natural theology has usually bracketed out the Bible and Jesus―and with them, usually, the scholars who study them. __History and Eschatology: Jesus and the Promise of Natural Theology__ represents the first Gifford delivered by a New Testament scholar since Rudolf Bultmann in 1955. Against Bultmann’s dehistoricized approach, N. T. Wright argues that, since the philosophical and cultural movements that generated the natural theology debates also treated Jesus as a genuine human being―part of the "natural world"―there is no reason the historical Jesus should be off-limits. What would happen if we brought him back into the discussion? What, in particular, might "history" and "eschatology" really mean? And what might that say about "knowledge" itself? This lively and wide-ranging discussion invites us to see Jesus himself in a different light by better acquainting ourselves with the first-century Jewish world. Genuine historical study challenges not only what we thought we knew but how we know it. The crucifixion of the subsequently resurrected Jesus, as solid an event as any in the "natural" world, turns out to meet, in unexpected and suggestive ways, the puzzles of the ultimate questions asked by every culture. At the same time, these events open up vistas of the eschatological promise held out to the entire natural order. The result is a larger vision, both of "natural theology" and of Jesus himself, than either the academy or the church has normally expected. \*\* ‘This is Wright at his best – exegete, theologian, churchman, and public intellectual rolled into one.’ Miroslav Volf ‘Wright’s crowning achievement.’ John Cottingham Building on his critically acclaimed Gifford Lectures, N. T. Wright presents a richly nuanced case for a theology based on a renewed understanding of historical knowledge. The question of 'natural theology' interlocks with the related questions of how we can conceive of God acting in the world, and of why, if God is God, the world is full of evil. Can specific events in history, like those reported in the Gospels, afford the necessary point from which to answer such questions? Widely shared cultural and philosophical assumptions have conditioned our understanding of history in ways that make the idea of divine action in history problematic. But could better historical study itself win from ancient Jewish and Christian cosmology and eschatology a renewed way of understanding the relationship between God and the world? N. T. Wright argues that this can indeed be done, and in this ground-breaking book he develops a distinctive approach to natural theology grounded in what he calls an 'epistemology of love'. This approach arises from his reflection on the significance of the ancient concept of the 'new creation' for our understanding the reality of the world, the reality of God and their relation to one another. "History and Eschatology: Jesus and the Promise of Natural Theology represents the first Gifford delivered by a New Testament scholar since Rudolf Bultmann in 1955. Against Bultmann's dehistoricized approach, N. T. Wright argues that, since the philosophical and cultural movements that generated the natural theology debates also treated Jesus as a genuine human being--part of the "natural world"--there is no reason the historical Jesus should be off-limits. What would happen if we brought him back into the discussion? What, in particular, might "history" and "eschatology" really mean? And what might that say about "knowledge" itself? This lively and wide-ranging discussion invites us to see Jesus himself in a different light by better acquainting ourselves with the first-century Jewish world. Genuine historical study challenges not only what we thought we knew but how we know it. The crucifixion of the subsequently resurrected Jesus, as solid an event as any in the "natural" world, turns out to meet, in unexpected and suggestive ways, the puzzles of the ultimate questions asked by every culture. At the same time, these events open up vistas of the eschatological promise held out to the entire natural order. The result is a larger vision, both of "natural theology" and of Jesus himself, than either the academy or the church has normally expected."--Publisher statement Building on his critically acclaimed Gifford Lectures, N. T. Wright presents a richly nuanced case for a theology that is based on a renewed understanding of historical knowledge, and in particular of the historical Jesus.